Spring 2011

What a busy spring and summer we have had! Technically, summer is not yet over by far, but with school already starting for so many children, it feels like summer is almost over. I find August 1st to be extremely early for school to be starting, but I can only assume it is because we have been having so many snow days over the past two years, causing children to miss too much school.

Dance Recital

Jorryn had her dance recital in May and it was so much fun to see her dance. She really loves it! It was funny, because most of the children seemed a little lost during the recital without having their instructor close by to lead them. Jorryn seemed determined to help her little friend next to her who seemed to have forgotten a lot of the moves. Jorryn still has happy bouncy feet, because anytime the dance required a bounce or a jump, Jorryn would clearly have the most enthusiastic jump of all. I took some videos and a few photos of the dance. We presented Jorryn with flowers at the end of the performance (the instructor had suggested it) and she just beamed from ear to ear, "Are these flowers for ME?!" she squealed. Such a girly girl!!

Anniversary

We went camping this year for our anniversary. Since we were scheduled to go on vacation the last week of May, we decided that camping would be an inexpensive fun family thing to do for our 12 year anniversary. This was also our first time camping this year, since John had been inundated with work for several weekends in a row. We drove down to Sulphur and camped by the river. We had fun walking the trails, doing outdoor cooking, sitting by the fire, and watching the stars. One of my favorite events of the weekend was listening to the owls hoot at night. They seemed to call to each other, back and forth. I found it rather pleasant and different. We also drove over to Lake of the Arbuckles to swim and boy was it cold. We still got in the water, but it made Jorryn's skin bright red and she had the shivers really badly, so we had to take several short swims. Of course, it was not easy having to get used to the water over and over again. We took a walk by the lake's edge and found some interesting rocks. The rocks led us to start skipping them across the water, which ended up being fun. Jorryn practiced skipping rocks, except she caught John on the shin at one point giving a nice purple bruise, so we had to take a break from that activity.

More Camping

We took another weekend camping trip to Lake Eufaula with my friend Meg and her daughter, which was a lot of fun as well. We really liked the location of our campsite, since it was far from any other campers. There weren't that many people camping that weekend, perhaps because it was right before Memorial Day weekend. It was nice to camp with friends. We have other friends we enjoy camping with too, but have not had the opportunity to do so yet this year. Jorryn enjoyed having a friend to play with. It threatened to rain a few times over the weekend, but the rain kept at bay. We went swimming a few times and the water was quite refreshing, although a little on the cold side still. Jorryna nd her friend did not seem to mind. We also visited the nature center, which was really interesting. They had several birdhouses around the park and one was equipped with a camera inside. From the nature center, we could watch the mother bird fly in and out of her nest and sit on her eggs. What do mother birds do in their nest? Well, they sit and sit and sit of course. She seemed to fidget here and there, but that was it. The daddy bird stopped by every now and then to add grass or straw to the nest and that was pretty much it.

Memorial Day Weekend

I found out less than two weeks before our scheduled vacation that we had to reschedule to a later date. Needless to say, I was very upset and disappointed. Alas, John is the only person who can do what he does at his work and he plays a very critical role, so when something came up the very weekend that he was supposed to be out of the office, we had to make different plans. At first, he was going to take advantage of the long weekend to complete some long put off weekend projects, but at the last minute, decided against it, so we made a last minute decision to go camping again for the long weekend.

Finding a decent place to camp last year had been quite the fiasco, and so we decided to head east where there were several campgrounds located in close proximity to each other. This would allow us to scope out the different locations if one were to be full. Our first stop was to be at Lake Tenkiller, which was supposedly a nice lake. When we got there, we learned that the lake was flooded - fourteen feet above flood level and so several of the campsites were underwater. We drove around a few times and finally found a spot all to our own right by the water, yet well above it.

We pitched our tents after dark. We had had a late start on that Friday, but we had enough experience to set everything up efficiently by the light of the lanterns. Once settled in, none of us were tired and we were hungry, so we decided to go scope out a place to eat and also a Wal-Mart to get a few more supplies. We ended up driving to Tahlequah, where we grabbed a bite to eat at a small diner and then picked up our supplies at the local Wal-Mart. We had no problems getting some sleep when we got back to our tents. The next day, we had plenty of fun exploring the nature center, playing at the playground, swimming in the flooded lake and making the long trek to the bathroom. The road that normally paralleled the lake was flooded and so we just swam over the road area, which we knew would be safe from rocks and other perils (such as underwater charcoal grills and fire rings). We located a few underwater picnic tables which offered a wet place to sit and relax.

As we swam we watched a few turtles poke their heads out of the water. At one point, I noticed a turtle head and pointed it out to John. After a moment, a chill ran down my spine. That was no turtle. John echoed my thoughts. It was a snake swimming along the surface of the water!! My ignorant bliss was ruined for the rest of the weekend from that point on. I kept imagining bumping into a water snake and getting bitten by something I could not see. I constantly looked over my shoulder, but still somehow managed to stay in the water. It was pretty hot out and Jorryn just adores swimming of any kind.

I'm almost forgetting one of our first discoveries at this campsite. We heard some rustling somewhere near our tent, and so Jorryn and I scouted for the source of the rustling. That is when we found a box turtle! We were very excited by our discovery. John and I used to have a box turtle living in our backyard who hibernated the winter back there, so this discovery brought back a lot of memories for us. Jorryn was tickled pink that she could pet a turtle. And it just so happened that we had some strawberries, so we gave our little turtle friend a sweet treat. After his strawberry, we let the turtle continue on his journey.

Back at the nature center, the park rangers were nursing a baby groundhog, who had been picked up and then abandoned by campers a few weeks back. It was funny watching the little animal's antics. The ranger let us pet the animal, and it clearly loved the play with the ranger. It had clearly already become tame towards people. It was unsure whether or not the little animal could be returned to the wild.

We saw several lizards scurry around in the grass. We also heard and saw many wonderful birds that weekend. I can't remember all their names, but I saw bluejays, cardinals, scissortails, and some yelllow bird with black on its wings to name a few. We also listened to a mockingbird sing, which is so amusing, especially when they start singing like a fire engine or a police car. I also heard it sing like a crow. I find those birds quite fascinating.

We went for a nature hike on Sunday and did some more swimming. All in all it was a wonderful weekend and we had a great time. John had set up his tarp to create some shade and this gave us the much needed shade to be able to enjoy ourselves without feeling overwhelmed by the heat or feel the need to constantly be in the water.