Off again ...

I'm wondering if there is anything Cameron has done this summer that HAS NOT involved skateboarding? Or traveling? I'm thinking no ... he'll have no problems writing that essay when he starts school in a few weeks. Well we're off again! At least Cam and I are. He finished up his camp at the skateboard school on Friday. And on Monday he'll start a new camp ... in Vegas! Oh yeah. It is a fantastic opportunity for him and he could not be more excited. A visiting mom at his camp was telling Bryan about an indoor facility in Vegas. Looked it up and saw they had a summer camp offered. Long story short - Called and got him hooked up! The owner has 8 instructors, all certified and training a group with no more than 4 kids. Training ... a little bit more intense than what he's used to now, but he's ready. The owner was excited to have him for the week and anxious to help with some of the areas that Cam could use some extra training in. It also sounded like he had a few semi-pros coming in during the week to teach. And with the lovely accommodations provided by mom and dad - we're set! So he and I are headed out tomorrow morning ... driving .... and headed back next weekend. I'm very fortunate that my supervisor approved for me to work from mom and dad's, so while he's at camp I'll be putting in my hours. :) We're keeping our fingers crossed - and toes - that Bryan can fly in Tuesday afternoon and leave Wednesday evening. He wanted to be able to see Cam skate while he was there, so hopefully that works out. Unfortunately, we probably won't know until Monday for sure. His progression with his skating has come a long way in the last few months. I'm really excited for him to polish off some skills and learn a few new tricks this week. I will try and post some pictures throughout the week!

Other than trying to keep up with work ... and laundry ... there hasn't been much going on. It's been hot. Really hot. And the humidity has been horrible. If I wanted to have curly hair I'd get a perm. Or live in Florida again. So our outdoor activities have taken a back seat for now. Even swimming is a bit rough ... the pool temp was 88 a few days ago. It was somewhat refreshing ... for about 20 minutes. Then you start to feel like you're in that Bugs Bunny cartoon where he thinks he's taking a bath .... in the big iron pot sitting over a fire? Toss in a few carrots and voila! Dinner is served. The monsoons should start up next week .. lucky Bryan. But looking forward to a little rain ... and the lightning storms are pretty cool. Okay - time to change my loads again. That's it for now! I'll keep you updated on the Vegas stop of Cam's skateboarding tour. :)

Skate video

Another week of skate camp completed! This was Cam's third week, and by far his best. He really worked his tail off and nailed some great tricks. I went with Bryan to pick him up yesterday, and got there a bit early so I could see what they've been raving about all week. Neither one was exaggerating. He was on fire! I took some videos of the last half hour of his skating and you can see it below!

Absence

... makes the heart grow fonder. Right? Well then I've succeeded. :) I've finally gotten around to posting. Been meaning to all week, but it's just kinda taken a backseat to everything else! We had a fantastic time in California last weekend. La Jolla was absolutely beautiful. Our hotel room had a great ocean view and we were about a block from the beach.

Our hotel was also just down the street from the "Rodeo Drive" of San Diego ... pinkies up, people. The little boutiques and galleries were very cool, but just a tad bit out of our price range. You know it's bad when the "sale price" of the item is equal to your house payment - and that item is a scarf. No thanks. We decided that the area was absolutely gorgeous - we drooled for a while over some of the homes, and played the "If we win the lottery, we'll take THIS one" game for quite some time, but we're a bit more hip on the open air bars/surf-n-turf restaurants that we could just walk into off the beach. Cam, however, was in heaven - the Bentley's, Maserati's, and Ferrari's were in full force. All weekend. We spent Friday evening in Mission Beach and hit one of our favorite little restaurants for dinner. It's right on the ocean and it was fantastic. Saturday was a killer! We were up early and hit the Birch Aquarium. It was a great change from Sea World. :)

They had quite the array of saltwater fish, sharks and our new family favorite ... sea dragons. If we still had our fish tank, we decided we'd get some of these. They were so mythical looking, they almost looked fake.

We walked around the North La Jolla area after that, hit some surf shops, walked to the beach and then headed over to Coronado Island. This was the first time I had been over there and loved it. It was so beautiful and it really made me feel like we were on vacation. We did some shopping, had a great lunch - and some afternoon cocktails - at a Mexican restaurant and headed over to the skate park. One of Cameron's skate instructors told us about the skate park located just underneath the bridge to the island. It was one of the nicest parks we'd been to, and it was such a great environment. We were right next to the beach and were able to watch all the boats on the water while Cam was skating. It was a gorgeous afternoon - a nice break from the triple digits in Arizona - so Bryan and I kicked back with our coffees and just relaxed!

Here are a few pictures of Cam skating. Just so you know - we don't DARE leave home without the skate gear. His list of park conquests is growing rapidly!





We left Coronado and headed back into San Diego for some more shopping ... nothing like having your son walk around with his pants to his knees because he forgot his belt. That was top on our list. Got back to our hotel and decided to walk around for a while, although I'm not sure that was a good idea - our feet were so tired! We had a great Father's Day breakfast at the cafe at the Museum of Contemporary Art - here's a pic of Daddy and son. (Bryan wasn't real fond of this picture, I thought it was great, so I included it. Shhhhh. Not sure how often he checks this, but hopefully you see it before he does and it is "accidentally" deleted from the blog.)

When Cam was in California with Mike and Denise, he did a little shopping in Disneyland. He found what he thought to be the most hilarious (and I agree) "gift" for Bryan for Father's Day. Grandma thought one that said "Dad" would be more appropriate, but Cam was thinking more along the lines of a joke. So ... he purchased the accessory below. For Bryan's truck. Cam snuck this in his backpack, hoping to "surprise" Bryan with it on Father's Day. We took my car last weekend on our trip, and he was extremely disappointed when he realized there is no antenna. So, we had to wait until we got home before he could put it on. Bryan thought it was funny, but decided to take it off before he left for work Monday morning. He didn't think it would be all that funny driving into the Prison complex to deliver while sporting this "bling" ... :)

Kind of a random picture, but I loved it. This church was across the street from our hotel also, and was gorgeous.

That was about it! After fartin' around for a bit in La Jolla, we headed home. It was a short trip, and we added quite a bit to our "to-do-list" for future trips when we have a little bit more time.
But ... It was nice to get away even for the short time!

Skate Contest - Updated!

The video clips and pictures from
Cameron's skate contest
have officially been downloaded!
Check them out!

Skateboard Contest

And 3rd Place goes to ...

Cameron Peterson!

Cam competed in his 2nd official Skate Contest on Saturday, and placed third in his event! Unlike the last contest, there were approximately 30 or so kids competing in the bowl contest. Some members of the skateboarding school, and the rest were "walk-ins". Again, he was in the Advanced 15 & Under category and was up against some pretty tough competition. Each participant had (2) 45 second runs, and the judges took the best run out of each. Cam was one of the few that actually made it through an entire run without falling off his board, thus ... 3rd place! I will attempt to post some video/pics soon, so check back!

FINALLY UPDATED! SEE BELOW!

Cam before the contest

Here's another little clip of Cam on the mini-ramps:

Cameron's First Skate Contest

Cam's skate contest ... it was his first "real" skate competition. And he did AWESOME. Have to give some details to lead into the contest a bit ... The competition on was open to all groups - including non-members of the skateboard school. All participants in the Intermediate and under all received a prize for competing. The Advanced and Expert competitions were actually judged and placed accordingly. Cameron decided that even though he was not in the Advanced group for his lessons each week, that he wanted to compete in the bowl competition. He wanted to see where he stood with everyone else. So the week before the contest - yes, in one week - he learned 4 or so new tricks to use in the contest. Friday night at his lesson and again for about 20 minutes or so on Saturday before the contest, he worked on his routine (run). So the tricks that he used in this contest, he essentially learned in one week. The other competitors have been in the Advanced group all year. Saturday morning we talk to the Skate manager and let him know that Cameron wanted to compete in the Advanced competition. Jeff was wary, and thought that it might be too much for him, that these guys knew a few more tricks than him. It had been quite a while since he had seen Cameron skate, so Bryan filled him in on what he had accomplished this week, and the tricks that he was pulling off. Jeff was surprised/impressed/etc., and absolutely agreed that Cameron should compete. So, he and his friend that is in the Advanced group were the youngest by far - the other kids he was competing against had at least 4 years on them. He was nervous up until Saturday, and in fact, did not want anyone coming and watching him. It was his first contest and he wasn't sure how it would go. So for those of you who wanted to attend, I apologize for that! However, he did later say that he really enjoyed the crowd cheering him on, and welcomes anyone to his next contest!

This particular area of the contest that he was competing in was the bowl. It was a half hour total, each skater took turns. When they fell, they got back in line and the next kid would go. Cameron had about 3 or 4 runs and did great. He had a great attitude (an area we have been working on a lot lately!) and was really focused on what he was doing. Without elaborating on all the tricks he pulled, (mostly because I'm not sure what they're all called ...) I will tell you that he placed 5th! He did so great and Bryan and I could not have been more proud. There were 9 total competing, and when they called out 9th place, and then 8th, up to 5th, he just had this huge grin on his face knowing he beat out these other kids - kids that had much more time and experience on him. He was a tad disappointed, thought for sure he would have placed fourth based on the competition, as did we, but still excited for him. The skate manager, the other coaches, and even the facility owner's wife came up to us and said they could not believe how well he did, and they had no idea he had worked so hard to land those tricks. :) At his first practice after the competition, the skate manager came up to Cameron, congratulated him on Saturday's run and said he was so impressed. He also told Cam that if he would have landed the 360 (the final fall in each of the video clips below) and handplant that he had tried (I didn't get this one on tape) in the competition, he would have definitely placed first! Like I said, we were incredibly proud! Hopefully you can see the video clips below ... it was tough to get a good spot to be able to tape the entire routine, mostly because of the logistics of the skatepark.

Cameron standing next to the cameraman!

Lined up with some of the other contestants (Cam is the 3rd one from the left)

Okay - you might want to turn your volume down just a tad, the sound is HORRIBLE! (Although you can hear a little bit of the announcer and how excited he was when Cameron landed some of his tricks.) I was standing next to the loudspeaker for the music, and combined with the people and the announcer, well it didn't turn out pretty. :(

Port Orchard

We spent the next few days or so with Aunt Cathy and Uncle John! Cam gave Aunt Cathy a lesson on playing his Nintendo DS, and Uncle John gave Cam a lesson in wrestling. :) Cam was actually wearing his skatepads and helmet for a while. That is some serious wrassling! Friday we headed down to the waterfront in Tacoma. Cam was able to skate along, and we had a fantastic lunch at Duke's Chowder House.

This was just the beginning of our day! We headed over to Maple Valley to see Becky and Slider and went from there to meet up with Jim at work. Unfortunately, Jim couldn't make it to dinner with us because of work, but we were able to meet up with afterwards. He gave Cameron the grand tour of the police car! Honestly? I think Cameron was a bit nervous and was very adamant about NOT wanting to see a holding cell and to make sure there weren't any "bad guys" at the substation when we were there. :)

That was enough excitement for me, but certainly not the end of our day! Jim mentioned a skate park close by and asked if Cameron had his gear with him. Of course he did, and it was in the trunk. So we made a stop at Crossroads Park before taking Becky back to her house. We stopped at Starbucks before heading over, and Jim met up with us for a bit. Cam had a pretty confident demeanor about him, perhaps because he was walking into the skate park with a policeman. :) Jim headed off to tell some people to turn their music down and another guy on a BMX bike that he wasn't supposed to be there, but it was okay if no one else complained about it. Just doin' his job. There were a few other kids Cam's age, but not skating inside the bowl. The other kids were about 16? 17? and up. After watching for a while, we got the hang of the park etiquette and Cam was all over it. The skaters there were very polite to him and even looked out for him, telling him to go ahead and giving him the head nod of approval on his tricks. :) The other kids watching were calling him a "beast" because of the trick he was trying - a handplant - and that they wouldn't try that even with all the pads on. :) It was a huge boost for his ego to say the least. We left there, to drop Aunt Cathy off with Jennifer, and they were going to meet us back at their house. Unfortunately, this was the onset of a stomach bug Cam picked up. Got to Target and he puked. Dropped Becky off at home and he puked. Headed home and puked in the car, because we were on the highway and couldn't find a spot to pull over. :( My poor baby! We finally pull over and get things cleaned up, and Cameron is standing off to the side of the road crying "I hate this trip!" It was sad. Finally get home, give him a bath and put him to bed. A corona never tasted so good. Spent the next day hanging out with Aunt Cathy and debating on whether Cam was good enough to ride down to Seaside. He wasn't, so around 6:00 we hit the coronas, again and had a GREAT day catching up with Aunt Cathy! All in all - even with the little stomach bug - our visit in Port Orchard was great. The only thing that would have made it a bit better would have been if Uncle John had some cream of tartar ... :)

Seaside

The third leg of our trip was to Seaside! Because Cam was sick, our arrival was pushed back by a day. But we still had a great time with Grandma! Grandma and I enjoyed our whiskey and beer until 4:00 a.m. Yes, 4:00. Unbelievable! It was so much fun and something I will never forget!





Of course, it would not have been a trip to Seaside without hitting the bumper cars - the traditional and the air/innertube ones ...



and miniature golf. Despite Cameron's TWO hole in ones, Grandma still won!






And on top of that, she was introduced to air hockey - which she also kicked Cam's butt at! Woohoo! The Seaside skate park is conveniently located down the street from grandma's house, so of course, we hit this one too. :) We had a great time with Ichi on the beach, playing frisbee, and a nice visit from Connor and the kids. Cam was excited to see his cousins!



I'm thinking when the weather is cooler here, Grandma will have to head down this way so we can repay her hospitatlity! (I'll be sure my liquor cabinet is stocked!) :)