Cowboy Dinner Tree 2019 Grads and Dads

Earlier this year Brent and I had our little get away around Summer Lake. We had made reservations at the Cowboy Dinner Tree.


It is a restaurant in the middle of nowhere.
When you call to make reservations you are asked the simple question "chicken or steak?"
Because their dinner options are that you get a whole chicken or a 32oz steak.

Brent and I enjoyed it so much when we went we made reservations to take Mitchel back for his graduation dinner.

When we were getting closer to the date we realized my Dad would be in town, as he had agreed to cater Mitch's graduation party. So we invited him to come with us for an early Father's Day.

It was AH-MAZ-ING!

We got there early and so we visited one of the state parks near the area.

Brent was making a weird pose

My guys

After exploring the creek we went to the restaurant and checked in. We played corn hole while we waited.

We sat down and were asked our drink order. Then we had the salads, beans, and fresh yeast rolls brought to us. After that they brought out the steaks...and my dad's chicken.

Brent and I each ate a quarter of his steak and brought home my whole steak and the other half of his. Mitchel was determined to eat his whole steak, but I pulled the plug on that. I was not interested in him spending the car ride home nauseous.

We finished our dessert and then walked around the gift shop and tried to play more corn hole before the mosquitos started eating us alive.

We are definitely going to go back sometime soon!

Swim Meets 2019

Last year August did swim team and loved it. This year we signed him up again.

It was mostly Brent who wanted to make this happen, and like usual he is right and at the end of it all I am happy. The reason it is hard for me to get excited about this is the HUGE time commitment that is swim team. From the end of June until the END of July there is swim practice EVERYDAY, super early in the AM. Then every weekend is a swim meet. All over the place there are meets.

The swim team literally becomes your family during the summer. You see them everyday, camp with them on the weekends...it gets intense.

It also kind of fills the calendar so your summer is consumed.

So there are aspects to it I like, and others that I wish were different.

Swim meets are also ALL DAY long. Thankfully we didn't have to attend on Fridays, but pretty much all day on Saturday and Sunday you are sitting around waiting for your kids event and heat. Then they swim for a few minutes (or less) and then its back to sitting and waiting. Emmett was a very patient boy this summer and found ways to entertain himself. Like finding bugs.

August really started to get into by the end of last summer...this summer he just enjoyed the social aspects and never really got as competitive.

In Klamath falls we were unable to camp, so we got a hotel. We swam in the hotel pool for a long time. I didn't think  he could possibly want to swim any more, but he did! We got all pruned up and then headed to the hotel to eat and pass out. We had to be there by 6:45 in the morning for warm ups. Blah.

The district meet to end the season was held in John Day. We were all able to camp in the adjoining park. We were in a tent city. There were families and kids all around. A creek ran right by the camp that Emmett and I tried to spend a lot of time in.

They have some fun concessions. We usually get the snow cones and hot dogs. Emmett was lucky enough to get the glitter tattoo and ocean tattoos.

I am not sure if I am excited for next summer or not...but I love the kids being involved in sports or clubs where the coaches, teammates, and their parents take your child under their wing and love and support them as much as you do.