Merry Christmas!

     Tis the season to be jolly!  For many of us Christamas is the favorite time of year and I am no exception, I love it!  It is the perfect time of year to get together with those we love and spend some quality time with them.  Maybe part of the reason I love it so much is becasue I usually get two Christmases!  This past weekend my brother Curt and his family were in town for an early Christmas as they are going to be in Butte the rest of this week.  It was great to see them all as we havent all got together in quite a while.  We hung out downtown most of the day Saturday doing some shopping and soaking up the Christmas spirit that the mall had to offer.  Then on Sunday we went over to mom and dad's for a big meal and gifts!  Everyone got really good gifts and even though I think my Dallas Cowboys stocking hat and coaster set was the best gift, Jaxson was the one who was most excited about his Thomas the train pajamas!  I will not soon forget the look on his face as he opened the box and imediately started saying, "train, train, train!"

     Of course once we had them opened we had to model them for everyone!  This is truly what the season is all about, seeing the joy on little kid's faces as they open up a carefully wrapped package with no idea what is inside but overwhelmed with the joy that they got a gift all to themselves, I never tire of watching this.  It makes me remember the true reason for the season which is celebrating the birth of Jesus and spreading peace and good will torwards others.  Doing kind things for others is something I believe is not done nearly enough in this world, I know I need to get better at it, and watching my niece's and nephew's open up their gifts reminds me of the joy something as simple as a pair of pj's can give a child!  I believe we can all learn something from that!  

     Tatum and Matt tearing into gifts!

    Aunt Kelli with her hands full:)

Remember, joy to the world, The Lord has come, let earth receive her king!  Don't let the real reason for the season be forgotten!  Merry Christmas to you all!

What a week!

     Man oh man what a whirlwind week I had!  It all started with my beloved Dallas Cowboys crumbling in the second half of their game against Green bay and giving away a win that I still can't talk about a week later!  What happened Sunday afternoon is simply inexcusable as a team and embarrassing as a fan, but even after such a horrible loss we still have a chance to make the playoffs!  Oh and as my lovely wife reminds me, there is more to life than Cowboys football:)  The silver lining to my teams collapse was the fact that we had our good friends the Ralstons staying with us for the night on their way over to MT for the holidays.  We had a great time with them, as we always do, and it was capped off my them giving me a mini Cowboys helmet!  It's a pretty cool gift that will surely be sitting right next to my little orange Cowboys fan every single game, and yes I checked to see if it would fit her and it's a hare too small:)

     Monday was spent cooling down from the football game, then packing for a work trip to Klamath Falls, OR.  Dad and I were scheduled to fly down there to work some claims but we knew we were in for a long day when our flight leaving Spokane was delayed an hour.  Any time two Gannon's are on a flight together you expect a certain amount of GL (Gannon Luck) to happen, but even we weren't prepared for what happened this day.  We made it to Portland just fine, an hour behind schedule, but no big deal because our connecting plane into Medford was the same aircraft.  So we went in and got a coffee and loaded right back on the plane.  I was seated in the very last row and in front of me were three flight attendants all dead heading into Medford for a break.  The flight attendant working our flight was in constant communication with these three, leaving me stuck in the middle to eavesdrop everything.  Normally I would have buried myself in a book but all they were talking about was the poor weather conditions in Medford and the chances of us even landing!  Turns out the fog was so bad that a plane coming from Seattle had already turned around and now these four ladies were talking like we had no chance to land either.  This was not really a big deal for me cause we could always come back later for the claims if necessary.  The scary part came when the captain came across the intercom and told us about the fog and that he was going to give it a try anyway.  He began his decent and just as I could start to make out tree tops and cars on the roads he powered back up and pulled back up in the air!  It was probably the eeriest feeling I've ever had being what looked to be a few hundred feet from the ground, then going back up!  We headed back to Portland, where Dad and I made some frantic changes to our schedule and got on a plane back to Spokane and cancelled the rest of our work trip.  I knew we had made the right decision when I spotted this on the plane while we were boarding.

     So because my work trip got cut short I was privileged enough to sit in the dentist chair for 2 1/2 hours and get two of my teeth prepped for crowns!  I chipped a tooth a few weeks ago and needed one crown anyway and they found a good sized cavity on the tooth in front of it so they decided to prep it for a crown also in case I decide to do a bridge.  Anyway, it was not exactly how I had planned on spending my Wednesday afternoon but hey, things could have been worse!  Luckily after the dentist chair I got a day to catch up on some work from home and my week came to a close in a good way, by Curt and his family coming over to visit for the weekend!  I went out and met them all in the valley yesterday and Jen and the kids shopped in the mall while Curt, Dad, and I hit balls at the simulator in Dick's Sporting Goods.  It was pretty cool, we had all three Gannon boys there and we got to show the pro at Dick's three VERY different golf swings that all have similar results!  The pro found himself in a lack of words when our loopy non-traditional swings produced favorable results on the simulator:)  It was a perfect way to end an eventful week!

Remember, sometimes a plan is made just to be broken up and remind us to slow down and enjoy life a bit!:)

What a day!

     Who knew two people could have so much fun in just 24 hours!?  This past weekend as you could tell from my previous post we were in Portland.  It was a relatively short stay but man did we fill it with fun!  We started our day by heading down to Voodoo Doughnuts in old town for some of the best doughnuts I have ever had, and I consider myself quite the connoisseur of sweets!  We then headed over to Ikea and made our way through the maze to find the platform bed frame we were looking for, along with a few other "necessities".  Next we went to the Oregon State Zoo where we pretty much had the place to ourselves because of the 19 degree temperatures!  Although it was extremely chilly, we still saw all of the animals except the lions, tigers, and bears.  Most of the animals were indoors from the cold but they had indoor viewing still so we got to see almost everything that we wanted to.  I think both of our favorites though was probably this baby elephant and his family.

     This little guy is only a few months old and the big ones you see with him are his mom on the left and his "auntie" on the right.  I guess when elephants are born their mom gets help form another female who is adopted into the family and considered the aunt, together they take turns protecting the little one its entire life.  It was pretty special to sit here and watch these magnificent creatures for a while!  We enjoyed every second of the zoo while we were there, then at the advice of my cousin Amber, we went down to a section of downtown that was full of little shops and restaurants all decorated up for the holiday.  We walked up and down the street hitting up all of the little shops and a couple big ones, like a two story Pottery Barn that I had trouble getting Kelli out of!  It was fun to walk around these stores with her and watch her design mind at work!  We then had an amazing dinner at one of the restaurants before heading back towards the house we had rented.  We capped off our day of fun by going to the Kennedy elementary school, sounds exciting right?  This is a school that was shut down in 1975 because it was too dilapidated to continue using and a local family bought the school and completely transformed it into a fun center!  Inside the school there are 6 pubs that each serve food, a restaurant, two event centers, a 100 degree salt water soaking pool, and a movie theatre!  We sat in the soaking pool for about an hour then got out and went to a movie where admission was $3, the popcorn was an affordable $4, and it's in the old auditorium where they've replaced all the original seating with love seats, couches and lounge chairs!  It was an amazing experience that we will definitely do again when we go back to Portland!

     Our busy yet fun day was finished off by relaxing in the quaint little rental house we had found, reminiscing about all of the fun we had.  Even though it was only a couple days it truly was one of the best vacations we've ever had!  There is so much fun stuff to do in that city that I feel like we could go back 10 times and still not even break the surface of all that we'd want to do!  It truly was on we will remember for some time!

Remember, everyday can be fun if you just open up and let it happen!:)

Another year!

     This weekend is kind of a big one for me as it got started on friday by me chalking up another year of sobriety!  It's been 11 years now since that fateful day North of Conrad when my life was changed for ever!  Almost every day has brought with it some challenges but thanks to an amazing support team another years worth of those days has come and gone.  Any recovering addict will tell you though that this is not a game that is winnable, we all only hope to make it to another day, one at a time!  So this day, I am writing this from a tiny little house that Kelli and I rented for the weekend in Portland, OR.  We'd never been here befroe and it is only 6 hours from Spokane so we decided to take a little mini vacation to celebrate my 11 years.  We got here yesterday and imediately went straight downtown to walk around and shop then try to find one of the restaurants that my cousin Amber recommended, she's lived here for years so she had tons of suggestions for us which was really great, and while we walked around we experienced more in about four hours than I have in the past month!  As soon as we parked we walked around the first block we looked up at the first giant building of the evening and it was the Church of Scientology!  We're not in Kansas anymore Toto!  As we walked past the front door I was hoping to see Tom Cruise inside greeting people but no such luck:)  We continued our walk through the chilly night air and headed up the street to try and find a place to eat.  Along our walk we came across something that made my day, Georgia's Grocery, conveniently located below Georgia's Hotel!  

     It's kind of hard to tell from this picture but there it is, mothers name in neon lights:)  We headed around the corner and found our place to eat, it wasn't on the options Amber gave us but we just stumbled upon it and had to try it out, Henry's Tavern.  Turns out Henry's is pretty dang good!  It's a sports bar on one side, restaurant on the other, and pool room upstairs with extra bar seating.  We sat upstairs in a booth with basically a coffe table, and we both ordered burgers cause even though there was steaks and other entrees on the menu, they advertised that the burgers were their specialty.  They didn't lie, Kelli had the blue cheese burger which she said was amazing and I had the stuffed burger!  A thick patty of beef stuffed with gorgonzola cheese, fried onions, and smoked bacon!!  It was literally the best burger I've ever had!  With full bellies we did some more sight seeing which included a home decor store Kelli has only seen on tv before, West Elm.  We made a pass through there and it was totaly worth it as I watched Kellis eyes light up like mine do at Augusta National!  We then headed back to the truck and made our way to our little house which is only about 15 minutes away from downtown.  We had a great nights sleep here now were getting ready to head back downtown for another fun filled day of exploring Portland!  

     Remember, some of the best days of your life are the ones that start out with absolutely no schedule:)

Winter is here

     We came home from a great weekend in Stevensville on Sunday and spent the majority of our travels on not so desire able road conditions!  It started raining I the morning and the closer we got to the apex of Lookout pass the more snow we ran into.  The roads were a little slick but they could've been a lot worse, still we came across two accidents.  Thankfully though we made it home safely, just took a little longer than usual.

     When we got home my relief from the roads was short lived as the local weather man informed us that it would be a while before we saw temps above freezing again!  The most frightening part of this news was the discovery that I think I might be getting old!!  A little blustery weather never used to bother me, now all I want to do is cozy up and stay warm!  So we spent last night out in the cold putting up a few lights, made some finishing touches to the inside Christmas decor, made ourselves some hot cocoa and did just that, cozied up!  And with a weather forecast like the one below I expect to see a lot more of this in our future:)

Remember, sometimes others don't understand your journey, they don't have to it's your journey!

Happy Thanksgiving!

     Well another Thanksgiving weekend is upon us and much like it does every year this day brings with it all the joy in the world as I share quality time with family, and get to watch the Cowboys play!!  The Thanksgiving day game has been played since long before I was a Cowboys fan, 1966 to be precise, but each year I am privelaged enough to watch it I feel that much more grateful.  Thanksgiving has long provided three of my favorite things all in one day, family, desserts, and Dallas Cowboys football!

possibly the best Christmas decoration ever!

     This year were spending Thanksgiving with the Dobsons over in Stevinsville and so far our day has gotten off to a typical Gannon type start.  I got up early and took the girls for a short walk so they could do their morning business and Duchess provided me with some unexpected challenges!  She's been taking an anti inflamatory medication after her eye surgery and for some reason it has not only reduced the swelling in her body but also turned her internal clock back about 10 years!  She has been acting like she's a puppy again, not listening, pinging off the wall with more energy than any mammal alive, and whining when she doesnt get her way.  Come to think of it, maybe she's just preparing us for a future child!  If so she's doing a good job cause almost daily since the surgery she has pushed my patience to the limit.  This morning all in a matter of 45 seconds she managed to hog tie all three of us, me, her and Kashi, with her leash not only once but twice!  Once she was untangled she drug me under a tree that took off my stocking cap, and hog tied herself again.  This time I left her hog tied, grabbed my hat, and headed for the house.  We got back to the house after Duchess hopped her way home, and as I untangled her for the third time I looked her in the face and couldn't help but feel thankfull for her, even with her newfound craziness:)  Mostly I'm thankful that she's done with the medicine now so hopefully she'll start getting back to normal.  Kashi has not gone without her share of craziness this trip either as yesterday when I went to load them in the truck she hesitated jumping into the pick up until after I went to give her some help, then she decided to jump in no particular direction and thankfully I was there to catch her in mid air!  I don't know if you've tried to catch too many 80 lb dogs lately but I wouldn't suggest it.  But between Kashi and Duchess and all of the craziness they bring to our family, we are eternally grateful for all of the joy they have brought us.  They have filled our hearts with more love than we could have ever imagined!

my cheering squad on my run this morning!

     So as I write this and lazily watch Donna scurry around the kitchen preparing our feast, I hope each of you has your own reasons for being thankfull today, whether its crazy dogs or big meals, I hope you all find some joy in your lives today!  I know I will.....as long as the Cowboys win:)

Remember, in the middle of all of the chaos today, don't forget what today is all about!  Count your blessings and pay attention to what you are thankful for.

Fun and games!

     Who says we have to grow up?  This evening Kelli, mother, Jill and some friends of theirs had the final night of a bible study they've been doing.  So dad and I decided to go get a bite to eat somewhere to give them mom and dads house without us silly boys getting in the way.  We had a good meal at Boston's while watching a little college basketball, then we headed over to Dicks Sporting Goods to kill a few minutes until the girls were done.

     

     The Dicks in the valley mall has a putting green next to their putter display and it only took dad and I about two minutes before we were in the middle of a putting contest!  We'd been there for about a half hour when an employee walked by and said, "putting contest guy?, I like it!"  We knew he understood, here it is 25 degrees outside and we were just a couple fellow golfers in dire need of some competitive action!  Well shortly after he saw us, and no doubt wanted to join in, we upped the anty by only allowing of the use of the same putter twice before having to switch.  One of the benefits of having about 20 different types of putters all around you!  We kind of lost track of score, although I'm pretty sure I had him beat, and almost an hour after we got there we headed home.  

     I couldn't help but think on the way back to their house to pick up Kelli about all of the putting contests I have been in with my dad.  I can't remember the last time he and I were near a putting green and didn't get into some sort of game.  And every time this happens I am immediately taken back to when I was a kid and he would have these putting games with all of us kids.  When I was younger it seemed like every ball that left the face of his putter went in the hole!  Not much has changed over the years, other than my competitiveness, he still seems to make nearly everything he stands over when he's playing a game against me!  These games always make me feel like a kid again and whether they're on the artificial green in a store, or on the practice green at Augusta National(a guy can dream right:), I look forward to having many more!  One of these days I might even beat the ol man!:)

Remember, if you start to feel like a kid again, don't panic, it's a good thing!  A very good thing!:)

Fridays!

     Man how I love Fridays!  I swear if I have one day that is more succeptable to crazy things happening than any other it's Friday.  This week I thought maybe I would be getting a good day today as yesterday Duchess had surgery to remove a tumor from her eyelid and not only did the procedure go very well, she is recovering at a record pace!  The doctor said she'd be pretty groggy and slow moving for at least two days but she was back to full speed by the time she went to bed last night!  So with the weeks biggest hurdle behind us I thought today would be pretty mellow. 

     My theory was initially busted right away this morning when I went to fill the girls water dish the faucet that I normally get the water from was frozen solid!  Our house has two outside faucets and neither one is frost free, which means they are exposed to the elements unless you shut the water off to them.  So I went dounstairs and tried to do just that but the gate valve that shuts it off is seized up and wouldn't budge.  I had to get going for work so I decided to resolve my frozen water issue later, in hopes that it would warm up enough to not split the line and flood my basement!

     Seconds after arriving at dads for work, I took a bite out of a cookie mother had set out for us and a large chunk of one of my teeth came off with it!!  Kelli's obviously my go to for dental advice so I texted her to tell her the great news and see what she thought I should do.  She was in a CPR certification class with all of her co-workers so she asked me to try and take a picture of it so they could all access the damage and see if I needed immediate attention or not.  Now i don't know if you've ever tried taking a selfie of our own teeth before but I can tell you it is a lot harder than you'd think!  I took two different pics and sent them to my council, they reviewed them and reassured me I was going to make it:). So I called the dentist and luckily got an appointment to go have it looked at Monday morning!  I was a little shocked since it's thanksgiving week next week but happy they were able to get me in!

     On the way home, a little lighter than when I'd left, I stopped and picked up some insulation boxes for our outside faucets.  Thankfully by the time I returned the back one had unthawed so hopefully well be okay for now!  So at the end of the day all is well that ends well:). I guess I just have to look at it as if I didn't have Fridays what would I have to talk about?  Without all of these fun little life's lessons they would just be another day!  Hopefully today's lessons are over however as I can only handle a couple a week:)

Remember, even if you think your having the worst day possible there's somebody out there who would trade you days in a second!

Pure happiness

     This past Sunday I finally got my ol girl Duchess out for a duck hunt.  Starting around the first week in October she begins to sense that waterfowl season is upon us and she gets a little more excited each day!  Between house projects and work our opportunities to get out kept passing by but we finally kicked the season off, and it couldn't have come at a better time, Duch goes in for her eye surgery this Thursday!

     So we got up at the crack of 2:30, yes AM, and headed out to pick up our guide for the day, a buddy of ours who lives in Hayden.  Once we picked him up we drove another 1 1/2 hours north past Sandpoint, ID to the Kootenai national wildlife refuge.  This place is about 20 miles from Canada and serves as a hidden oasis for duck hunters!  According to the bird count on their website there were about 9600 birds there last week!

     Aside from the ample amount of birds to hunt with views like this surrounding you it's easy to justify the 2 hour drive!  We got into the birds fast and within the first hour had four mallards down.  Duchess once again made me proud as she went after each bird with the enthusiasm of a puppy, even though she's 11!

     I know she's not the perfect huntinndog in the world, but as I recently told another buddy of mine who has a lab of his own, the guy who says his dog is perfect probably doesn't hunt with them that often!  I am in firm belief that labs are like little kids when they go hunting and can only contain their excitement so long!  But Duchess imperfections are often followed by some of the most amazing retrieves I've ever seen!  Usually about the time she makes me angry for whining when I can't seem to hit anything, I sail a duck so far away I can hardly see it and she swims a half a mile faster than Micheal Phelps could then drops the bird at my feet and sits down ready to go again!  

     An when it's all said and done and were hiking back to the truck with a string of birds, she has the look in her eyes of pure happiness!  I've seen the same look every time we go hunting since the first time 10 years ago, and it never gets old.  When I see this look in her eyes I am reminded of the big picture and thankful that I have been blessed to be the man who has been allowed to provide these moments of happiness for Duchess!  She truly has been a good dog her entire life, Lord knows I out her through some rough patches in the beginning while I was trying to straighten myself out, but her loyalty has never waivered.  She has looked up to me with the same level of adoration from day one!  And as she gets older every year, and her body takes longer to recover from a hunt than her mind does, I am even more grateful of each outing we get to go on.  Each one bringing both of us to that place of pure happiness:)

Remember, it's the little moments in life that stick with us all forever!

Perseverance

     Well our kitchen floor renovation is completed and the only word I can use to describe it is the one in the title, perseverance!  Our originaly plan of simply removing the existing tile to expose and refinish hardwood floors vanished immediately as once we got the tile up we were surprised to see the vinyl tiles underneath the ceramic tile had been glued to the hardwoods with an asphalt based glue!  I tried to remove it without chipping the wood and got about one square foot section in almost an hour.  So I called my interior designer, Kelli, who was out picking up paint and other supplies and asked her to do the hardest thing a designer has to do, make a last minute change of plans on short notice so the project could still be finished by the end of the weekend.  

     I left this morning to come down to Klamath Falls, OR for work for a couple days and we knew we had to get the kitchen back in operation before then so Kelli went to work coming up with an alternative plan for the floor.  Our first thought was retile it, but neither one of us likes tile that much and theres no way it would get done in time.  Then we thought of a laminate type floor, we went to a couple places and actually found one we liked and nearly bought it but opted to take a sample home first to see how it would look.  Then the Pinterest Gods came to Kelli and she had the thought of doing a finished plywood floor, an idea that is all over Pinterest and actually looked pretty cool.  So at about 6pm on Saturday night we got back home with sheets of plywood ready to be cut down to strips and made into a floor!

     Sunday was a long day as we got up early and got after it as soon as we thought we could without ticking off the neighbors.  Ten minutes into the day we ran into another speed bump when the air compressor we were using of Dad's quit working!  I made some phone calls to rental places and got some prices while I waited to hear back from Dad to see if he'd taken his back up compressor down to Arizona or not, turns out he hadn't and after he brought it over we were off and running again, at the crack of 2pm!  We managed to get all of the flooring down the same day, well technically it was Sunday morning by about an hour before we wrapped up for the day:)  We fell asleep immediately, feeling like we were on an episode of Renovation Realities, and my alarm went off in what felt like 20 minutes later so I could pick up stain for the floor right when Home Depot opened up.

     So we applied a coat of stain, and let it dry for the day while I did some work and took a trip to the dump, then applied two coats of sealant and our project was done!  When it was all said and done we ended up with new paint throughout, including a chalk board wall that you can kind of see in the pictures, and a kitchen floor that we love!  We had some definite trials and tribulations through this project, but we learned two improtant lessons, keep at it until the finish and you'll most likely be happy with the results, and never start a project like this when you have a time limit!  Obviously we've learned nothing from all of those episodes of Renovation Realities where almost no one meets their deadline!  In the end though it all worked out and we couldn't be happier, now it's break time for both our wallets and our bodies to mend before the next project!:)

Remember, sometimes during trying times a little bit of perseverance is all that you need:)

What did we get into?!

     Ah home renovations!  What a wonderful way for one to test your mental stability.  Kelli and I have known since the day we moved into this house that there was going to need to be some updating done to it.  It was in good shape and the previous owner had done some nice things to it, like refinish the hardwood floors, but he also did some not so nice things to it, like the tile in the kitchen!  We also knew that the water heater that was installed two year before Kelli was born would probably have to be replaced:)

     So as we've been making this house out own, room by room, we've completed painting the living room, hallway, and entryway.  We updated the fireplace with new tile on the floor, painting the brick face and old brass doors, and I built a new mantle for it.

     All of these little projects went smooth and our next big move was being narrowed down to three things, kitchen floor, water heater, and new interior doors because the existing ones have been painted so many times they don't open or shut right.  Kelli quickly prioritized the water heater as taking a nice hot shower is one of life's luxuries he simply can't go without, and she said she was getting pretty tired of setting a new land speed record for shaving each time:)

     So we bought a new water heater as well as about 30' of PEX pipe so I could relocate the water heater from the middle of nowhere to next to the furnace.  This project went really well, probably because it was not the first water heater I've replaced:), so we got a little eager and decided to jump into the kitchen floor last night!

     The tile in the kitchen is the one thing the former owner of this house did that is my biggest pet peeve!  It looks like he didn't use any spacers cause the grout lines are all different, and the tiles are all even and comin loose in certain spots.  Since my office is in the small room of the kitchen that has the same tile i look at it every day and want to tear it out every day!

     So last night we started tearing it up with the intentions of hopefully revealing more hardwoods, and if not then just retiling it the right way.  The good news is we found hardwoods, the bad news is its underneath asphalt based tiles!  After hours of contemplation of wether to retile over the asphalt tiles or remove all of it and refinish the hardwoods, we decided to reveal the wood!  

     The only big problem will be the amount of time and work involved with removing the old flooring, I know it won't be very fun but I have to keep reminding myself that it will be worth it when were done!  Isn't that the words many of us live by half way through our home reno's?  I know nice said them many times before!  If not those words I know we've all uttered "what did we get ourselves into" in the middle of a home repair that has gone wrong!  Most times I feel like there should be cameras following us around for a reality show!  But all we can do is keep rolling with the punches and keep our eyes on the finish line.  Just try not to loose sight of that line:)

Remember, sometimes trial and error is the only option you have:)

Fall fun and fowl

     Man where does the time go?!  It seems as though it was just yesterday that I was dusting off my golf clubs to go hit a bucket of balls with Dad on a chilly spring morning.  Now the golf clubs have more or less been rendered idle for the year, barring a trip down to Mom and Dad's Arizona house, and the camo has been pulled out of the closet!  You've read about our bowhunt for elk on here and I haven't hunted with my rifle since I picked up a bow so my big game season is pretty much over so now it's on to the wild animal that really gets my blood pumping, ducks!

   I hunted waterfowl a few times growing up but it wasn't until I moved to Conrad, MT and got my baby girl Duchess that I really got interested in the sport.  Since getting a dog who pretty much lives to retrieve my desire to bird hunt has only grown stronger each year!  Duchess has been an amazing dog over the years, showing me some of the most awe inspiring retrieves one could imagine.  She's had so many of them it's hard to share all of them but one sticks out above the others, we were hunting outside of Laurel, MT on the Yellowstone river when the buddy of mine that was with us winged a goose and it sailed all the way out into the middle of the river which was starting to freeze up so it had little icebergs flowing down it.  Duch never hesitated, she swan out to the wounded bird, picked it up and began swimming back to me, getting slammed by icebergs along the way!  I ran down the river bank to shorten the distance she had to swim and all I could think of was how I was going to go get her when one of the chunks of ice took her under!  Thankfully this never happened and she eventually made it back to me and I'll never forget the look in her eyes as she sat there shivering in my arms, looking up at me with a face that simply said lets go do that again!

    
     Duchess turned 11 in June and as much as she seems to defy the odds of aging I know her hunting years are numbered so I take each hunt were on as a blessing in itself.  She has been an extremely healthy dog her whole life but recently she had a small growth show up on her eyelid.  We took her in to an optician, yes they actually have a pet optician, and she's going in to have it frozen off and sent in for testing in a couple weeks.  The vet was pretty optimistic that it was not a cancerous tumor but never the less I know I am going to treat every hunt we go on this year that much more special!
     So as the days start getting shorter and the thermometer becomes more resistant to showing warm temperatures, I know at least two of us who are eager for the snow to fly! 

Remember, if you try hard enough you can usually find a silver lining in every situation we come across in life, the trick to happiness is being open to trying to find it:)

One of the Great Ones

     Many of us have those special souls in our life who have the impressive ability to put us in a good mood no matter what we are dealing with.  This past week two of those souls in my life left this earth. 
     Leo Balcer passed away last Tuesday and for those of you who did not have the privilege of knowing Leo I can tell you that he will be missed by many people for a long time!  He owned a small in and out restaurant in my hometown of Glendive called Frosty's, which will forever be at the top of my list of favorite places to eat for two items on the menu, potato salad and milkshakes!  My family has been friends with all of the Blacer's for as long as I can remember and one of my fondest childhood memories was when Curt and I were lucky enough to join Dad at Leo's to watch a pay per view boxing match on the big screen!  Leo had one of the original big screen TVs, you know the ones that they pretty much had to build your house around they were so big, and I remember sitting in front of that TV feeling like Evander Hollyfield's right hook was going to hit me he seemed so big!  Leo was also a very avid golfer and with as much time we spent at the course we got to play a lot of golf with him.  It's funny how little tiny details of our lives stick with us forever, like how every single putt I stand over with the same old Wilson 8802 putter I've had for 15 years I give myself the confidence to make the putt by hearing Leo's voice in my head the time he said, "you have one of the smoothest putting strokes I've ever seen", just after I made a 25' snake on number 5 during men's league.  Or how to this day when I'm playing in a scramble and we have a long approach to a par five I still use an old trick, a completely legal trick by the way, Leo taught me in the hospital scramble one year when I was just 17, I can't tell you the trick of course cause I still like to think I'm the only one he ever shared this with:)  Later in life when I had a place of my own I was lucky enough to live just a couple blocks away from Leo and our friendship continued to grow, as I matured I began to realize just how special of a person he was, always in a good mood and never putting himself ahead of anyone.  The world truly will miss Leo Balcer, he was a man we could all learn something from and should aspire ot be more like.  All I know is right now he's undoubtedly up in heaven helping God work on his Texas wedge game, sinking putts from off the green on all of the great courses of his dreams!

     Jill and Ryan's dog Pugsley had to be sent ot heaven last night and if you ever met Pug's you know how great of a loss this is for sure.  Pug's came into the Nagle family way back in Jill's law school days.  He was adopted from a shelter and in no time at all became one of the family.  He and Ryan became best buddies immediately, almost as if they'd known each other their entire lives.  Pugsly was a mix between a boxer and a pug and he had probably the biggest heart of any dog I've ever met.  He was about 35 pounds or so, and if you let him he would climb up on the couch with you and snuggle in to share his love with you whenever he could!  Our dog's came to know and love Pug's like a brother, every time we'd take them to the ranch he would run around with them happily showing them every square inch of his playground.  After we moved here he would even come over for some sleepovers when his family went on vacation which only strengthened his bond with his cousins.  He was one of the most protective, caring dogs I've ever seen, not letting anyone suspicious get close to his family.  He would go on runs with Jill to get a little exercise and protect her, and then come home and literally lay at the foot of the kid's bed's as they wen to sleep making sure no one was going to come in and harm his family!  The last few weeks of his life here on earth were kind of tough as the tumors grew faster each day, all of that pain is gone now though as he has passed over to eternal life.  There is no doubt in my mind that he is up there with Ryan's dad right now roaming around his new playground pain free!  

     These two souls both meant so much to me that words simply could not describe, they truly were each respectively one of the great ones!   

Remember, all of us know on of the great ones, cherish them and treasure each moment you share with them while they are here!

FFF (Fall Fishing Fun!)

     Yesterday morning I had a sscheduled check up on my ear with my ENT doctor over in Missoula so Kelli and I decided to take advantage of it by spending the weekend in Stevensville with her parents.  It was the perfect opportunity for the girls to do a little shopping and the boys to do a little fishing!  Dan has been fishing the Bitteroot river about 3 times a week and has become quite familiar with a few really good holes that consistantly produce fish.  So Saturday morning Kelli and I drove over and I dropped her off in Missoula with Donna and raced down to Stevi to meet up with my guide for the weekend.  We quickly got our fishing gear put togethor and headed down to Dan's favorite spot, a hole where he almost always catches fish.  

     We got to the spot, suited up and waded out across the frigid waters to access the hole.  After surveying the hole we could see some fish feeding on the surface so at my guides request I tied on a purple haze dry fly while he gave the nymph he had on already a try just upstream of me.  It wasn't long before Dan had us off and running by pulling a whitefish out of the top side of this hole.  Moments later I was hooked up in battle with a nice littel rainbow!  In the next 2 hours we each got into a great number of fish, I landed four rainbows all in the 13"-15" range and Dan caught 2 bows of his own along with a few more whitefish!  For fly fishing in October we were pretty excited about our day!

     On our way back to the car forthe day Dan wanted to give another hole he's had success in one quick try cause he's caught a 16" cutthroat out of it before.  After I gave his nymph a few tries he took over and on his last cast of the day hooked up with another nice 16" fish!  It was a great way to finish off a fantastic day on the water!

     The next morning we came back to the same spot and continued upstream fishing the whole way up.  Dan once again got into the whitefish and when we had fished our way back to the original spot we both got back into the rainbows, catching 3 more, these ones caught in a Cowboys jersey by me as it was game day!  We then went back home so I could get settled in for the game and after eating some of Dan's world fameous ribs we watched the Cowboys roll their way to a much needed win!  All in all the weekend could not have been too much better, spent some quality time with Kelli's parents and had a ton of fun the whole weekend!  We always have fun when we go over there but it certainly is a little more fun for me at least when we can have days like this on the water!:)

Remember, your only goal when fishing in October is to stay upright, anything else is just a bonus! 

Unexpected perks

     Last weekend Kelli and I volunteered to help our friends the Ralston's move the rest of their belongings from Missoula to their new home in Seattle.  It was a no brainer for us since they're some of our best friends and it gave us a good opportunity to go back to Seattle, a town we simply love spending time in!  On Friday morning before we left for Missoula I was over working at dad's when I got a rather nice unexpected change in plans.  One of the grape growers in the San Juan islands that we insure had turned in a claim and needed a field visit!  This would have taken quite a bit more planning had I not already planned on being a couple hours away from the vineyard.
     So we headed out to Missoula, spent a short night with Kelli's parents, then loaded up a trailer and a 20' Uhaul and headed west.  We had all hands on deck in order to get it all loaded and still get on the road at a decent time, Bryant and Hailey, her parents, Kelli and I, and the Dobson's.  Unfortunately for Dan and Donna we don't really feel right doing a move of any kind without involving them:)  They were troopers though and greatly appreciated as always as Dan, the tetris master, was finding spots for items that simply didn't exist to the normal eye!  By the time we got loaded up and made the roughly 9 hour trip over to Seattle, it was all we could do to muster enough energy to move at least the mattresses in so we had something to crash on.
   

Our moving crew found some killer eye wear!

    The next morning we got up fairly early and went for a walk around Greenlake, it's a small lake near their house that has a 3.5 mile walk path around it and a Starbucks on the corner, the quick walk loosened our muscles back up and the coffee helped kick start a full day of moving!  We had to rush when we got back to the house cause the Cowboys played in the afternoon and since Bryant is as big of a Dallas fan as I am we weren't about to let moving in prevent us from watching the game!  We took a break in the afternoon and went to a local sports bar where I literally lost my voice yelling at a TV as my beloved boys gave the Broncos a run for their money!  Much like many times before the game ended in heartbreak for me but never the less I remained optimistic about my team, pretty much a necessity if your going to be a Cowboys fan!
     After unpacking the rest of the stuff and putting bed frames and furniture together I finally got to bed around 11, normally not a problem but I had to be on the road for work by 4 the next morning!  Thus far in my short crop insurance career I had yet to experience a claim anything like this one.  This vineyard visit would require punctual timing in order for Kelli and I to make it back to Spokane before the wee hours of Tuesday.  First I would have to drive an hour and a half north of Seattle to the town of Annacortez, there I would board a ferry out to the island, I would have exactly 2 hours to complete my tasks in the vineyard before the ferry left for the mainland, finished off with about a 6 hour trip back home.  Luckily I made it to the ferry on time, having never taken a car on a ferry before I allowed myself a little extra time, then the visit at the vineyard went exactly as planned and I left the growers driveway at 9:08 for the ferry that left at 9:20!  When I got back to the ferry it was 9:12 and I figured they had to be boarding but I had no idea which line of cars I needed to be in, there are ferry's going to 3 different islands so I had to make sure I was on the right one!  I drove past a huge line of cars before finally spotting a sign telling me the line of cars is where I needed to be, so I turned around and by the time I got to the back of the line one more car had slipped in front of me!  I was kind of sweating bullets cause the grape grower had just told me that this 9:20 ferry only takes 50 cars and the next ferry isn't until 1:30.  If I didn't get on this one we wouldn't get home til the wee hours since they shut down I-90 for 2 hours right when we would be getting there to blow up rocks!  When the line started moving I felt pretty good about my chances until they stopped the car right in front of me.  I was thinking they were making room for one more, him, and I would be screwed.  Turns out they were making room for two more and I was the last one on!
    

 Last one on, last one off

 nice little getaway

another giant water taxi

    

viewing deck right above the cars

     Once on the ferry and headed towards the mainland again I got out of the truck and went up to the cafe for a hot cup of coffee to sip while I walked around the viewing deck and took in what I couldn't see in the morning when it was still dark.  I was shocked at how beautiful the ferry ride was, every island we passed was covered in such a dark green they appeared like life sized 3-D paintings!  When I got back to the city and picked up Kelli, I couldn't help but reflecting on just how lucky I am to be able to do what I just did for a day job!  I am extremely blessed an many ways and almost every single day I am reminded of this by yet another one of life's unexpected perks!:)

Remember, the only person you need to be better than is the person you were yesterday!!

Pandemonium

     Last Thursday Ryan and I had planned on returning to Boulder for one final crack at filling our freezers with elk meat with a bow.  Our hunt was slightly postponed because of an apple appraisal that we had to help out with over in Quincy, WA Thursday morning but even though we knew we would be in for a long day we were excited and up for it!  We hit the road  just after 5 am and were picking apples in near 70 degree weather by lunchtime.  After a quick trip back to Spokane we loaded up and headed towards camp just after 3 pm.  Now earlier in the week Ryan had asked his brother to ship him a wall tent that was hanging in the barn at their shop for years.  We'd been looking at them for a year, nearly buying a couple different ones, before Ryan remembered about the one in the barn.  The only glitch in our plan was his brother didn't find time to ship it so Ryan had to get it on the Greyhound last minute and we were to pick it up in Butte on the way through!  Luckily the tent caught it's connection bus from Glendive to Butte and made it just in time for Curt's wife Jen to pick it up for us, you'll have to ask her about the Butte bus depot if you want the rest of that fun story:)  So with tent in hand we were off to camp.  
    Butte had seen some abnormally early winter weather last week and the closer we got to camp the colder the temp got as well as the more snow we ran into!  Curtis had pulled the camper into a good spot just about a mile lower than where we had intended on setting up the tent and as we crept up the mountain road towards Curt I anxiously watched the temp fall lower and lower.  By the time we got to the tent site the truck temp read 28!  So we did what any clear thinking people would do and began to set up our tent at midnight under the lights of the truck in sub freezing weather.  We really lucked out though and the tent was an external frame style, much like the ones I guided out of years ago, so with some help retrieving lodge poles from Curt along with the pent up excitement of 11 hours of windshield time thinking about elk we went to work and had the tent ready for use around 1:30 am!  Curtis headed back to the camper for bed and Ryan and I spent the next hour and a half trying to find wood dry enough to keep a fire going!  

  

Base camp

One happy elk hunter

    So we finally got to sleep and began dreaming of stalking a big bull, that was until Ryan started dreaming that he was on fire only to wake up to a wall tent full of smoke and canvas on fire!  The tent never had a stove pipe jack on it, just a hole cut through the front of the canvas, and as we stoked up the fire the pipe got hot enough to ignite the canvas!  Once we got that situation under control we were back to bed.  The next morning we slept in for a while from our late night excursion, and took a short still hunt through the timber behind the camper.  We saw nothing and Curt had the good idea to take the quads for a cruise to some different areas and see if we can use the snow to our advantage and try to spot some fresh tracks to at least see where the elk had been.  So we split up and Ryan went one way and Curt and I the other, after a short while Curt and I got on top of a big hill and as soon as we shut off the quads we heard a bugle!  Then another, and another, over and over again, bulls just talking to each other all over this small ridge in front of us!  We waited for Ryan to meet up with us then raced back to camp because dad was on his way in and we knew just where to go for an evening hunt!

    

Action, Curt, and Me

     Around 4:30 we all four headed in from the bottom of the ridge up towards all the action.  I left my bow in camp as I was going to attempt to lure one of these bulls in front of one of the other three.  We had to cross over a little finger ridge to get into the draw that I knew we had to be in and as soon as we did we began to hear the elk again.  We worked up the draw slowly closing the gap between us and the elk and we'd been on this ridge enough in the past to know that at the top of this draw was a huge meadow, it certainly sounded like all of the bulls were in or near this meadow.  

     I waited until we were a few hundred yards from the meadow and began bugling back and forth to the other bulls.  One responded immediately, then another from my left side, then a third from behind the first one!  I played cat and mouse with these three bulls for about 20 minutes with the three shooters fanned out in front of me and after none of the bulls came in any closer we decided to slowly close the gap.  We crept up the draw fanned out like a front line of soldiers, me bugling back and forth to the bulls the whole way up.  The closer we got to the meadow the more elk we were hearing!  Once we got on the edge of the meadow we could hear cows out there with the bulls and we noticed that there were pockets of pine trees scattered through the meadow along with 5' high sage brush!  The elk were nearly impossible to see!  Dad and Curt had swung to my right side to get to the other side of the meadow and I went over to Ryan's side to follow him up the left side.  All three of our shooters had begun cow calling a little bit and just as Ryan did a nice bull came walking down the edge of the meadow and stopped just in front of him.  Ryan had no time to use his range finder and guessed the bull to be 40 yards and shot, he must have been a little farther cause his shot just missed low and the bull spun and lunged into the protection of the thick timber!

     Ryan stayed there to look for his arrow and make certain he drew no blood and with darkness approaching us I swiftly moved farther up the meadow, keeping the rest of the bulls interested.  I had no idea where Curt or dad were by now but i kept working towards this small thicket of pine trees where I had the attention of a bull that sounded too good to not see with my own eyes!  I kept inching my way from sage brush to sage brush bugling each time I would move, getting within about 30 yards of where I knew the big boy was, and with no shooter anywhere near me!  To my surprise I then heard the unmistakable sound of Curt's cow call!  He was no farther than 50 yards to my right!  I thought this is it!  It was perfect, Curt cow called one more time and I moved about 20 feet closer to the bull and screamed a big challenge bugle at him, he immediately replied, almost covering me up and I thought I was going to see him come out of the trees any second.  He never came out though, only causing my heart to skip a few beats and the hair on my neck to stand on end.  I left him alone and worked my way over to Curt and by now it was dark enough I couldn't see him until he looked at me.  I bugled one more time to see what else was out there and a nice 5x5 came charging in right at Curt only to turn and head the other way when the wind switched directions!

     We turned on our head lamps and reconvened, Ryan never found any blood from his shot on the powdery white snow so we headed down the mountain.  Dad filled us all in on the way down of how good the bull I was tormenting was as he had a real good look at the bull and all the action from across the meadow, all we could do was shake our heads about what just happened.  By my count I had 6 different bulls respond to a call, all of them no farther than a 100 yards from each other!!!  I had never seen nor heard anything like it before in my life!  

     We got a good nights rest, all I could hear were bugles as I drifted to sleep, and then next morning we woke up to go try to find a mule near the camper while we waited for the evening hunt on the elk.  Ryan got a mule doe mid morning, made a fantastic shot on her from 43 yards, and once we had her hanging back at camp it was time to go in again. 

    

     We went to the same ridge as the night before because that afternoon we had spotted a huge 6 point feeding out into a meadow up high so we knew the elk were still up there!  This time we hiked to the top of the same meadow from a different angle and split up, dad and Curt went low and Ryan and I went high.  Dad and Curt saw no elk and three other hunters so they're hike was cut pretty short.  Ryan and i got up in the same meadow we'd seen the big bull earlier, I asked Ryan which way he thought the bull had fed, across the meadow or back into the timber.  He said he had a hunch he went back into the timber and his hunch was right cause we weren't 200 yards into the timber and we found him!  He was feeding his way down the mountain with two cows.  We glassed him for a minute, ranged him at 118 yards, and I bugled at him with nothing more than a look back!  I couldn't believe it, we knew this was the same bull I had all riled up the night before because he was exactly how Dad described him and in practically the same spot, and he wanted nothing to do with me tonight!  So we followed him and his cows down the hill, never getting any closer than we first were right up until dark.  

     As Ryan and I worked our way off the mountain I told him this was one of the best elk hunts of my life.  Ryan is a true bow hunter so no words were necessary to explain why the best hunt of my life didn't involve killing anything!

     We spent another good night in the wall tent and instead of still hunting timber after elk opted to rest our bodies and minds a little before tearing down camp and heading back home.  I've thought about that Friday night hunt every single night since then and no matter how many times I play it over in my head in an attempt to figure out what we should have done differently I keep coming up with the same answer, nothing.  God puts these majestic creatures on this planet not just to provide nourishment to our families, but also to allow us to feel as thought we are one of them, even if it's only for a second.  In my opinion there is not many things on this earth more humbling and spiritual than holding a conversation with a big bull elk on his turf, on his time!  These experiences make me feel both extremely large and yet very tiny.  That will only make sense to a few of you but for those of you who don't understand what I'm saying, trust me it is a very powerful experience!  So the book is closed on another bow season and once again my mind is filled with happy thoughts from both the hunts and the camp, now I just have 350 odd days to calm myself down until next season!

Remember, if looked at in the right way every hunt is successful, sometimes the ones where nothings brought home are the most successful!

Bring on fall!

     It has been a couple weeks since I posted on here for a couple reasons.  One, because for the past three weeks we have been in a continuous battle with Century Link to repair our internet service which appears to have finally been remedied, at least for now.  And two, because we have jumped right into fall with the same amount of recreational business that we had this summer!  So before a squirrel chews another hole in my internet line, honestly what they said probably caused the problem, I'll update you all on our fall fun!
     Two weekends ago Dad, Curt, Ryan and I all met up over south of Boulder, MT for opening weekend of elk season!  The weather was supposed to be hot all weekend but we went into opening day filled with excitement as Dad and Ryan had watched about 80 elk feeding into the bottoms the night before so we knew we were going to have a pretty good chance of getting into them.  Opening morning we devised a plan to hike into the timber line long before sunrise in anticipation of catching the elk coming back into the trees from feeding all night in a hay field on the bottom.  Not being able to sleep with the visions of big bull elk dancing in my head, I got out of bed at about 3AM and slowly the rest of camp got up as well and we headed into the dark timber just before 5AM.  Dad and Curt set up on one side of a big draw and Ryan and I went to the other.  Unfortunately no elk came by us at first light but it wasn't long before Ryan spotted a nice bull with a few cows about half a mile up the mountain feeding in a meadow.  We quickly closed the gap between us and the elk and I sent out a bugle, but with no response we had no choice but to try to sneak up on them in the trees.  We finally found the bull but never got any closer than about a hundred yards and didn't get a good shot.  We still hunted the timber all the way back to camp with no luck the rest of the day.
    

    The following day we slept in a little since the elk clearly weren't bugling yet, and headed into a different spot to still hunt more timber.  Just Ryan and I went in this time as Dad and Curt had a different plan of checking out another area on the four wheelers.  We hiked straight up gaining 500' of elevation in about half a mile and immediately came upon a cow elk in her bed!  Ryan got ready with an arrow and slowly crept closer to the cow as we were about 60 yards away and he needed to close the gap for a better shot.  As he did this his eyes caught another cow who had gotten out of her bed and was onto us.  Without hesitation Ryan ranged her at 40 yards, drew back his bow and let an arrow fly!  His arrow was redirected form it's course just before reaching the elk by a tree branch and both cows busted down the mountain!  Even though the tree branch ruined it for him we were both completely amped up after that!  We kept working down the mountain running into elk over and over again and towards the end of the day we came across a spike bull in full velvet, Ryan had a clear shot at him form about 30 yards but unfortunately spikes are the only illegal elk in these mountains!
   

     All in all we had a blast as we always do and it was the perfect way to kick start a busy fall for us!  We plan on going back in this week with hopefully a few more talkative elk that are easier to get onto!  And if not, we'll at least get a few more days soaking up what is in my opinion God's most magnificent accomplishment!

Remember, sometimes the best remedy for whatever it is that ails you is some peace and quiet in the woods!

Water, water, and more water!

     In the past couple of weeks Kelli and I have spent enough time on, around, and near water that I am starting to feel a little bit like a fish!  It started two weekends ago when we got invited to join the Nagle clan up at Priest Lake in North Idaho for a weekend of camping.  We rented two inflatable stand up paddle boards, which we've all been dying to try since first seeing them while in Hawaii, and along with our canoe we had plenty of watercraft to enjoy the lake with!  We got there Friday afternoon and immediately set up our tents and set out for the water.  The SUP's were everything we had hoped they would be, even the sun dropping below the mountains was nearly not enough to get us off of them.
     We came back to our camp, which was just a short walk from the waters edge, and filled our bellies with some amazing pulled pork sandwiches that Ryan had prepared.  The rest of our evening was spent hanging out around the campfire until we were paid a visit by a park ranger who easily stood 6'10" and I was asked to move our car to the overflow parking area.  "Tall Timmy" as Kelli called him was very polite but this would not be the last time we saw him:)  So once the car was moved we let the fire burn out and got some rest for a busy day!

     The next morning I rose early and started to make coffee before the sun was even streaking through the trees, I was only alone for a few minutes as the Nagles tent soon erupted with two kids who did not like sleeping in a tent very well!  The first words out of Ryan's mouth, even before both eyes were open, were "we need to get a camper"!  We got some coffee in both he and Jill and ate a big breakfast before heading down to the beach area for a day fill of adventure!  We laid on the beach, paddle boarded, and canoed for a few hours before heading back to camp for a nap.  The kids took a nap under Kelli and Ryan's supervision while Jill and I drove down to check out the other state park campground to see if we wanted to try it out next year or just come back to this one.  These campsites fill up for the season in the first couple months of the year so we decided to scout things out now so we could make a reservation next January.  When we got back we took off on our final adventure of the day which was a 5 mile drive followed by a 2 mile hike up the mountain across the road from camp.  Jill had done some research and found a natural water slide that we simply had to check out.  The hike was pretty brutal, I had the Jax man on my back and I thought he was coming out the top a couple of times!  But once we got to the water slide we forgot all about the hike!  There was something really special about riding down a shale rock that has about an inch of water flowing over the top of it and grabbing on to the ski rope at the bottom if you'd built up too much speed to stop!  It was both extremely exciting and scary at the same time!  You'll have to check out Jill's blog if you want to see pictures cause all I got were videos of the craziness.  Once we were done with the slide we hiked a little farther to check out a beautiful waterfall at the top then came back down to camp for a spaghetti dinner followed by yet another evening of paddle boarding.
     The next morning we packed up all our gear, in the rain I should add, then took the boards down for one more ride.  I think it's safe to say that someday I will own one of these boards as I simply didn't want to get off of it! 

     The next weekend we continued our water theme by hosting the Vollertson family, some friends of ours from Kalispell, while they combined a doctors visit for their daughter with a family trip to Silverwood theme park.  We had a lot of fun all weekend!  Friday while Kelli worked I took them through nearly all of Manito park, then took them downtown to Riverfront park where the kids got to play on the worlds largest radio flyer wagon!  Then we barbecued at our house and got up the next morning to go to Silverwood.  There's two sides to Silverwood, a theme park side with regular rides and a water park side with water slides and wave pools.  We started out on the theme park side and after we got warmed up with a spin on the tilt a whirl and the octopus we were ready to tackle a roller coaster!  They have two wooden coasters there and we decided to try the "Timber Tremors" first.  If your thinking the name should have caught our attention and made us think twice your absolutely right!  Luke sat next to his daughter, Kelli sat next to Kristi, and I sat next to their son Chase.  Luke asked the girl strapping us in if this one is fun and she said "if you like 50mph with a 200' drop then yeah, it's fun"  I think if any of us would have heard that before the ride started we would have bailed!  She wasn't kidding either, as soon as it takes off you head straight up then make an immediate left hand turn into said 200' drop!  Oh and the last half of the drop is inside a tunnel!!  I immediately felt myself coming off the seat so I reached over and put an arm in front of Chase cause I thought if I was coming out of mine he had to be floating in mid air!  Kelli told us when it was over that her sunglasses fell off and sat there for a split second defying gravity and Kristi snatched them out of the air saving us from buying another pair of Oakley's!  I think every one of us was literally tremoring after the ride was over so the name of the ride is very appropriate! 
     We then headed back over to the water park side where the kids had a ball on slides and riding our backs in the wave pools.  We then sat in line for about 30 minutes to ride down a water slide where all of us sat in one tube together.  Finally Luke and I climbed the stairs to the slides that go straight down and raced each other to the bottom, this was a blast until I mistakenly let my feet come apart while coming to a stop then gingerly limped away after using the wrong body part to slow myself down!  We spent the rest of the evening drying off and warming up before Chase and I hit up one last ride after we ate dinner.  As we walked out of the park Luke and I each had one of the kids on our backs and both of them were fighting to keep their eyes open by the time we got to the car. 
     All in all the last couple of weeks have been a blast!  We have got plenty of water exposure which in my opinion is the key to a good summer!  As our summer comes to a close I look forward to opening week of elk season this weekend and late season golfing which should last even longer over here!  The more I think about it I just don't think our summer will end, we're just going to carry the fun right over into winter!

Remember, you haven't had a complete summer until you've accidentally swallowed a fair amount of water that didnt' come from a faucet!