A Joyful Family Backpacking Excursion!

We had a fun vacation backpacking with part of our family this past weekend!  This is our crew at the trail head before we began.  I should have taken a picture of us at the end... not nearly as energetic looking!  This is me, my hubby, oldest son and his 3 kids, 2nd daughter, her hubby and fur baby, and my 3 children still at home.
Our hike was to Independence Lakes about 3 hours from home.  It was supposed to be 4 miles and was steep enough in spots I needed to stop on the switchback corners and rest, but it was easy enough for my youngest son who is 9, and 3 of my grandchildren who are 7, 6, and 4 to go along without much help.

The view along the way was beautiful!  Looking out across the valley below you could see fields and a small town.  We hiked most of the time in pine or aspen trees.

There are 4 high mountain lakes at the end of this hike.  The first was pretty grassy and beginning to dry up, but the little fish in it were jumping like crazy!  A large group was camped at the second lake so we hiked to the third lake to camp.

There's just something wonderful and peaceful about these beautiful mountain lakes!  I've come to wonder if some of the awe I feel has quite a bit to do with the hard work I put in to get there!  Packing a 35 pound pack, up a decently steep mountain, using my over 50 body is challenging!  I earned that beautiful, mirrored lake!  I took a few minutes to sit out on the large rocks at the lakes edge to just breathe.  I felt my shoulders and muscles relax, the weight of everyday worries just wafted away leaving me peaceful and warm.

We ate a variety of freeze-dried backpacking food, but good ole' Cup O Noodles were a hit with the under-10 set, and the rest of us enjoyed instant potatoes as a side with most of our dinners.  Breakfasts were instant oatmeal and homemade granola (which you can find on my other blog HERE).  Cooking at home is easier and tastier, but those freeze-dried meals are convenient, and most importantly, LIGHT!  Here's our lovely outdoor kitchen.  Notice the granite counter tops in this baby!

Backpacking isn't where you go to enjoy the food, or the comfy bed, or the nice, hot, shower, but it is a wonderful way to get away from the hustle and bustle of our busy world.  My husband commented that he'd woke during the first night and had a hard time going back to sleep because it was SO quiet!  Not even frogs croaking! (There were tadpoles in the lake, but we never saw a frog!)

Hiking out was so much easier than hiking in!  Those switchbacks weren't nearly as challenging!  It was a warm day though, and gratefully my wise husband had a cooler of A&W Root Beer waiting at the truck when we got back. (No ice cream to go with it however, and that caused a bit of weeping and wailing from our 4 year old granddaughter because she wanted a Root Beer Float!)
I am filled with gratitude for this beautiful world God has provided for us to live in and enjoy.  I cannot see the beauty of it without feeling His love.

Who's up for planning a backpacking trip for next year?!  I'm in!!!

Auctioneering and Fifty Bucks

Each year at church, our young men and women hold an auction in the spring to raise funds for their summer camps and activities. It is quite successful!   My husband grew up going to cattle auctions and bull sales.  He has been asked for years to auctioneer at these church events and does a great job.  While he auctioneers, I usually wander around and keep track of my bids on silent auction items and keep an eye on my kids.

A few years ago, when Wes was 5, while we were at the auction he came running up to me excited and we had the following conversation:

W: "Mom! I need $50!"
Me: "What do you need $50 for?"
W: "I need it for Dad."
Me (feeling confused): "What does DAD need $50 for?" 
W (with urgency in his voice): "I don't know! He just keeps asking people for it!"
...... and I started listening more closely and realized that to begin the bidding, my husband was saying "Can I get $50?... $50 for this item... Can I get $50?"!  OH! MY GOODNESS!!!  Poor little Wes just felt so bad for his Dad up there begging people for $50!    

We have chuckled over that incident every year since, as my hubby begins the bidding.... "Can I get $10? ... $10 for this item?  How about a $10 bid!

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The picture above is that same year when W had a short fascination for Indiana Jones.  He's pretty creative with his costumes!

Sisters, Friends, or Both?!

Isn't this picture adorable?  What cuties these little girls were at this age.  

My two youngest girls are 10 days shy of being exactly 2 years apart in age.  Really, neither of them remembers life without the other.  Since the beginning they've been best friends, best enemies, and just acquaintance's living in common territory.... it really just depends which stage we're looking at.

Overall, they've been the best of friends.   These two had many a tea party when they were little girls, played dolls, watched Disney movies, made crafts, rode bikes.  As tweens, they battled, and ignored each other more than they played together.   As teenagers, they compete in similar sports, share secrets, talk and giggle LONG after the lights are supposed to be out at bedtime, and lend a shoulder to lean on when times are tough.

That's what sisters are for!

Alike and Different. Something to Ponder.

Re-posted from 2017.

My youngest son Wes, is in 3rd grade this year.  He has a wonderful teacher who has been quite patient with him.  He finds it difficult to stay focused in class sometimes and needs quite a bit of extra encouragement to stay on task.  He loves being in her classroom and has made good friends there.

Wes is unique in his school.   He joined our family through adoption when he was just 3 weeks old.  We are Caucasian... Wes is of African-American descent.  Most of the time we don't even notice because we're just busy being a family and living everyday life.   We live in a rural area that is mainly Caucasian.  In our whole school district (we're small - guessing under 1000 students total K-12)  there are only 3 African-American children right now, though there were a few who graduated a couple of years ago.  Wes was in 2nd grade when he came home and said, "Hey, how come some kids are white and their parents are white and I am brown and my parents are white?"   We had a good discussion.  Even though he's always known he was adopted, race has just not been an issue in our family.  

Sometimes, since he started school, Wes feels different because other children point it out.  They aren't trying to make him feel bad, they just notice because he IS different from them. Visibly.  They want to touch his awesome tight curly, black, hair, they are impressed with his darker skin. Sometimes it is embarrassing or uncomfortable being different just because it draws attention.  It is okay for people to notice differences when they aren't doing it to degrade or disrespect another.  We should be proud of many of our differences! Differences are what make each of us our own person!

Anyway, (I get off track easily, don't I!)  I'm sure Wes's teacher didn't create this project just because of him, but I am so grateful for it and what it supports.  We can be Alike And Different and it's OKAY!  Wes was so excited to show me his project and writing.  (My teenage daughter informs me that this is an "essay", which I knew, with a "Venn Diagram", which I did NOT know.  I'm pretty sure I was not introduced to Venn diagrams back in the old days when I was in 3rd grade, at least not by that name. hehehe  Good thing I have kids to keep me informed and up to date.)

Here is Wes's essay: (Excuse the wrinkles... I'm just happy it survived the bus ride home in a 3rd grade boy's backpack!)

 

And here is his project Venn Diagram:  (Look at THAT! You CAN teach an old Mom new tricks! Thanks to my teenage sweeties.)

Thinking about the implications of having 3rd graders complete this project, touches my heart and gives me hope!   What do you say we hire Mrs. J. to teach this to our Congressmen and Senators!!!  Think what we could do as a nation if we stopped attacking each others' differences, and spent some time finding the similarities!  When we find common ground, we can be more compassionate and understanding as we find solutions to our governmental and societal problems  challenges.  

Kudos to Mrs. J for her common sense, positive, approach to teaching children to recognize and accept that we are alike and different... and IT'S OKAY!  

It is not only through our similarities, but through accepting our differences that we become united.

A Clever Walmart Marketing Idea

There are all sorts of funny little things that pop up when you least expect them. This is one of those.

The other day my family needed to do some shopping at Walmart.  We split up, girls looking at hair products and the boys checking out the cereal aisle.  When we finished in in the hair care section, the girls and I were hunting around for hubby and my son. We found them in the aisle with salad dressings, my husband standing there intently studying the shelf where my favorite Olive Garden dressing sits.  I thought he was wondering if we needed any, and I was about to tell him we just opened a new bottle, when he said “Joy!  Look at this!  They’ve got a new type of dressing dispenser!”  I turned to look and low and behold, a garden sprinkler, nestled right there with my favorite dressing!

I wonder if it works best applying it direct in the produce fields or better at home for really large salads?    What a clever marketing technique!  Just in time for those spring salads using freshly grown greens.

Oh my goodness!!!  I laughed so hard!  You see odd items abandoned here and there in the aisles of Walmart all the time, but this one was perfectly placed!  Thank you to whomever chose to abandon the sprinkler in this particular spot! You and Mac made my day! (Though I’m sorry to the employee who has to round all that up and put it back in its proper place.)

I’ve got to continue to keep my eye out for other things that tickle my funny bone just so I can share them with you!   Hahaha!!!   Hubby kept such a straight face too… makes me laugh every time I think about it.

I’d love to hear about the crazy things you’ve found misplaced on your shopping trips to Walmart or other stores.  It may take me a while to top this one!

Credit to my son Brett for figuring out the perfect captioning.  lol  He's a clever guy!

The Cart Before The Horse or Creating Our Own Challenges

Re-posted from 2017

I receive an immense amount of joy from my family!  Children are so entertaining.  I've always said, "Who needs TV when you've got kids?"

My youngest son Wes is 8 years old.  He loves to create.  Right now he is creating a book.   He showed me this weekend what he has done so far.

So far we have the title page and the Table of Contents, including the page each chapter begins.   Wes is finding it difficult to make the first chapter long enough to go to page five. (We may have to increase the font!)  I suggested he might do the Table of Contents AFTER he has written the book, but he insists this is where he should start.  The page or so I've read of chapter 1 is pretty good.  He gets right into the thick of things without having to create a setting or build a character!  :)

To me this is the equivalent of putting the cart before the horse.  For Wes, it doesn't matter as long as he has a cart and a horse.  We may need to chat about this!

I LOVE this age!  Full of creativity but not really planned out well.

The past many years Wes has made books out of paper by taking several sheets of printer paper and binding them with Scotch tape. (I cannot even guess at the number of rolls of tape nor reams of paper we've gone through the past 5 years!)  A few times he stapled them but you just can't get a good, thick, book with a regular home quality stapler.  He always drew pictures and sometimes wrote words or captioned his pictures.   Creating his book on the computer is a fun, new experience! ( and may save us tons of paper.  Literally.)

Oh this boy makes my heart smile!

Joy and Then Some? Explain That!

Well hey there!  Thanks for dropping by!    I'm Joy (and that handsome guy up there with me is my awesome hubby and best friend).  That explains part of this new blog title!   I am the 6th of seven children, including 5 girls and 2 boys.  For years I thought I was named Joy because it rhymed with boy and my Dad had been feeling outnumbered.  Haha!  Occasionally I wondered if it was because I was at the end of the family and they were ready to be done having children.  BUT, as an adult I found out that my Mom really wanted another baby and they were so happy when I finally joined the family!   I like that reason best of all.

I think that my name has influenced my personality and outlook on life to a large degree.  I am pretty optimistic most of the time.  I love to laugh and find silliness in the funny little things of everyday life. This is good because I have a husband who makes me laugh all the time... as well as making me roll my eyes with his clever Dad jokes!  I have silly children who are entertaining and have picked up their Dad's sense of humor.  I enjoy going through life with a light heart and not needing to take myself too seriously.   I'm normal though and I get down and bluesy like many of you.  In fact, for years I've dealt with depression and anxiety.  One of the ways I can deal with that best (if I catch it early enough!) is to look on the bright side... to count my blessings... to find inspiration that uplifts!  And I want to share some of that with YOU!  Thanks for joining me!

The New Camera

Many of the pictures I've been taking to use on my blog, have been on my phone.  Sometimes that works well, but my phone doesn't take good action shots.  My busy kids, the dog, cats, and anything else in motion are blurry!  (There is a possibility this is due to operator error, but we won't go there at the moment!)

One of my awesome Christmas gifts was a new Nikon D3400 digital camera.   My husband has an older digital camera but it quit focusing and was having some other issues.  This new camera is ALL MINE!!  I'm so excited to learn to use it! (I'm hoping to advance to using manual settings rather than just the easy peasy auto settings)

Here are a few pictures I've taken so far:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Isn't that just cool?  And I don't even know what I'm doing yet!  Thank heaven for youtube video that feature this camera and explain how to use it.   Be watching for the blog pictures to improve in the near future!