I am not traveling again....ok, at least not until next month

The last week and a half have been crazy. Last Sunday night we flew to Salt Lake from California and got in about 11 pm. We woke up, did all our laundry (thanks to my mom), packed, and jumped in the car at 4 pm Monday to head to Omaha. Stayed the night in Cheyenne and drove the rest of the way on Tuesday. We got back home at about 3 pm Tuesday only to leave at 6 am on Wednesday to board a plane to North Carolina. We had 2 stops and finally made it to Raleigh at about 2:00. Mitch's parents picked us up and we made the 2 hour drive to their house to feed the dogs and get back in the car for the hour drive to the beach. After many drives back and forth from Raleigh to Pink Hill and the beach and the plane rides back home, the key word is BACK HOME. We are HOME! It was a lot of traveling with 3 small children and even though going from coast to coast wasn't exactly fun, we sure had fun when we weren't traveling and we are glad to not be traveling now. I really have no desire to travel for a very long time, however, I will admit I have my plane tickets already booked for the end of next month. :) It's for a great reason though....my adoreable little nephew Beckham will get sealed to his mommy and daddy! Can't wait for that so it's worth the travel!

8 is Great!

This post is late too, but as you probably have figured out, Easton still turned 8 months old despite my tardiness in blogging it.

There were 2 big milestones this last month.

* TEETH: At about 7 1/2 months Easton got his first 2 teeth. One right after the other. Bottom center teeth. We had issues nursing for the first couple weeks after. He thought he needed to bite me to let me know that he was finished each time. OOOUUUCHH. He has grown out of that....knock on wood.

*CRAWLING: He started real crawling right before 8 months. He is very good and he even has been pulling himself up. The problem is he doesn't quite know how to get back down once he pulls himself up, so he usually injures himself. I need to teach him how to fall gracefully. That hopefully will be next month's milestone. He loves crawling though and he is all over the place. I am terrified the kids will leave the door open and he will fall down the stairs. I am sure you all hope along with me that you don't read on my blog about something like that.

Lastly, as you noticed in the picture, he has gotten even squishier.

We love you Baby E!

Newsflash! I am not a country gal!

Ok, I know you all knew this, but in case any of you wondered, I am not. It is now completely official. I had the great opportunity to go to North Carolina this past week to visit Mitch's family. He has a grandma, aunt, uncles, cousins, parents, brother, sister-in-law, niece, and nephew that live there. His brother's family lives in Chapel Hill and is attending maxiofacial radiology (hope that's right) school, but the rest of the family I mentioned lives out on farm about 2 hours from the airport. I refer to places like that as "the boonies." I have to start out by saying that there is one really good reason for being a country gal (at least in North Carolina). The people there are SOOOO incredibly nice. Holy cow, you wouldn't believe it. They are amazing and I love their accents! Ok, besides that, yeah, I think I'll stick with the city.

Here are a few things that made me say, um, the country isn't for me.

#5 Mitch's mom picked us up from the airport with this terrible rash all over her legs. It was poison ivy. She said she got it from going in the ditch. I thought to myself, oh, I bet the ditch is far away, I don't need to worry. No, the ditch was right in front of their house.
#4 We pull up to the house and his mom says, now be careful, that's an electric fence and it could knock your kids out.
#3 I was excited for my kids to play with the pigs and other animals. The pigs had to have been over a 1,000 lbs and looked like hippos. Then I was told that some prisoners admitted that they would throw some of their victims to the pigs because they ate everything, including the bones. I decided my kids would not be playing with the pigs.
#2 Creighton and Jackson got eggs from the hens. Mary said I needed to make sure I washed their hands really good. I think it was too late because Creighton was throwing up all over the next day.
#1 The dogs. I had some of my scariest moments of my life in that little town while running. After not running all week, I had to run a long run on Saturday. Mitch agreed to get up and run with me, since I was a little nervous to run by myself. I am SOOOO thankful he did. I think that if he would not have, I would be writing this from a hospital bed (Ok, that's a little dramatic). Mitch's mom mentioned there was a dog at the end of their road. I asked if I should be worried, but she said I was going early enough that he wouldn't be out, so I wasn't worried. Yes, I should have been. There was not 1 dog at the end of their road. There were 4. Along with about 15 others throughout my run. They all would bark and run after us. I am terrified of dogs, but Mitch protected me. He just glared at them and they eventually backed down. (He's so tough :)) We even noticed 1/2 way through our run that there was a man walking his little dog and he had a giant stick. Where was our protection? Did you know you have to run with protection? It was too late. We had an ANGEL dog come to protect us, however. This one dog ran up to us, but unlike the others, he was wagging his tail. He was a good dog and ran with us the rest of the way and even almost got in a brutal fight to protect us. I wish I would have taken a picture. Mitch was walking on the side of the country road, shirt off (his shirt was completely drenched after 2 miles because of the nasty humidity) with this dog. When he becomes some fancy smancy lawyer, I would have loved to have a picture of that to put in his office. Anyway, Mitch and I were talking about this after our run. I don't think anyone there runs or bikes or anything. They don't have any shoulders on their roads to do this. And if you try, the dogs will kill you. For that reason alone, I am staying in the city. Dogs and I don't mix.

Side note: Please know that this post is not to offend any of you country folk. I know some love it. I just found it wasn't for me.

Good Memory!

On our way through security last week at the Omaha airport, the security guard said, "3 boys! 3 boys! Where is your sister?" Jackson replied that he didn't have a sister. She responded, "You better tell your dad to get going. Next time I see you, I better see a sister."

One week later, after completely forgetting this tiny conversation, we are walking out of the Omaha airport. All of the sudden I hear Jackson yelling something to the Security guard. "Sorry! No sister yet! I'll tell my dad to get going!"

Ok, I really got to start being careful what I do and say around that kid. He has a good memory!

Spending time with our Omaha buddies

While we were in Utah, we were able to get together with some of our Omaha buddies who have left. I saw some at the shower for Marianne, we went to Seven Peaks with Angie and Shauna's family (so fun by the way....thanks Derek's sister!), I ran Provo Canyon 1/2 with a bunch of my good friends, we had a swimming party, and we got together at my dad's place. Here are just a few pictures. I guess I didn't take my camera to many things.

I really miss these girls! Shauna is the peppiest runner, and I have had a hard time motivating myself to run since I got back to Omaha without her. Oh, so do you like our shirts. Yeah, we were really cool since we matched! We even had a sponser, jk, but we did talk about getting one.

Our California Adventure

This year, we went to Southern California for a family trip with my side. I found $29 flights out of Salt Lake to Long Beach a few months ago and since you can't beat that, we booked the flights and it was finally time to take the trip. We stayed right on Huntington beach and we had so much fun. We went to Knott's Berry Farm, the beach, DisneyLand, the aquarium, and did a lot of swimming. The boys loved it.
1st up, Knott's Berry Farm:
We got into CA at about 8 a.m. and couldn't check in until 4, so we drove right to Knott's Berry Farm. It was pretty dead so we were able to ride all the rides and even left at 1. The boys loved Camp Snoopy.

The Hotel:

The hotel was right on Huntington beach. I loved it because it had a really nice trail that went right along the beach for about 8 miles. Perfect for running! They also had a nice kids pool that they just built. It had slides and kiddie pools. We did a lot of swimming. So much in fact, that Mitch got swimmer's ear and was in a lot of pain the majority of the trip. However, that didn't stop him from swimming. I didn't get any pictures of us at the beach but here are some at the pool and in the hotel room.

Although my boys fight a lot, they also love eachother very much. For about 20 trips up to the slide, they would wait for the other one to get out and walk up with the arms around eachother. It was the sweetest thing. (You don't get a lot of tender moments with 3 boys, but this was one.)

We took a pack'n'play down to the pool for the babies. Beck and E would play and sleep in there. They are actually holding hands while they are sleeping in this picture.

Here's my crazy hair little guy sitting in his pen.

My boys lounging out. I was really lucky to have Courtney come visit us at the hotle. This was only the 2nd time Easton and Westin were able to get together. They are so cute together. Easton was kind of a party pooper most of the time. It was during his nap. Thanks for driving all the way down to see us Court!
One of my favorite pictures of my family was us doing a dog pile on a hotel bed in California probably about 15 years ago. Here is my little family doing the same thing. I can tell they are just thinking about doing something naughty in this picture. I love it though.

The more peaceful moments during the trip. Each night a couple got to pick the restaurant. My dad picked Ruby's. It was at the end of the pier in Huntington beach. It was cool and the boys loved their milkshakes!

At the kids pool they had 2 fire pits where you could roast marshmallows. We made smores as a fam. We actually attempted to do this 2 different nights. The 1st resulting in temper tantrums, but we did have success the 2nd night. We went to Disneyland one of the days. At first I was not looking forward to going. I don't like crowds and I don't like lines. My friend Janette told me about this website called Ridemax where they can print you out a schedule and it will give you shorter line times. Some engineers created it and I just put in all the rides I wanted to go on and the time we would be there and it gave me a schedule for the least amount of time in line. It was great. We didn't follow it exactly, but it gave us some good tips on mastering Disneyland.

I was so nervous about loosing one of the boys, so I dressed them in orange.

At the end of our trip we went to the aquarium on the way to the airport. The picture didn't turn out as I hoped. We are standing in front a lot of fish, but you can't see them.

It really was a great vacation! Here is the whole fam together! Thanks mom and dad!

Marianne's Shower

I know I am about a month behind in my posts, so here I go.

On August 6th, we had a little shower for Marianne and her adoreable little Seth. It was fun for the 5 of us girls to get together. Seth is so cute and I couldn't be more happy for the Pence family. We miss them so much and I am sad I won't get to see him grow up 2 doors down. Good thing I happen to visit Utah often so I can see them! :)

Here are a few pics:

Happy Birthday Uncle Que!

Yesterday would have been Que's 18th birthday. It was a special day and I loved reminding my boys about their uncle Que and directing my thoughts to him. Birthdays were always a big deal in my family, so we celebrated. We took up balloons and flowers to his grave and sang Happy Birthday (I know he was probably looking down on us from heaven thinking we are out there, but it was more about remembering him than anything else.) After we went and did baptisms for the dead which was a great and spiritual experience. I always feel Que there so strong. I don't think I had done baptisms for the dead since I was 13 years old, so that was really cool. Plus, since Lindsey hasn't taken out her endowments, it was a great opportunity for our entire family to be together. Thank you to my wonderful friends who offered to babysit. You're the best!

I can't believe it has been 10 months since he passed away. We found a journal he wrote in and he wrote about his birthday last year. In it he wrote that he was happy because "his 2 nephews and sister were there from Omaha (the worst place on Earth)." Everytime I think of that journal entry it makes me smile. It tells me that he missed me and my kids....enough to call where I live "the worst place on Earth" since it was so far away from him. I hope he knows that I missed him too then and I do now as well. I am sure he does though. :)

My little cowboys

We went to Children's Museum in Salt Lake a few days ago and they boys put on the dress-up cowboy hats and rode the fake horse. I thought they looked adoreable, but they are my sons of course.

Here are a few other photos of the fun day at the museum.

Yea for us!

Mitch took the bar last week and it was a relief for us all! Of course, it will be more of a relief when we find out if he passed, but we are trying to forget about that for now and just enjoying that it is over. Since he doesn't start work until September 8th, we have just been playing. You will see this in the upcoming blog posts.

I have no doubt Mitch passed, but I wish he would have more of my confidence. Occasionally I will look over at him and he has this stressed look on his face and then hits himself. Yes, he hits himself. I think a tad childish, but that's just me. When I ask him why he did that, he goes on and on about the questions he knows he messed up on. I will add however, that he has been doing better the last few days with less hitting and stressed faces. He had a dream a few nights ago that he passed. Thank goodness! Now we just hope that "all our dreams come true!"