AZR: July 2008 Report

For July 4th we went to a Sussex Skihawks baseball game. They are a local minor league team that plays near by. The field is something right out of the movie "Field of Dreams". It is located in the middle of a bunch of corn fields. It is a great place to watch a game, there isn't a bad seat in the house.

The game was followed by a very nice fireworks show. After we got home the boys lit a bunch of the fireworks we purchased in May when passing through PA.

The next night Randolph did their annual fireworks display over at the college so we joined some friends and went over for that. It was a fun evening. Overall it was a pretty relaxing holiday weekend. It seems like we have had so much going on that it was nice to stay at home and relax.

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The drama for the month was Shelby caught her foot on something outside and had to go the vet. She got this cute little bandage and having learned from the master (Kim), she limped around looking for sympathy after her "surgery". She is fine now and has healed completely.

I had to make a quick trip to LA and decided to stop off in Utard for a quick golf game on my way home. Jeff was nice enough to pick me up at the airport and give me a place to sleep. (I was disappointed that Alex and Alysia weren't around, they were at youth conference) The next day Jeff and I met a couple friends of mine for a golf game at Thanksgiving Point down in "Happy Valley". Jeff played 18 holes with us and then scooted off to work. My friends and I managed to get another 18 in before I had to catch my flight home to NJ. It was a perfect day for golf, the weather was nice, not hot at all with overcast skies so it was very pleasant. I had such a great time I may have to do that more often.

Chayce continues to enjoy working at the Seeing Eye. He gets a nice mix of working in the office and walking dogs. It's been a great experience.

Chayce and Brandon went to EFY for the week. It is located in Mansfield, PA about 200+ miles from our house. I don't think they got much sleep, but they had lots of fun and had plenty of good stories to tell when they got home.

I drove up and spent the night in Williamsport, PA Friday night so I could pick them up first thing Saturday morning for the 3 1/2 hour drive home. This was required because we had to do a weeks worth of laundry, get repacked and rush off to the airport to catch our flight to Seattle for our Alaska Cruise.

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This brings us to the big news for the month and that was the Cruise to Alaska. Wow what a great trip. Alaska is a spectacular and beautiful place, it would be great to spend more time there. It felt like we barely scraped the surface of what there is to see and do. We will definitely be visiting again.

Here are some of our favorite highlights:

The helicopter ride and hike on Mendenhal Glacier.
Fishing for Salmon and catching 4 awesome fish. We had them shipped home and oh boy are they tasty.
Cruising through Glacier Bay seeing whales, bears, Bald Eagles, and watching the calving of the glaciers, too cool to describe.
Spending quality time with Grandpa, Grandma and all our cousins. It makes cruising even more enjoyable when you have family along.

Obviously we did a ton more, but you'll just have to ask for a live recounting of the stories. See below for a sampling of the pictures from our trip. I went a little crazy and took over 1200 photos, it's going to take a little time to go through and pick out the good ones.