Birthday Boys

September is a big month for birthdays.  Doug and Jack both had one, as well as my Dad, Mom, sister-in-law, and uncle. Let's start with Doug's. From these pictures it looks like his birthday was rather uneventful,

But on the contrary I'd say it was one of the most eventful birthdays he has ever had.  To make a long story short, he took the scouts camping that day.  They had grand plans to boat to an island in the river to camp and fish. They got as far as setting up their tents and fishing for an hour before the rain began.  A drizzle turned into a deluge that just wouldn't quit so they ended up abandoning their site and coming home.  I picked up 7 drenched and shivering guys that night at 9:30.  We had a more official celebration the next day after everything had calmed down a bit. We celebrated with Mango Key Lime pie.

Next up was Jack's birthday yesterday.  He woke up bright and early and opened a few presents before school.  

Strawberry filled Crepes for breakfast at his request.

He didn't want to have to go to school but it was an early release day and I came and picked him up for a quick trip to Subway for lunch so it really wasn't too bad.

More presents after school with the older kids this time

Then it was off to scouts and mutual where Jack recieved his Wolf patch. At long last we came home and had dessert.  Jack really wanted a cherry pie.

 He told me this was the "best birthday ever"!!! Yay!

Jack's sweet primary teacher brought him over a huge cookie for his birthday tonight.

Happy birthday Jack and Doug. We love you!!

President's Day to Today

Week 3 of school... done! Time is flying...Soon the Holidays will be upon us. We had a nice Presidents Day weekend. Doug decided to try fishing REALLY late and REALLY early. They stayed out until 1:00 AM friday night fishing under the causeway. Not too much luck catching fish though.

Then Monday morning they got up at 4:30 and took the boat out.  Doug bought a massive flood light to try out driving the boat in the dark (1100 lumens). Here are a few pics from their day.

Catfish

Mangrove Snapper

They also found an island to explore.   You can actually camp on it. Doug is going to take the boyscouts there for a campout...Now that he's SCOUTMASTER!

Mullet.

Everyone came home and slept the day away. That night Mer decided to take her friend out for dinner and a movie for her birthday. They went to Chipotle then came home for cake and Ice cream and a movie at home.  Her present was awesome! She inflated 16 water balloons with helium and tied a string to them that was attached to papers that said her favorite things about her friend. She stuffed them all in a box so they would fly out when she opened it.  She forgot to have her open it until after the movie and by then all the helium had leaked out and the balloons didn't float. Oh well, it was the thought that counted. They had a ton of fun anyway. She also made her a really cute cake.

Oh one last thing.  While everyone else was fishing I was on a mission to reorganize our garage...yet again. Well just the part closest to the door. Our big shelf fell off the wall a couple of months ago and everything has just been in a heap on the floor. Soccer season is starting and that is a prime dumping zone for everyone and everything. So we gave up our soccer basket which was overflowing and Jack and I used my new chop saw and built a little shelf to go over our free weights. I also installed some wood and hook where our old shelf was. These work way better and we can finally walk easily from our door to our car. We'll see if this system works for the season. Crossing fingers!

 Luke wanted to play a game one day this week so he decided to invent one. He drew one out on a piece of poster board. All the dots were lose a turn spots.  It was really cute.

Max and Jack had their first soccer games today. They both did great and earned us ice cream. I got a good shot of Max.  He was really awesome today, he dominated midfield, and scored 2 back to back goals .

And, unbelievably, I think I am finally caught up blogging our lives. 

OVER and OUT!

Colorado Vacation.

We did it! We got our house ready to list just in time to head out of town to Colorado for a little R&R. We left the house at 5 am in PERFECT condition. Ready to show. I can't believe we pulled it off. 

These kids were so excited to get to Colorado and were glad to finally be on there way.
Here are a bunch of photos from highlights of our trip.

The boys love the lego room where they can create to their hearts desire with tons of Lego from years gone by.

We hit the Boulder County fair to check out the exhibits. Unfortunately they were closed for the day. We did get to see some Sheep though.

There was a cool climbing wall at the rec center that we had to check out when we went swimming one day.  Max got a lot of practice playing with his new baby cousin Charlie.

We had a really neat experience going to do Baptisms for the dead with all the cousins who were old enough.

It was Max's first time. Mer was able to be baptized and confirmed for her Great Grandma Lucy. It was really special for her. Look at these two big kids of mine.

Then the rest of the crew joined us at Casa Bonita for a fun fiesta of craziness. We even persuaded Grandpa to come.

Mom and Rachel put on a fabulous Luau for us. We had delicious food and fun entertainment. Jared taught all the boys the Haka dance.

Mom put her awesome painting skills to goo use and whipped up a shark to eat us up.


Dad even got in on the action.

The girls made these adorable beach cupcakes and we had a ton of yummy food.

No trip to CO would be complete with out a trip to Into the Wind. It is seriously the most interesting toy shop I've ever been to.

Mer was on a quest to find a statue to pretend to kiss. This bear was the closest she got.

Here are Jer and Ben testing out Dad's new outdoor griddle. These boys love to cook!

Mer had a ton of fun playing with the babies. Here are little Elizabeth and Charlie.

We escaped to Rocky Mountain National Park for a day.  We hiked up to the beautiful Alberta falls.

And we also hiked around Bear Lake. The mountains might be what I miss most about Colorado. I love them!!

Mer is posing with Hannah here, who is headed to BYU Idaho for Winter semester. She's so fun.

Cousin love!

The view was just so pretty here we couldn't stop taking pictures.

Here are all the girl cousins. Girls are rare even on the Newson side of the family.

A siblings pic (minus Ben of course)

We had an elk jump in front of us on the way home.

Nonstop playing with all the cousins is the best part of going home. Everyone has just so much fun.

Of course we had to do a few family photos too. 

All the cousins.

So long fun Family!! We wish you all lived closer.