While Simms Was Away...

We were without Simms for 8 days and 7 nights. Not that we were counting or anything crazy like that. I just thought it would be fun to share with you some of what consumed his days and ours. So...while Simms was checking out Hurricane Ridge with Rayda and Papa...

Looking at the vegetation

Eating at the best smoked salmon place in the area


Taking in the sites like this one



Hiking here...


...and here


Setting up camp


and preparing some food


Sleeping at Shi Shi Beach...

...where this is just a walk away!

Getting to see this...

and these...

and this...

and THIS...

...and these. All in their natural habitats!

While he was doing all of that we were busy here at home. What were we doing?

• The boys gardened at Grammie and Poppy's while I had a ministry meeting
• We went to local parks on 3 different days
• We had some play dates
• We went to the premier viewing of the new VeggieTales movie Minnesota Cuke and the Search for Noah's Umbrella.
• We went to Chik-fil-A
• We went to church
• Jeter had a worship team meeting
• We had the family over to go swimming in the pool
• The boys swam in the pool a lot!
• We read books
• We ate ice cream - on cones that I bought from the store! (this was a super big deal to my little men)
• Grammie taught Jeter how to play the D chord on the guitar.
• We had dinner at Promises and Dawson's - where there was lots of cousin time.
• Dawson kicked around the soccer ball with the boys
• I didn't blog much and had a hard time falling asleep at night
• The boys had a sleepover in my room - only one night. I learned that Barber moves around A LOT and Jeter sometimes talks and giggles in his sleep. These were actually things I knew but forgot when I agreed to the sleepover.
• We did laundry and dishes and cleaned and reorganized...with much more to do!
• We went to the weekly reading time (last time this summer!)
• Barber got new cleats for soccer. Of course he is a size 12 and we only have 11, 1, 2, and 3 as hand-me-downs from Jeter.
• The boys played the Wii.
• We all missed Daddy and prayed that he would have fun and then return to us safe and sound.

I bet I can guess who you would have preferred hanging out with for the past 8 days!?!

The Simple Games We Play

As I've mentioned before, we are transplants to PA. Therefore, we often travel a minimum of 3 hours in the car to visit family and/or friends. We do have a portable DVD player and once in a while, a movie is nice but there is something to be said for utilizing the time and do something as a family.

There are two games that Simms and I often play together. Jeter just started joining in with us this past trip to NY. Barber would repeat us and do his own version of the game at times - but he is still at the age where a nap does him a lot of good!

Favorite Game #1: The Alphabet Game. You are simply competing against one another to get from A to Z. You can find the letter on license plates and signs. You may not however use the state name on the license plate. You are also not allowed to use the same letter from the same sign as someone else. This gets tricky for the letters "J", "Q" and even "Z". Simple but a fun way to pass the time.

Favorite Game #2: The License Plate Game. You simply keep track of how many different states you find while driving to your destination. In the past we've just kept track of the number in our head. This time I decided to write down the state name on paper and note the differences between the trip to NY and back to PA. I found that on the way to NY we totalled 23 different plates (21 states and Ontario). On the way back we totalled 27 different plates (25 states, Ontario and Quebec). However the total for the entire trip was actually 30 different states plus Ontario and Quebec. Why do I do this? I can't help myself - analysis is just a part of who I am. What I am not writing about here is my hypothesis as to why certain states were present on the trip to NY but absent on the way back to PA. Obviously this scrutiny of the data is not part of the game - you can simply count the license plates and see how many you find.

I think my favorite aspect of these two games is that you don't really need anything with you to play except your eyesight. So, what do you do when you travel? Any games you like to play?

The Journey to LI

...was long. Seven hours long. The Garmen said it would only be four. It was wrong. Very wrong. Either the Garmen is overly-optimistic or it doesn't understand the nature of traffic in NY. I know it isn't programmed for traffic but it is very depressing to see the arrival time change from 3:39PM minute by minute to 6:45PM. Regardless, we were not expecting this trip to take longer then five hours or we wouldn't have left the portable DVD player at home!

I finally had to write down bits and pieces of this memorable trip:

• We decided to try out the HOV lane on the LIE (Long Island Expressway). This lane is supposed to be saved for High Occupancy Vehicles - meaning two or more passengers. It usually goes faster and you can only enter and exit it at certain points. The annoying factor is that although it appeared to be moving much faster than the rest of the lanes, we abruptly came to a crawl and even a stop while the rest of the LIE moved forward. The plan subsequently changed - we would exit the HOV lane at the next opportunity. However, when that opportunity arrived, the LIE was at a stop again and we were moving. Simms decided to stay where we were and sure enough, we soon came to a stop as the LIE began to move again. It definitely felt like a cruel trick was being played on us. We didn't realize the boys were noticing until we heard Barber cry from the back seat "WE ARE TRAPPED!!!"
  
  
• Simms doesn't like driving next to large trucks or barricaded walls. It's even worse when he feels sandwiched between them. I don't know what Jeter said but I couldn't help laughing when I heard Simms response "Don't make fun of being afraid of trucks. It is a legitimate concern."
  
  
• It could be due to the lack of DVD's but we heard the question "Are we there yet?" too many times. It then evolved into "How much longer?" The difficulty in answering this was that in a span of 30 minutes our answer remained the same "About an hour". Finally Barber protested "It can't be! Time has passed and you gave that answer a long time ago." Trust me - we all felt his pain.
  
  
• I don't know about you but constant repetition can get really annoying. It was this that led to Simms declaration to the boys - "You are no longer allowed to say 'hay bale' in the car. Ever!"
  
  
• After their quick education in traffic, Barber began to pay attention to the cars around us and the goal of staying ahead of them. All of a sudden we heard him yell "Hey! You passed us!" What alarmed us was that Simms and I heard "Hey! You b@st@rd!" Thankfully it was only our traffic-mind-altering-stupor that momentarily affected our hearing and our four year old didn't really say those words to the driver of a car that was passing us.