Bonus Time

Monday was the added bonus to our weekend....since Lyndsay and Aaron decided to stay and play another day. Unfortunately, there wasn't as much playing as usual. Lyndsay and I spent the morning with Anden at the Doctor. This was after Jeremy and I spent the ENTIRE night awake with the poor little inconsolable kid. He has his first ear infection. I felt awful. I had SO many growing up and can truly empathize with how horrible they are! And we were plagued with extreme guilt that maybe we added to it by playing all weekend. Luckily his doctor reassured us that he would have gotten the ear infection anyway since he had a lingering cold from last week that eventually moved to his ears. He had acted perfectly fine all weekend so we thought he was over his cold. Guess not. Anyway he's on antibiotics now and ear drops. Within a few hours after, he was already perking up to his usual funny self! Ah, the miracles of modern medicine! :-)

The only thing that made Anden happy before the drugs kicked in!

Later that afternoon, the boys were itching to go back out riding. Anden really wanted to go too (ok and so did the girls). So we relented and said he could go for a little safe ride. What I didn't know is that the boys wanted to ride quads this time...which I have now learned that means so they can be crazy fools. Regretfully my husband is the Ring Leader of that prestigious group.

Aaron getting stuck

Jeremy watching Aaron dig out

Women & children safely playing

Rare sighting of an endangered species!

(and yes Jer parked us downstream from them!)

Snack Time

Jer getting stuck

Jer attempting to get out (and soaking himself in the process! lol)

Aaron giving in and ruining his shoes to help Jer

Now that the boys were a muddy mess, they became even more fearless crazy. We followed them in the rhino at a SAFE and SMART distance. Two words the boys didn't understand. We explored around more until Jer found this huge cliff.

Jeremy scoping out how far of a drop it is!

Jeremy jumping it anyway!

No casualties = great day!

We rushed home, grabbed dinner and sent Lynds/Aaron on their way back to Vegas. Oh and sadly Rocky went too. The kids were a bit distraught about this.

Taylee has since been wandering the house yelling, "Wocky where r u?". Meanwhile Anden randomly asks me on a repeated basis if we can go to Vegas Baby and get Rocky. Sorry Lyndsay, you have now been replaced by a turtle! :-)

Mother's Day Weekend - Part 2

To continue our non relaxing super fun weekend, we headed out riding on Sunday. I guess I'm not your typical "mother" cuz this is exactly what I wanted on my special day! lol We headed a few miles north of us and found some beautiful scenery. I LOVE where we live and being so close to the "country". (beware: camera happy mom on board)

Unloading the Trailer

Taylee & all her accessories

Strapped in & Ready to GO!

We drove until we found the stream! Apparently my camera magnified the green hues quite nicely. I swear it didn't really look this gross!!

Taylee just loved throwing the sand!

The BOYS just wanted to catch the fish

OK so I have to admit, this is where the fish were swimming most of the time.

In 6 inches of water.

And they still couldn't catch one.

Seriously fish. Just use those flippers to start running.

You'll get away faster than attempting to swim! lol

The girls were not intrigued by the belly crawling fish and created their own fun.

One last attempt to catch the fish.

By running them over. (just kidding)

Explaining to Anden why the hybrid water snake fish couldn't come with us.

Driving to find the next adventure. We looked back and Taylee was chillin' & relaxin'!

The rhino has magical sleeping powers. Knocks the kids out EVERY time!

Maybe that's why I enjoy riding so much?! lol

Exploring why the kids are locked down & daydreaming.

After a few hours we loaded back up and went back home....where we stayed still 30 mins before heading to the water park! Then to top off Mother's day. Lyndsay surprised me by deciding to just stay another day! YIPPEE! The fun continues!

Mother's Day Weekend - Part 1

Happy Mother's Day to all you gorgeous wonderful moms out there!

This is the hardest yet most rewarding job we'll ever have!

On that note...

We definitely had a MOTHER of a weekend!

Lyndsay and Aaron came into town and we made use of every waking moment! We went to football games, water park, rhino/rzr rides, more water park, more rhino/quad rides....all while juggling sick kids with intermittent puking and ear infections. :-(

Friday night we spent in Anthem at Music in May. It's a free concert series they have in the park every Friday night in May. If we weren't juggling sick kids (yes ours and Mortensens') we probably would have taken a picture.

We left the concert early to head home for Lynds/Aaron's arrival. Anden was MORE than thrilled and conned us into staying up extra late to see them. Lyndsay had been teasing us ALL week prior that she had captured "something" in her parking lot that she was bringing for the kids. She named it Rocky. Knowing her love for animals is about equal to mine, I figured she probably caught a real rock. The anticipation and excitement had built up all week. I was a tad worried when she was texting me on the drive that Rocky was a little hyper, hope Maxx (our dog) liked him, etc. Maybe she actually DID catch a real animal after all?!

We were in the backyard with the fire pit blazing and roasting marshmallows when they arrived. Lynds came in beaming while holding a big purple fleece blanket wrapped in a ball. Nothing could have prepared us for what we saw next.

Seriously. Who catches a FREAKING TURTLE?!?!

For once in my life I was speechless.

I couldn't stop laughing picturing Lynds building up the nerve to chase down a rogue turtle that was cruising through her parking lot! lol

The tortoise (I was corrected that it wasn't a turtle, as if I knew the difference!) was the HIT of the weekend! Little did it know it was dumped into the middle of a chaotic circus filled with mini humans that couldn't stop mauling it, hugging it, carrying it, dropping it (one minor accidental trip), petting it, kissing it, flying it and pushing it. I'm actually surprised it lived through the weekend. Every time they let go, it rushed as fast as it's little legs could right into a corner or under something to hide. I'm sorry Rocky; I can empathize with your plight. I too feel like that sometimes after a weekend with my kiddos.

Saturday morning, Taylee was introduced to Rocky. In true girl fashion she threw her arms in the air and yelled "AAAAHHH! SCARE ME!!" Lynds and I fell off the bed laughing. After the rough start, she immediately became a smothering fan of the desert tortoise also.

Then we all rushed to Jer's softball game. Anden was lucky enough to get to bring Rocky with us. He did so well softly holding him on his lap during the drive. We were so proud of him....until I heard him making rocket noises and I looked back and he was flying Rocky up, down, circling all around. We quickly reminded him that Rocky doesn't like to fly and to place him back DOWN CAREFULLY on your lap! Phew, flying turtle crisis adverted.

The tired football players...after losing by one measly point!

We rushed home from softball, changed our clothes and cruised over to the water park! It was finally the season opening debut! We were first in line, waiting at the gate. Literally.

Our 7 minute wait to enter the pristine shooting water....was longer than the kids actually stayed in the water. It was freezing!

We had a blast!

And it really added up to some great naps afterwards...for the men and children!

What is that?!

Late the other night, I was picking up the house while walking around barefoot. I had momentarily put on Jer's flip flops to quickly walk out to the garage and back. Upon my return, I was beginning to lay out the kids' clothes for the next morning. Jeremy comes over to see what I'm doing and immediately says, "Um...Don't Move!" First, I HATE comments like that! Don't you realize the first thing I'm gonna do is jump to the ceiling and scream?! Second, that's exactly what I did...while also doing the wiggly dance and brushing off every part of my body before he could even finish his sentence. He muzzled his laughter to point out this nasty creature lurking behind me.

Excuse me MR. DISGUSTING SCORPION, What the HECK are you doing INSIDE my house? Did you happen to forget that the Bug Man just came 2 days ago and pulverized all of your little friends? You have your domain outside and I have my domain inside. If you happen to get confused and cross into enemy territory, you will be severely punished. No humanity for creepy crawly poisonous scary things will be spared. AND because of you, my dreams will surely be tormented by your likeness tonight.

While I was hanging from the chandelier, Jer ecstatically ran to get his scorpion flash light (YES they really do make such a thing and YES my husband bought one). He then proceeded to turn off all the lights, to my harsh dismay, and shine the flash light on the gross lil bugger. I was beyond shocked at what I saw. Yes, so I knew they're supposed to glow under the light. But honestly, I have about a million more important things to do than to have ever found this out first hand. Well, today I was enlightened.

WOW! These little arthropod guys are like their own night club party. I could almost hear the thumping beat of the techno music. Well at least if I wasn't 50 ft in the hair still clinging to the chandelier I could have definitely heard it. Jeremy continued to inspect it in awe....while it would occasionally take off running (or whatever they do with all those legs) thinking it could flee the human's laser beam. That's when I put down my foot...literally. I threw Jer's flip flop (that luckily I was still wearing!) at him and told him to terminate the party. The Katie Cop had arrived.

After Jer's new friend was properly disposed of (and yes he did freak himself out and took a LONG time to get the courage to kill it), I continued my preparations for the next day. This time however I was in my snow suit and moon boots. No creatures were getting me tonight! I braved up and went back to the garage to get my walmart shopping bags out of the car from earlier that night. Somehow they weren't in the car. Hhmm...so I rummaged through the house some more. Still nothing. Honestly, who goes shopping and forgets to bring their grocery bags home?! Wow, I really am losing my marbles.

At that point, I realized it was time for bed. This was just way too much excitement for one night. It was clearly time to doze off and dream about marbles covered in scorpions.

Windy Sunday

The wind continued Sunday.

Anden begged all day to break out the kites.

We gave in.

We almost lost our kids to the skys.

May Day

Mayday! Mayday!
Where the heck has this year gone?!
It's now May? Is it still 2010?

It was a busy weekend as usual. The kids had a sleepover Friday night at Grandma and Papa's house. So we were FREE! First up, Ash and I went running and worked out at 7am. (Ya, I tried to sleep in but it's impossible after having little kids!) Then we all rushed to Jer and Ty's first flag football game at 9am.

The boys could barely walk afterward.
I think they now realize they're not 17 anymore.

After that, we picked up our kiddos and headed home for lunch and naps. The second they awoke we were off to the next activity. Our Anthem waterpark was scheduled to make it's long awaited season opening. It was postponed. A "cold" spell had hit. It was 70 AND windy. HOWEVER, the splash pads were still open for those that dared. Of course we attempted it.

We looked like this...

Guess we should have looked like this...

Too bad I didn't have my camera to get a picture of all of us (yes the Mortensens included) shivering in our towels huddled up sitting along the edge of the splash pad. And yes, we were the only ones there.

After our 15 mins of water fun, we headed back for a bbq at Mortensens house....only to head back to our house for the grand viewing of Avatar.

Jeremy and Tyler have been anxiously waiting to view this epic movie in our theater. Too bad we're so busy it took 2 wks to find time! And too bad everyone fell asleep during the movie except for me and Jer. Geez, who invited the old folks to our viewing party?! We debated whether to wake up Ash/Ty or just let them figure out in the morning where they were!

We try and fit the most into each day.
I guess some people just can't keep up with the Harbecks! :-)