(July 25th)

Sunday we woke up and got ready for church. That really is no fun when you are getting two kids ready by yourself. Grandma and Grandpa’s church is getting re-done, so they are meeting at a different building (seriously like 2 block away), and at 1 pm. Grandpa had saved us a whole row, but between all the kids and us, they ended up sitting behind us. Well, Jameson decided he wanted to be the worst child at church. I handed Ella back to Grandma, and took Jameson out kicking and screaming… literally. Paul said he kicked a lady in front of me. Ooops. So I walked outside till he calmed down, but then realized he enjoyed being outside more than in. So we went back in, and stood in the coat area until he quit crying. A lady had her kids in the foyer, and Jameson wanted to play with them since they were running around. Thanks Lady. He finally calmed down, so I stood by the door so I could see Ella. I was sure Grandma’s arms were getting tired. I had to hold Jameson really tight to keep him from getting away. Talk about a work out. Finally, he decided it was better to go back in than stay with me out in the hall. It was just in time, too, because Ella started to fuss. So I head back in, Jameson climbed in Ella’s carseat (fine by me… he’s more contained), and I took Ella back. Then I had to calm her down, which only took giving her a bottle thank goodness. Needless to say, once sacrament was over, I headed home to put two ornery children to bed.

After naps, the child was much happier. The boys got Popsicles, and found Grandpa’s golf balls on the porch. See the little white dots all over the lawn? Those are golf balls.

While the boys found the apricot tree in the back, grandpa filled a bucket for them. It was really hot, so he sprayed off the patio to cool it down. Then, the boys were trying to jump in 1 little puddle on the patio. So Grandpa got a bucket for them to stand in and cool off. Let just say it’s been a while since Grandpa had small children, and might have forgot they were not just going to “stand” in the bucket.

So since the boys were already wet, and hot, Grandpa turned the sprinklers on for them. The boys loved it. Poor Drew, though, just couldn’t keep up with the other 2.

It was also Steve’s birthday! Christina made him a cake, and Grandma told her she had a recipe for frosting. Well, Christina took a nap, so Grandma thought she’d help out by starting to make the frosting. It was a recipe her mother used. Now, I’m all for sentimental recipes that have been handed down, but I don’t think I’ll be asking for this one. Let’s just say the recipe did not call for any powdered sugar, but it did have some flour in it. Tasty right? (I really do apologize to Grandma if she reads this. It was so nice of you to help.) Anyway, right before Christina went to frost the cake, I asked if she tasted it. She said no, so we tried it. (Me, the whole time wondering what frosting recipe calls for flour and not powdered sugar.) Umm ya, it tasted about how it sounds. The cake was good though, so we just ate around the frosting. So Steve did get a cake on his birthday, but not the one he wanted. Sorry, Steve.

Paul then tried to pawn the cake off on us before we left to the cabin. I told him, he needed to be nice and eat it after we left. Grandma worked really hard on that frosting. Actually, I think the frosting recipe was supposed to be more of a fondant frosting. It set really well, which leads me to believe it was supposed to be more for decorating than eating. So, maybe one day, I will need that recipe after all.

As Kevin and I were sitting here watching tv tonight after putting the kids into bed, I received this email…

from Jameson <jameson’s email> to “brittany <brittany’s email> date Mon, Sep 6, 2010 at 10:14 PM subject Hu.

hide details 10:14 PM (3 minutes ago)

Sent from my iPod

I laughed so hard. Let me explain. Jameson has an itouch his Grammy got for him. It has been the best toy ever. He has puzzles, flash cards, games, memory, videos, Diego, etc. We haven’t had to buy a travel dvd player even with all our traveling, because we just put the movies on the itouch. It’s pretty durable, too. Jameson’s Grammy also sends videos of them and the animals on the farm. So I created his own email since I didn’t want him to have access to mine. Lately, he’s wanted to watch the videos, so I showed him how to go to his email and watch them on his itouch. (He loves the videos, Grammy!)  So at night, we sometimes let him take it to bed, and then go retrieve it from him after 30 minutes or so. Then we all get our own quiet time before bed.

Well I’m sitting here tonight, looking at some craft blogs, and I get the pop up that I recieved an email. Who is that email from you ask? Jameson! My son just sent his first email at 2 years old. It read “Hu.” And that is all he had to say. 🙂

P.S. The email also reminded us that he still had his itouch, and we needed to retrieve it for bedtime. He wasn’t too happy.

July 23rd, I packed the kids up, and Kevin took us to the airport. I had a 7:00 flight, with two children, 3 bags of luggage, 3 carry-ons, 1 stroller, 1 carseat, and no husband to help. We were flying to Salt Lake to visit, and to go to the family reunion. Kevin pulled up in front of the Southwest zone, and he helped me check my bags with the aircap. While he got my luggage checked in, I unloaded the kids from the car and our carry-ons. We prepped Jameson this time by telling him we need to wear our seatbelts and sit nicely on the plane. We made it through everything just fine, and boarded. Luckily, the plane wasn’t nearly full, so I could take Ella’s carseat on. She slept from just after take off, till we landed. Jameson actually sat quietly playing his games or reading his books. The loud ones on the plane were the teenage girls across from me. I’m pretty sure the guy in front of them was so glad when that flight was over.

We always seem to get on the planes that have flight attendants with personalities. Just as we were landing, they came on and told us, “We will be landing in just a few moments. We are actually 5 minutes early so tell your friends. We know you always tell them Southwest is always late.” I was laughing, because this is normally true. Not this trip, though.

So we got into Salt Lake just after 11:00 pm (it was a 3 hour flight plus time change). Paul picked us up, and when we got to Grandpa’s and Grandma’s we were greeted by Kayden. They drove up that night and met us there. We got up early Saturday morning and headed up to the reunion at my Aunt’s cabin near Preston Idaho. We were able to make it there by noon which was pretty good for us. The kids had a blast. They had cousins and second cousins to play with along with swings, cars, slides, and rootbeer to keep them occupied for the day. We never saw them. (Well we did, because we keep watch on our kids, but you know what I mean. They were busy, and didn’t care about us.)

Grandma and Grandpa had gone up the night before, so she had her first meeting with her 2 newest great-granddaughters. She also has a new great-grandson that was there. I want to say she’s somewhere around 45 great-grandchildren.

Ella is named after Grandma Cartwright’s mother, Ellen. Everyone called her Ella. I was reading Grandma Cartwright’s autobiography she wrote when Kevin and I first got married, and knew I wanted to name our daughter Ella one day.

Grandma meeting Jenna…

They even match.

Aunt Carol put the hose down the slide for the boys. It was hot, especially for us who came from 60 degree weather and we’re now in 90 degree weather.

(Sorry the video is sideways. I forgot I can’t rotate videos.)

It was a little fast with the water, so Jameson always ended up on his bottom. Drew had a little help from Aunt Carol

The older boys left Drew behind, and found the teeter-totter and the other kids. Don’t worry, Drew found stuff to keep him occupied.

These cars were the biggest hit of the day. This is where Drew was most of the day, especially when the older boys ditched him. They would do circles, around the patio, into the pavilion, back around the patio, back into the pavilion. The only time they stopped was to get rootbeer that my Aunt had made. It was in a big 10 gallon cooler, that the boys learned how to work the spout on. They had free access to rootbeer with no monitoring… if they didn’t get caught. We tried to monitor.

These boys would all head to the top of the hill, and the ride down and land in the grass. They thought it was hilarious, and did it over and over all afternoon.

While the boys rode their cars, the adults sat and chit-chatted.

Grandma and I took a walk down to the river behind the cabin. There were cows on the other side, which we couldn’t tell what they were until getting a closer look.

Ella took a nap in the stroller, and only her toes were making appearances.

Drew was probably the biggest rootbeer thief of the day. He was so quiet about it, where the other boys would be laughing and talking while getting their rootbeer and get caught. Drew was more sneaky.

Jodi kept Ella entertained for me once she was awake. Even with her hurt leg… what a trooper.

I think this picture describes my child with no words needed…

Chase and Easton are always so good to play with Jameson. We wish they lived closer, because Jameson loves them.

Love this picture of these two…

After the boys had played all day, we decided to head out. We got everything cleaned up, and then it was time to pull the 4-wheelers back inside. Paul and my cousin, Blake, gave all the boys a ride around the yard before pulling them in. Jameson did not like how loud it was, but didn’t complain. He just covered his ears. This was my test since we were going to the cabin. I was wondering if he would like the 4-wheelers there.

While the boys were giving rides, Aunt Kathleen was trying to get her lawn mower started to pull it back inside. For a while, I thought the lawn mower was going to win.

In the end, she beat out the lawn mower.

We got everything cleaned up and headed back to Salt Lake. The kids were out cold before we even left the drive. They slept the whole way home. We’re so glad to have been able to see family and play together. Jameson has been lucky this summer to see his cousins more often and play even though we live further away.

(July 22, 2010)

This week for park day, we ventured to Farrel McWhirter Park. It used to be an old homestead, which was then bought out by a family in the early 1900s and turned into a horse ranch. When the owner died, she left it to be used as a state park. They have a bunch of farm animals to go see, so naturally, Jameson loved it.

We started out by chasing the chickens that were free to roam where ever they wanted.

We then checked out the baby cow and goats in the nearby pasture.

We went around the back into the barn. They had the biggest pig I’ve ever seen and the baby goats to watch.

See the biggest big ever!

So we’re in there checking out the pig, and can hear a turkey. The pen next to the pig is empty, and the goats are on the side. We can’t figure out where the turkey is until we realize there is a loft in the barn. We look up at this sight…

Half its feathers on its chest were gone. It kept looking like it was going to jump on us. Can turkeys fly? I didn’t thinks so, but this bird looked like it was going to. We walked back underneath the platform for protection, but then it would crane it’s neck around the edge and look at us. We decided we better get out of the barn. Just as we were about to walk out, the turkey jumped from the loft to the light fixture. Apparently, they don’t fly so well, but can hop really well.

We walked around the side of the barn and found the bunny hutches.

Back around the front of the barn, the goat and her kids were out in the yard. Jameson loved the goats, especially the little one that would lick his hand.

You can see it’s mom kept a close eye on her baby and Jameson.

It was nice that we could visit the animals, and it was even more nice that it was free. (Ella was there, but was asleep in the stroller the whole time.)

(July 21,2010)

I signed Jameson up for a gymnastics class this summer. You could buy a punch card and then attend however many classes you paid for. It worked for me since I knew we would be out of town, and I could make up those weeks. Jameson was so excited the first day. He ran right in the class with his friends. Which wasn’t as good as you might think. After a few minutes, myself and another mom (I won’t rat you out 🙂 ) were asked to come into the class to help monitor our children who were not listening. There did happen to be about 10 kids that day so I’ll give the teacher that credit.  He couldn’t stop talking about it after that.

The next class wasn’t as successful. He didn’t have any friends this time (we went on a different day). He ran in the class, but then threw a fit and cried. Luckily, he had Miss Jen this time and she is awesome. She kept him whether he was crying or not, and got him to calm down.

We went out of town, and upon returning, had to start the whole process over again. I tied to only go to Miss Jen’s classes, because she was much better at handling the stress of so many toddlers. He didn’t like the beginning of class, but once he got comfortable, he loves “junastics” and talks about how “I listen to my teachers.”

He loves being in the big gym with the trampolines and “the pit.” Here he is doing their routine for the day. They do seat drops down the trampoline (he is easily distracted), then somersaults down the cheese matt, jump one either side of the red line, and then walk down the balance beam. Oh, and he’s with Miss Jen.

Enjoying his time in the pit.

(Image from zazzle dot com)

Today, on our drive home, there were some suspicious noises coming from the back seat. We’d just been to Wal Mart and Panda Express… a real treat for me since it took 30 minutes to get there. I got Jameson a few characters from Toy Story since he was being good. On the way home in the car, I can hear kissing noises behind me. I looked in the mirror to find Jameson holding Woody and Jessie. Apparently the characters have a better relationship than previously thought.

(July 20th)

We had a very eventful Tuesday. We woke up early and headed out with friends to pick raspberries. They open at 7:30 am, and you need to be there when they open or the raspberries get picked out. So we got there by 7:45 and it was only after I left my house, I realized I had no jacket. It was a bit cold, but we managed. Ella slept in her carseat for part of the picking, and Jameson helped. These were much easier to pick than strawberries. No bending over for one thing.

Jameson thought he was so cool, because he had a bucket that hung around his neck. Good thing he brings his blanket everywhere to help give cushion around his neck.

You can see here, whatever he picked did not make it to his bucket. The kids pretty much ate anything they picked.

We got home around 10 am, and I got everything prepared to make jam. My friend came over with me to learn. First, we headed to the farmer’s market down the street to pick up some peaches and strawberries. We got back, I put the kids to bed, and we made about 4-5 batches each of raspberry jam. Once we got that done, I had some pretty ripe bananas, so we made some banana bread. Delicious.

She headed home with her jam, I got dinner ready. Once I got the kids to bed for the night, I headed back to the kitchen. I had kept some raspberries aside for some raspberry peach jam.

My Grandma Judd had given me her mother’s recipe. It took a little bit of guessing, since her measurements just said 3 boxes of frozen raspberries and a box of frozen strawberries. I think it turned out pretty tasty, though. I almost didn’t have enough peaches. Good thing it worked out. I did have to split it up while the jam boiled, so it didn’t spill over the top of my pan.

So if you need any jam, I have a freezer full of about 4 different flavors.

(July 16th, 2010)

The neighbor kids have been outside this week, and they actually came and invited Jameson out. There’s 4 kids belonging to the neighbors, and then another little boy staying with his grandma (who lives at the end of the street) for the week. Well, the visiting boy brought his skateboards with him. Just past our house, the road starts to decline into a cul-de-sac. The kids start at the top of the hill, and ride the boards down into the circle. They let Jameson use one of their boards, but it was a mini size. He was having so much fun, though. So today, while at Target, I checked out the boards. The cheapest I could find was $10, so Jameson got a board. We got home just before nap time, but when we pulled in the drive, he saw the kids outside playing. He could barely wait. He jumped from the car yelling to them, “Friends! I got a skateboard!”

I couldn’t confine him to a nap, so I let him play for a while. He loves his skateboard.

He looks like such a big boy with his skateboard.

This is Naria going down the hill with him. She is 6, but acts like his little mom. Fine with me. She makes sure he’s ok, and wears his helmet. She also keeps him entertained. The kids love to play with Jameson which is kind of funny since he is 2 and they are from 6-10 years old.

My Skater boy!