Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Camp Rapidian Hike

Yesterday, we did a hike to Camp Rapidan where Herbert Hoover (the president) stayed as a summer retreat. We have done this hike before, but my mom had friends from Ohio visiting, and she thought they would like the hike a lot since it is one of our favorite, and it is unique since it has the retreat at the bottom. The trail was 4 miles round trip, and it was really rocky. There was even a creek running down the middle in parts. We also had to cross a river a few times and the water was very high because it has been raining a lot. I also swam in the swimming hole with a waterfall forming in it. The camp was very neat, and even had a small museum in it. Right beside the main house of the camp, we saw a huge rattlesnake. I got close enough to take a pretty cool picture.
It does not look like this is a very old snake, since it did not have many rattlers!
Billy and J-Wow in the 'swimmin' hole'. It was cold!!!!!

The church lock-in....by JJ

We had a lock-in at our church last weekend. It was so much fun. We had two HUGE nerf gun battles. We also got to go out to the bowling alley from 10PM-midnight. That is way past my bed time. We also played a game like capture the flag, but it was boys -vs- girls and we used 10 glow sticks for the flags. The boys won....and by a lot too! We watched How to Train your Dragon movie, and by this time I fell asleep by Billy woke me up! I thought before the lock-in started that I really would not like it. But, I really did. I am glad I went, and it will be fun next year too!

The boys are back!

It's summer, and that means Billy and JJ are going to be back 'blogging' about all their adventures again. We did not do any updating the entire school year, they were just both so busy. So, to give you all a quick look at what they have been up to the last 9 months, I turn it over to Billy and JJ: Billy.....5th Grade: (This picture is of red ribbon week at school....I did announcements and had kids sign a poster to live a drug free life.) I had a good first year at SLMS as a 5th grader this year. I made a lot of good friends and had good teachers...a few bad ones, but mostly good! There are 5 boys in my closest group of friends, and we call ourselves the 5. We got to go together for a whole weekend and stay in a hotel that one of my friends grandparents own. That was fun. Towards the beginning of the school year when I was still in Young Marines, I did announcements for Red Ribbon Week. I did them every day for a whole week. At the end of the year, I got the chorus award, which is funny because I cannot sing. I also did a math competition and got 11th place out of all of the the and 6th graders. I also got my Arrow of Light in Cub Scouts and now I am in the Boy Scout Troop. I hope 6th grade is as good at 5th was! This is my group of friends....the 5:
From JJ: Highlights from 3rd Grade
JJ got the Citizenship award for the second year in a row in his class! His list of memories: 1) Cub Scouts because it is fun to learn about the Wilderness 2)Recess is my favorite thing at school 3) Doing fun stuff with my friends 4) I was the stork in the school play. I wore yellow tights 5) History is my favorite subject at school 6) I was glad to get the citizenship award 7) PE Peers was fun the first half of the year 8) on the last day, we played kickball 9)The events for field day were fun 10) I was SEC Postmaster. That is an office position. 11) I had three different teachers....it was a crazy year!
JJ got to put the flag up at school on September 11th.