My step-son and his wife came to visit us. It was so amazing to see them. This was the first time I met his wife and I haven't seen my son in 10 years or so.

My daughter was staying with her grandparents for a week so they stopped off to visit them and see her also. He got her ATV going which she loved!I was worried about Butterball as he sometimes does not do well with strangers but he did amazing for most of the time. Course it could have been the money burning a hole in his pocket that he couldn't wait to take to the Air Force Museum. The minute my son and his wife showed up Butterball was pushing us to go to the museum. Thankfully they were game to go along.Appleseed was so cute with them. He would walk right up and reach for their hands. I loved seeing it.After the whirlwind tour of the museum from Butterball we took them out to dinner. It took a long time for it, it felt like. Here is Appleseed waiting for his pizza.Butterball bought a plane that you wind up and it flies, or is supposed to. It has been a very frustrating toy for him and has caused a lot of tantrums.After visiting I gathered them for pictures of course. My oldest son with his wife and my youngest son. I love it.After a long and very stimulating day Butterball was done. We had forced him out of his room, from under his bed, to take pictures. After I saw these it made me sick. I will never willingly force him like that again. He was tired and had had a lot going on that day and had had enough. It breaks my heart to look at his face in this picture.My husband with his son's. I thought these pictures would be like all the others with Butterball where he is usually crying but these just tear me to pieces looking at how miserable he is.I am so thankful they took their time to come and visit us. My son is only 3 years younger than me but started calling me Mom awhile ago. I have really loved it. And he is always good at calling me on Mother's Day. It warms my heart. We love you both!

More camping

So surprise surprise we had a rough night sleeping. Appleseed does not do well out of his own crib. He did give everyone a very enthusiastic rendition of I Am A Child of God in the night. He cracks me up.Right before we left we went down to the creek again and my friend convinced me to let the kids go in the creek. Something I would normally do. Darn, I hate being so overprotective and cautious now. They had a blast. Butterball found a piece of wood that he called his surf board and kept trying to get on it.Appleseed was my scary one. He kept climbing all over.While we were packing Appleseed was having his own cooking lesson apparently. He had cracked every single one of the eggs. Look at that guilty face. So cute.
When it was time to go I had put Appleseed in his car seat as he was dead set on returning to the creek while we packed the last of our stuff. It cracked me up because his friend and him are very good together but also have times of not sharing. I all of a sudden heard him in the car saying, "Mine L Mine. Mine L Mine." He and his friend L say that all the time to each other. She was no where near him at the time. We decided it was their friendship language.

Camping!!!!!

I was THRILLED when I found out my husband did not have to work the weekend that the Stake campground was open. He asked me what the name of the campground was and I of course said, "Stake campground. I am sure you can google it" I was kidding.

I had asked my husband to bring something that we could use for rain as I heard it was supposed to rain while we were up there. He was amazing! He brought a tarp for over the picnic table and a big mosquito tent also. I loved it! And it was nice when the kids were in it because you knew where they were.My kids are like me. If I let them they would be off exploring to the end of the earth. I love their desire to do so but I have become more of a worry wart lately so as long as I could see or hear then that was as far as I would let them go.There was a small creek by the campsite that we went down and threw rocks in. My kids wanted to get in and walk around and for some crazy reason I told them no. Normally I would say yes and get in with them. I am not sure if it is all the injuries I have received in the last year or my husband wearing off on my (he is more protective where I normally am more relaxed).Then we went for a walk, something I LOVE to do while camping. I have always loved exploring things and just being out in nature. We enjoyed it. At one point in the road my daughter said it looked like 1/2 of Jesus' cross.We found a playground and I let the kids play for a short time. We ran into a counselor from my daughter's old school and she said that she had heard I was moving her to a new school. When I told her that I was she said that she felt I had definitely made the right choice in doing that. Hmmmm, makes me wonder about the old school.Silly Appleseed was swinging like this and kept asking me to push him. Nut, hello you can push yourself buddy.This is what I get lately from Butterball. That kid! :)Butterball is always very good at packing his own stuff, toys and what not included. But I was curious about this. You can't see it very well but he had packed a ton of hair bows, flowers, and clips and came out of the tent wearing them in his hair.We had friends that camped with us in our site and we loved it. They are an amazing family and I always enjoy spending time with them. The Dad made homemade fries that night. I INHALED them! They were SOOOOO good and I am been dreaming of them since. I plan to make some soon.

Home again, home again, just not the way I planned.

This is a long one, sorry.

We leave early in the morning from the Ranch to head home. On the way out there was quite a bit of bison. At least I think that was this day. I don't know.Now I know it is no big surprise, but I can be pretty immature sometimes. My husband asked me to follow my sister home. I HATE that because I feel like I have to be babysat. I know he only does it so that he can feel more comfortable when I am not with him but it still drives me bonkers. So at one point I passed her up. DUMB! In fact her friend that was driving said that she wouldn't follow me because she didn't think I was driving save. DOUBLE DUMB!! Me, not her. We were doing good, yes I made a massive wrong turn and ended up going the wrong way on the highway. I hate that Pocatello exit. We stopped for lunch and it took forever as there was a TV on cartoons right by our table so my kids were GLUED. But apparently it didn't take long enough.
Right around Malad, ID we hit a sudden freak hailstorm. I saw a car that had rolled over in the median so I decided I better slow down. Right as I touched my brakes I started hydroplaning and rolled into the median. The worst part was I had my 3 precious angels in the car with me. Scariest thing EVER!!! When we stopped my daughter was screaming, "I love you Daddy!" over and over. The boys were crying. Butterball had a cut on his finger but not a large one, his window had broken out. Appleseed was just terrified. I found my phone on the dashboard and tried to call 911 3 separate times. It was busy. A man came up to me and I told him that I couldn't get through to 911 and he said that he also had been trying and couldn't get through. But obviously someone did as it was not long before a cop was there and then EMT's. The EMT's were actually responding the the first roll over but they had refused service so we got them.I was very sore on my chest and neck from burns I had received from my seat belt and I had a sore neck and back. Butterbean had hit her head so her and I were attached to back boards with neck braces. NOT FUN! Then the boys were cut out of the car in their car seats and all of us rode in the ambulance to the hospital. The EMT's said I had done such an amazing job putting their car seats in and that they were very tight and that is why they had to cut them out. On the ride I was told I would feel better at the hospital as my doctor was "cute". That cracked me up. I had asked them if they knew what it was like to ride like this and they said that it is part of their training to ride in the ambulance on a back board and in a neck brace. I just couldn't help thinking that I bet when they rode they weren't frightened and in pain.The boys were not emitted as the doctor said they were acting fine. My daughter and I went through several x-rays and me a CAT scan. My wonderful sister, who I was supposed to be following, came back to be with us. Her friend and kids entertained the boys and my sister relieved a lot of my stress by just being her. I love her dearly. My brother-in-law came from quite a ways away to get my stuff out of my car and take me, the kids, and my husband (who met us at the hospital) home. I am very thankful to him for doing that. My husband was asking us about a huge rock that was in the car. I told him that we didn't have any huge rocks with us. Apparently we had picked it up when we rolled. We were very lucky that it didn't hit any of us. The man that saw our accident said we were very lucky. I truly believe that we were watched out for. One thing that made me impressed and grateful is, at the hospital I had asked for a Priesthood blessing for my daughter and I. My EMT and one ER doctor were right there and did it in no time. To have two worthy priesthood holders right there was an amazing feeling.Now an update....I still go to physical therapy twice a week but I am getting better. I still have quite a bit of pain and I have to watch how much I do or I feel worse. My daughter is getting better and better. She did have some neck pain tonight with a headache (poor thing). The boys are fine except for the mental anguish. And my kids have now grounded me from eating, talking on the phone, or "texting" (I don't do that anyway) while driving. No I wasn't doing any of those things at the time of the accident but they are very stressed while in the car now so I will do anything to help them out with that. Thank you so much to everyone that has helped us this last month with the kid sitting while I and my daughter go to NUMEROUS doctor appointments, the food, weeding, lawn mowing, weed eating, borrowing of car, goodies, flowers, and prayers. You have no idea how much we appreciate it all. We are truly blessed to have such amazing family and friends in our life.

Parade Rest Ranch - Day 3

During one unruly meal, can you imagine my kids being unruly? The waitress brought out these cute masks to color. The kids loved it. This is Butterbean's.And Butterball's adorable one.
Yep, that is Butterball, asleep with his helmet on ofcourse.Sunday it snowed nearly the entire time we were in the park. I was very glad I had gone in Saturday as on Sunday there was hardly any animals out. I was joking that they thought it was time to go back into hibernation.Hmmmm, blue skies in that picture. Must have been on Saturday. :) This late in the game I can't remember what happen what day. Except ofcourse the last. Not a good one. I will fill you in on another post.

Parade Rest Ranch - day 2

The kids love to play on this cute wagon at the ranch. Appleseed always makes me nervous that he will get the door open and fly out.This is the day the kids get to go on a corral ride. Sometimes my daughter won't go but she decided to today. I was glad. The kids very patiently waiting their turn to ride.Butterball was so excited and giggled quite a bit. He loves this part of our trip. Not as much as the hot tub but he still loves it.Butterbean will be so excited next year. She will finally be able to ride a horse, by herself with no guide, and go on a trail ride. I am not excited for that. I will be more nervous than anything.This was Appleseed's first time. I had told the wrangler she did not have to take him very far. I wasn't sure how he would do for his first time. Half way through he said his trademark, "Need you." So I took him off the horse and we walked back. Sweet little guy.

Renaissance Fair

We went to the Renaissance Fair with some friends the other day. Boy am I glad she got me in on the discounted price because I almost had a heart attack at the regular prices.

I actually get nauseous taking these darn "in case we get lost" photos.We saw a really good magic show done by our friend's Uncle. I enjoyed it quite a bit. And I loved how the audience would yell "Huzzah". It was fun. And all the costumes were amazing. Our friend's Uncle bought us all these HUGE turkey legs. They were pretty good.We enjoyed feeding our faces on them. And of course Butterbean wouldn't eat one and then complained about being hungry. She also refused the orange I had because it was "smooshy". So she had to starve.This was when we were near a pirate boat getting our pictures done. Captian Jack Sparrow was there and he looked AMAZING! The guy had that character down to a T. It was so cool. I wanted my little pirates picture with him but he huddled next to my leg instead.Thank you to our amazing friends for inviting us. We had a great time, mud and all.

Talent show

We had our first Family Home Evening talent show the other night. It was so much fun. We each picked out something to show off to the rest of the family. Dad played some music on his flute. I said the first 4 Articles of Faith (That is right, I had them memorized). After I said them my daughter ran up to me, "Yay! You finally got them all right!" My daughter was showing off how she is good at taking care of animals. She had a litter box made from a cake pan and a scooper was the spatula. She then had a bowl and some "cat food" (the confetti in the measuring cup) and she fed her stuffed animal cat and then cleaned out the litter box. Butterball made a guitar and a microphone and played the guitar while "singing" I Am A Child of God. He actually had to have his sister whisper the words to him as he sang it. Appleseed pointed to various body parts. It was so much fun and the kids really enjoyed coming up with their own talent. I can't wait to do it again.

Coolest Snow Fort EVER!

My crazy Appleseed out enjoying the snow. That kid is funny. Notice he has no gloves. They last a few minutes and then he takes them off and refuses to put them back on. Yet he will stay outside for a very long time before he finally can't stand it anymore. He is my big one on being outside. I like that!So we don't need those silly snow fort building thingys that cost $10. We just need some old icecream buckets and a stock pot and we were good to go.And they were both so good at helping and really doing a great job of it.So maybe not the coolest ever but we loved it. That right wall accidentally fell over right as we had finished. By then I was exhausted so I just bundled it together. Butterball loved it the most and had hid some items in it's crevices. But the next time some meany kids kicked the walls in on their way home from school. Next time we will build it some place else.

You've been Minioned?!

What may you ask do these goooooorgeous shoes have to do with Minions? I will tell you how. I was wearing these shoes one day after my super tacky flat shoes fell apart in the washing machine. And when I say tacky I mean it! Tragic I know. So when I was wearing them I twisted my ankle 3 times all before 11:30 AM!The last time I was holding Appleseed, I fell dropping him on the cement and then my knee smashed his head a little more into the cement. So sad. But all I saw was a slightly scratched face. It wasn't until after nap time that I noticed his front tooth was broken and crooked. Very sad. After a couple dentist visit we found out his tooth has to be watched but may be fine. Whew! As for me? I pulled some serious muscles in my back and can barely move.So one day I had to go get my Bountiful Basket and when I came home I found this sign with several balloons taped to my door.Inside we found these adorable minion Twinkies. I ate WAY TOO MANY of them and the scale showed it. Totally worth it.And of course a nice bottle of my favorite soda with "Get well soon!" on it. I actually had given up soda per my son's request. But he gave me permission to drink just this one. YUM! But day 3 and I still have about 1/2 a bottle. Normally that baby would be gone by now.The kids all had individual gift bags with fun things in it like sticky hands, hand made notepads with their name, jars with erasers, and a minion. They were screaming like it was Christmas.Appleseed LOVED his sticky hand. And my good boy took a few bites of his Twinkie and then tackled some strawberries. My boys are good at eating more healthy then bad.Licking those chops!And here is a sample of our minion balloons that were on the door. Thank you secret minion decorator. My cute kids guessed who it was and wanted to break into her home and decorate it with "robbing stuff". Silly kids!