Friends, Zoo and more...

So my friend was visiting Oregon from Chicago and we decided we had to meet up and ended up meeting up at the Oregon Zoo. At first we thought we were going to get rained out, but by the time we got there it had cleared up a bit and besides a few sprinkles held off the whole time we were there. I met my friend Ashley through adoption blogging (I think, I am pretty sure). Our oldest kids are the same age and both have red hair and both were adopted. We already have their marriage arranged :) .  We had a blast and the kids got along SO well! So glad that she is moving a touch closer, so that she can visit home more and there for I will get to see her more.

Aren't they so cute?! They will make us the cutest red headed grandbabies.

This picture kills me! Oh, his face and hand! She kept on telling him that she was going to marry him. He thinks it is gross, but he sure liked her.

Some really cute red heads having fun on the Zoo train.

Love the cute face Little Miss C is making!

On the way home the kids begged to stop at the Temple. Mac was VERY concerned with the fact that we weren't wearing church clothes or shoes. 

The beautiful sky on the way home. Love how my new iPhone captures the sky so well.

Love his sweet hand on his chin!

Road Trip Part 3

After the cabin we came back to my brother's house in West Jordan for another night. We were able to go to City Creek Mall in SLC and we were able to get all of our laundry done. Then we headed up to my cousins house in Idaho Falls, but before we got too far there we stopped to see my best friend Amy. 

Totally terrible picture. Not sure what is up with it. It was so great to see her and her kids. I love this lady! We didn't stay long because we were trying to get to Idaho Falls by dinner time.

We stopped at a rest area just before Idaho Falls and they had some cool trails that took you through some old lava flows. And there were stairs you could use to go up onto the roof of the rest area building. The kids thought it was so great. 

It was so fun to stop and visit with my cousin Erin and her family. They made us a delicious dinner! And she has twin boys who are the same age as Mac and he had so much fun with them. They ran around rowdy and rough housing and had a blast. Wish I would have thought to take some pictures. We stayed the night then headed up to Montana to got to visit Mac's birth family. But about half way there we stopped in Deer Lodge to eat and to go to the car museum and old jail museum that we had gone to with my parents when we first moved to Montana. We ate lunch at an old school A&W and we ate outside and threw rocks in the near by creek. While we were sitting there, I just got giddy because it just felt so much like a real family road trip, I loved it! 

Mac thought it was so cool that we could go into this old caboose.

So I had to get pictures of my kids in the this because I have a pic of Hubs and I in it more than five years ago HERE

Same with this one. I have a pic of Hubs sitting here.

Mac was in heaven in the car museum. When he gets really excited he gets too anxious and wants to zoom through everything and then gets upset that there isn't anymore. So we have to really work with him to slow down and enjoy what you are seeing. He loved everything and Oak just did not want to be in her stroller and it was nap time.

We looked at the old jail a bit but didn't really have time.

Both kids fell asleep not long after we left and slept the next three hours to C's house near Flat Head Lake.

Utah trip Part 1

 We were able to drive to Utah with my parents. The main reason we were going was to be able to go to the Temple when my nephew went through for his endowments. He will be leaving on his mission to the Concepcion, Chile mission in January. We were lucky enough to get to spend Thanksgiving with my family too. We packed so much into this trip and it was so much fun. It was a very long trip since we were gone for about 12 days, but it made it easier with Hubs going with us.

It was our plan to drive through the night to get to Utah. Then we were going to try to get to Boise for dinner and we were going to stay at the recently released Boise Temple Presidents house (his daughter and her family are in my parents Ward). We got a super late start because of what time our rental van was ready for pick up. I was excited to get to Boise because we were going to stop and meet an old friend of mine for dinner that I had lost contact with for more than 5 years and just recently got back in contact with her. We were supposed to meet for dinner, but we could see that we were going to get to Boise to late so we were going to meet her for breakfast instead. We got to Pendleton and the had the highway closed and we were forced to stay in a hotel there. I was actually glad because I didn't want to be traveling those bad roads just past Pendleton in the dark.

The kids did awesome in the car and when they got out and we were in the hotel they went wild. Oh my were they wild!! We got up the next morning to snow and headed up to the bad roads that go through the mountains. They weren't terrible, but it was still scary!

This was the first time that Oak got to ride facing forward. She loved it and would just giggle everytime we would look back at her. They were so cute zonked together in the back seat.

Trying to get the kids to settle down so we could get some sleep.

We weren't able to meet my friend until lunch time. But we finally got to Boise and I finally got to see my friend Rebecca. I am totally bummed that I forgot to get a picture of us. It was so great to see her and meet her new husband and her two adorable girls.

We then didn't get to my brothers house in West Jordan until almost 10pm that night. It was such a long drawn out road trip. And the kids did so great!!

When we got to Utah, they had just gotten some snow and that is all Mac wanted to do. It was Sunday, so we left the kids home with my parents and Hubs and I went to church with my sister-in-law. After we got home we decided to build a snowman before all the snow melted. The snow was so awesome and Hubs literally just rolled it like it was a blanket.

After I took this picture i went in the house. A little while later, Mac comes in and asks if I would come out and throw snowballs at him. So as I come out, the boys attacked me. It was fun and I loved watching Mac get so excited over throwing snowballs.

We stayed at my brothers house. They have a finished basement and so we had plenty of room for us and the kids. We didn't even have to share a room with our kids, so nice. My brother has twin boys who are just a few months younger than Oak. Oak loved them, and loved helping take care of them. Unfortunately when we got there one of the boys was really sick and they had to take him to the ER a few times.

Grandma and the boys.

Little T was so sick when we got there, poor guy! Thankfully he got better quickly and we got to enjoy his cute personality.

Sunday night we went to Provo to visit Hubs's sister and her husband. It was so fun to see them. My kids adore both of them!

My brother got Mac hooked up with PacMan and it was kindof a never ending battle with Mac the whole trip. It caused alot of tantrums. We were thinking about possibly getting a Wii although we have always been against having video games in our home. But then after this trip we changed our mind and are back to for sure NOT wanting video games in our home. We are fine with playing them at other peoples houses :)

We didn't do much on Monday, but on Tuesday decided to take Mac to the dinosaur museum. We thought he would love it, but we kindof forgot how Mac is with things like museums. He gets too excited and can't stop to look at anything and enjoy it. He has to move from one thing to the next before he even gets to really look at anything. It makes it kindof not fun.

he did however like digging for dinosaur bones. And he loved the movie about the earth that we saw there.

This was the first time putting Oak on my shoulders and it did not go well. She LOVES to pull my hair and so she was in heaven.

Tuesday night we also went and visited our very best friends from when we both lived in Tigard. I didn't take any pictures, but Amy did and I haven't gotten them from her.

The Butte

Last week my friend B and I decided to go on a hike with our kids because the weather was supposed to be beautiful. We ended up at The Butte. It is a bit more than one mile to the top, and the hardest part is at the top where the trail is mostly climbing rocks. The three boys (ages 5, 3.5, 2.5) were walking the whole way, so we started thinking it was a possibilty that we wouldn't make it to the top, although it was our goal to go all the way. I was pretty worried that Mac wouldn't make it because he hates going on walks. But he did AWESOME! He made it to the top with out much complaining and complained quite a bit on the way down about his feet and stomach hurting. Which to be honest I didn't blame him, because I was in pain too with Oak on my back. But with alot of encouragment and promise of ice cream he kept going. It definately seemed like it took much longer to get down, which seems opposite of the usual. But it was so much fun and every ache and pain I felt during and after was so totally worth it. And now that I know Mac is a pretty good hiker, I am excited to do more hikes this summer.

This is pretty much true to how steep the top, rocky part of the trail was.

I was so scared that I would fall backwards at this part of the trail. And it didn't help that Oak kept on pulling my hair, which would pull me backwards. When we took her out of the pack at the top she had a huge wad of my hair in her hands. In this picture I put my hood up, but she kept pulling that off too and it was too hot to have on.

part of our view while we ate lunch at the top, so beautiful!l

My cute, goofy boy!

The whole gang!!

Thanks B, C & D