Girl's Camp

July brought camping for Meghan and Marissa at Girl's camp. They were so anxious to go and have a great time!  Our stake's camp is near Lake Tahoe and is a pretty nice camp. Showers, nice pavilions, and yurts to sleep in.

 

Meghan was a 4th Year this time and she was so looking forward to the Ropes Course the 4th Year's get to do.  Doug was lucky too because they needed drivers to take the girls to/from the Ropes Course (which was in the mountains near Reno and Tahoe at Mt. Rose ski area). Since Meghan was going, they asked  Doug if he wanted to go and drive. Of course he said YES, even though he had to leave home at 4:30am to get to camp by 6:30am!

All the next photos are from the Ropes Course. If you are not familiar with Ropes Courses, they are designed to teach groups to reach objectives that they cannot reach unless they unite as a group and help each other succeed. There are not any easy ways to accomplish the tasks, but all the tasks are completely doable, it just takes teamwork and thinking outside the box.

These first few photos are from the carpet walk. We had 10 people in our group, and we were given four very very small pieces of carpet. The objective was to get our entire group from point A to point B which was about 50 feet away. We could only step on the carpets. If we stepped off the carpets into the hot boiling lava (the ground) we either lost one carpet or lost the use of an arm or leg or other consequences.  Seems impossible at first, but once the group gets thinking and working together, it is not impossible.

After  a few other challenges such as this, we graduated up to the next level, which were "elements" that were a few feet above ground. There were balance wires, and other contraptions where we had to get the team from one area to another, without touching the ground.  Here Meghan is taking a rest:

In this next one, the team started at one end of a small rope zip line. We had to get the entire team to the end of the zip line all standing inside an area as big as two hula hoops. The challenge was getting the swing back to the other team members who hadn't slid down yet, and catching the team members as they landed and not falling or stepping out of the hula hoops into the hot boiling lava! Working as a team, Doug was voted the first one to go since he was the uh....ummm..largest? fattest? strongest? one and he would be able to catch everyone at the end and not allow them to fall. It did take him 6 tries however to find a way to get the swing back to the group without him stepping out of the hula hoops!

This next element was called the Octopus, and was a series of cables that looked like an octopus' legs. There were eight different ones and they all crossed in the middle. The objective was to have a person standing at the end of each cable, and all the people had to trade places, without falling off. This one took a lot of trial and error and holding each other up and supporting each other. It was a fun one.

After lunch, the highly anticipated "high course" was calling our name. Our facilitator was very impressed with the group and often mentioned that we were able to get through some of the tougher challenges very quickly and worked very well as a group. She said we were ready for the high course, and all the girls cheered!

The first one we did was more fun than challenging. It was the zip line.  See in the middle of the pic, the trees in the back? You can kinda make out a platform? That's where it started. The climb up to the platform was about 30 feet off the ground and you had to climb up a wobbly ladder, and then spikes in the tree. (click on the pic to see it bigger)

Here is Meghan coming down the zip line:

 

Here are some more pics of some of the high course elements:

Here Meghan is belaying for her other team members helping to keep them safe:

 

Here is Meghan climbing up to the platform, and then finally reaching the platform, after crossing a "tight rope" cable for about 50 feet.

 

Once up there, how do you get down? Swing down of course! They called the swing "The Screamer" and it was named that for a reason! You could go either single or doubles. Meghan was one of the few that got to do doubles. Here she is getting ready for launch, and then finally the scream!

 

We then did the "Flying Squirrel" element, where the entire team lined up clipped into a rope into two lines like a dog sled team. One team member was attached to the other end of the rope that was on a pulley high up in the trees. The solo team member went running while the rest of the team, in dog sled fashion, went running the opposite way. When the slack of the rope was out, the solo team member went flying into the air!  Very fun!

Doug was the only one who got two turns at this one, because our facilitator wanted to make sure the girls could do it so the first try was just a small practice run. But the 2nd try, was no small practice!  He went flying!

 

Here is Meghan doing it:

 

 

After a week at camp, the girls came home, soaked their feet and gave each other face masks! They were glad to be in their own beds, but had a very fun time. And Marissa can't wait two more years until she gets to do the Ropes Course!

 

I'm Melting! I'm Melting!

It wasn't just the wicked witch who said this!  We are all saying it now!  It's H-O-T!

And smokey....still......We did have three or four days where we could open the windows at night and go outside during the day, but now it's back to staying indoors. Even not recommended to go outside to mow the lawn, go to the park, or anything.

Taken from the car this afternoon showing the outside temp: (a little blurry, but you get the idea)

4th of July

Normally on the 4th of July, we would be in Utah watching the fireworks at BYU with about 40 family members, eating pizza and playing games.  This year we stayed home and made our own 4th of July activities.

We started with some geocaches. Can you see the cache in the photo above? How about the photo below? Click on the pics to make them bigger.

Still no? Ok..here is what it looks like in the open: It's a good one!

 

See the coordinates for our next cache written on the fence below?

This cache scared the girls at first....

 

Our next cache was a very unique one. It was called the MonKEY because there was a key inside a contraption and the hint was act like a monkey to get it out.

Here is Jacob acting like a monkey trying to get it out. Tilt your head, the video is sideways. The key to the lock is inside the contraption. The log book and cache is behind the lock.  The "secret" was that we had to turn and flip the container to get the key out, and the only way the key would come out was to make go through the handle. We had to ask for a clue- we didn't get it at first try.

We then went to a park in Rancho Cordova for a huge family 4th of July event. They had bounce houses, pony rides, crafts to make for the kids, train rides, (narrow gauge train over a mile of track around the park) giveaways all for free.  It was pretty good and we all had a good time!  Here are some photos of it:

 

After that, we stopped in to Leatherby's our favorite ice cream place, and went back to Roseville to watch the fireworks.  All in all, a great day!

Cough! Cough!

It's Fire season, at least the beginning of it anyhow. And we have been having the worst fire season on record. Already in the past 6 weeks, more money and effort has been spent on fires than the past two years combined!  Currently, as I write this, there are over 800 separate fires burning, with hundreds of them being started by dry lightning the past few days.

Since Sacramento is in a valley, and there are fires surrounding the valley, all the smoke settles here and it's not going anywhere soon. It's been a week now that it's been getting smokey, and they are telling us not to go outside, even to mow the lawn or go to the park.  Our  Boy Scout camp was evacuated earlier this week, after them only being there one day. 

Here are some photos of the sky. IT looks like these were taken in the fog, or at early sunrise, but they weren't. They were taken in the afternoon, when it should be sunny and blue skies. When the smoke finally does clear, I will take some photos about the same time and place, and put them up here to compare. 

The photos don't do the sun justice-it's about as orange/red as this type is, but it doesn't show up in the photos.