Ziplining

I was on the internet a few months back trying to come up with a good Father's Day present. I found a place nearby that does a zip line "tour" with 3 zips. Trevor had never been (and neither had I) so I got him a gift certificate for two people to go. In hindsight, it seems like his Father's Day presents always involve me, too. :) But really, who would want to go zip lining by themselves? Plus, I'm way more fun than any of his guy friends...says me.

We had to use the gift certificate by the end of the 2011 season. Our summer had been busy so we hadn't had any time to go, but we squeaked it in to a free day before the "zip line season" ended.

It was a lot of fun. I thought it would be a little more of a fall at the beginning, but it was kind of like going on a really long slide. Still fun, just not quite the rush I was expecting.


Trevor

Trevor


Kim



Tyler's all excited because he found out you have to be 70 lbs. to go, and he JUST turned over from 69 lbs. to 70 lbs. I don't have the heart to tell him we have like one week left of the season....he'll probably have to wait until next year.

Redneck Fishing Tournament

A few months ago, Trevor was watching ESPN and they were doing some show on the "Redneck Fishing Tournament" in Bath, Illinois. It's a fishing tournament to try and get rid of Asian Carp. They're taking over the rivers and they want to exterminate them before they reach the great lakes.

I'm sure many of you have seen videos of these carp, either in an email video or onAmerica's Funniest Videos or something. They're the fish that jump out of the water. A lot of times they'll jump right in the boat. Trevor thought it looked like a fun trip to make. So, with our friends Jared and Marci, we decided to make it a road trip.
Please don't look too closely, I'm not really that big of a poser...

We left one evening and drove all night, getting there the next evening to Bath, Illinois.

The fishing tournament lasted two days over the weekend (Friday and Saturday), and it was SO MUCH FUN!

Tournament rules say you can't use a pole (you don't need one), but you can use a net or a bat. :) We caught around 130 fish between the four of us the first day. The tournament had two heats both days--each heat lasts two hours--but Friday we only got through one and a half heats and ran low on gas. There is no gas station in this tiny town, so we had to fill up in the next town over.

This is only about 60 fish after the first heat. Disclaimer: Those are all fake tattoos. Although some drunk guys asked Marci where she got hers...




There were a TON of fish to catch Friday. Sometimes it was all you could do to shield your face and forget about catching because there were so many fish jumping. We were so covered in fish slime and fish scales by the end of the day, it was disgusting. There were a lot of boats, but nothing compared to Saturday's madness. Friday was "Redneck Costume" day. I'm pretty sure a lot of these people weren't in costume...but they could definitely win :) This fishing tournament draws some interesting people. And some drunk ones. Marci and I got hit on more than we ever have in our lives--a lot of times with Trevor and Jared right there with us. We're hot in Illinois! :)

Our costumes were ok, but Marci's was the best with her helmet (this is common so you don't get smacked in the face with a fish--a lot of people get broken noses, etc.) with a rubber chicken duct taped to the top. :) There were several tv stations, as well as the travel channel and photographers for ESPN, etc. Marci got so many interviews because of her chicken helmet. Pretty funny stuff. She also had a boat full of photographers following us around for 45 minutes snapping millions of pictures of her catching fish. Love that girl.

Saturday was less exciting, there were WAY too many boats trying to load off one tiny boat ramp. The fish weren't jumping as much, so we left a little early to try and get an earlier start back home. We only caught about 10 fish in the first heat. Sad. I wish we got some more pictures of the fish jumping, but we didn't get a lot of action shots...the boat full of photographers said they'd send some to us so stay tuned :)

We drove all night again and got home Sunday evening so everyone could get back to work. We stopped by Mount Rushmore for a quick look.

Thanks Grandma Strupp for watching the kids! We had a blast and I know they did, too.

Texas

We had some friends get sealed in the Dallas Temple, so we decided to make a trip out of it to go to the sealing and also see my sister for awhile. The kids and I went for a week and Trevor joined us for the weekend. Here are some of the highlights of our Texas trip:

A quick note: Dallas was the hottest place in the country during my little vacation there. Good time to visit, I know. It was SOOO hot. I stepped out of the airport and it was like a sauna. So that's why all we did was swim the whole time...

We went to a waterpark that was the perfect size for kids. They had a lazy river, some bigger waterslides, and a kids area that was pretty big. P.S. The cement was SOO hot that the kids all had burned feet from running from lazy river to the slides to the kids area. I had to carry Jason and run from wet spot to wet spot on the cement. It was crazy. Most people kept there flip flops by the edge of the pool to slip on. That would've been smart. I feel for all you Arizona folks. You're probably scoffing at this post because you deal with these things all summer.

Here's Jason with a little girl in the background. They got in a little tiff later because she kept pushing him out of the fountain he was playing in. Little bully. But Jason yelled "No!" at her and pushed her hands off his chest. :)


Ashley and Hailey at the waterpark


Jason got really tired and finally fell asleep. Poor kid, I tried to get him to take off his life jacket when I could see he was going to fall asleep. I didn't want him to be any hotter than we already were. He wouldn't, though. And don't worry, I've come to accept the fact that I look old.


Another day we went to a "splash pad." I'd never heard of one. It's not like a spray park, but more like a bunch of sprinklers on the cement. This is a horrible picture of the splash pad, but I didn't take many pictures of it.

Tyler and his cousin, Rachel.


We also took full advantage of the neighborhood pool. The kids had a great time at Aunt Amy's house. Thank you!!


And the reason for our trip in the first place:

This is Ted and Caroline. We met them in Philadelphia while Trevor was going to school. Ted and Trevor are hunting buddies. Which makes them practically brothers :) We were happy we were able to attend their sealing. We had fun with them for a couple nights while Aunt Amy took the kids. Yay :)

Couer d'Alene

We decided to take a family vacation to Couer d'Alene this year. We had never been there and had heard how beautiful it is. So we rented a boat for a couple days and had some fun on the lake. Cliff and Lisa (Trevor's brother and wife) and their two kids (Nyah and Sabra) came with us, and it was SO much fun. Thanks guys!

Here are some pictures of our boating fun:

The kids about to do some swimming during one of our stops


Lisa, Sabra, Jason and me


Hailey, me, and Ashley


The day got pretty long for Ashley and Jason. But don't let this picture fool you, they had a blast


They gave us a surf board with the boat rental. This is me trying to figure it out. Trevor was doing really well by the end of the first day. I could do it, but only holding onto the rope. The second I tossed it onto the boat, I fell behind the wake and no more surfing for me.

Whatever

Spokane

The day after we took the boat back, we just relaxed and hung out. In the morning we spent some time at Cabela's. Then the Cliff and Trevor went golfing at this amazing course in Couer d'Alene with a green that floats in the lake. If I had Trevor's phone, I would download some pictures of it. But I don't...So while they went golfing, Lisa and I took a little trip to Spokane. It's about 30 minutes from Couer d'Alene.

We took the kids to the city park, which was really beautiful and had fun things for the kids to play on. Here are some pictures of the kids at the park: (And since Lisa's an amazing photographer, I'll use all of her pictures--taken with my camera--)

The kids and I


All the kids on the wagon slide



I took this one :) This is Lisa, Nyah, and Sabra

Silverwood

The last day of our vacation was spent at an amusement park named "Silverwood." It was a lot of fun. You would think I could take more pictures than just the kids on the helicopter ride.

We had such a fun time, it was hard to come back home. But it's alright, we have more vacations coming. So stay tuned :)

Hailey, Jason and me on the carousel




Tyler and Jason


Hailey



Ashley



Nyah and Sabra

Most Patriotic

We just got home from a great vacation (more pictures of that to come...maybe later than sooner...) and I got a message on my answering machine that I did indeed win most patriotic for the 5K :) I even get a gift certificate. Yipee!

So I checked the website to see what place I took. We'll leave the men out of these standings...I got 3rd among the women. :) I knew I should have tripped that girl that ran by me at the very end! Just kidding. Kind of.