Day 180: July 10, 2009

The kids finally got me to drag out the pools, but only because their friends came over to play too.

Day 179: July 9, 2009

A family in our neighborhood is generous enough to let anyone and everyone pick from their cherry tree. They even provide a ladder!

Day 178: July 8, 2009

For days Michelle has been asking to go to the store so she could buy a Juicy Drop Pop (too much tv leads to too many commercials and thus silly "must haves" like this). So last night I told her to give me her money and I'd buy one while I was doing errands. She was so excited she woke up at 6:19am and was enjoying the sour candy by 6:21am. After a few licks she closed it up and went back to bed - obviously it wasn't as great as the advertisment. Shocker!!

Day 177: July 7, 2009

Caleb has successfully taught Michelle how to play Pokemon - she's a good substitute brother.

Day 176: July 6, 2009

Welcome to Megan's Pirate Cowboy teaparty. She's been fascinated by pirates and cowboys ever since we went to the American West Heritage Center where she rode a pony and met a pirate woodwright (he wore a patch over his eye since an accident in his youth). Megan even asked him if he spoke pirate language.

Day 175: July 5, 2009

After the kids were back in their own beds I was able to have a few minutes to myself. I dug into my souvenir from the trip: a solid chocolate golden spike! Yummy!!

Day 174: July 4, 2009

Megan and Michelle standing by the railroad tie where the Golden Spike was driven to complete the transcontinental railroad. Earlier they'd each been able to hold real gold spikes (the original is of course in a museum at Stanford).

Day 173: July 3, 2009

We visited the aerospace museum where Caleb found the real plane that's exactly like his toy plane he bought when we were at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

Day 172: July 2, 2009

We had a great time in the Pepperidge Farm's outlet store. The kids thought it was the greatest thing ever that they were able to get a whole bag of goldfish all to themselves.

Day 171: July 1, 2009

This is just one of the tires that's used on the huge trucks at Kennecott Copper Mine.