The Hazard Chronicles

Summer is in full swing. In the last eight days we, as a family, have gone on an overnight kayaking trip, gone rock climbing twice, taken a trip to Seattle, gone mountain biking, attended three concerts, ran a 5k, gone rv camping overnight, made an Irish dance video, played in a band, taken a trip to visit grandparents, and started a week with friends in Washington DC.

Let's take these things one at a time. 

First, the kayaking trip. We actually wrote about that last week. It was super fun and refreshing for Rachel and I and got us ready for the upcoming madness. School got out on Tuesday and it has been non-stop ever since.

Rock climbing: Rach and I joined a group a while back. We climb at least once a week and we've made a few new friends along the way. It's pretty much all just sport climbing, and we keep things pretty chill difficulty-wise. We sometimes go out for refreshments after it gets too dark to climb anymore.

Seattle: The day after school let out, Maren and Rachel went on a road trip- just them. They did Seattle things. They bonded. I hear it was great. Here are some photos that Rachel and Maren captioned:

The gum wall holds a disgusting allure that I will never understand. Somehow it is a 'must see' when we go to Seattle.

Maren and I went on a Seattle Underground tour that has been running for the past 60 years. Did you know that the 33 blocks of Seattle downtown businesses are actually entered on the original second floor? That's right! Due to rising tide issues, the street level was brought up a whole story to preserve this area. Maren is walking on the historic sidewalk that is now underground.

Many of the original levels are no longer used. This floor used to be the ground floor and has since fallen into disrepair. 

We had so much fun! I sure love this girl.

Maren created our Seattle schedule and Chinatown was a must! As we walked around, we scouted out a good restaurant. We ended up going to the first one we saw! The mini teacups made it an easy choice. Maren loves tea, and the tea we were served on arrival did not disappoint. We also made it a goal to try new things throughout the trip. Fried bean curd was a first, and it was pretty tasty.

We could have sworn those were pterodactyls hanging in the background

I would take a trip with this girl anywhere. We had a great drive listening to psychology podcasts and chatting.

Mountain Biking: There was a big demo day where we were able to try out a lot of different bikes and take a free shuttle to the top of the mountain. This was at a bike park with lots of named runs, well maintained trails, and a rating system similar to skiing to make sure we didn't die. The kids and I stuck mostly to blues (the one black we did was kinda scary), and Rach did a lot of greens sprinkled with blues. This was all pretty new for us but it's definitely something I could get used to.

Jack on a BMX course. Rach and Jack enjoyed the BMX bike course.

These ones were my favorite.

Concerts: Evelyn's boyfriend has been playing a lot of gigs with his band, Solace. There are usually other bands there as well. Ev has become a pretty regular part of their crew, while at the same time trying to re-start her own band, Retrospect.

5K Color Run: This was a run I did with my work team, but some of us invited kids as well. Addy and Jack both did it with me and we stayed together pretty much the whole time. The weather was a little temperamental, and for a while we were getting pelted with large hailstones. Personally, I think it just added to the unique flavor of an already unique sort of run.

Most of my work team- looking nice and fresh at the beginning of the race

Ready to go at the starting line

Maybe it was the cool weather. Maybe it was the gripping story I told while we were running. Maybe she's just getting older and better. This was Addy's fastest 5k that she's done.

Every so often there were people throwing color bombs at us, which was kind of the point of the whole thing.

Camping: Sort of a spur-of-the-moment thing where we just wanted to get out for a while and this was and easy way to do that. We went to a local campground and explored the trail system before settling in for dinner and games around the campfire.

Exploring the trails

Explanation: Jack and Lindsey wanted to go explore on their own. I posed them like this and told them to hold it so I could take a picture. We then walked away without telling them, just to see how long they would hold the pose. It lasted for like a minute before they turned around!

Why use a hot-dog stick when you can use a sword instead?

Good morning!

Dance video: We also wrote about this in the last post. Lindsey's Irish Dance group finished filming this week and editing is currently underway. Lindsey was especially enthusiastic about the fog machine they got to play with. It will be interesting to see the final product.

Band: Ev and I played together in church again. I was on lead guitar this time, making it so that I have officially played rhythm, bass, and lead with her now. Our summer weekend schedule is starting to fill up pretty quick so it might be a while before we get a chance to do it again.

Big trips: Addy was dropped off at the airport at 3:30am Sunday morning. She will spend the next week with friends in Washington DC and New York City. She updates us regularly and will share some photos and stories next week.

Jackson was dropped off yesterday to spend a week with my parents. I think they are planning on camping at least one night. Outside of that, I don't really know. He'll also have some things to write about next week though.

And that was our week. Whew! We love summer!

Have a good week!