Swimming Hole

It is stinkin' 

RED HOT

around here.  

The last few days have been especially super hot, like in the 100's, and it is supposed to be that way all week.  Yesterday, our main floor got up to 81, and upstairs was 91 degrees!  By the time we went to bed last night, it was 87 upstairs.  It only cooled down 10 degrees during the night last night.  I turned the a.c. on for about an hour today.  That is the only time we have turned it on this year.  We're weird like that, I guess, but it usually stays pretty cool in our house, thanks to the huge Maple tree in the front, and neither Weston nor I mind it hot.

We've been spending lots of time in our little creek right by our house to keep cool.

Weston took us to the big creek on Saturday after he finished working.  

It has a pretty nice swimming hole.

It is probably 8 feet deep.  We parked in the field next to the fence and shimmied under it.

Spencer brought a canoe paddle.  We don't own a canoe.

I bought that one and another one just like it at Wal-Mart in Carson City, NV when we lived there like 7 years  ago.  I used the paddles as curtain rods in Spencer's little 2-year-old room.  They've never even been in a canoe.

The swimming hole was up-creek from where we went in.

We went down creek.  Honestly, I didn't even want to attempt that with having to hold on to so many little ones.

We were in plenty deep where we were.

We explored, and shot baby rapids a bit, and caught minnows, and swam, and jumped, and sunk in "quick sand".  It was a lot of fun.

Then we got back in the Suburban and drove through the field, passed the idle tractor and a small hay stack... 

Weston's goal was to finish haying (swathing (cutting), raking, baling, stacking) by last Friday.  He finished in good time, meeting his goal with a few hours to spare.  He did all of that in 2 weeks.  Not bad.

We stopped at another favorite place a little farther down the creek.  This time we did more collecting than swimming.

It's so cool how the creek is constantly changing.  It never looks the same.

Zoe loves her freedom outside, walking all around picking up rocks and throwing them.  I have to watch her, though, so that she doesn't try to eat them.

Kate likes to catch these cool bugs that stick to rocks, and look like rocks.  In the picture below, they were about to come out of their shell.  I almost got a picture of them out of their shell, but then Kate dropped them because they freaked her out.

Does anyone know what animal this might have come from?  I wish that someone's hand was in the picture to give it a little perspective on the size of it.  It's pretty big.

We're guessing that it is a horse's jaw.

Ezra's treasures.  Actually this is only 1/2 of them.  It was just his first trip to the car.

The a.c. in our car is broken.  I prefer windows down anyway.  I'm really not a big air conditioner person all around.  This week, since it is supposed to be in the 100's, we are planning on just staying home, and staying out of that black metal box of a Suburban as much as possible.

I love me some summer!