June 2018

Well, June wasn't quite as busy as May was, but it was still an action packed month! It's hard to even know where to begin.

We are in love with the summer weather here. We never got over 100 degrees, so even the hottest days weren't really all that bad. We spent lots of time visiting different parks around town, but the ones we frequent the most are the ones right here in our neighborhood. This day we took some kites the kids made and let them try their hand at flying. Erik was pretty excited about it, but Sharli mostly just wanted to go play on the toys at the park.

We also were still only a month into life in our new house, we did spend a lot of time working on getting settled. Maren loves trips to Walmart and Costco. Especially when I let her wear anything she wants. :)

We were still getting used to the new neighborhood and the new sights and sounds that come with it. One morning we were woken up fairly early by a strange sound. It sounded like the neighbors were burning the weeds in their back yard with a blow torch. I laid there for what felt like forever trying to figure out what I was hearing, and when I finally sat up to look out the window I nearly fell out of my bed. There, just exactly over the top of our neighbor's house, was a hot air balloon!

We grabbed clothes and shoes and ran out into the street to see what was going on. When it became clear that they were going to land right in the road a few houses away from us I went back in the house to get Erik and Sharli.

By the time the kids and I got back outside a moment later it was too late. The balloon had landed, quickly changed passengers, and taken off again. There were several other balloons floating nearby, and they all flew off together. It was so neat to get to see them so close.

Not all our adventures were quite that spontaneous though. We spent one Saturday walking the "Blue Line Trail" through downtown Carson City, which led us past lots of historic homes/buildings and taught us a little bit of the history of the area.

The trail starts at what once was a US Mint but is now the Nevada State Museum, led us all over the historic downtown.

There were parts of this walk the kids liked more than others. It really wasn't a terribly kid-friendly activity, but they were good sports and managed to have some fun along the way.

I decided to start a new blog about family-friendly things to do in and around Carson City, so the kids and I got serious about exploring the parks and other attractions around town. It's been a fun adventure! It's more of a reference blog though, and all of our more personal family stories will still end up here on Mississippi Mowers.

It turns out that the biggest and best parade of the year around here was the Carson Valley Days parade. They blocked off all of downtown Minden (a little town to the south of us) and the parade was great! The kids had a blast, and came home with SO much candy and other free junk.

I think our kids almost believe that parades happen so everyone can drive by THEM and see THEM. Not the other way around. They loved waving at and interacting with anyone who gave them the chance.

One thing we didn't count on being a problem was the cute little American flags that someone handed our kids during the parade. The next day Sharli and and Erik were rough housing and Sharli got tackled with the end of the flag stick in her mouth. We got to go meet our new doctor and get her all checked out to make sure her throat was okay. It was fine, just a big scratch, but it was more adventure than I liked!

We got our first taste of Fire Season around here when Ethan noticed a strange cloud forming on the horizon one evening. He called me out to come see it and we realized it was not a cloud. It was smoke. The hillside just a few miles from our house was on fire, and the blaze was expanding pretty quickly. It was too close to nightfall for any air support to come in, so they had to just let it burn all night and put it out in the morning. It was pretty incredible to watch the lights of the fire move across the hillside that evening.

In our quest to explore our new surroundings we've been scouring the internet and any other information sources we can get our hands on for ideas of places to go and things to do. Some have been fairly simple, like this Tot Trek organized by the city to get kids out hiking the trails. We ended up making some new friends on this little hike that have opened the door to some fun new opportunities for us.

Other activities we've gone to have been a much bigger deal. Like the Saturday we spent at the Nevada Outdoor Experience. The kids got to see and do and learn so many fun things! This rock climbing wall was the first thing we saw as we walked over from the parking lot, and the kids were in line for it in a heartbeat. We were a little surprised when Sharli ended up being the more daring of our two climbers, but they both had a marvelous time.

In addition to rock climbing, the kids got to see animal skulls, live reptiles, practice milking a cow, shooting a wrist rocket, try their hand at metal detecting, panning for gold, and even archery.

I loved how all the people running the booths were willing to get down on the kids' level and help them get the most out of the experience. Even little Maren was never denied a chance to try her hand at something unless her size was a safety concern (such as with the rock climbing wall).

And oh my heavens, all the free stuff we came home with! Hats, bags, coloring books, duck calls (mom's *favorite*), and more.

The best free thing we got that day was a free lunch. Hot dogs, soda, juice, chips. The kids were in heaven!

Erik, with his engineering mind, just HAD to see how the climbing tower could possibly be taken down and hauled away on a trailer, so when it was all over we found a shady spot and watched the tear-down of the event. Erik was totally fascinated!

One thing we didn't end up doing with our kids was to get them enrolled in swim lessons. We did, however, find out that there was a nation-wide program that would get kids into one free swim lesson on a certain day, so we headed down to our local pool and enjoyed an hour of free swim time with one on one instructors for each of the two older kids. Hopefully we'll get them into swim lessons next year, because they loved the little taste they got of it this day.

Another really fun, free event we went to was an open house at the little local airport. There was a huge variety of aircraft there, and the kids loved wandering around and looking at it all.

Of course there was more free junk to bring home, which is always exciting (at least for the kids).

The same day as the airport open house, the Children's Museum was having a free admission day, so we decided to swing by there and check it out. It's one of the smaller children's museums we've been to, but it was still a lot of fun!

Erik was infatuated with this treadwall; a climbing wall that moves as you climb so you never reach the top. He spent a ton of time here that day.

The girls loved the grocery store/kitchen area, and spent a huge amount of time "cooking" food for Ethan and I to eat.

We also learned that there's a frisbee golf course just a couple miles from our house so we decided to give it a shot. It ended up being  a lot more bushwhacking through the sage brush than most of us were up to, but one of these days Ethan and I will have to go back and give it a try just the two of us. I think it would end up being a lot of fun!

Some other highlights from this month:
--We got to meet our new neighbors when we shared some spudnuts with them on National Doughnut Day. A few days later they came by and brought us a pile of warm fresh cookies. I think this is a friendship made in heaven. ;)
--Maren decided she wanted to potty train, and did a pretty good job for a few weeks. She's over it now, but at least we know we're close to having no diapers in the house some day soon(ish).
--We had our first out-of-tow family visitors when Uncle Jeff and Aunt Denise dropped by for a few hours while in town for a work training.

We ended the month of June with a three-day camping trip that took us to some really neat places, but I think that trip deserves its own post. You'll just have to wait to see where we went and what we saw.