Author Archives: metamegan

>From the Mouths of…

>From the mouths of babe… And by babes, I mean 6 year old knows-it-all.

Sunday was errand running day. We went to home depot, the verizon store, and we wanted to go to Bed Bath and Beyond, but we just didn’t have time.

Dave decided we should walk from Home Depot to the Verizon store, and he would catch up with us after he dropped the furnace filters off at the car. “Oh, what the heck, I’ll just drive over so the car will be there.” It was 17 degrees on Sunday, and snowy.

Jack was holding hands with Luke and I, and running. Then he would just drop down and hang from us and take a bunch of fast steps while dangling, parallel to the ground. Then he would jump, then sometimes fall, then run.

Once he broke free and ran towards the street. I scooped him up, and in between his screams, I tried to explain to him that when we are walking near a street you cannot let go of mommy’s hand. You! CANNOT! Let! Go! Of! MOMMY’S! HAND!

Luke had a good suggestion though, “Or you could just hold on tighter, Mommy.”

>The Wildlife of Yellowstone

>Oh look, my family is so good at fishing, people are lining up to watch them and to take pictures.

From Yellowstone

Coincidentally, there were some elk.

From Yellowstone

Hello, bison with geyser, aka quintessential Yellowstone photo!

From Yellowstone

>The Target/Walmart ad of Yellowstone

>As usual, I forgot some essential camping item, in this case it was a sweatshirt for Luke, so we had to stop somewhere and purchase a sweatshirt. We stopped at Walmart. Luke was really excited to be wearing all clothes from only two stores: Target and Walmart. I guess when he has on clothes from Savers, it just isn’t the same? Anywho, I suggested we do a photo shoot.

From Yellowstone
From Yellowstone
From Yellowstone

>The Food Of Yellowstone

>One our long ago trip to Yellowstone, all the adults took turns making meals.
I made fajitas, served with guacamole, wine, and a side of ibuprofen. Actually the ibu was just for Luke and his potentially dead tooth, a story that I will post about just as soon as I can look back on it and laugh.

From Yellowstone

Grandad made a pizza with with guac, chicken, chedder and salsa. On the grill. We have a friendly pizza making rivalry between the two of us.

From Yellowstone

Grandad has to get creative after he insisted that I not continue to buy wine with screw top lids.

From Yellowstone

Which inspired all sorts of resourcefulness:

From Yellowstone

After our awesome hike, Grandmom made chili dogs.

From Yellowstone

Pancakes are usually my specialty, but Dave developed quite the knack this summer:

From Yellowstone
From Yellowstone

>The Mushrooms of Yellowstone

>Luke and Grandmom and I went to a Ranger talk about “The Predators of Yellowstone” the night before we took a 3 mile hike (one way) into the wilderness of Yellowstone. Have I mentioned my Bearaphobia? I also have a touch of Wolfophobia. But I tried not to let the extreme phobia get to me. The ranger said that a pack of wolves will circle and circle a group of deer and then all at once attack the same deer. (Side note – the deer are usually old and decrepit. Wolves cull the herd and prevent overpopulation.) Anywho, they attack the same deer all at once, almost as if they have the ability to read each other’s minds. Yes. I know what you are thinking, because I was thinking it too!!! Just like the Twilight Werewolves, right? So when I got to bed that night, I was not just worried about bears and wolves, but werewolves and vampires. Actual thought process:

OMG – Bears. Wolves. Vampires. Werewolves. But the vampires just attack animals, not people. Argh, that’s fiction! I am sure they prefer people. Shh. What was that? Did you hear something?

The next morning, we drove out to a place far away from the crowds and hiked 3 miles to a lake to do some fishing. I got sort of obsessed about the mushrooms we saw on the way in. I’ll never forget that Biology of Fungi class that I took, back in the day.

From Yellowstone
From Yellowstone
From Yellowstone
From Yellowstone
From Yellowstone

Luke and Dave did some fishing on the way there.

From Yellowstone

Jack took a little nap.

From Yellowstone

We had a great day, and we made it all the way back without getting eaten by a bear. This may have been due to Luke’s bear bell, purchased for the low low price of $3.99. I wanted to buy the v. expensive bear spray, but Dave got the bell instead. I used that to justify an extra $27.00 in purchases from the gift shop. And really, using a bell to alert a bear to our presence and give him/her time to get out of our path is much better than trying to scare a bear away with pepper spray that shoots out 30 yards or whatever. Luke thought it was weird that 100% of the people we saw on the path said to him, “Oh good! I bet we won’t see any bears today!”

I set the timer on my camera for a group shot when we made it back to the trail head, and when it went off, we found out that it made a barking sound. Also, that it takes more than one shot. I like the second one better.

From Yellowstone

>Good Night Mama

>As I was putting Jack to bed the other night, we had this conversation:

Mama?
Yes?
Mama?
Yes?
Mama?
What, honey?
Mama?
What?
Mama?
Yes?
Mama?
I love you, Jack.
Mama?
Good night.
Mama?
Do you have something you want to say to me, honey?
Yes.
What is it?
Mama.

>Days and Days of Photo Essays

>Remember, way back when, after I got back from vacation, when I posted a list of things I planned to blog? I really want to say “blog about” instead of just “blog”, but I can’t end a sentence with a preposition. Anyway, remember that?

Let’s see how have I done so far? Ok, not great. But! I have posts scheduled into the future now.

1.) Wildlife – Tuesday
2.) Mushrooms and Wildflowers – Friday
3.) Jack getting dirty and dirtier – See below
4.) Food – Saturday
5.) How my pedicure fared? – Done!
6.) Other
7.) Luke’s ad campaign for Target/Walmart – Sunday
8.) Core Mountain Sports – Sort of Done!
9.) Geologic Features – Monday

Full disclosure, I have the photos ready… The text isn’t complete. So if I fall back into some other rut of working/sleeping/reading/watching tv… the posts will still go up, but without my scintillating commentary. And I am sure no one wants that!

And now, here is a boy that got pretty dirty on his camping trip, and had no time for photos.

From Yellowstone

>Shoulder to Shoulder

>We took the boys to a CU game recently. Got there sort of late, left early, napped through the middle, and yet somehow Jack absorbed the fight song. The game was a few weeks ago, and yet it wasn’t until this morning that Jack was running around the house saying, “Shoulder to shoulder. Fight! Fight! Fight!” I felt the need to explain it all to the daycare teachers this morning in case all they heard was “Fight!” and all they saw was a fist in the air. The teacher said, “Oh I know. He says, “Go go go Buffaloes!” all the time. Especially when he sees a buffalo. There’s one in the sand box.

In other news, we ate a late dinner on the patio and enjoyed a beautiful fall evening as the stars started to come out. Dave said, “I see one, two, three stars. No, four.” And then Jack said, “Five.” Yes, my little genius knows some numbers. He also said “Seben. And eight, eight, eight.” But when I tried to get him to count starting at 1… well, I regretted it. Because when he starts at one, he can’t stop himself from following “one” with “two, three, GO!” And then he jumps up and down a bunch of times. Yeah, I know, it’s really cute, but when he is standing on your lap it’s not that great.

Hmm, what other cuteness? Jack and Luke were kicking the soccer ball in the back yard and Jack fell. Dave was trying to get him to just shake it off and keep going. Jack said, “I tan’t. Leg hurt!” But then once he got a kiss from his daddy and big brother, he was just fine.

Speaking of the big brother, he was at the game too!

>Soccer Mom, MetaMegan Style

>We had soccer practice today. I’m a soccer mom, and the wife of the coach, so I had to bring the balls. Jack wasn’t too happy about it!

In continued Luke/bookworm news, Luke turned down a play date today to read instead. And last’s nights homework was to find all the compound words in a book about maps. Luke thought compass was a compound word. I said, “What? Comp and ass?” He said, “No, com and pass.” I said, “Com isn’t a word, use it in a sentence.” He replied, “Dot com.” Then between the two of us, we couldn’t figure out if highway was a compound word or not. So we went to bed and finished the homework in the morning. Yes, I am already stumped by first grade homework!