belated birthday with family

Thursday found us packing up and doubling up on homework so we could realistically take half of Friday off. Having completed enough school work, we loaded up after lunch on Friday and headed to pick Dad up at the office. Three hours, many pages, lots of questions, and several CD's later we arrived at our dear friends' home. Homemade hawaiian pizza bubbling as we greeted the Skeens, we enjoyed a delicious dinner topped off with vanilla ice cream and delightful converstations. Saturday morning Dad and Uncle Bo make breakfast and leave the house to start celebrating Dad's birthday. You might be thinking that you've got Dad's birthday down wrong on your calendar...you don't, at least not if it's written on March 23rd. So now I've got you completely confuzzled; let me explain. As part of Dad's birthday present this past March we gave him a fishing trip with his dear friend Bo. Fly-fishing is apparently best in the fall, so the fishing trip was delayed from Dad's actual birthday until the prime of fishing the San Juan River. All that said, here are a few pictures from the boat:


Daddy

Uncle Bo

When the dads were off fishing, the rest of us ate a leisurely breakfast and headed off on a walk down to the river which flows nearby. As the others threw sticks for the Labrador to retrieve and sauntered on the river bank, Sarah and I continued walking in the crisp fall air and talking about everything under the sun. Apparently we were out for so long the moms, who were by this time back at home and working on lunch, were starting to get worried about us two. Talking over lunch we decided to go to town, which meant only a 5 minute drive (wow! only 5 minutes, what a change for us =D), and shop a couple of the sales at Christopher Banks and C.J. Banks. Mark, Scott, and Russell (and I must say the three of them behaved remarkably well as we girls were shopping) and Riley tagged along. Vanilla Moose, an ice cream parlor, was just around the corner and calling us ;). We couldn't resist. Amongst ice cream cones, sundaes, and milkshakes one dessert had "Sken-cer" written all over it. This was the Big Moose Sundae, a dish of 6 different flavors of ice cream- alegedly 10 pounds of "frozen gold." Sarah, Courtney, Marissa, Meghan, Aunt Jan, Mother Dear, and I decided on Hot Fudge, Apple Pie, Turtle (carmel pecan), Grasshopper (mint), Almond Rocca, and Black Forest (cherry and chocolate...even miles apart we didn't forget Curtis). This was topped off with loads of whipcream and a couple maraschino cherries.


For the record, the Sunday didn't even weigh 4 pounds


it melted fast and all became a giant puddle of melted gold ;)!




After dinner on Saturday we turned on several computers and were able to video chat with Curtis; what fun!





waiting to talk


and some cousin pictures =D








favorite quote from the week: "Of course I'm great, I'm here with the Skeens!" -Scott