At the Beach with Dera!

My cousin and (bestest friend since forever) Andera came down to visit with us last week and of course we had to go to the beach! It wasn't as warm and sunny as hoped but we still had a good time (no dead seals or unexpected nudist beaches like we have stumbled over before!). Austin found a good, long piece of kelp. Austin wanted to play tug of war with it but Danny didn't understand that so Austin just ended up dragging Danny along at the end and they both loved it! I had Austin take a picture of Dera and I, to add to my collection of us at the beach pictures. It took him about 10 tries I think to get both of us in the picture, for some reason he kept cutting me out! He loves to take pictures and I have high hopes that he will follow in my photographic "phoot" steps.

More Home Improvements

Our driveway is finally finished! No more dust bowl in the summer and muddy bog in the winter! (although I do think Bryce will miss "having" to 4-wheel up it in the winter!) It looks so good! The boys loved getting to watch all the machines working on it. When I came home from my parents I had a surprise in store for me. Bryce had finished the bathroom walls! He is amazing! It is so nice! We still need to add the trim, light plate and do a little patching but it looks like a different room and I am loving it! If you want a reminder of what the driveway and bathroom looked like before you can click here!

Tabletop Disaster!

Last Sunday night there was a huge disaster at the Jukes home!
It is all my Dads fault and the boys loved every minute of it!
So, to explain:
At work my Dad has a training set of toy cars/trucks/emergency response vehicles/helicopters/haz mat/buses, etc, that he uses to illustrate emergency response scenarios and train fire personnel. He brought it home for Austin to see it and we ended up making a tabletop disaster!

The first step was to lay down butcher paper over the table and create a city and rural area. My dad laid out the city roads and I laid out the country roads. Then we started in on drawing in all the buildings, schools, parks, etc. Austin drew a great golf course!Once everything was drawn on we started to add the 3-D objects and this is were it got really fun! The whole family was involved and there was all sorts of mayhem and disasters!
The boys got to stay up super late for them. But they were having so much fun and behaving so well that it was worth it!
Thanks Dad for such a fun evening!

Grandma's Backyard

My Grandma has a huge and absolutely stunning hydrangea bush in her back yard. I had Austin jump in the picture to illustrate how big the blooms get! When I walked into her back yard they took my breath away! Grandma's back yard also a couple of lemon trees so we got to bring home some fresh lemons. Austin is super excited about it. The lemons look so pretty and sunshiney sitting in a bowl on the counter that I almost don't want to use them up! We walked the boys to the park near Grandma's and I loved this shot of them all holding hands. The boys barely played at the park. They had more fun in Grandma's backyard!

Our Week in Pictures

We have been lucky to spent this past week up at my parents and getting to visit with family and friends. Here are some pictures of our week!
Austin has been really interested in Chinese Characters lately and loves to draw them. Here he is writing "hello"
While getting some pictures of Danny and Maysie together Danny reached over and held her hand. She didn't really get what was going on but it was so cute!
Austin made himself a Daniel Boone, coon skin hat and went out to shoot at the birds.
The view of the sunset from my parents house.
And Austin last Sunday - he wanted to be a missionary and wear his Daddies name tag!

Danny's 2nd Birthday!!

Today is Danny's 2nd birthday and what a fun day we have had! We had a WALL-E birthday party with friends and family and it was great! Everything was Wall-E/robots themed because Danny absolutly loves Wall-E. It is the cutest thing to hear him say Wall-E just like the movie. We drank oil (known to non-robots as rootbeer) out of oil cans. We built robots out of junk, searched for nuts and bolts in the sand and threw bean bags through space, I wasn't really thinking when I decided on the time for the party and I scheduled the party to start shortly after Danny's naptime. Luckily his Oma was there so he had a lap to nap on! Danny thouroughly enjoyed his pre-party cupcake, his party cupcake and his after party cupcake! Here is the robot building. The kids came up with some great robots. Austin has been planning his Wall-E type robot for weeks now. He had a little help from Auntie Dera putting it together (she was in charge of poking the holes, thank goodness!) but he designed it all and I think he did a great job! My Brother Trevor spent a couple hours on his robot and it is amazing! Some more random pics of the party, the kids playing the games, drinking out of the oil cans, etc. Thank you to all our great family and friends who came, enjoyed and helped Danny have a great 2nd birthday!

warning - this is a long and drama filled rant

So I have to rant. I have to get this situation out of my mind as it just keeps playing over and over and over! I am really mad, bewildered and just don't know what to do.
It all started a couple of months ago after church on Sunday. A mom, we will call her "Crazy" brought her son, who we will call "Joe" to me. Crazy told Joe to tell me what Austin did. Joe said that Austin hit him and he started crying. Crazy then told me to get control of my son or next time she would discipline him. I was astounded and totally blindsided. I responded that I would talk to Austin and see what he had to say. Then Crazy disappeared. I talked to Austin and found out that, yes he had hit Joe but Joe had hit him first. Not surprising on either part as they are both energetic little six year old boys. (Her son has hit/kicked me several times in primary. She thinks he is an angel and can do no wrong.)
I thought the whole incident had blown over. I had seen Crazy at church, at birthday parties and various functions. She always acted fine, dare I say even friendly?
3 weeks ago
At church, the primary prez and I are sitting in the back of the primary room having a discussion about the new primary sharing time/sacrament meeting program guide for next year (which are awesome by the way!). Crazy comes in and leans across 2 other people to tell me to make sure to tell my son not to kick her (Austin was in his class at this time so I had no clue what had happened). Then she disappeared. Maybe I should have tracked her down right then and there and then it would never have gone any further.
The primary prez and I just looked at each other, both a little shocked. I told her that this was the not the first time this had happened and that Crazy seems to have a grudge against my son. She confirmed that this was so and went on to tell me that Crazy calls her on a regular basis to complain about "the Austin issue", how he is a menace and a threat to her son, that he is jealous because Joe is friends with another little boy at church, that her son should be protected at church, etc. She has gone so far as to complain to the bishopric as well. After church I asked Austin what had happened and he told me that he was kicking his legs and looking behind him when she walked in front of him and that he kicked her on accident. I believed him as that is completely something Austin like.
2 Sundays ago
I was talking to the primary prez again and she told me that no one knew what to do about "Crazy". That she had told the bishopric counselor over primary that because of Austin kicking her she now requires 6 months of physical therapy and she is going to bill us. The primary prez assured me that I am not the crazy one in this situation, that no one else understands why Crazy is doing this. I decide that week to send an email to Austin's teacher to see if she had witnessed what had happened. I had held off on doing this because I trust Austin and I did not want to drag anyone else into the middle of this. She sent an email back assure me that she had witnessed it and Austin had only kicked Crazy on accident, and that he apologized several times. She also emphasised that there was no way that Austin could have done any real injury.
Today
I get a call from the Bishop. He felt the need to give me a heads up about what is happening. Today Crazy brought the medical bill to him and wanted to know if he was going to give it to the Danenhauer's or would she have to. He replied that neither would be happening as it was policy that the church would pay for it. She was not happy with that response and wanted to give the bill to us. He tried to get the bill so he could write her a check to cover the expenses but instead she left in quite a huff. So the Bishop is concerned that she will be trying to bill us and wanted to assure me that the church would cover the bill.
I am not really concerned about the bill. I do not feel that we are responsible for it and if she cannot cover it the church will do so. What I am concerned about is being at church around this crazy lady and being in constant fear that she is going to threaten my son or come up with some more trumped up charges against us. Today I had to leave Austin alone during opening exercises so I could take Danny to nursery and set up for sharing time. I was a nervous wreck the whole entire time, shaking and nauseous. I was so relieved when Crazy snatched Joe out of primary and left.
I am not the kind of person to confront people and cause drama. I hate drama. I tend to try to understand and, when I can, just let things go. I realize that a lot of the time people don't mean to be hurtful or give offense. I am sure that there have been many times when I have unintentionally hurt someone and I would hope to have the same understanding. But what do you do when someone is maliciously out to get you? Especially when this is happening at church! I don't feel it is fair to drag other people into this and make them choose sides. I don't think that this should be happening at all. I just don't get it! So anyway, maybe now that I have that off my chest I can get it off my mind. Ugh!

Camping at New Brighton

We spent the last 2 nights camping at New Brighton With Trevor, Heidi and their family. A group of families from their ward comes down here once a year and we love the chance to get to join in! The weather was beautiful, even the rain last night wasn't too bad. My favorite part of camping there is getting to hear the waves as we go to sleep at night.
The campsite we got was great! It has a wonderful tree with branches low to the ground and the kids loved to play in it! The also dug a big hole and where very busy building booby traps to catch the bad guys. Now look close at the top pic. That's Austin in the tree, in his chair. It fit perfectly and he was going to have a little nest and sleep there. With his injury record lately I was nervous just to let him walk let alone sleep in trees! I hope to be able to post video of his 2nd fall (this time down a steep hillside) as soon as I can figure out how to download it from the video camera.

Danny and Tyler loved to play in the long grass. At least it was long when we got there. They had steamrolled it all flat by the time we left!
In the grass - part one
In the grass - part two
Glow Stick Fun! Thanks Oma, they loved the glow sticks! I got Austin and Taska to try to hold their faces really still while waving the glow sticks and I think they did great. I love Taska's expression! Danny didn't really get trying to stand still but he did love trying to do the splits!
At the Beach:
You can't camp at the beach and not spend at least an afternoon there! The beach was covered in kelp but the kids didn't care, they still had a blast! There was a lot of digging, sliding and rolling in the sand mixed in with a little kite flying too.

I love this shot of Hannah - what a little bathing beauty!
Around Camp:
Hannah was very unsure of me the whole time but I think I wore her down a little. By the time we left she was finding green, plastic pieces on the ground and giving them to me. But wary of me or not I still managed to get some great shots of her!
This morning in the tent I let the boys have graham crackers for breakfast in the tent so I could get things packed up without them getting wet and muddy (that only lasted til I let them loose, then they were completely covered within seconds. They are talented like that!)
We had such a good time. Thanks Trev and Heidi (and friends) for letting us come and crash your party!

My Little Graduate

Austin graduated from Kindergarten on Thursday! It was a great little ceremony. The kids all sang us some songs. Then their teacher handed out their certificates, and with each one she shared something unique and special about that child. He got the "smarty pants" award because he always has something to share and say about everything, she also said he is wonderful at giving hugs. The kids performed a play called the "Carrot Seed" that their teacher created from a song she listened to as a child. And then we all had a brunch together and just like that it was done and my little guy is no longer a kindergartner. I made it through the ceremony without crying, it helped to be busy watching after Danny! Austin has already made the comment, just this afternoon, that "summer is boring, there is nothing to do". And this was after the last 3 days of swim parties, camping and having family visit!


Performing the part of the Big Brother in the Carrot Seed

Receiving his certificate from Mrs. Denny

Emergency Family Pictures!

I have written before that I want to take the next set of our family pictures at the local park because I love the walls. Well I found out last week that they are power washing all the walls and making them look all clean and spiffy, which is not the look I want. So I decided this morning that we were going to do an emergency family photo shoot! Luckily we got a couple of good ones before Austin decided to go and fall off the 10 ft. wall into the creek. I looked up just in time to see him fall and I think my heart stopped. It is a good thing Bryce was there because I was barely able to hold it together. I am still trying to decide whether or not to take him in for x-rays of his foot (no bruising, no swelling but he won't walk on it. Is it drama or is it real? We are thinking it is just a sprain). Oh the joys of having boys!
Sometimes it amazes me that I have yet to take either one of these boys to the ER for an injury! I wonder how much longer that will last. Last week the boys were playing outside while I was planting. Danny was sitting in a chair which was close to the edge of the embankment above the road (which is about 5 ft up). Well he stood up in the chair, tipped it over and went tumbling down. He landed in a tangle of pine branches which stopped him from hitting the road but he was stuck. Austin was right next to him but he wouldn't climb down to help him up. He just stood there and yelled "help, 911, help!". I guess it is lucky that "Mommy 911" was nearby!

Misc Pics

I was going to take a picture of my salad garden to put up on one of my previous posts but I forgot. So here it is now :) Bryce brought his patrol car home the other day. It was the end of shift and he was down at the end of the road on an accident. So when that was cleared up his Sgt. told him to just take the car home. I just got a kick out of seeing it parked in the driveway!

FHE BBQ @ SCSB

Yesterday evening we had a Family Home Evening Bar-B-Que at SeaCliff State Beach with some friends, the Bybee's and Hansen's. True to the north coast in the summer it was foggy and a little bit cold. But not cold enough to stop the party! The older boys (Austin, Soren and Isaiah) had a blast playing on the beach, discovering and exploring all sorts of things. Their favorite was the dead birds. Lovely. The littler ones (Danny, Ian and Sydney) stayed closer to the picnic area, blew bubbles, chased birds and watched the big kids play.


The big boys out exploring

Danny and Sydney watching the big boys. Doesn't she have the best pigtails?!
After playing down by the water were they all got wet, Danny hitched a ride back up with Bryce.
"Dude, there was this wave . . ." Austin is exclaiming as he tries to run back up the beach with his wet pants falling down!

Despite the weather being cooler than we had hoped it was a great evening. Good friends, good food and the beach, a great way to spend an evening!