The Swine Flu

I am sure you have heard about it. Down here it is all over. School has been cancelled, church has been cancelled. They are passing out masks at grocery stores and overall telling people to just stay home. So, with 7 days off school, the kids and I are on extended spring break. Nothing to do but swim, play the wii, and watch tv. Yeah, I know their brains will probably be rotten if the swine flu doesnt get them, but it is the only way for me to get anything done. Our first rule is, watch tv or play the wii until I am done exercising. --Sometimes it can take me hours to get going--Then swim the rest of the day away until we have to make dinner.
Usually they are not allowed to play the wii during the week, so they have been enjoying their extra playing hours. So far they have been pretty good, but sometimes they are seriously bouncing off the walls. This morning was one of those times.
I started out by asking Chloe to keep an eye on Luke while I exercised. She lasted about 15 mintues--pretty good for a 7 year old. Over my ipod I hear a big clunk and Luke start crying. Logan runs in my room and tells me that Luke fell off the top of the bunk bed. I run in and pick him up & make sure nothing is broken. After he calms down I get to exercising again. After I get off the treadmill the kids come in my room. The treadmill is off, but the kids can make it go just by running on it. Long story short, Luke gets his foot stuck in it. No toes ripped off or anything just a cut where the skin got rubbed off. Poor little thing wouldnt walk on his foot all morning. It took him a long time to settle down, but eventually he did. Later this morning I was sitting at the table and Luke was playing underneath it. He had an empty gatorade bottle, which I thought the lid was screwed on to tightly. Wrong. Luke got it off. I heard him making this weird barking sound and I looked under the table. He was choking on the lid. I grabbed his arm and pulled him towards me, that seemed to get the lid out and everything else that was in his tummy.
So, three near death experiences for Luke today. I would say that is enough. Tomorrow I am going to have to keep a better eye on him. And lookout for the swine flu as well.
Ahhh, so much to do. :)

The real reason we went to the rainy Northwest...

The Great Wolf Lodge

The Great Wolf Lodge is an indoor waterpark in Washington. It is kept at 84 degrees and the water is perfect. No slathering the kids with sunscreen or worrying about sunburns. There are life jackets and life guards and tons of fun. Waterslides for all ages--in fact I never got a picture of Chloe, she was too busy running from one slide to the next.

The only picture of Chloe. She was so happy she was tall enough to go on all the slides. Logan missed the mark for only one of the big slides, but that was okay with him.

Luke loved playing in the water and he loved the lifejacket.

This is Logan on his tummy coming down a slide. He put on a life jacket before going down the slides--just in case!

This is Carter going down one of the kiddie slides. Luke and Carter had so much fun here.

Here comes Luke. He was so brave, just walked right up the steps and went down all by himself. He was crazy. Other parents kept asking, "How old is he?"

Here comes Carter again.

And, here comes Tyler too!

Luke found his favorite spot in our room. He got in this drawer all the time. We had a totally sweet room, the Grizzly Bear Suite!

Isnt this a cool picture. It was in the lobby and I loved it. The blurry part on the left is a tree.

More Pictures from our Vacation

Mount St. Helens--the Volcano!!!

One day we decided to drive up to Mount St. Helens. There are actually 3 visitors centers dedicated to Mount St. Helens. The 2 closest to Mount St. Helens were closed when we were there. They are only open from mid-May through October, because of the weather. So, we stopped at the first one. It was really neat. We learned a lot of things about volcanos. For example, did you know where the word volcano came from. The Greeks have a story for everything and this one starts with a guy named Vulcan. He is a blacksmith. When he hits the rod, that has been in the fire, it produces a lot of sparks, just like the lava exploding. Hence the name volcano from Vulcan. At least that is the short version of the story. :)

And, yes, there are another gazillion pictures in this post, but they were all so gorgeous, I couldn't leave any out!

These first couple pictures were taken from the lookout at the Visitors Center.

The kids are down at the lookout.

It was such a beautiful day. This was taken in the visitor center parking lot.

Even the road to Mount St. Helens was gorgeous.

This picture shows the turn off to the second visitors center. This one is like a childrens discovery center--playground and everything. Too bad it was closed!

The brownish-gray valley-like part in this picture was created by one of the lava/mud flows in the 1980 eruption. Apparently lava spewed in 4 directions: north, south, east, and west..so yeah, it went everywhere.

This waterfall just came out of nowwhere on the road. Of course, we had to stop. Why not, we are on vacation!

The kids wanted to feel the water--it was freezing!

Look at all the trees...

This bridge is on the edge of the original blast. Mount St. Helen's erupted on May 18, 1980. It took out more than 150,000 acres of federal, private, and commercial land. Weyerhauser is a huge lumber company. They spent $9,000,000 on replanting. They replanted over 45,ooo acres with 18.4 million seedlings--by hand. WOW!

Mount St. Helens use to be much taller. In the eruption it blew off its top. You can see where there is kind of a hole on the left. And now, in the center of this mountain there is another lava dome forming. Who knows when it will explode again!?!

This is Mt. Rainier. At the visitors center we watched a video, that said Mt. Rainier is a bigger threat now than Mount St. Helens.

The little bump on the left with a cloud at the top is Mt. Rainer. Mount St. Helens is on the right.

Oh yeah, I couldn't forget this picture. Right before this statue are signs saying, "Entering BigFoot Territory." I wanted to take a picture of the sign, but my camera battery died. And, so sad, the BigFoot Territory Gift Shop was closed. :(

What a vacation we had!!!

On our last day on Oregon we went to see Multnomah Falls. This is the 2nd highest year-round waterfall in the United States. It totals 620 feet tall. It was spectacular. Sorry there are a gazillion pictures, but it is more for journaling sake. After we did the short hike to the bridge, (there is a longer hike you can take all the way to the top), we visited with Tyler's Great Aunt Iris.

Here we are with Great Aunt Iris. Tyler hasnt seen her, since he cant remember and the rest of us had never met. It was so much fun. She has dogs called Whippetts. I have no idea if that is how you spell it, but the kids loved playing with them & her enormous cat named Chewbaca.