Dive Meet #2

Karianna did fantastic at her second dive meet!  She did the exact same dives as last week, but wow, they have gotten so good!  I was super, super impressed with the height she got on her tuck dive and on her front flip, and the arc on her back dive was beautiful.  Unfortunately, the wait was not great for us, as the pool we were at closed early, and we had come prepared to swim.  I wasn't fully equipped with drinks or activities for the kids, so we had quite the interesting wait!  thankfully, Grandma and Grandpa Lautenschlager came and that lifted everyone's very bored spirits.

James being crazy for the camera.

 I managed to dig up some crayons and a couple of coloring books.

 Here's her back dive....

 Here's her tuck dive-the height is great, as is her tuck!

 And here's her front flip-again, a great tuck and height!

 She ended up in SECOND place!  Even more impressive, she increased her overall score by about 14 points, which is just awesome. Good job, Karianna!

Another Visit to Krazy Air

These pictures (all three) are awful, but they at least document our second visit to Krazy Air for family night.  We had an absolute blast, as expected!  Jared came dressed to jump this time around, and both he and I loved jumping with the kids.  I mastered the back flip today-started off doing it into the foam pit and surprised myself when I landed on my feet amidst the foam cubes.  After doing that a few times, I attempted it on the trampoline, and while it took me a few tries, I was able to land it pretty consistently-cool!  All the kids practiced their front flips.  Karianna and Jordan can land on their feet although in a squat position.  We had fun jumping off this little step in the second picture and immediately flipping after one jump-I was super impressed with Joshua and Tyler's flips, they were so free flowing and high!  We will likely visit one more time near the end of summer-I could seriously go to Krazy Air every week and not get sick of it.....there is something so relaxing about jumping on trampolines!

Tonto Natural Bridge

What a fun day!  We absolutely love driving up North, and we do it all the time.  Sometimes we just find a good spot in the woods to explore and hike, other times we actually visit an actual venue/location.  Today, hiked the Gowan trail at Tonto Natural Bridge, one of our favorite spots.  I love this area.  The trailhead is so gorgeous, right in the bowl between the mountains, with lots of grassy space to run, eat lunch, and relax.  It was warm today, but there was enough of a breeze and occasional cloud cover to make it really beautiful, especially when we got down under the bridge.  Last time we came here, we went through the back entrance of the bridge.  This time we started on the proper course to really explore under the bridge, and it is by far my favorite trail to take.  

We took a TON of pictures, which are laid out below.  I realized, as I was posting these, that there are several pictures of JD and Jordan in proportion to everyone else-that's because they went hiking to the other side of the bridge with me and got a lot of screen time!  Regardless, everyone did great-awesome attitude, persistent hiking, even when it started to get warm, and a happy baby who sat in the backpack most of the time. Lots of nice people down there as well, our only complaint was we were not allowed to play in the water, as indicated by the signs, and by the ranger who blew his whistle and yelled at anyone who got close.  We laughed it off, and Jackson still got to throw rocks in the water, like he wanted.  Fun, fun times!

At the trailhead and just barely starting down it.

 Oh the steps!  So many of them...we were breathing heavy on the way back up, that's for sure!

 The opening to the bridge is right ahead.

 And there it is!  :)  Taken with my handy camera timer!

 And....the climbing begins.  The boys literally took off the second we got down here.

 This rock slide right here was so, so slippery-our sneakers had no purchase on it, whatsoever.  When you are trying to help 6 kids down this, one of whom is in a hiking backpack, it is not so easy-we actually had two other ladies help us on the way back up because it was that slippery!

 Kind of dark, but can you see the water drops plopping into the stream?  It was "raining" under the bridge most of the time.

 Me and the boys are almost to the other side of the bridge in these next few shots-we stopped by a very quiet, peaceful pool of water that was super beautiful-these shots don't do it justice at all.

 Here's the little pool Jackson sat by nearly the whole time, just throwing rocks as hard as he could.

 He kept looking shocked as he pointed to the ceiling-he was pretty amazed by the height!

 I was laying down when I took these pics of James-catching the wall and the underside of the bridge!

 Right before we headed out, Karianna was expressing her annoyance at her hair-it kept going in her eyes.  I took a second to pull it into a ponytail, attach her hat so it gave her optimal shade, and then took a picture because she wanted to see what it looked like.  I personally think she is drop dead gorgeous in this shot.  :)