Saturday

Scott had a meet at Woodlands in Walnut Creek.  He made the consolation finals but was NOT excited.  You can see in his expression his dismay.  He didn't even know I was taking this picture.  Plus, it was 102 degrees.  

Lately Tyler has been into watching our home videos on my phone.  I don't have that many of Blakey and he's been talking a lot, so I filmed him talking about my air/water syringe.  I can't understand what he's saying but he seems confident that he knows what he's talking about.


The kids had the co-op later that night and Heidi and I just hung out at home, in the air conditioning, watching TV.  At 9:53 pm it was still 83 degrees.  I don't know how Dan-o can survive in the Arizona heat because I bet sometimes it doesn't get under 90 there.

Seth called and we talked for 59 minutes.  It was good catching up.  I used my headset and changed the oil in the van during our conversation.

My kids

I was not pleased to get a text from Heidi with this picture attached.

Scott had hit the bottom of the pool and chipped #9 last Monday.  I made him search for the piece in the pool and he found one of two.  When I arrived home from Vacaville, Scott wanted me to fix it that night.   Kira and Tyler came with us and we went to the office to produce this result:

 I was pleased.

Yesterday, after I arrived home from work, the kids wanted to hang out in the garage since Scott was working on a birdhouse.  They climbed up on the VFR and I just had to take their picture.

Blakey has been talking quite a bit and he can put together sentences with six words, like, "I found my baba right there."  He's potty trained, too, so that's nice.

School starts next week.  Crazy.  Okay, bye.

McMillan family reunion at Bear Lake

We had a great vacay to Utah for the annual McMillan family reunion.  This year we stayed at a cabin near Bear Lake and we took the back roads.  It was pretty straightforward until we exited 80 East onto Nevada 233.  We were in the middle of nowhere and the van was running out of gas.  I pulled off the road to this gas station at 6:18 am and it didn't open until 7:00.  The owner was there, setting up stuff, and I thought he would accommodate me since I'm not from those parts.  Well, no, but at seven he said the gas was ready and I could fuel up.  

First we went to the beach.  The shallow water was warm but the lake was a chilly 64 degrees, so after a dip, we just hung out in the sand.  The boys and I drove the RC cars but they all had failures that day.

Our first excursion was to Minnetonka cave.  I'm pretty sure I've been there but it was Heidi's first time.

Kira and Blakey had had it, so Heidi left the tour early and this was the only shot I got of them.

On Saturday we saw Beauty and the Beast at the Pickle Valley Playhouse.  It was super good.  Better than expected.  There's a lot of talent in Utah.  My favorite character was Lumiere.

Adam borrowed this Hobie cat and sailed around quite a bit.  I went with him twice and we got going maybe 15 knots.

Found some snow in Tony Grove.  Tyler got too cold too fast.

Early morning fishing with Grampy.  Tyler was stoked to drive Afterburner.

We didn't catch any fish with the traditional methods, but Scott and Tyler were excited to play with the carp.  Carp are gross.  They're garbage disposers.

Some nice water in the harbor on Monday morning.

Heidi got right up on the wakeboard and made a couple of jumps.  She did pretty well, especially considered that the last time she wakeboarded was probably 2004 at Trinity.  I wakeboarded too and did some huge jumps, and I felt good because I was scared of being a young has-been.  The back held up and I tried some flips but didn't land.  Now, two days later, I have soreness everywhere except maybe my chewing muscles.

Horseback riding was interesting.  I think the horses have more than one horsepower.  Tyler and Scott rode these quarter horses and Kira and Blakey rode ponies.  

We rented these ATV's and did a course.  I was able to test the capability of our craft.  The renter guy said they were very powerful, and I was expecting them to take off like the VFR.  Not exactly, but still, the suspension was adequate and I liked being able to drift on command.  

It was a great trip.