House Guests-Wow

***Never finished but wanted it posted anyways****

Quite the parade of folks coming through over the past week or so, keeping the house busy and the blog entry-free.

We had some family come in from out of town and stay for 4 or 5 days. This was cool. They brought another boy with them (another J), and that made it easy for me to still call out 'hey boys' when I wanted the kids to behave or come to do something (girls mess me up).

Anyway, most of the visit was spent at the house here, playing in the yard, working the Wii games, talking, hanging out....stuff.

Adding the three extra folks living in the house (they stayed here, in the downstairs apartment), we had a parade of friends and neighbors come by, some for an hour, some for 8-9 nine hours. Most everyone brought some flavor of child with them, which kept the boys going. We had a hairdying play day, where a small girl had her head turned the color of lava girl from the movies (hot pink, but darkish hot pink). We had lots of rounds of swimming in the tiny pool and trampoline activity. We barbequed and mingled, and our visitors got to meet our extended family in Washington.

The last bit of fun on this visit came on Tuesday night (a week ago) when I took the older boys (J and J) to the Experience Music Project and Science Fiction Museums downtown.

Mayhem Festival

So Dad is a wicked Slipknot fan, and by proxy, the rest of the family has become fans as well. This includes the boys. I do have to take some time to explain the words and meanings to them, as they can be unheard and misconstrued. Mostly, they get it and are really good with it. Little D does have a tendency to sing inappropriate bits in public, but that is the joy of a little boy.


Anyway, July 9 was the Mayhem Festival, with 8 million bands, 3 stages and healiners, Disturbed and Slipknot. It was a day of days, a holiday for me, and we all went out to sit on the lawn that evening and listen to some of the most thrashing music made today.
Despite what may be in your mind, you can tell from the pics, that hanging on the lawn was casual and relaxing. Folks danced and screamed, but there was plenty of room to lay down, sit or walk in a little circle if necessary. J spent all of the Disturbed set dancing and singing, so by the time Slipknot came on, he was mostly good with sitting in the grass with binoculars. He did get a bit upset when people walked in front of him, but that's J.
Little D spent most of Disturbed on Dad's shoulders and most of Slipknot on Mom's back (in a child sling that amazingly still works for him). He really didn't run out of energy, but that's probably partially because he could lounge while his folks danced and screamed.

This picture was taken late, probably around 11:30PM and you can see that little D was still rocking and screaming (although he is laying on the ground).

Disturbed and Slipnot (along with 10 other bands) played fantastic shows. It was the first time Slipknot had played live in nearly 3 years. We didn't go over to the show until about 6pm (the festival started at 2pm but Disturbed didn't take the stage until 8:30pm).

Anyway, the boys had a blast! We met a few friends just inside and hung out with them for a few hours playing in the sprinklers (pic one) and things like that.

The following is our homemade view of the show (not the best quality, but gives you an idea)

Later-E

Croquet in yard

I have always been a croquet fan. It is a fun, slow paced, relaxing way to enjoy the yard and a beautiful day. So, we have always had a croquet set. But the kids are small and have never been that focused on such a game, preferring to throw the balls (and croquet balls are not soft) and use the hammers as tools and weapons. Happy Joy!


This past year we bought a new set and kept it in the bag, the last one fairly runied by the above activities mentioned. And just a few weeks back, we set it up and actually played our first successful game with the family.
As you can see, I am not the traditional croquet course guy. I'd rather play modified lawn golf, and just lay the course out throughout the yard however one sees fit. Cool part was, the boys stuck with it, taking lesson well and trying their best to complete the course before giving out.

I have to say we just barely made it through the entire thing, but we did. It was awesome and although they both needed a mental break afterwards, they say they dug it and want to play again. Next.....frisbee golf?
Later-E

4th of July

So this 4th of July, we headed down to the south Sound to hang out with Aunt D and Uncle J (wow D and J) at their house on the island. Honestly, while it wasn't the prettiest of days, it was a good time and really nice to get out of the suburbs for a while.


D and J love the house because it has hidden 'fort' rooms downstairs, incredible amounts of room to play and there is always food to be had. You'd think we don't have food at home, but you know, food out is always better somehow.
We got down there around noon and spent 4-5 hours or so hanging out with family, playing in the big house, and taking a little venture down to the beach to check out the low tide creatures. Starfish, oysters, clams, crabs, jellyfish. Good stuff. We've been to the beach before but for some reason, the kids both seemed to notice all of this as if for the first time, which was fantastic. At the end of the day, we took off to home, watching local fireworks from the deck in the back and on the TV (downtown Seattle stuff). It was a full and fun day!
Later-E

Rope Ladder

So you wanna be a pirate?

Or maybe a Tarzanish type? Scaling ropes with ease up to the crow's nest or that fantastic perch in the highest branches?

So did little D. Don't get me wrong, J loves a good tree climb and is game for rock climbing, but only up to a certain height. Put a ladder or rock wall sideways, keep it 4-5 ft off the ground, he is a GOD of scaling. Put it upright, well the interest is there.......

Anyway, with two climbers and one out of hand (don't know if the wife mentioned it but he has scaled all the fences in the yard and pretty much anything climbable, steady or not...freaky), we went for the challenge of a rope ladder off the deck.

Gotta stop for a minute and tell you that Sweet went out on the net and looked for rope ladder instructions for hours, AND she is an awesome web surfer. I even pitched in and helped (and I'm a better web surfer) and still, forgive me for saying so but....crap. Nothing worthy.

So intuition wins. Hey, let's just tie them in square patterns with no slippage. And there you go! Works nicely too.

We did learn to find a place where we could 'spread' it a bit and it would probably be better with another piece on the left side, but it works fine for everyone (even adults) and the kids have had it up less than 24 hours with several sessions of climbing thus far. That pays off.


So it's all good. Kids are flailing on the rope, swinging around and getting their legs stuck in the rungs. Fantastic stuff, seriously.

Next comes additions to the web to move it to the next level.

Two things accomplished. One, the climbers can climb something that is challenging but won't kill them or fall apart. Two, we prep for the future, when rope ladders connect the rooms in our multi-tree, tree fort. Can't have the boys stuck in one room just because they don't get the rope ladder.