Last Friday night I went to the mail (my fault I should have went Thursday for Colt's bday) but at any rate we found a package for the Colt Man from Grandma and Grandpa Ison and it was LOADED with fun! Grandma must be on to our Thomas obsession because it was packed with Thomas fun. Little boy heaven!

My favorite was the t-shirts! The boys got Thomas t-shirts for Easter but after wearing them about every 3rd day all summer long I was tired of them and left them with a friend in SLC that we thought could probably use them (her boys will be 1 and 3 next summer) so even though Grandma didn't know about that she totally replaced our Thomas shirts! I thought that was pretty cool! She sent a couple fun books too, one is called Demolition, and the boys and I have played "Demolition" with the blocks and excavators at least 50 times this week since reading it. Its fun though. 
Baseball season is winding down so we hit up the last Braves (regular season) home game. Hopefully the playoffs will treat them well and we'll get to go again. The boys had a good time playing catch there!

 

We've also enjoyed the new wagon, Cannon loves to pull it, sweet! (Colt has figured out he's not strapped in...that's not ideal and we'll do our best to keep it from being disastrous.)
We had some friends over to swim at the apt pool before they close it (so lame we could easily swim for another month but anyway...) that was Thursday, they left at about 1:30 I put the boys down for naps and started throwing a few things in a suitcase as that night we headed down to the Big Easy (New Orleans)
Remember how I'm married to Mr. Adventure? Well he found one, and we went for it :) It was our ward temple day this weekend but a couple ward members were going through for the first time on Friday, then being sealed Saturday (today) Isaac ended up being his escort but that put us needing to be in Baton Rouge Friday instead of Saturday...So Isaac looked up things to do there and found out the Saints had a preseason game. So we went and spent Thursday night (instead of Friday night) The game started at 7, we didn't even leave home until 4:15, its a 3 hour drive if you don't hit traffic, but we did...we got there... scalped a couple of nosebleed tickets and got to see a couple plays before halftime.

 

The Superdome was pretty impressive, the Terrace level seats were actually a really good view of the game. It surprised me how steep it was in there. It was a sea of Black and Gold, I'm pretty sure we are the only people in the whole place who hadn't dressed accordingly. 

 

Of course we didn't stay in the nosebleeds, there were way to many empty seats on the lower level just taunting Isaac. (Actually after we went down there he kept wanting to go lower and asking me if I wanted to go take pictures even lower like with the players in the background, I said "I have enough pictures you just want to go lower." He said "You just don't want to go down any further." I agreed to that and we stayed put.)

 

But don't let me kid you with any of this nonsense, we didn't really get to watch any of the game, if that's what we were going for we would have needed to get a babysitter, the truth is we had a wrestling match on our hands, which serves us right for taking a 1 and 3 year old to a ball game way past their bed time! Oh well we went for the experience and we got it. (This second-blurry-picture is a pretty accurate representation of what it was really like.)

After the game we headed up to Baton Rouge to spend the night. Isaac had found us a good deal on a motel. We've since discussed it, and I really mislead him-unintentionally-but he thought I was only game to go at a certain cheap price. And I was ready to ring his neck for having to get us the cheapest place which put us in a disgusting place in the freaking hood. GHETTO is an understatement. Actually as we pulled in Isaac said well it looks like its in an okay area, as there was a couple nicer places really close. Not exactly.  Motel 6 see ya later, Tom Bodet-you can leave the light on for someone else. NEVER AGAIN! It was gated...and all of the rif raff was on the inside. The blanket on the bed had holes burned in if from cigarettes even though we were in a non smoking room. It was just gross, not like dirt on the counter dirty gross, just gross GROSS. I don't know.
The good thing is that we did talk about it and ultimately both of us would have been way willing to spend more money and be in a nicer place we just thought the other one wasn't, so that's the good part of the story. But I was beside myself, and the plan was for me to stay there with the kids and take them swimming and stuff while Isaac was at the temple. NOT HAPPENING. So we just loaded up and left! We had a good time, we drove around, we found a Walmart and killed some time and bought ourselves some doughnuts for breakfast and snacks and naps happened in car seats but hey, we lived to tell about it which may not have happened at the Motel 6. Isaac said "There was a security guard, did you see him?" and I said "Why yes I did, and that dude probably couldn't fight his way out of a wet paper bag!" To which Isaac said "Oh, well he had a big gun."
Anyway, so our plan was for me do do a session after Isaac got done then we'd just head home, well Isaac got done and the next session was...at 7:00 PM--these little temples are killing me. So we killed the afternoon as a family (at one point we parked and ALL had naps in the car.) Then I went to the temple last evening.
Our friends who had just gone through earlier came back for that 7:00 session and it was fun to be in the temple with Sis. Bailey, so that was cool. But it was a late drive home and a late night. We finally stopped (in another ghetto town-one that Uncle Shawn served in-) to buy Cannon some milk at the Walmart and they were closed. Closed at 11 and not having any of Isaac talking them in to letting him go by some milk, I'm telling you-it was comedy of errors.
Oh well.
That's why I didn't blog on Friday, but we're back now. And its good to be home.

 

Colton was so willing to sit in front of the temple and let me take his picture....Cannon was too preoccupied with the puddles. (Oh that was the other thing, I came out of the temple and Cannon was in his underwear and Colt a diaper only, because they'd got so wet... so that's how they rode home. You really wouldn't expect anything different out of us would you?)

Colty Man is 1

I hesitated with that title but...that's what I call him so run with it right?

"Hey Colt, how old are you?" 

 One :)
Cute little showoff isn't he?

Saturday we headed for Bull Valley and had a little horse party a few days early. Colt has always loved the horses...and we had a dog party for Cannon when he turned one, so I thought a horse party for Colt was the way to go! I mentioned it, Grama ran with the idea and Grampa was a sport to play along (and make it happen) by bringing Monty and Clyde over for the fun. (We definitely felt spoiled!) Thanks Grama and Grampa!

 

We visited. Rode Monty. Roasted hot dogs -never even got to the smores-  rode the Rhino and 4 wheeler. The weather was great, up out of the heat a little, and it was just a good time!
It wasn't perfect (but almost) we forgot the knife/spatula and forks for the cake :( so after having the kids licking their chops we said..."We'll have cake tonight!" and gave'm their party bags instead.

 

That night we did have cake and while I'm convinced Cann Man is all Ison--ole Colt Man proved himself all "Icin" he had no use for the actual cake (or candle).

 

That night as the sun set we headed up to my uncle Steve's beautiful backyard (with our sunburned from the day at the ranch faces) for a long overdue Frei family picture. The last one we had with the whole crew was at our wedding almost 5 years ago...it was a little out of date. (Isaac has 6 siblings, I have 2, you'd think it would be harder to get his side together but his side of the family is definitely better and getting those group pics done we've done 2 since we've been married.)

 

I would say having big group-or any-family pictures is always better after its over, the process can be a little rough!
Anyway. Sunday we went to church and then had naps and I puttered around pretty much all afternoon with packing. We stopped in and said "hey" to grampa great and Isaac had Cannon up to the new corrals when I was really getting wound up (that was a blessing) but we got all packed up and headed out about 10 pm. When Cannon woke up the next morning I think we were in New Mexico...Gallop? Santa Rosa? Anyway he figured we should be back in Mississippi by then. I said it's still a long way and he said "We should have taken an airplane!" That's my boy :) Actually I'm the worst traveler in our family (Colt's a close 2nd) I did good until I got us lost in Dallas and then I'd just had it but we still had 7 hours to go.  But about 2:30 AM the next night we rolled in. And here we are, back to the grind.
(of course that's fun too, swimming frog hunts...and even a frog on our window)

Yesterday was Colt's actual birthday but I was glad we'd already partied. We did have fun though. We met our friends for playgroup, it was really fun to see them and we hit up the children's museum that afternoon. Colt was loving life, in 3 months he's definitely changed and grown enough that there's lots for him to do too. Both boys had fun.

Colt got this cute little collapsible red wagon for his birthday.

 

Cannon was definitely ready for it to be HIS birthday, I forced him to let Colt open a present ("I'm helping him I'm helping him" he'd say) and see the far left picture...he forced Colt's hand to do it. Oh well, it was a fun day though!

That night I had a primary meeting, I loved getting to see the gals I serve with in primary! I really do love them, it was so fun.
So here we are--back at it
The humidity and heat are nasty, remember how it was starting to cool off in Salt Lake last week? Not here. I've done a whopping 3 days of the "Mormon diet" (its a guaranteed winner- get up read the good book VERY first thing to exercise/nourish the soul, then exercise the ole body) I ran for 10 minutes -hey I gotta start somewhere- but I SWEAT for a solid 3 hours afterward! Most of which had Nothing to do with the little jog, Man, the Welcome back to the south!!!

Our last week in SLC

Oh man! We have had such a great summer, we have LOVED Salt Lake and the wonderful people in our ward here and we just tried to shove as much into the last week as possible.

Friday night we got to see uncle Nathan he'd been working up here and stopped by before he headed back. It was great to see him and visit.

Saturday Isaac was pretty excited to hit up the Summit County fair, the boys had fun, as it turns out I'm just a city slicker who thinks all of those animals look and stink the same. That was really all we did was look at the show sheep, steers, pigs (by then I wouldn't even go in) and birds.

Oh it was gross, there really wasn't anything pleasant about it for me. 

Isaac wanted to have a fun day as a family, well really he wanted to of something with Shawn and his girlfriend but that didn't work out, but he wasn't content to just drive back so we swung into Park City with hopes of the old silver mine being open (yeah right) but we ended up finding concert in the park  and got to ride the gondola do that was cool. Cannon and Isaac really wanted to ride the ski lifts further up the mountain but they were only running for private weddings...oh course he asked if we could just ride up and  back anyway but it was a no go. The boys had fun playing in the sand there.

Sunday was our last hurrah at the monument park 16th ward, we have loved it, it was so easy, they loved us first! Such a great experience, we're sad to leave. That evening we hit temple square one last time because we could.

The boys found a fountain that wasn't on and we're the rednecks that stripped our kid down (Isaac did it I swear it wasn't me! I'm only responsible for the documentation) It really was so fun for them though, they had a great time.

Monday we hit the Bees game with Jesse and Gwen and their family.

We spent about 4 innings waiting in line for that stupid train (and some people think baseball is slow) -but look at that grin somehow it makes it worth the wait.
Tuesday we went to the ward summer social ( so I guess Sunday wasn't really the last hurrah) it was great company and food and fun, the entertainment was some gal singing songs from musicals...I was out my league but I got a kick out of people watching and it wasn't a very long program :) It was super fun to visit with Isaac as we rode up and back the canyon, he said "we'll pick our own entertainment on our next date" the boys stayed with the Russell's who we just find ourselves such good fast friends with they remind me of the Allred's -that's a pretty good compliment- they have a teenage daughter so I asked her to babysit, we ended up taking them over there though so the whole family got in on it :) Cannon was so worked up about it all day "why do I have to go, when are you coming back, can I just go with you?" and so on, by time we picked them up, visited for a few minutes, and left it was "why do we have to go home?"
Wednesday we had a fun adventure, after all summer of asking we finally took the Cann Man on the FrontRunner train. We rode up to the Ogden temple open house, and we were so glad Miss Kathy came with us!

 

 It was beautiful but it was a silent (2 kids-yeah right) walking tour/wrestling match. I was exhausted by time we got done. Containing them on the train wasn't exactly a picnic either! But a cool experience and fun to be in a temple with my kids and talk to Cannon about it and show him what an alter looks like and so on. It was neat. 

So as you can tell we were jamming nights as full of adventure as possible. We tried to sneak some fun in the days too. We slipped up to the zoo and made sure our punch pass for the train/carousel was all used up and (I waited until the last week on this on purpose) but one of the days we went over to the discovery museum because they had a Bob the Builder exhibit. Cannon was in heaven! Well, so was Colt. I think they could have stayed forever...we stayed a good long time as I wanted to get my moneys worth but at some point naps were a necessity! Anyway...they had fun.

 We also hit up the Primary Splash Bash where they have a fire truck come...pretty cool! Cannon stayed back, not even Sister Russel could talk him into getting close.

 A funny thing he did there was take the wrapper off his ice cream sandwich then peel the cookie part off and toss it right in the garbage with the paper, the kid hates chocolate. Colt thinks its pretty alright though!

Thursday night we stopped for a short visit with Grandma Kenworthy and then met up with Nathan at Levi's. I didn't get any pictures but Isaac had good time visiting with his brothers. Jacob is darling with Colton and Tyler and Cannon took right to playing-I think Tyler loves not being the youngest when my boys come around! It was fun but poor little Colt man finally reached the end of his rope. (Imagine that we'd had him out and running around past 10:00 pretty much every night, poor kid needed a little structure and bed time routine.) So I spent quiet a while just holding and rocking him. Then Friday was clean out and moved day. Amy so graciously tended (and spoiled) my kids. She's the best! And she introduced me to the best doughnuts! Branbury Cross 7th East 7th South...don't miss it if you get a little Salt Lake time. I'm pretty sure that place could do some major damage to a waste line! We said our goodbyes to the Russell's -no pic :( - and Miss Carol with our fingers crossed that we will be back soon. Then we hit the road.

We stopped in and said "hi" to Aaron and Tarra and cute little Henley on our way through Orem

Today, we've spent the day celebrating Colt's birthday (a few days early) but I think that deserves a post of its own! So I'll stop now thinking I'm mostly caught up. (No edits so forgive typos until I can at least read through it)
Oh and here's what we've been working on :)