Max - The Cute Dog

Grant's dog, Max, is 5 months old and has learned several tricks. He is super cute and super friendly. Watch his great moves...

The Ostrich Festival

For the last 21 years, the city of Chandler has been putting on an ostrich festival. This year's festival was this last weekend. Since Brent and I were privileged to have Julie with us on her birthday, we made her come with us. What a fun birthday activity!! Brent has been to the Ostrich Festival before and has even ate an ostrich burger. So while we were there, he made sure that Julie and I ate one too. They taste like hamburger just much leaner and much healthier. Here is what we saw:

Right when you walk into the huge festival, the ostriches are there to greet you. There were several ostriches in a pen that would come right up the side and try to eat whatever you put close to the fence. Their feathers are VERY soft and fluffy! These birds are very tall.

However, their two toed feet aren't very attractive. Did you know that the ostrich is the only two toed bird?

This is our first ostrich race we watched. The "jockeys" rode on the ostrich's back. It was fun to watch them race around the track. We also watched an ostrich chariot race where the jockey rode in a small lightweight chariot behind the large bird. They had several other races including kids chasing an emu around the track, chicken racing with little kids herding their chicken across the line (chickens are not very cooperative) and there was also a camel race. I have video clips of these too. If you really want to see them, send me an email!

Next we went to an exotic petting zoo. There was an unique assortment of animals. My favorite was the Jacob Sheep. (That's its real name.) This crazy sheep has four horns coming out of his head. Look at the picture closely: There are two large horns coming out of the top of the head and two horns coming out each side of the head. Pretty crazy!

This is NOT a cow! This really is an exotic animal. Can you guess what it is? This is a yak. Have you ever seen a yak before? I had no idea that they looked just like a cow but have a ton more hair.

The last place we checked out was the Famous Flores Thrill Show. This crazy guy and a super crazy gal are circus performers and do very dangerous stunts. The coolest stunt they do is in the "Globe of Death." This stunt is performed by having two motorcycles driving on the inside of a 14 foot metal "globe" at the same time. It is hard to imagine that the two cyclists didn't hit each other. Watch this video clip only if you can handle the suspense and thrill of EXTREME danger!

There were many other super cool things to do and see at the Ostrich Festival. We would have loved to have had Mitchell and Grant with us. They would have had an incredible time on all of the carnival rides, watching the demolition derby and experiencing all the other awesome things! And of course, they would have had to eat an ostrich burger too!

The Bike Park

Mitchell is obsessed with going to the bike park.

The bike park is a cement hole in the ground with dangerous slopes and curves. He loves to spend several hours of the day at the park practicing jumps and hanging out with his biking friends.

On Monday, Julie and I went to observe Mitchell biking. He has no fear and flys through the air. We also brought Grant with us who stayed on the perimeter of the pit.

Some of the bikers.

Going into the pit.
Mitchell is up on the side of the wall on the right.
This is how much air Mitchell caught as he was coming in for a landing. He is several feet off of the ground!Mitchell lands his jump!

So if you ever need to get your heart rate up and have no fear, grab your bike and join Mitchell at the bike park. He will teach you some new moves!

Spring Band Concert

Tonight, after the track meet, Grant played in the Pueblo Spring Band Concert. Grant is currently playing the bass clarinet. He likes being the only kid in the band who gets to play this instrument. Grant says it is much heavier than the clarinet. The concert was as high quality as a 6th grade concert can be. I am so proud of Grant's accomplishment in playing an instrument. He is a talented young man!

Track Meet

Grant had his first track meet today. It was fun to watch him compete in four events. His first event was the shot put.

Next, Grant competed in the discuss throw.

After the discuss throw did the running long jump. He had a good running start and a great jump. He did not scratch on any of his jumps.

Lastly, Grant competed in the high jump. This was the event he was the most excited for. Unfortunately, the jump formation was off today and the bar was set 6 inches higher than what they had practiced. He was pretty upset that he didn't make any of his jumps.

We don't know if he placed in any of his events because we had to leave early to get ready for his band concert. Grant will find out tomorrow! Keep your fingers crossed!

Tortilla Flats

Today Brent and I took a motorcycle road trip to Tortilla Flats with some of Brent's friends. This is an annual thing Brent and his motorcycle buddies do. Tortilla Flats is located in the Superstition Mountains two miles past Canyon Lake. It was a beautiful day to go riding!

Here we are in our motorcycle crash gear. It was a little warm to wear the jacket, but it's better to have the jacket than to have major road rash if we have an accident.

Tortilla Flats is just a couple of old buildings along the side of a secluded road. It has a campground down by the stream. They have an indoor restaurant or an outdoor bar-b-que patio area where you can eat. We always eat outdoors because they have a couple of old cowboys who sing to you while you eat.

The outdoor patio was jam packed with visitors today. We had a hard time finding a seat to eat lunch at. When we did find a seat, we sat with some visitors from Wisconsin. Brent had fun chatting about his "homeland" with his kindred Wisconsians.
Tortilla Flats offers some traditional western toursit sites like a gunfight every hour, a replica of a stagecoach, man hanging from a tree, an old museum about the size of a 4x8 sheet of plywood, and an ice cream parlor that serves homemade Prickly Pear ice cream. (Prickly Pear is the fruit off of a prickly pear cactus. Yes, they really do make it into ice cream. Brent had some today and it was pink.)

The old metal stagecoach.The man hanging from a tree. This is very morbid.

The walls and ceiling of the ice cream parlor are covered in $1 bills. The decorating of this shop took several thousands of dollars!

So if you want to go someplace a little different in Arizona, where the desert scenery is beautiful and accented by a cool running creek, and the food is pretty good, I recommend heading out to Tortilla Flats!

Happy Birthday Brent!

On February 26th, Brent turned 43! To celebrate this momentous event in his life, we went out to dinner at Fudruckers and had the best burgers and fries. For dessert, Brent had his favorite chocolate malt.

Mitchell wanted to get Brent something nice for his birthday. He spent $1 of Brent's money trying to win him a stuffed animal from the MACHINE.

Unfortunately, Mitchell did not win Brent a special stuffed toy :(

Next we went to the Mesa Arts Center to see a performance called "The Price for Freedom." The show was about individual stories of men and women who experienced World War II. It wasn't about weapons, war strategy, or all the reasons we had to go to war. The story was portrayed through news and media footage from the war, stories from actual letters written by families, and through music.

The men who wrote and produced the show are friends of Brent's. This is how we heard of this fantastic show. The show gave me new insights to historical tidbits that I hadn't heard of before. For example, whenever a family sent someone out to war they put a blue star in their front window. People walking or driving down a street would know if you had someone serving in the war. If your family member died during the war, the star would be changed to gold. As stories were told of a family who sent two young men off to war, it was sad to hear the reactions of neighbors who walked by the home and noticed that one star was changed to gold. Then later in the war, both stars were gold.

It was a fun birthday night out on the town with the family!