Since we've been gone

Sam had is 6th birthday!! Kong Zhu, enough said! Thanks Mom they LOVE them.

Look at Logan's face, I couldn't tell him it wasn't for him so we sang twice.

Logan opened his presents early with Sam.....Don't judge! You tell that

face he has to wait 3 days for his.

Sam got his beloved Toy Story 3 robot.

Logan got a box full of puppets for Grandma Linda.

Logan turned 3! They love their new train set!

Logan played us like a fiddle! He got another cake, stinker.

Since his birthday he can't even be bothered to pants on, he

has got better things to do!

We went to Gatlinburg, in the Smokey Mountains.

We rode a ski lift up to the top.

I was the one who wanted to do it, but me and my phobias almost

made it not happen. In the end Dave talked me back into it. It was

a blast, no one fell out of the chairs! Happy Day!

Logan LOVED it. more than Sam for sure.

He put on a happy face, but was really nervous for sure.

Dave with his leg over Logan. The only reason we went.

The view for the giant tram that took us to the ski resort.

Than we drove to North Carolina.

We hiked a mountain.......kinda.

Resting a the top.

The drive was beautiful. And Windy....I alone went through a bottle

of Dramamine the our 3 days there.

A random horse we found on one of our explorations through town.

Gotta take a picture of the scarecrows!

At the penguin hospital in the Aquarium.

Proof I was there.

Sam wants to scuba dive......should have been born to a different

family buddy, NEVER going to happen!

We went around on the moving sidewalk several times, like this.

Dave is a great bag carrier. Thanks Babe!

We found this really cute river with a trail beside it.

They all wanted on the rock, didn't work so great.

On the trail.

The Pancake Pantry. Oh baby! The best breakfast I have EVER had.

Amazing!

Dave went to Canada for business. While there they drove over and

saw the Canadian Niagara Falls.

He said it was really cold and loud.

He said there was just a little rail between his and certain death.

There were people stepping over the railing trying to get better pictures,

Idiots!

The boys and I went to a pumpkin patch while Dave was in

Canada. This place is really cool, I get my Strawberries here in the spring.

Dave's work had a family day. They always have really awesome things there.

Sam had a great time bouncing. In the background, that slide is where finally,

Logan got over his fear of slides and went down it! YEA!!

The Managment had a dunk tank to raise money for something.

Thats my man in his dunking best!

Sam got him first.

Dave and Sam loved the rock wall although, thats all the farther Sam got up.


Washington trip

The boys and I went home for fall break at Sam's school. We got to

meet Asher (Dee) for the first time. LOVE HIM, he has the best smile!

See, best smile!

Sam and Logan LOVE playing with Avry, Edyn and Jade.

Blurry, but they seriously played like this for hours!

My Grandma and Grandpa Marlatt were staying while we were there,

they were so good with the kids and everyone loved having them there.

Rory (Tom's) and Emma (Casey's)

Emma took what I think were first steps.

Jade turned 3!

Uncle Ryan came home from his mission.

Uncle Peter bought the biggest chair ever. Great

crowd pleaser!!

A few days before we left for Washington our computer crashed and took with it all of our pictures. So from Sam's first day of school until October we don't have any pictures of our happenings. And Im still learning how to use this new computer, so hopefully I will get back on the blogging wagon.

Holy Stain!!

We finally got the big toy finished! We have been debating the color we want to stain it for a couple of months now, and we decided on Chocolate. It really does look like chocolate.....I like it! We wanted to do the fence and the big toy the same but after we finished we aren't going to do the fence the same color. It looks great on the bog toy but we have a lot of fence and it would be a little to much. It took us only 2 days to get it done. Dave goo to buy paint gun, which made fast work of the whole thing. We had to do the corners and a few places with a brush but it went really fast. The boy sat in the grass and painted extra pieces of wood with their craft paints and had a blast.


Final product...I love it! The added life of the wood is also a plus.

First Day of KINDERGARTEN

I can't believe I have a kindergartener! That can't be right. Sam started at Pope Elementary on Aug. 2, and so far likes it. He teacher Mrs. Johnson, has been teaching there for 28 years, so I feel slightly better about him going. I am not sold on the importance of Kindergarten especially ALL DAY kindergarten! I don't think he should be there from 8:30-3:30 everyday with only one 20min recess, that's just to long. He seems to be adjusting well and loves to learn. Everyday he comes home ready to tell me about his day. He has been couped up all day so he is bouncing off the walls when he gets home and it is SO HOT I can't just send him outside to play, which means he and Logan wrestle until one of them gets hurt. Fun for all! Logan however is not loving this whole Sam being gone all day. I have had to find alternate routes to the store. If we drive past his school Logan starts saying "You pick up my Sammy right now! Him wants me! School over!" Its really cute but at the same time sad, they are best friends! And YES he is wearing a uniform, I am still pretty angry about it! He is going to a PUBLIC school (not happy about that). I get why they have them do it, but I LOVE shopping! Plain black, white, or maroon polo's are not so fun to shop for people!
Sam loves school and I feel very relieved that he likes going and is looking forward to it everyday. I have been near a breakdown for months now about sending him to a public school in the Jackson. I have made a deal with Dave to send him to this school which is very close to our house until 2nd grade. The principal is great and there are only 13 kids in his class so I do feel better about it. (this IS better, people) He looks so grown up, I can't stand it!! I love the little kid in the background,(Alex) he looks so freaked out.

Lemmon Petrified Wood Park

Every year we stop by this park. It is all Petrified wood. It has all sort of dinosaur fossils in there. The boys can't get enough of this park and the added bonus is that when we get there we only have 1 more hour before we get to grandma and gramp's house!

Bowman County Fair

We spent a lot of time at the library in Bowman. It is so awesome, they have pillows, recliners, leather couches all for lounging. They also have a HUGE big screen TV with a Wii and all the games. You can just go and play all day and if you don't want to play the Wii you can play the GRAND PIANO!! Seriously I want to move to Bowman just so I can go to the library everyday. We went to story time and after the stories, it was art time. The girl showed them how to do straw art. you put drops of paint on a paper and blow on it through a straw. When they were done she said they could enter it into the fair that was happening that weekend so we went for it! Both Sam and Logan loved it, there was LOADS of spit every where but they were so proud of themselves. They both got blue ribbons and 3 dollars for their prize!

While we were at the fair checking out their artwork we saw some of Dave's distant relatives who had entered some of their animals. This little girl took the boys into all the animals cages and helped them to pet each of them. She was so cute, totally manhandling the huge cows and telling the boys not to worry. I swear that cow could have crushed her; but she was in there moving them around like they were stuffed animals at a tea party! The boys loved it........I was stressed out.




I love this picture. They loved all these things there were several different ones. I took the picture right before Logan got his head stuck in the hole, so funny because he got stuck in a few of them.

They were proud of their art.

North Dakota 2010

We took our annual trip to North Dakota a few weeks ago. We always have so much fun there. It is such a small town with very little to do but we LOVE it. Dave's grandparents are so awesome! It takes us 2 days to drive there, so we find a hotel on the way which is boys favorite part. We let them jump on the beds and back and forth between the beds (they get spanks if they jump on our beds). We drove for 16 hours the first day! We like to get as far as we can on the first day because the boys are hard to get in the car on the second day. The second day was only 6 hours in the car...much better! We drive through a tiny town that has these huge things made out of scrape metal, they are awesome. We stopped to get a closer look and the guy who made them was there so we got to see lots of others he has made, they are awesome. Grandma and the boys. I love this picture, they were so happy to see them. Every year when we leave it is SO HOT and when we get to Bowman we are all freezing! At least this year we remembered to pack warm clothes.
Every year Gram makes Dave a Prime rib on the spit (grill). It really is so good.
Gramp's chair. Every time he moves the boys take over. It is amazing how much they love Gramps, they climb all over him! They try to both sit on his lap when he is inside. Sometimes we have to intervene and protect him.
Sam and Logan loved to watch the cows, mostly just watched them run away.
The neighbor's (1/2 mile away) daughter was home visiting, she trains horses and asked if Sam wanted to have a ride. We thought that meant she was going to give Sam a ride, but NO........ She just tossed him up there and told him to go! And was he scared.....NO, he kicked the horse and they took off! I thought I was going to have a heart attack! I am scared of horses, so I was torn between protecting my child and staying away from the beast! I'm glad Linda was there because I made her protect Sam while I protected myself! Don't get me wrong if Linda wasn't there I would have stood closer......Maybe! The girl (I forgot her name) stayed that close to him, but when he trotted her didn't run next to him. Sam loved it, he could have ridden all day!
We spent a lot of time in the basement. It was cool and the boys could make big messes and be as loud as they wanted.

We drove to Theodore Roosevelt National Park to check out so of the Bad Lands. It was really pretty, they seemed to go on forever.
Over about 2 feet there was an overhang that dropped to the bottom of the canyon. It didn't look safe at all and it went all across the overlook. Dave thought it fitting for me to stand over there, he thinks he is funny.
I'm not quite sure what Logan is doing, but it's a cute picture.
Dave's not even looking at the camera and still takes an awesome picture!
Dave stopped at a Prairie Dog town and they were trying to call them.
Navajo Tacos! Yummy.
A museum in Bowman. the boys see this dinosaur every year.

They boys 'resting' with Gramps.

Dave took Sam fishing out to Davis Dam.
Grandma Linda went too. Sam is still excited that she went with them.

Most of our evenings were sitting on the porch watching the cars on the highway.
All of us.
On our way home we drove down through the Bad Lands. It was so cool. It took us about an hour to drive around the loop. I didn't get car sick on the curvy road, that was our only worry. There were signs all over warning us about the rattle snakes but we got out of the car anyway, I just made Dave go first!! He is a good man.
Then we stopped at the Corn Palace. The whole outside of the convention center is decorated with corn. It was to cool and it gave us a good break from the car.