Natural Bridge Hike

This morning we gave the kids the option to forego our usual Saturday bike ride for a hike, to which they enthusiastically agreed. We headed south this time to Nelson, NV to hike to a natural bridge. This area is still part of the Lake Mead NRA, but lies south of Hoover dam along the Colorado River. A natural bridge is similar to a natural arch except that it is formed by water erosion as opposed to wind erosion. You can actually see the arch if you look carefully at the Google imagery (35°43'36.74"N, 114°49'7.37"W: look for the shadow spanning the wash). This is a good 1.0 mile hike each way with a tiny bit of thigh-high rock scrambling on the trail. This destination is tucked away at the bottom of a wash with some neat rock formations, plenty of oak shrub, a spring, great vistas of Boulder City and Nelson, as well as a small glimpse of the Colorado River.

We had a baby rattlesnake cross my path today between Karter and I. Baby rattlers are about 10 inches at birth. This one was about 12-13 inches long and I could only see maybe two little rattles on the tip of its tail. The snake was about 3 feet from Karter and heading his way when I spotted it as I was about to step near it. We were in a small space between the rocks and I realized I couldn't get around the rattler to get to Karter, so I frantically called to Miki, who was in front of Karter, to pull him clear of its path. Karter did a great job of standing very still, probably frozen from me raising my voice suddenly. Miki swooped Karter up while the baby snake quickly hid under the rock not to be seen again. Karter decided after this that he never wants to step on a snake and had me carry him past that spot on the way back out.

This time we packed a lunch that we ate in the shade of the natural bridge while we enjoyed the cool breeze. Of course the "tired" starts to kick in on the way back, but we made it back home to enjoy a short nap followed by Saturday chores. It was a fun time! Now maybe I should probably start thinking about getting ready to plan to possibly go about getting some studying done for my upcoming economics test. Can't wait!

Natural Bridge Hike

The price of being a great dad

So after hauling Karter around on Fridays to go hiking and doing errands, I figured it was about time we do an activity of his choice. Apart from Disneyland (which he asks every other day if we can go back there since last summer), where does every three year old want to go? You guessed it...Chuck E. Sleeze's! We have our two older children and several birthday party invites to thank for the first-hand knowlege we have at the battles of tracking our little ones among throngs of excited and screaming children, camoflauged by the seemingly endless maze of flashing lights and sounds of the video games. It's a good thing they stamped our arms upon entry with an invisible ink bearing a unique indentifier that matches us together so that we cannot leave without each other, right? Right!

Well, this wise dad looked online to see what time they open, and planned this trip accordingly on a school day and during normal school hours. Trust me that this place is much more tolerable when you share the place with three other people...that is if you have to go!

We scrounged all the left-over tokens from the other kids drawers. You know the ones from past parties that you don't have time to spend in the name of getting safely and sanely out the door together. Darn, there's only 9! I think we can get by with 9. I negotiated to purchase them from Sage for a buck. Luckily there was a third-grade bake sale going on that day at her school, so she was desperate for cash and saw it as a win-win.

Thanks to the overhead climbing tube-bubble thingy with the slide, our 9 tokens last us almost two full hours. Just enough! Now, it's not that I'm too cheap to pay the exorbant prices for their pizza lunch (afterall it is worth it's weight in grease), but the thought of getting out of there without spending a single dime was too tempting for me, so we shared some orange chicken from Panda Express on the way back home. Karter is one happy kid. I am one great dad. And now I get to hear a little less of Disneyland and a little more of Chuck E. Cheese's for the next month. We'll have to hone Karter's skee ball skills another day.

The Dawning of an Era...

And an expensive one at that. Kaleb is venturing into the exciting world of orthodontics. Just after new years he we had an expander put into his mouth to help make room for the much larger permanent teeth coming in. Of course we don't have pictures of that since we don't think you'd appreciate a picture of the roof of Kaleb's mouth. But yesterday morning Kaleb got braces put on his front 4 teeth and 2 molars. At first he was very excited and liked what they look like. In his words, "they don't hurt at all". As luck would have it, the kids bi-annual dental cleaning and check up fell on the same day in the afternoon. By the time we got to the dentist his teeth were sore and he wasn't impressed at all with the cleaning. Today he says the braces are bad and good. Good because he still likes the new look and bad because they're still sore. I'm a little worried that we might have to do this again with two more kids. Of course anyone who knew me as a teenager knows I had braces for over 2 years and multiple oral surgeries to get the smile you see today. My kids definately come by it honestly and since Kal's never had braces there's no doubting who's genetics created the mess.

How Cool is This!

My fab friend Terresa is an aspiring writer but if you ask me she's already a fabulous writer. Check out her blog, Chocolate Chip Waffle. She's among the top blogs on Mormon Mommy Blogs and is hopeful of winning favorite blog. If you feel so inclined please check her out and vote!

Love to you all!
Miki