OH MY! Dinosaurs!

So, Jurassic World theme song sounds about once every five hours around my house! The dinosaur movie has taken over our life. We have the four raptors, t-shirts and the sheet music! I never thought buying theme sheet music would make my kiddos run downstairs and randomly work on their piano skills. It is pretty cool. I went and bought Darth Vader's Death March as well as some other Hans Zimmer theme songs.

When we were in Portland we drove down the Pacific Hwy 101. Along the route was the amazing Dinosaur area. It was one of those toursity places you never stop at for a.) It costs too much money and b.) it is probably sketchy for the amount of money you will end up paying. Needless to say, we all had to go to the bathroom, so we ran in and used their facilities. The boys desperately wanted to go, but we said NO!

Instead we kept going to get to the Redwoods of California.

Two key elements for us to get a hotel is free breakfast and a pool. The pool in Newport had an amazing pool. My children, along with some friends from Kansas, had learned if they blow their water shirts up they can float along under water. We deemed them: Puffer Fish! Too darn cute. A little boy at the hotel desperately wanted to be their friend, but they ignored him completely. I am wondering if my boys are snobs, but I have come to terms with the phrase "ANTI-SOCIAL." They aren't exactly snobby, but they are standoffish and don't really like other people. I have NOOOOO idea where they get that from?!!?

New Member of the Family

For Mother's Day/Birthday I got a mini pool. We were ALL pretty excited about this new purchase. It was rough going tgetting it and I even cancelled the order. I was not at all impressed with Watsons in Clarksville, IN. Their salesman leave a lot to be desired. I left numerous phone calls and so did Prince Charming. It is never pretty when I have to get him involved.

Needless to say, six weeks after we purchased our new BullFrog Spa it arrived! It is a 8-seater that holds 500 gallons of water. It is a beast! It took four guys to get it down my hill and onto the walk out basement porch. It fits perfectly. It was meant to be there.

Did you know you can't just PLUG in a hottub? Nope. You have to wire it. AND do you think they mentioned this when we bought it? So, here I have this wonderful piece of water equipment and two little Padewans who want to swim and NADA! Such a bummer. And the worst part was we left the next day to go to Kansas. Prince Charming wasn't going with us, so he stayed and got it up and running. When we returned from KS (at 11:30 P.M.) my two little Jedi Knights were in that water! It was fun to watch.

Prince Charming and I have gotten in with them a few times and everyone is enjoying it. My Sciatic nerve has been acting up again, so I think I will start using it on a regular basis as well.

Book Review: Another Day by David Levithan

There are days when Rhiannon struggles getting out of bed knowing she has homework due which isn’t done, teachers who will bore her to tears, parents who will annoy and a boyfriend who thinks she is too needy. Rhiannon knows she will attend school and longs for the weekends to party with her friends. The thought she never has in the mornings is, “Who am I today?” She never has to question what sex she is, what town she is living in and what is on her agenda for the day. Until she meets A.

In David Levithan’s newest book, Another Day, we get to experience the other side of his original story, Every Day. In Levithan's first installment of this story we get to meet A who is in a new body each and every day of his (her) life. From his (her) earliest memories he (she) has experiences with new parents, new schools and new life choices. In Another Day we get to see, hear and feel what it is like for a "controlled life" to encounter a life full of variables. On a Spring day A meets Rhiannon. It isn’t until her boyfriend, Justin, invites her to play hooky one afternoon at school and he becomes the most intuitive, optimistic, and amazingly charming guy Rhiannon has ever met. Rhiannon cannot believe the overall change in Justin. Until she meets A.

Rhiannon keeps asking Justin to return to the beach with her, but he cannot remember the day. He cannot remember what he said and did that day. It isn’t until Rhiannon meets A that she truly understands Justin was not at the beach that day. It was A.

It is an extremely difficult task for an author to finish a standalone book much less follow it with a book with the same content, but from the other perspective. I can understand the argument Levithan's fans are stating that it didn't need a second story, but I am awed by his ability to keep me reading. How often we want to hear 'the other side of the story,' but authors don't give us this. I wonder if he may be starting a new trend?

See the rest of the view at Books & WhatNot 

Light House Inn at Crescent City

Don't stay at the Lighthouse Inn in Crescent City, CA. It was clean, but looked like we went back to the 1980s. I had booked a suite. A suite with 3 queen size beds. Yep, that is exactly what it was---but you need to remove the word "Suite" and put in room. It was a regular sized room with three queen sized beds. It was a mess. There was no way we were gonna all sleep in one big room together. YIKES.

Battery Point Lighthouse
Crescent City, CA

We did get to see a cool lighthouse. After you have seen Tybee Island Light House it is hard to see other less spectacular ones. This one was nice, but small. We had a good time exploring Battery Point. You have to see this lighthouse at low tide or it is inaccessible. Kinda a neat little tidbit of information. Where the boys are walking would be completely under water within the next hour. Obe Wan started freaking out as the tide kept creepin' in while they were exploring in the tide pools. There was all sorts of fun animals to be found in the pools. The textures and smells were doing me in, so I wandered back and sat on a rock. I got some good pics.

He became a little mini me
 of Aunt Ree

Aunt Ree & boys at lighthouse

A crab! Aunt Ree was gonna eat it.

Book Review: Silver In the Blood by Jessica Day George

I try to read a William Allen White book to my children every summer and last summer wasn't any different. I took the suggestion of the school librarian and picked up Jessica Day George's book Tuesdays at the Castle which opened the door to a summer of Castle Glower adventures. When I discovered Jessica Day George had a new book/series, I was elated! George does her research on her books, so my excitement was at an all time peak when I discovered Silver in the Blood beings in 1897 in New York with two cousins who are on their way to meet their Romanian family, the Florescu, in Bucharest. 

The cousins are separated on their journey across the ocean despite their own desires. Dacia is extroverted, troublesome and quite the flirt. She was going to elope with a young, handsome aristocrat of New York society when her family discovers this and ships her off with a maiden aunt. The first of the family secrets to be discovered is when Dacia discovers this maiden aunt to be kissing a man on the train into Bucharest. When the two girls are reunited, they learn their family has old magic; they are shape shifters. They are on this Earth to protect the ancestors of Vlad the Impaler: the family of Dracula. The girls are informed of a Prophecy stating two girls from the New Country will help 'the dark become light' by their position to help the family overturn the King and put the Dracula family on the throne. Thanks to the dark and mysterious man in Paris, the girls discover a secret society who wants to destory the monsters of the night and keep peace within Romania. The girls must learn to control the silver in their blood while also keepign peace in a kingdom and within their own family.

To see the complete review go to Books & WhatNot.

Hallmark Ocean Front Resort is amazing!

When we visited Portland, OR one of the goals was to drive down the Pacific Highway and see the sights the coast offers! This is an amazing coast and one everyone will appreciate if they have watched The Goonies. Every turn provides an opportunity to say, "That looks like the setting in the scene where One-Eyed-Willy's ship comes out of the cave." Although we were two hours away from Astoria, OR where the movie was shot, it was hard to not imagine it was at many of the scenes we viewed!

Unfortunately, I didn't catch any of the great views due to driving, but they are there. Goonies never say die! 

The Hallmark Resort is where we stayed the first night down the coast. I did a quick review of TripAdvisor, and found this amazing resort, and it was spot on AH-mazing! 

Upon our arrival to our room, we were greeted with the ingredients for S'Mores and a bundle of wood for a fire on the beach. What native Kansas girl would ever have the ingredients for S'Mores on the beach? It was awesome. Prince Charming carried out the bag of wood and I carried out the bucket full of S'mores ingredients! 

Portland Aunt helped arranged wood and we got settled. J-Bird instantly went to the water and discovered how cold the Pacific ocean is! He thought it would be Florida warm and he could conquer the waves. Silly boy. 

 We went to bed that evening with the door open as we could hear the roaring, crashing waves throughout the night. It was a breath taking full and right on the ocean.

The room was spotless, large and had a balcony. Aunt Ree had a fireplace in her room. Totally romantic if you wanted it to be!

FIVE STAR RATING FROM THIS FAMILY! 

Hallmark Resort