Love My Boys

I love being a mommy and having the funnest, cutest little boys!

Good Bye and Hello!

When we sold our Jeep we ended up inheriting Shane's Grandmother's car. It was an okay car. It got us from A to B. But it was sort of a lemon to the fact that the gas mileage was bad, really bad. In fact it was like driving an SUV. So Shane and I took Dave Ramsey's advise and saved and saved so we could pay cash for our next vehicle so we wouldn't have a car payment. This weekend we bought a (New to us) Honda Pilot. It was a blessing because Friday we listed the red car and 3 hours later someone called me wanting to buy it. 

Good-Bye!!!

Well, Hello!!!!!

*On a side note, I LOVE my new car. I am so grateful for it. It is so much easier to put the boys into and it fits 8 comfortably!!!! And a huge trunk! I feel like I'm in a dream! 

When it Rains it Pours

 It's Monsoon Season here in Vegas and we're loving it. It's cooling us down a little, but then when the sun comes back out it makes it hot and humid! It will be in the 100's this week! But we sure do love the rain! 

This was right after church. It started to rain on our way home and by the time we got home it was in full down pour so we quickly changed and went out to get a little wet.

 Poor Kellen stayed in the garage with mom watching everyone else play in the rain. Maybe next year little buddy!

Playdate

The Vegas heat can make for cabin fever during the hot summer months. recently we made a trip to a local indoor playground for some much needed run around time.  My friend Anna introduced us to this wonderful place! Not only do my boys love hanging out with her cute little dude, but I get to have some normal adult conversation with another mommy! 

Colson was rocking that Giraffe toy.                                                     Kellen had fun too. 

 These slides might look innocent, but they were no such thing. Colson had me side down on the slide next to him at one point and let's just say I won't repeat the words that flooded into my mind as I rapidly flew down the slide, hit the middle bump and then went soaring down the rest of the way. After talking it over we're highly convinced this place waxes their slides! No exaggeration!!!!!! And yes I might have wet myself a little because let's face it that's what moms do. 

 Colson just loves his little brother. He even came over to play in the little kids ball pit to be with Kellen 

"Holy Moly!!! Look at all of these balls I get to slobber on!!!!"At first he wasn't a big fan but once he got used to the idea and feeling of sitting on all those balls he had a blast! 

Thanks Anna and Easton for making our day just a little more bearable and fun in all this heat! 

Lake Powell

Well, we have a habit in this family that whenever we go on a big trip literally hundreds of pictures are taken. You can imagine the difficulty when it's time to blog...... Lake Powell was no exception! The day before we left we stayed in St. George and managed to catch the movie Brave with all of our cousins that we there. Shane and I thought it was quite a cute movie! But Early the next morning we were off after all of the crazy packing and grocery shopping the night before (1 week of food and provisions for 20 people) we were off. There were quite a few glitches in our trip. Some pretty big some smaller, and I really don't want to address them because I want to remember this trip for what it really was when you get down to it, absolutely wonderful. Here are a handful of pictures. 

 At the movies

 Getting ready to go

 Grandma and Kellen. Kellen did so great the entire time.

 Relaxing at Gunsight this is where we docked the first night.

 I found this picture with many others like it after we got home. Practicing his funny faces. 

 Let's get this show on the road!!!!

 Kellen even helped when we were wake boarding

Lounging on the top deck after dinner on the 4th of July.

 Excited for the fireworks!!!!The boat next to ours set off a full on show. They must have spent at least 5 Grand on the show. We were more than lucky that we beached next to them!

 Soooooo exhausted!

 Kellen was not a fan of the hiking backpack at first! 

 On our way to Rainbow Bridge

Colson was dragging his feet all the way back to the boat after the uphill hike to Rainbow bridge. We perked up his spirits again by letting him climb a little under this hanging rock and show us his Big Guns.

 Me, Krew, Lincoln, Kinsley, Melissa 

 So I'm not quite sure how I should tell this next story so that all parties involved come off looking innocent and a finger not pointing at anyone..... We were exploring all the fun little passages in Cathedral Canyon, and Grandpa being the daredevil that he is got us into a tight spot despite the yells and hollers from his daughter in laws and sons that maybe we should reverse because it looks like this is the end of the road. Yes, the boat got wedged on its belly on a rock. We all jumped out and clambered up this really steep rock. The boys finally got the boat out. Here's Shane having a grand old time at the front of the boat while they were trying to get unstuck.

 Kellen and Daddy

 So pooped out, the rule was life jacket on at ALL times! We prepped him a month in advance. He did pretty dang good. 

"Ey, ey captin!" 

Colson was wearing the captin's hat everywhere.

 Me wake boarding. It's been like 2 years since I've got to go since I was pregnant last summer. It was so much fun! And we got a girls board so it was a lot easier than having to use the boy's boards.

 Colson tubing with Aubrey and Kinsley. He loved it! 

 Shane doing a back flip whoop whoop! 

 Every time Shane did a cool jump or flip Colson was in the boat giving his daddy thumbs up! He's a very supportive child.

 Tayson and Colson hiding from the cool morning air on our wake boarding run. Personally I thought it was wonderful! 

 Kellen getting his bath! 

The grandkids and the adults had so much fun on the slide off the boat. One time grandpa decided that he was going to slide off it head first on his belly. Well, Mr. Colson saw grandpa do this so up he went by himself before anyone could stop him (which we really didn't need to) and off he went head first. That kid is a fish! 

Colson playing on the turtles with all of his cousins and Grandma in her sweet hat.

All of us were without service the entire week. Which was really nice having a break from technology. But last minute we decided to stay one more day, So we traveled out onto open water to get a signal and make arraignments for those of us who had family member watching other children that didn't come and substitutes for Sunday. 

 At Dangling Rope. It's a little store that floats out in the middle of Lake Powell where you can buy all sorts of things. Specifically ice cream! Shane has fond memories of feeding his ice-cream to the fish you see here. Colson on the other hand will have memories of trying to feed his toes to the fish! FYI I was totally discussed by those fish. 

 You can't go to Lake Powell and not cliff jump, am I right?! We set out looking for a nice spot with the sweet depth finder on the Cobalt. We were quickly joined by 3 other boats filled with families just like ours. 

Here is Shane cliff jumping, he's mid jump. All of the boys and kids were jumping while all us wives were in the Colbalt with Richard and Kathy. Colson kept begging me to go and I couldn't take it, so I had Richard get a little bit closer and I threw Colson in and he swam to the side of the rock and started a little cliff jumping himself with Shane's help. I had jumped out of the boat with Colson because honestly, why should the boys get to have all of the fun? Jocylyn also got out and jumped. So much fun! After talking to our oldest niece and her cousin we all agreed that the worst part is when you jump and you have time to think to yourself "Oh crap I haven't hit the water yet!!!!!!!" 

 This is what happens when you cliff jump and hold your nose. I jumped without a life jacket because the last time I went cliff jumping I got bad whiplash from the jacket, so I thought I would be injury free this time.... guess not. I didn't feel it at first but as I got out of the water everyone was quick to point out that I was bleeding. I'm sure the water mixing with the blood made it look worse than it really was. One of our nieces pointed out "Heidi you look like you have half of a mustache" Why yes I do, and I'm going to rock it! 

The Captin taking us back to the marina after a week of fun!