Jonathan and Tomi: August Fun

I failed to mention that while we were gone last week, Jon had the time of his life!!! He got to play a round of golf with his buddy, then go fly fishing with that same friend. He caught a rainbow trout bigger than any others he’s ever caught. . . he thinks. It was about 23”. The next night, he went to dinner and bowling with a few other friends. These friends had planned a “man trip” but it fell through at the last minute due to work schedules, so it was good that they got to get together anyway for a “man date.” Jon just wishes we’d leave town more often so he can play bachelor for a few days.

Despite only working 4 days weeks and every other week only being a 3 day work week, I was getting tired of being at work, so I took some time off on Tuesday to go swimming at the aquatic center with the family. We really enjoyed spending time swimming and both kids LOVED going down the twisty slide with Dad. Mom is too big of a whimp to go down, so Dad took turns taking the kids down until Tayton got so cold that she had blue lips and was shivering, a sure sign it was time to pack up and go home.

On Thursday, we went to the Weber County Fair. This was our first year there and we really enjoyed it. It was good sized, but small and intimate enough that we didn’t feel overrun by people and claustrophobic. There were lots of activities to see every day, including; the backhoe rodeo, where they had to do “stunts” with the backhoe, like loading an egg on a spoon and dropping it in a dish without breaking the egg; a youth rodeo where we got to see lots of kids calf rope; a draft pull with the huge Clydesdale horses; a parrot show and all sorts of other events. Tayton later told someone that we watched horses catch cows. That was her 2 year old version of calf roping. She was also very concerned that almost all the riders lost their hats. She wanted to make sure each of them got their hats back. By far, everyone’s favorite thing to do was see all the livestock. Jon swears Tayton pet almost every animal there. I think her favorites were the pigs! She loved petting their noses and really liked it when a few of the ladies there got the kids some squire bottles and told them to spray the pigs because they loved the little showers. We also all got to try our very first funnel cake. Good. . . but a little over rated. Sad to say, we didn’t get a chance to try the deep fried Coke or Twinkie.

On Friday, we met Teri and the cousins for a trip to Pine View Reservoir. I was shocked to see the repercussions of the water shortage first hand. The lake had receded so much that we had to find a different spot to set up for the day. When we did find a spot, where there are normally sandy beaches, it was rocky and very muddy. Kind of gross if you ask me, but the kids all LOVED it! We enjoyed swimming, floating in the raft, floating on the lounge chairs, feeding the seagulls and having a little lunch. Doesn’t matter what we do, we always seem to have more fun with the cousins!

On Sunday, we had dinner with family and had a later afternoon/evening dip in the pool. The kids all loved jumping off the diving board and having Kelly throw them into the pool, one-by-one. At one point, after Kelly was throwing them into the pool, Noah says, “Kelly is so mean.” I said, “No he’s not, you loved being thrown in the pool.” Since they had all lined up multiple times for their turns to be thrown in. Then Noah says, “You’re right, Kelly is so nice!” Ryann kept a close eye on Tayton, swam around with her everywhere and even helped catch her off the diving board. Tayton has found a new best friend.

The government has found money to reallocate from other programs to civilian payroll, so I only have 1 more Fun Furlough Friday left, next week. I don’t like the 20% less pay, but I have really enjoyed the time off with my family and am actually sad to see the furlough Fridays go away. Can we just find a way to have every Friday off while still maintaining the same pay? Too bad they won’t allow us to work 10 hours a day.