Summer Camping Trip (August 27-28)

Nyah loves camping and kept telling us "once Ryker is born and is older, can we go camping?"  So we decided to try it out for one night the end of this summer and it went really well.  We were lucky to end up with a camping spot. At the campground we chose, the spots are apparently reserved months in advance.  I guess it's not really like the camping situation in Idaho. :)  Now we know.  Anyway, we just stayed the one night and both of the kids did great.  We went to Golden Canyon State Park and it was beautiful.  Plus, there were flush toilets and even showers.  That is my kind of camping!  You will see from one of the pictures that Nyah had an "incident".  She was running with Toby and tripped...  Luckily she didn't get hurt too bad since we were so far from a hospital.  Then it was hilarious to see what she did to her "owie" the next day during nap time.

Nyah's First "Haircut" (August 25)

So a few months ago I started to mention to Ryan that I thought it was time to at least trim Nyah's hair.  I insisted that it would look healthier and we would only cut off an inch or two.  He was sure we would end up somewhere getting it cut and they would cut it all off.  He was not excited about the idea, so I decided if he did it, maybe he would feel confident that it would only be an inch or two.  Here are some pictures to document the event.  He was so sentimental about cutting her hair and it was cute to watch. :)

You can see it really did end up being only a couple of inches and she still has very long hair. :)

Ryker's 2 Month Update

I'm obviously way behind and am hoping to do some major catching up over the next few days.  We'll see if I can make it happen. :)  This was one of Ryker's first times in the jumper and was just over 2 months old at this point.  You can see he liked it from the beginning.

What a sad face but it's so adorable! The frown was first and then the next face so you can see he was happy again in no time!

This was after his 2 month appointment with band-aids all over his legs from his shots.  You can see he was a pretty good sport about it. At 2 months he was 24 1/4" (90th percentile), 11 pounds 9 ounces (50th percentile) and 15 3/4" head circumfrence (50th percentile).  He spends tons of time smiling and we just love it!

Here are some other things about Ryker at two months:

1. He loves to snuggle (and so do I)
2. He likes to suck on all of his fingers (as you can see in the picture above)
3. LOVES to be held
4. Likes his swing and sometimes sleeps in it all night (we'll see if I regret this later when he doesn't want to sleep in his crib)
5. His longest stretch of sleeping was six hours but typically four at night.
6. Smiles and laughs all of the time
7. Loves his big sister and gives her great smiles.
8. His favorite songs are "I Am a Child of God" and the lullaby song on the VIP CD.  We can play this song and sing and he calms right down even if he's super tired of being in his car seat on a long trip.
9. His very first time in the jumper was actually on August 10 and the picture above was his second time.

Heritage Square

We decided to try out an amusement park and Nyah had a great time.  We had a great time and the only thing we would do differently next time is just get her an unlimited ride pass.  We didn't because we weren't sure what she would think of the rides but we will know better next time. :)

I love seeing Ryan squished in this little train with Ryan.  It was so funny watching him try to get in and out.

This last one is just a random picture to show what types of things Toby puts up with.  Nyah decided to color him with her "window crayons".  What a girl. :) He's such a good dog.



Trip to Idaho

I decided to take a trip to Idaho while I was on maternity leave.  I figured I should take advantage of the time I already had off work so I packed up the kids (and a lot of stuff) and headed to Idaho.  Ryan tells me I take everything including the "kitchen sink" these days, but you never know what you're going to need when traveling with kids.  Plus I took the Tahoe so I had plenty of room!  The kids did great on the drive.  I'm very blessed that my kiddos do so great in the car.  We took lots of stops but we weren't in any big hurry and it went well.

We had lots of fun in Idaho.  Below are pictures of some of the things we did.  I mostly just enjoyed hanging out with family.  One of the nights, we got together with lots of extended family at the park and it was great to see everybody.  Some how I didn't take any pictures but I really enjoyed it.

We had the chance to just hang out and spend time together which is the best part.

Here is a super cute picture I love of Jana, Nyah and Ryker.  I love the sunglasses Nyah has on and this is a very typical picture of Nyah.  She's such a happy kid and has tons of energy.

The next one is a great one of Shari and Ryker when we went to Boise to see Shari.  Lisa and Hallie also came with us so that was lots of fun.  Nyah and Hallie chose to spend a lot of the time fighting so they actually rode in different rows in the Tahoe on the way home - kids!

We went on a picnic to Justice park one evening.  What a great tradition.  We actually just took sandwiches and then took up the stuff to make S'mores.  We had lots of fun and the kids did great.  I love sitting by a camp fire.

All of the rest of the pictures are of a boating trip to American Falls. When we got there, people were commenting that they had never seen the water so great this season.  Well by the time they launched the boat to getting it over to the marina, it had changed drastically and there were huge waves and lots of wind.  Hanna and Jana still braved it and were able to ski but the others decided it wasn't worth it with such crazy water.  Lisa was a good sport and took the two little girls "tubing".  Nyah loved it - even with the waves.

Hanging out on the beach

And this picture is to document Lisa was pregnant since I don't have very many pictures of her pregnant.  You can barely even tell she's pregnant in this picture...

And Dad and Aaron made the best of the situation and decided to build sand castles (with some help from the little girls).  I was quite impressed with the results.

Aaron didn't want to "pose" with his castle but here it is. 

It is always fun to see family.  Thanks for the fun times and the memories.