"Bad Boys, Bad Boys, Whatcha you gunna do?  Whatcha gunna do when they come for you?..."

You all know the song & if you now have that song stuck in your head...You can blame me for that.

Well, this past Wednesday we found out what happens to those who are not so nice...The Good Guys come for them...and this is their story...well atleast one of them...our Uncle Clyde.

Who is Uncle Clyde you maybe asking yourself?  Well, he is none other than the COOLEST Sergeant at the Apache Junction Police Department!

See...I told you!

And he likes us SOOOOOO much that he gave us a personalized tour.

Clyde is very impressed that Devyn aspires to become a police officer someday...and introducing him as such, Devyn was quickly given advice by a fellow officer to become a fireman...jokingly he said, "everybody loves firemen".   Call us biased, but we have a special love for the men in blue.  I mean, come on...besides the fact that they all love donuts...who wouldn't love those who serve & protect us!?! 
What's that?  No Donuts?!  Dyxon is going to be upset!

Because I LOOOOVE CSI...Forensics was my favorite part of the tour.  Here we met the resident Forensic Scientist and discussed the different jobs they perform plus we got to see a dismantled atm that was brought in for fingerprinting...pretty cool stuff.

Now you don't want to go venturing into this area w/o a key.  We found out that you get absolutely no privacy when stuck in a jail cell.  The toilet is in plain view of the 4 bunks that are stuffed within these small quarters....AND...to top it off... there is a camera watching your every move!

And if you are REALLY bad...you get strapped into this wheeled chair.  The hard part, we were told, is getting the "bad guys" into it!  They don't go quietly or without a fight!  But, once they are in there, they can easily be wheeled (transported) around to places like the court room.

The K9 Unit w/o the K9.  We found that the K9 was locked inside an office for safe keeping.  OUR Safe Keeping!

That's one door we won't be venturing through...
But, the door that leads to the yard was full of fun stuff!

And then...right up Devyn's alley.... (because they are just as [crazy] as he is) were the Special Weapons And Tactics (aka: SWAT) vehicles.

After viewing the motorcycles, Devyn decided he did not want to be a Motorcycle cop anymore based upon ALL of the buttons on it.  I think he was a bit overwhelmed.  And then to top it off, while I was busy trying to take pictures, Uncle Clyde turned on the siren...scared the tar out of me.  Yes, I screamed!  Hey, you would have too...it was LOUD!!!

And what tour of police vehicles would be complete without the "paddy wagon".  Denym climbed right up inside...silly girl.

For those of you that even think you could even steal the entry code to any secured area...think again!  Devyn tries to copy the code he witnessed being punched in...but to no avail.  The #s change every time it is used...HA!

What!?!  You were caught trying to break in to a secured area?  Great, now you must go through interogation. Busted, Devyn!  I told you to not go messin' around with that keypad.

Now Devyn, you must get your fingerprints done.  Hold still & relax your hand.  This is NOT going to look good on your record.  Unless of course this was intended all along to obtain your Cub Scout Bear Achievement Award for "Law Enforcement Is a Big Job"...which it was.  No worries Gma's & Gpa's.

I think Dyxon is STILL wondering where they keep the donuts...

And that concludes our tour of the Apache Junction Police Dept.

THANKS SO MUCH UNCLE CLYDE!!!  WE LOVE YOU!!!

The Ancient Egypt party was a blast!  The kids wrote their names with the use of Ancient Egyptian writing called heiroglyphics onto peices of paper cut out into little tablets...very cute. 
Here is a picture of the hieroglypic symbols we used:

Then they made little mummies to go inside an egg carton sarcophagus....another creative idea:

While they were making their mummies, we dined on Egyptian foods.  Such as figs, dates, grapes, pomegranates, raisins & and other dried fruits.

The kids gobbled it up before I could take a picture of everything...but here's what was left:

Our activity was last and ended up being fun for all the kids.  First we talked about the 3 different types of pyramids:

Then we discussed the structure of the pyramid and passed out our pretzels & marshmallows to begin construction.
Here is Dagyn's ...she's so proud of herself.  It wasn't an easy thing to do...the pretzels didn't always want to stick to the marshmallows.

And here are Dyxon (left) and Devyn (right) making theirs.  Notice Dyxon's concentration....tongue sticking out!  He gets that from his Daddy.  ;)

And here is Dyson in the lower right-hand corner concentrating very closely on his pyramid construction. 
Denym is being held by my friend Aubree in the background on the left.  She was so good for Aubree too.  Which helped me out a lot since I was running around assisting the children with constructing their pyramids & passing out more marshmallows.  For some reason they kept disappearing...hmmm?

And a party in the Arizona heat would not be complete without WATERMELON....YUMMY!!!

It would be OK to say that the kids had fun.

Next month we are traveling to ANCIENT CHINA!

A lot has happend over this past month...

...like for instance, Dagyn's birthay celebration.  

Since Dagyn got a 'newly refurbised' bike for her birthday, we decided to celebrate by taking a bike ride to the nearby park (or should I say, water retention area).  Chris had painted Devyn's old bike purple, added some bells & whistles (well a bell, a basket & some streamers) & I drew some silver pin-stripping decals on it ~ she loved it! 

Devyn, unfortunately, wasn't home to join us (he was at football practice) when we got the spur-of-the-moment idea to go.  Even without all of us there we still managed to have a great time.

Chris left me with the 2 little ones while Dylan, Dagyn & Dyson followed along with him to Mickey D's for some burgers & fries.
During that time Dyxon, Denym & I enjoyed playing 'chase down the mountain' (running down the slope/hill), hide-n-go-seek behind the trees (well actually, Denym just curiously watched Dyxon & I) & catch with the soccer ball that we brought along with us. 
Afterwards, when Chris & the others got back & we had eaten...we all played a very short game of (one-base) kick ball.  I think everyone ended up just kicking the ball 1 time.  If Devyn was there, I know we would have had to drag him away from playing all into the night... Even if he had just finished practicing football for 2 hours.

The kids also enjoyed playing in the trees & running around while Chris & I got to chat for a moment or 2 in between all the action.

We all knew it was time to pack up and head home when Denym spotted the moon.  Good night moon.
(more to come...)