Blog catchup - This is gonna take a while

I miss having a blog.  I like going back and reading about the stuff we were up to.  I am going to try and get this thing started up again, but I have kind of missed a year and a half or so?  Sorry about that. I'm going to skim lightly over the very surface of that time to try and catch up, but even skimming is going to take some time.  A lot has changed.  So, just in case anyone is still out there, bear with me.

Here are a few things that happened from late May through June 2018:

First of all, my sweet sweet grandma got her wish on Mother's Day morning and got to celebrate it in heaven with her mother and my grandpa.  I felt bad because life was in my way and it had been a couple of weeks since I had visited, but I had told myself I would see her on Mother's Day.  She left early that morning and her little present didn't get the chance to be given.  I was happy for her of course, but very sad for me.  I'm going to miss her so much!  I still feel a little sad every time I pass her exit on the freeway.

She was an amazing grandma, and I have lots of happy memories of her.  She loved taking home movies of us, and we always had wonderful Thanksgivings and Christmases at her house.  I remember her pushing us in the old tire swing in her backyard, and how much she loved her beautiful flowers in her yard.  Mostly I'll remember how much she loved me, and it is hard to lose someone who you knew would love you unconditionally.

Anyway...happier thoughts:

Dax turned 10.  Yup, double digits!  He is a giant and gets bigger and bigger all the time.  I can't remember why he looks so hot and sweaty in this picture, but oh well.  The point of it is to show how much bigger he is in comparison to his teddy bear.  He used to be smaller than the bear!

Dax at 10 loved Pokemon, Pizza Pie Cafe, watching a guy whose-name-I-can't remember open packs of Pokemon cards on YouTube (for hours and hours), chain-eating bowls of cereal, the Imagine Dragons, and basketball.

Arden graduated from elementary school!  So scary!  They had a big ceremony and one zillion people were there and I couldn't get a single good picture.  But here is Arden afterward,  with her big official diploma or whatever.

And after that Arden was off to a big old party at a friend's house with half of the sixth graders.  But it looks like she had fun!

While Arden was off at her party, I was off doing something I didn't think I'd ever do....Ragnar.  Yup, I finally got roped into that whole "let's go hang our in a van and take turns running for a day and a night and a day" thing.  It was actually really fun!  We had a super-stacked team made up of friends from the neighborhood and some of their very fast teenage kids.  I was in the second van, driven by Wade, and containing me, Matt, Lori, Chris, and the lone teenager Jackson.

It wasn't so bad!  We passed everybody.  The weather wasn't too hot, and I was actually too cold to sleep on our second break.  Our team name was the Insane Bolts, and we (surprisingly) ended up taking third place in our division!

I was more than ready for a real shower at the end of that experience...the wipes were no longer cutting it.  It was fun, but I'm not sure I'll feel the need to do it again.  We'll see.

In May and June, we of course spent time at the cabin.  This view will never get old.  It changes so much from day to day and season to season.  Sometimes I wish I could just sit out on the porch for an entire year and watch it go by.

It is fun to have friends up at the cabin sometimes.  I do wonder, why is it so much fun for kids to throw rocks into bodies of water?  It provides hours of entertainment.

Arden likes Cora's new floatie!  Werk it.

This was a picture I took of the kids taking a swimming break at the pool, and playing a card game.

Later in June, I made the kids go on a hike with me.  My kids are not usually excited to go on hikes, which blows my mind.  I love to go on hikes!  Cora and Arden were at least pretending to have a good time, but you can see that Dax's acting skills were not up to the challenge.

I ran the Heber Half marathon last June.  I somehow got 3rd place in my age group.  My time was 1:39.  Yay me!  (Right now my ankle is broken so I am missing running, can you tell?)  Here is me on the cute tree stump podium they had.

And here are my two fancy medals and my trusty purple running watch.

I guess those are the highlights from May/June 2018!