Parentheticals

This week Mike did more and more homework in hopes of finishing the semester with good grades. He is finishing up one of this finals, which is a paper documenting a project that he has been building all semester. His other project is 80% done, and since it is all due midway through this upcoming week he just has to get it done. On Tuesday we all went to the Classic Fun Center to celebrate Timmy's Birthday. It was really his birthday a long time ago, but this was the first time that we could go, so we did it then. Timmy had a fun time. We went in the jungle part, the ball shooting part, the bounce houses, and lazer tag, and we also played carnival style games in order to win prizes. It was super hot in there because it was over 100 outside, but overall it was pretty fun. On Wednesday the kids were invited to a sleepover at the Plastows house. They all had a fun time, but Boo decided at about 9:00 to come back home and sleep with us. It is too bad, because she was sad that all her si

The Fourth of July went well. The Plastows came to our house for a barbecue, and Amy brought an awesome collection of fireworks from Costco (Rea really hopes we can find the ones called "goddess fountains" next year). It didn't have Pop-Its or sparklers or tanks, so we bought those. We didn't find any Bestest Crackering Ballz this year, though. It rained a tiny bit and then was very windy, which is not great for fireworks in a drought, but we survived and didn't even light anything on fire. We had a lot of fun. No-one got hurt, and we got to bed at a reasonable hour. Timmy and Gideon both ordered more Bakugan on the internet. Both packages arrived on Saturday, and they have been enjoying them a lot. For those that don't know, Bakugan are ball shaped toys that transform using magnets and springs to become monsters and robots. They are pretty cool. Mike is getting closer and closer to the end of this semester of grad school. He only has one assignment left from

This week was the camp out. Mike stayed home and worked and did homework. He is having a hard time getting all of his homework done during the night, so sometimes he has to work during the day on it. It is disappointing to him, since he has been really enjoying having such a lot of family time. Still - he only has three more weeks in this semester, so he is looking forward to a small break. Grandpa Mike and Grandma Sheila invite him over for dinner repeatedly, but he only ended up going over one time since he ended up going up to the campout on Thursday night. When Mike came up, we hiked around and looked for edibles. There were lots of strawberry plants and some raspberries and elderberries and sticky currants. We're thinking of going back in a month or so to see what's ripened; nothing was ripe this week. Alison and the kids had a great time at the campout, although they missed Mike a lot. They explored the campground and played in the stream and did crafts like friendship br