School Photos

 We had school photos this week. It was Desert Girl's second year going--it's such an effort to get to a professional photographer, so I am grateful to get her photo done as a preschooler! I asked Carmela to come and help do her hair. I wanted a really simple style, and Carmela can do anything with Desert Girl's hair.

 We were the first ones there, so I had the kids pose while I took some photos of them out on the lawn.

 They are such cuties! (Naw, I couldn't be biased at all :)

 When I asked them to hold hands, they goofed around a bit.

 Some of Desert Boy's friends arrived, and that meant it was time to play.

 The kids ran and ran. They have so much energy. Every day Desert Boy says he wishes he had more time to play.

 Once inside the gym, we found the photographer still had a couple things to do. So I asked the teacher if we could get a group shot.

 Here's the K-1-2 class. And most are looking at the camera, which I think is pretty remarkable! The school is mostly boys, which is funny because the 3-6 is mostly girls, as is the preschool.

 We just had a few preschoolers show up, but they wanted their own photo.

Desert Girl had her photo taken in front of the screen, and then we asked the photographer if he would take shots of both kids together. He said yes, which made me very happy. While he took his photos, I couldn't resist snapping a few, too.

We had some funny ones, but I did get one I liked quite a bit. Hopefully the official ones turn out well, too.

An Interesting Walk

 We had so much fun at our beach out in the desert that we went back a couple days later. It was a hot afternoon, and usually I try to keep the kids out of the sun in the middle of the day, but since school was starting soon, it was time to make an exception. We lathered on the sunscreen, found our sun hats, and headed out.

 Big storm clouds loomed in the not-so-distant horizon. We kept a close eye on them, not wanting to be in a large body of water if lightning struck. Maybe it would just feel like a little tingle, but maybe not.

 When the water is high enough, the lake is a reservoir, storing water for irrigation. Gradually, the winter and spring accumulation of water is decreased due to agricultural use and evaporation so that water doesn't even reach the dam outlet.

 The lower water levels mean that there is plenty of sand for everyone. You can also walk out a long way from shore and still only be knee deep in water. During high water, the lake is high enough for my husband and me to flip our 15' Laser multiple times and never have the mast touch bottom. This time of year, it might be hard to find places you can't touch bottom.

 The kids and dogs were having a blast.

 Desert Boy and Sam hanging out in the big float tube.

 After swimming awhile, we decided it was time for an adventure walk. I love adventure walks, as we never quite know what we're going to find. I encouraged Desert Boy to collect some shells for a future craft project (which paid off with a blue ribbon in the fair!).

 This photo is for my friends Kris and Amanda, who love foot shots! Note how our feet are still relatively clean. Not all the sand was so kind to us...

 Just a little ways down the beach we found oozy, gooey mud. If anyone wants some, I'll go back and bottle it for you and sell it to you for $50. I'm sure it's good for your skin.

 Not all was beach. We also found rocks (with fun water lines).

 Ava and Desert Boy kept their shell buckets close.

 The cloud cover had cooled off the rock so it was bearable for walking on bare foot. Or scooting down.

 We did get a little hot on the walk, so we just waded into the lake and cooled off. Then we continued walking. I thought that was so cool.

 Ava had lots of smiles.

 Finally we got to the part of the lake I wanted to get to--the side with lots of California floaters. These are large mussels that are native to the area. They live in the mud, but when they die they float to the surface and the wind pushes them to the edge of the lake. The kids had a great time hunting for them. I managed to forget to take photos of them!

 Desert Girl was so happy sitting in the one-inch deep mud and spreading it on herself.

 Isaac soon joined her.

 Somehow the kids talked Jenny into carrying their shell buckets!

 Maybe it was so they could have a running contest!

On the way back we discovered something interesting--and by Ava's reaction, gross: a catfish head. That's one big catfish! Thinking about it makes me have some second thoughts about swimming in the lake!

Fun at the Beach

We headed to a nearby reservoir a couple weekends ago to cool off in the water. We've had lots of hot afternoons lately, interspersed with thunderstorms. The dogs were delighted to romp in the water.

The kids love to play in the sand anytime they can!

We went with some friends, and they had been there the night before playing in the sand. No one else uses these beaches, and we don't have tides, so their names were still in place.

Soon it was time to bury some kids. Ava was first. She wanted to be a mermaid.

My husband thought it might be fun to go fishing. Nothing was biting, though.

We helped bury Evan and Ryleigh.

Desert Girl became a mermaid.

It turned out that getting out of the sand pit wasn't so easy. But that didn't stop all the kids from wanting their turn!

Desert Boy and Ava were next.

Ah, relaxing in the nice cool sand.

They weren't so happy when we told them to get out by themselves.

Finally they succeeded.

Smiles again! They're such good kids, wearing their life jackets everywhere.

We still had more burying to do. The littlest kids always have to do what the bigger kids do! It was a fun afternoon.

You can imagine what the shower looked like when we got home! Nevertheless, we headed back to the lake just a couple days later for another adventure...to be continued...

White Pine County Fair 2012

This weekend is the White Pine County Fair. As I mentioned a couple weeks ago, I love county fairs! We drove into town Friday night to go to the big Cattlewoman's BBQ. Several hundred people went, and we had to wait in a long line, but it was worth it. The food was delicious! The kids were getting a little tired (meaning whiny) so we had to leave before the band got going. Maybe some other year we can hear the band!

The next morning Desert Girl woke up so early. Arghh! This was a morning we could sleep in a little. We did a couple errands and then headed to the fairgrounds. We were in time to see the cousins show their animals.

Megan had a nice-looking lamb.

She had to work hard at getting the lamb to mind her.

Kayli had a lamb too. She also had some eye-catching pink cowgirl boots!

The judge had them all line up in a row.

My husband watched intently while Desert Girl just enjoyed climbing.

When the judge touched Megan's and Kayli's lambs, they jumped! They ended up getting blue ribbons. Nice job, young ladies!

We went and visited Melanie's lamb. She was busy with last-minute grooming. Then we went over to see the pigs. They were so fascinating that I didn't even get any photos!

Then we went in search of the cousins and found Alyshia preparing her steer. She and her steer have had quite the battle of wills. Her first steer cleared the fence when he jumped away from her, so she had to use her alternate steer. The alternate steer apparently didn't have quite as good jumping skills, but it didn't want to be around anyone. During the last few weeks when it was supposed to be finishing, putting on that last weight, instead it lost weight. That still won't keep it from going to fair and getting sold.

I'm not sure who dislikes this more--Alyshia or the steer!

She led her steer into the show arena without any problems.

Smile, Alyshia!

Caleb's steer had had some of the same problems, but still made it in the heavyweight class.

Caleb has gotten so much taller and stronger this last year! It's fun to see photos of Caleb at Desert Boy's age, as there is a strong resemblance.

While we were watching, Desert Girl found her new friend from the night before, little Kate. They had fun in the grass and then climbed the fence.

That was enough time to be fast friends, hold hands, and go for a walk!

We headed over to the exhibit building. Both Desert Boy and I had entered some projects.

I entered five photos, all of them in the photo above (although one is displayed sideways!). Can you spot any?

I was so excited to get a Reserve Grand Champion for my portrait of Desert Girl!!

Desert Boy found that he had received a blue ribbon for one of his pictures, a train and the Big Dipper.

He also got a blue ribbon for his artistic flower arrangement, and another for his jewelry entry of California floater shells from a nearby reservoir (I still have a bunch of photos to post from that excursion!).

Those girls were just so adorable!

Next it was time to wander about the booths. One of the mining booths had this sandbox with some simulated mining structures. The kids absolutely loved it!

Desert Boy did an art project involving a hammer at the Eastern Nevada Landscape Coalition's booth. That was another winner!

Ely's Hometown Band played some wonderful tunes.

We really enjoyed watching the puppeteer and clown make balloon creations for the kids.

Then it was time for some games. The first was the water balloon toss. Desert Boy paired up, and I figured he was going to get drenched because he hasn't had much practice throwing and catching.

Looking at this photo, I now understand why he has some problems catching--closing your eyes doesn't make it easier!

The next game was a watermelon eating contest. I'm not sure if Desert Girl was unhappy about being in a light drizzle or being woken up from a nap or something else. When the starter said, "On your mark," she started eating. We told her to wait, and she burst into tears and didn't eat any more. She did get to take her watermelon with her and eventually ate some of it. It was really good watermelon. I tried it.

Desert Boy went to the table with the next age group.

He did an admirable job munching away at his watermelon.

While I was nibbling at Desert Girl's, they announced that the last category was age 13 through adult. A sudden flash of inspiration hit me. I was an adult (well, technically, maybe not mentally!), and I could enter. I still had room for more watermelon, and it was REALLY good watermelon. Plus I have all these terrific memories of blueberry pie eating contests and watermelon seed spitting contests from when I was a youngster and my parents took me to the fair. I tried to round up a few more people to enter, and found one willing young friend.

The rain was pouring by now, but I had a rain jacket and decided to go for it.

We had two picnic tables of people competing. We had to keep our hands behind our backs and eat as much as we could.

The starter said go, and as we bit into the sweet melon, the rain continued to pour. About half way through, the guy next to me got up and went over toward the watermelon cutter. I wondered what he was doing. The next thing I saw was a man giving him the Heimlich. Yikes! I wondered if I should get up and help, but the person assisting him was doing just fine, so I kept on trying to get down to the rind. And then our minute was up, and I was surprised how well I had done. In fact, I had done so well that I was declared the silver medal winner! And my young friend was the gold medal winner!

Here I am with my medal! Yippee!

I'm still waiting for those endorsements to roll in. I'm sure my phone will be ringing any minute now.