Another Friday!!!

So this summer we have tried hard to include Fridays in our weekends. I almost always have left work early and we find something special to do. Last Friday, for example, we went to swim at the city pool in Bogert park.

Yesterday was even different yet since Katie first had an eye Dr appointment. So while at that, Ruby was still napping and Reder and I played water-balloons!:

Mom got home and we eventually work Ruby up - she was sleeping too late to let us do anything! I came up with an idea of something close to home that would be fun- We went to the Langhor creek side trail (level, paved trail a few miles from our house), but with a twist: we let Reder bring his "Motorkycle" - his garage-sale-find Harley Davidson big-wheel tricycle. Boy he thought that was awesome racing around the paved loop. I admit I felt a bit jealous...

And Ruby rode in the stroller instead of the backpack:

Of course we had to climb some rocks:

After this short hike, we took the scenic route including "Yonder Rd" (I love that road name) to get to the Gourmet Gas Station. We sat out on the patio and had a great dinner, enjoying the great weather and great views. Then we took another back-roads way home and Katie mentioned that she needed some exercise after that big dinner. I suggested a hike around Kirk Hill. So we did that. But in tag-team fashion - Katie went and did the ~2-mile ~1000' elevation change loop while I bathed the kids and put them to bed and then I went and did the same loop (except I went the opposite direction) after she got home. Although we would rather hike together, this hike otherwise couldn't have happened, and we decided that we will have to try this tag-team thing more often.

Kirk Hill is one of our favorite hike, and not just because the trail head is less than a mile from our house. It is a great hike through a lush forest, with lots of great views. The initial climb gets your heart pumping though. Here is a picture I took randomly along the trail:

One hillside is actually covered with ferns- this part of the hike reminds me more of the forest we saw outside of Kyoto than anything in Montana. I reached the the main lookout (I can see my house from here!) a few minutes before sunset so I hung out a while enjoying the end of the day. Then I ran back down the hill before it got too dark.

Today was a more relaxed day. Reder and Katie went garage-saleing this morning and found some good kids clothes. Then Reder helped me fix random sprinkler problems including a pipe that I severed while pounding a T-post to hold deer-fencing (I do this frequently; What are the odds?). Katie and Ruby went to the grocery store and then Katie made peach-butter (like apple-butter but yummier). After naptime, Reder and I went to get some birdseed and landscape bark and then Reder saw the "M" on the hill and remembered that the fish hatchery is nearby. So we took a quick detour there and saw lots of big fish, raced on the riverside trail, and best of all we played with a tiny newborn duck (we didn't touch him, but we could have). I didn't have the camera with me, but the duck was so cute. It was tiny and yellow, and had just stubs for wings. It quacked a little high-pitch quack, and liked to swim behind its mom. Yet it wasn't afraid of us at all - and would climb out of the water to see what we were up to. Good idea Reder!

Here is one last random photo of Katie celebrating some tomatoes and zucchini from the garden: