Treasure Hunters

We have a new hobby around here. A new hobby that we are obsessed with. It's called Geocaching (pronounced geo-cashing). It's a real world outdoor treasure hunting game using a GPS to find hidden treasures or containers - or a cache. It's an international hide and seek game, and who doesn't like a game of hide and seek? Or finding hidden treasures? I love the challenge (it's teaching me patience and not giving up so quickly!), that it gets us outdoors with a specific goal to accomplish, the family time hiking, biking and exploring; for Kayla its collecting treasures. It's also shown me that she's really excellent at navigating and interpreting maps. And she doesn't shy away from an adventure, even when I hesitate, that leads us deep in the woods or thick brush or steep ravines. In fact, she's been the 'first to find' caches in tight spaces, up in a tree, under logs, just as many times as I have!

See? Don't you think we make a great geocaching team?!

 Success! Found the hidden cache down by the water on the Blue Water River Walk

Another "easy" find in downtown Port Huron

A very very long chain hidden geocache. Good thing I have such good helpers. This was a fun unique find!

I originally got interested in geocaching almost 10 years ago, went out a few times, but didn't pursue it any further.... until Kristi came home in August and stayed with us for 2 weeks. She had recently gotten into geocaching and convinced us that we needed to go while she was home. So the four of us girls did. Again. And again. It was official, I was hooked (and Kayla too. Even Khloe says "When are we going geocaching? Haha!). After Kristi returned home, I continued geocaching. Caches rated with an easy terrain and difficulty I'd bring Kayla along, the more difficult ones I'd go find. Since I started in late August, I'm up to 22 finds so far!

This weekend Kristi was home for 3 days for her birthday and geocaching was at the top of our to-do list. It was a bonus that for Kristi's birthday weekend it was BEAUTIFUL and WARM and SUNNY the entire weekend. That's what makes geocaching an ideal outdoor activity - gets us outside moving and exercising when we might not otherwise! On Friday Kayla and I visited Goodells County Park and found TWO; Saturday the three of us headed out on bikes to the Fort Gratiot Trail and found FIVE (attempted six but couldn't find one); on Sunday we went hiking at several different places and found SEVEN. Woohoo, FOURTEEN in one weekend!

Happy birthday Kristi! Here's a little sampling of our weekend adventures. I look forward to more adventures, but soon we need to get Daddy in on it too! He would love the challenge and the competition!

 Found this cache right on I-94. 

At a minimum a cache always has a log in it to sign so I let Kayla sign her name and date on our behalf to every log. We mustn't forget our pen!

Khloe was with us too at this rock... somewhere off playing in the rocks

 This was a fun cache to find - a PVC pipe wrapped in birch bark. Clever!

 Mini-me's with their walking sticks at Woodsong County Park

 Another one along the Ft Gratiot Trail

 Off the trail at Woodsong County Park. I believe Kayla was in the midst of climbing this tree when she said "Hey, I found it!" Way to go Kayla!

 Riding the Ft Gratiot Trail off to find our first cache of the day

 First cache - see it in Kristi's hand? - along the trail

 This was a loooong interesting beautiful hike deep in the woods at Woodsong County Park where the trail wound over 100 feet down to the Black River. Another 1/2 mile hike along the river and several hundred feet off the trail, we found this:

 Kayla loves the bigger containers like this that have swag in them. Geocaching protocol says "take something, leave something", so we always do. Kayla took a calculator (score!) and we left some items too. This river hike came after a much more difficult hike at the same park that took Kayla and Kristi 75 feet off the trail down an extremely steep ravine. Neither shied away from the challenge and it was an experience for Kayla to learn how to navigate footing and balance on a steep climb down... and up. After an in-depth search of the ravine, they finally found it. Made the trip down and up worth it!

Go pink!

We got our pink hair extensions today to join the fight against breast cancer! We thought it was the perfect opportunity to teach Kayla about how a simple pink hair strand helps girls & women fight sickness and get better, provides hope for those who are sick, raises money for medicine to help find a cure, and most importantly, Granny got sick and died from cancer, so this is what we can do to help. And she was ready too! I believe that starting the conversation at this young age about healthy lifestyle choices and making OUR (girl's and women's) health a priority will make those conservations and appointments completely natural as she gets older. It's pretty neat what happens around here in October to support Breast Cancer Awareness - there are 15 salons in town that offer the pink hair extensions for $10 each. The money is collected by one salon at the end of the month who donates 100% of the proceeds locally. Give where you live.

Bonus: Today was Kristi's 25th birthday! Happy birthday Kristi!

We set up a special salon at home just for Khloe!  She got pink in her hair too by way of pink tinted mousse She got pampered by Kayla who took charge of putting in Khloe's pink highlights.

Smiles all around!

Field Trip

One of my favorite field trips of the year... the Pine River Nature Center. This year's program focused on learning all about trees.

 The trouble table!

 Writing in their Tree Discovery journals

Funny blindfolded tree identification game

There's 18 girls in Kayla's class, and just 6 boys!

We had a fun beautiful day exploring the woods and taking several long hikes!

Afterwards, Kayla, Addison and I took some time to go to the park next door and go geocaching. Even Addie is hooked after just one time and she can't wait to do it again!

Little monkey

We are so proud and quite impressed with Khloe's gymnastics ability lately. This girl excels at anything that involves moving! She is in CONSTANT motion. CONSTANT. Sometimes - No, always - it makes me dizzy and tired. I know it's the difference between having a three year old at 39 versus 29 years old!

She graduated from her 3-5 year old class last week when she accomplished a cartwheel and is now officially in Level 1. Here she is celebrating her graduation on the "stage" with Flames Gym owner and her coach, Coach Mel. We love Coach Mel, but I think Coach Mel might love Khloe more. These two have been together since Khloe was 17 months old and they have so much fun together. Coach Mel is SO wonderful with Khloe.

A certificate and a medal!

Coach Mel pushes and encourages the kids to always try and never give up. There is no going half way or quitting at Flames! Gymnastics has given our girls great confidence, strength and independence. A new Level 1 goal on Khloe's chart is to climb to the top of the yellow rope and touch the white tube. This is an activity Khloe has never had to try before, so Coach Mel had Khloe do it on the first day of her new class. Coach Mel expected Khloe to make it half way up - most kids do on their first attempt. But not Khloe. She went straight to the top and back down all by herself without hesitation. Coach Mel was blown away! She said no other kid has ever done that before! Way to go Khloe! You are so strong and brave and confident! There is nothing you won't try ALL BY YOURSELF!

American Girl

It was our first. And I'm sure it will not be our last. 

It's official, we've been immersed head-to-toe into the American Girl doll world. There's no going back now! This weekend we visited the American Girl store in Columbus, OH for Lexie's 10th birthday.

American Girl packages with their names on them received upon check-in at the hotel

As the story goes, Lexie's family had this trip booked for their family of four for Lexie's birthday several months prior. Turns out, this weekend was High School Homecoming weekend and Lexie's older brother was taking his girlfriend to the dance, which meant Brother couldn't go and so Dad had to stay home to supervise (neither of them shed a tear I'm pretty sure). That left two open spaces for the hotel room and the birthday meal at the American Girl cafe. Karry gave Lexie three choices of friends she could ask; Lexie choose Kayla because "Kayla is nice, we have fun and play well together and Kayla doesn't have any drama". There you have it, the drama-free friend was chosen! What an honor and special privilege for us to spend this memorable weekend with Lexie. It was a weekend we will all remember!

The girls carrying all their luggage, their dolls, and their doll's luggage into the hotel

 The hotel was amazing (one of the nicest I've ever stayed in) and treated the girls like royalty. Lexie and Kayla were greeted with special American Girl packages upon arrival which each included a bed, blanket and pillow for their dolls. At 3pm milk and cookies were delivered to our room for the girls and their dolls and later that night the dolls received turn-down service for their beds with a piece of chocolate. The dolls! Not the girls, not the mom's (Ummmm I could've really used that), THE DOLLS. How fun for the girls to receive such special treatment!

The cookie and milk delivery (cookies already eaten!)

The bed with turn-down service and a chocolate

 The main purpose of the 4-hour trip south was to visit the store which did not disappoint and MANY HOURS were spent inside. Our experience included a birthday meal in the cafe, spa and salon appointments for the dolls, and lots of shopping. Are you beginning to think that the dolls received better treatment than the humans on this trip? You are right.

 It was a fun birthday lunch that included appetizers, drinks, an entree and of course cake and ice-cream! Even the dolls (here we go with the dolls again) had their own chairs, cups and plates.

 After lunch Lexie's doll had an appointment for the spa and Kayla's doll had an appointment at the hair salon. Kayla chose for her doll to receive a fancy up-do with a sparkly crown. Unless you're there to witness it in person, you wouldn't even believe that each doll has their own hair stylist, chair and cape. 

The finished 'do!

The Easton Town Center, where the shopping and hotel were, is an amazingly huge indoor/outdoor mall with every up-scale store and restaurant you can imagine. There are beautiful fountains, outdoor model train sets, park-like settings, and fireplaces. Despite the cooler than predicted weather, our weekend was very relaxing and even included lots of hot tub time and sleeping in until 9am! (I haven't slept until 9am for three years!)

The dolls went with us EVERYWHERE but in this hotel, it's encouraged! In case you momentarily forgot this weekend was about Lexie and not her dolls. Lexie said "It was the best birthday ever!" We truly did all have such a fun weekend  - the girls, the mom's, and the dolls. Kayla and Lexie can't wait to go back! Happy 10th Birthday Lexie! Thanks for letting us come along on your super fun birthday weekend!