Camping, Girl trips, and the Frog

We had our annual ward camp out a few weeks ago and Phil was on overnight call at the hospital. I thought it would be a fun adventure and decided to try and do it by myself. We got the tent set up and made a giant bed for us all to sleep on inside. Phil was totally surprised I did it, mostly because I did it without an air mattress. It was the first time I have ever been camping without one, and I am glad it was only one night. The kids had a blast and slept great. Zach slept next to me, away from the other kids, and he woke up with a big smile on his face, he is a camper already. The kids had fun catching little toads, which died the next day.

Some friends decided to go camping again the next weekend so camping was done again, except this time Phil took the kids (minus Zach) while I spent some girl time in Chicago. They ate like kings, well cowboys, with wonderful dutch oven dishes. Phil said he is getting too old to go camping without an air mattress, other than sore mussels everyone had a blast.

Kasey, who moved to Alaska a year ago, came to Chicago for her hubby's conference. So Robs, Sarah, and I drove up to see her. She brought Ethan so Zach wouldn't be the only boy. We had a blast shopping, laughing, eating, taking pictures of Robilyn, talking about the past and the future, and just being together. The boys were super stars!

I got home Saturday night, our anniversary was Sunday, Phil was on call 2 more times that week and then I headed out on another fun girl trip adventure. I went to Minneapolis to the Mall of America! Not to shop, can you believe I only went in two stores the whole weekend! It was Scrapfest 2009. My friend Heather, from med school she lives in Des Moines, and I decided to see what it was all about. It was Disneyland for scrappers. We payed to get a badge ($15) and then spent three days walking around the mall standing in lines and doing projects. It was lots of fun! They even had the expensive souviners we had to buy to remember the weekend.

The frog! I was driving to volleyball at the church one night last week and noticed something hop on the side of the road. I thought to myself, McKell is obsessed with frogs right now, she should come to this pond and see what she finds. The next day Phil was post call (home sleeping) I was taking the kids to school and when I got home Phil was awake, shocking.

He said, 'that was a funny joke.'

Me- 'What?' looking at him like are you sleep talking?

Him- 'Go look out in the garage in the bucket'

Me- 'Why?' thinking- just go to sleep so you can get up before dinner and help me with the kids

I go look in the bucket and there is this

I was so shocked. He found it on the ground in the garage. McKell has been asking for one as a pet and Phil thought I got one and was playing a joke on him. There would be no way a frog would be able to get in our garage on its own. We were baffled. Then I remembered the night before when I was driving to volleyball and saw something out of the corner of my eye. He must have jumped onto the grill of the van and stayed there while I played and then got off before I left in the morning. Prayers do get answered! The girls were so excited when they saw him and quickly named him Cody. They kept saying, 'I can't believe this is real, I can't believe we really have our own frog.' Poor frog had a broken leg, look how it goes out. They were planning his recovery and feeding him crickets and deciding who gets to take him to school first. McKell took him the next day to school and he was a hit. She didn't let anyone hold him except for Brody, of course, but let everyone look at him. She was going in from recess and held the door open for some 1st graders, a girl was walking in and looked at the frog box and didn't believe it was real. She took the box from McKell and shook it and threw it on the ground. Poor Cody was bleeding from his head and only lasted until about 5 pm that night before he 'croaked'. McKell was devastated. She was crying and didn't want to eat dinner. She wanted a proper burial, which I talked her out of. Poor Cody, he will now be forever remembered on the blog.

We won't be hanging out together as a whole family anytime soon, Phil is on nights then headed to interviews and conferences and then another week of nights. So maybe once October is over we can finally celebrate our 12 year anniversary, and go to dinner together.