2nd Leg

We left Wyoming and made a half day drive to a nice campground outside of Denver. On the way, Carter enjoyed his "travel bag"...a gift from our awesome friend, Lindsey. She made one of these bags for each of the kids, packed with tons of fun things to do in the car like coloring books and little games and glow sticks and legos and knitting. I was really touched by how thoughtful she was to do this for each of the kids and they LOVED them. (In fact, they now each repack these bags when we head out for any kind of car trip!)

Carter diligently coloring a page...

The best part of our Colorado leg was getting to meet up with friends and family. One of my oldest and dearest friends and her husband and kiddos met up with us and camped along with us.

And then Joshua's mom and sister and her younger son and daughter came to visit for the day too!

The kids all had a great time playing together for the afternoon.

After a swim, Emilee and Daddy worked on making dinner for everyone...

After dinner was the much anticipated "glow stick hay ride" that the campground puts on each evening and of course the kids had a great time!

First Leg

The first leg of our trip was Boise to Cheyenne, WY. I thought I'd share the view I had over the eventual 1900+ miles of our trip...the back of our trailer. I was always right behind Joshua, who was towing it...it was a LOT of miles looking at those bikes lol.

The nice part about having two vehicles was trading monkeys around. Each one got some one-on-one time with us, and some extra space. I'd say that time with Daddy was probably the highlight, and as you can see, Emilee was quite amused to snag Daddy's hat. Isn't she a GORGEOUS cowgirl?!

We arrived at our campground and all were a bit surprised at the sparse landscape. When we had "camping" in our head for our trip, THIS wasn't what we pictured...but it's Windy Wyoming, what should we expect? Our trailer did look pretty awesome though!

There was a very not-up-to-current-safety-regulations playground that the kids immediately ran over to play on. ALL day in the car meant they had tons of energy.

And there was a mini golf course so we all whacked around some balls until the attendant said we had to go in. A severe storm started to brew and we weren't allowed to stand in an open field holding metal sticks over our heads...go figure!

The HIGHLIGHT of the day for Carter was taking a bath in the "Booga Sized" trailer bathtub.

And just before getting settled into bed, the kids decided to go outside and test the crazy 50mph+ wind that was whipping around our trailer from the storm. They could barely stand up!

Good morning, trailer-style! Thank you, Daddy, for making us amazing cinnamon rolls!

And you can't forget that the pets were all packed into the trailer with us too. Above, with Carter, you can see Trevor's crabs in their travel tank hanging on the dining table. And Emilee's birds chirped non-stop from their perch on the sink.

Signs of Moving

I thought I'd get started with our moving story with a sort of "say it with signs" version. The picture above was one we snapped as we moved TO Idaho.

As we started our moving journey, the first state line we crossed was into Utah. It was sprinkling...just barely sprinkling...but Carter refused to get out of the car and get wet (yes, he's Mr. Personality some days!)

Then we quickly were into Wyoming and we couldn't get to the sign to get a cool picture so this across the road one had to do.

Day 2 brought us into Colorado and it also brought Emilee's adorable conversion to Texan with Daddy's hat (oh and look, Carter joined the picture because "it is sunny now, so I'll come")!

Day 3 had us through Kansas...

And we made a long push and got into Oklahoma!

We spent an extra day in Oklahoma and then completed the last leg into Texas. We don't have a family picture with the Texas sign as the weather was T.E.R.R.I.B.L.E. and it was all we could do to keep our truck, trailer and van on the road safely. But just to make this seem complete, I've borrowed a picture from dear ole Google...

So we're back in Texas.  As the Texan natives have trained us to say..."We're not from Texas, but we got here as fast as we could!" HAHAHAHA!!!

We're Home!!

Oh boy, has it been a BUSY month! I've barely been at my computer to even think of catching everyone up via my blog. So this is a "check in" post, to let everyone know that we are alive and well in Texas. Above is a picture of our beautiful new home that we are settling into and I hope to get to MANY posts updating on the actual move and moving trip and the fun we've already been having here in Texas. We miss Idaho terribly (HI to everyone back in Boise!!) but we are enjoying reconnecting with Texas and Oklahoma friends and we are looking "forward" with positive thoughts! Stay tuned!!!

Trevor turns 12!!!

Yup, we are in the midst of the chaos of moving but one VERY special boy turned 12 years old today so I just had to get a quick blog up to celebrate our favorite middle child. He had a birthday outing with his best friend last weekend to celebrate early and then today he got to go to his last day of school, pick his favorite restaurant for dinner and then have fantastic rainbow cake in our hotel room. We love you, Buddy!! Hope you had a wonderful day!!!

This was a very important picture for me. Each and every birthday we hang this (now) old paper HAPPY BIRTHDAY sign and snap a picture. I saved it weeks ago (when we found out we'd be moving during Trevor's birthday) from the abyss of packing and being lost in a box and hung it in our trailer. So yes ma'am, that's a silly paper sign hanging in the crazy redone trailer we are going to camp our way across the country on the way to our new home...with our WONDERFUL 12 year old sitting underneath it!!

Happy Mother's Day!!

Just wanted to share one of my Mother's Day gifts.  Several special people worked together to create this for me and I *LOVE IT*!!!  It showcases my three beautiful monkeys that I'm so proud of, and it makes me feel pretty darn special that a lot of hard work went into it!  I also have to point out, that the calligraphy was done by Emilee.  At first I just read "Kids" and I thought it looked professionally printed, but then I read the whole thing and Emilee explained that she freehanded it.  (I omitted the top box with our last name, but you'll have to imagine it written in beautiful scrawl.) WOW!  Nice job, girlie!!  I can't wait to get it hung in a place of honor in our new home in Texas next month. 

Even though Joshua had to take off early for work this morning and we missed him, the monkeys and I had a nice day today (and don't worry, Joshua took me out for a very yummy dinner with friends last night).  We went for a bit of retail therapy (read...I had a 30% off from Kohl's burning a hole in my pocket lol and everyone is in need of summer stuff) and then we went to the pool for the afternoon.  Emilee and I sat on the side of the pool and had a very nice chat for a bit as we watched the boys play in the water.  The boys called out lots of "Mom, watch!!" as they did their tricks and jumps and splashes in the pool and it hit me how special that is.  They won't call out to me to watch their every trick for long and it was just an awesome moment to soak in...my very grown up daughter hanging out with me and my two boys happily playing and still thinking I was the most important person they want to see their tricks.  It was a perfect Mother's Day afternoon!!

Happy Mother's Day to all!!!

Emilee Sings!!!

Emilee has been singing to us for YEARS, ever since she was tiny.  Joshua used to say she just might grow up and be the next Brittney Spears (not exactly hoping for that lol, but we'd sure be proud to see her put her singing talents to work somewhere!).  Emilee is in her school choir here in Idaho and I am finally getting around to uploading some of the video I have of her performances.  It takes a looooong time to get these uploaded, so I unfortunately lag way behind on getting these on my blog, but here they are...better late than never!  And HUGE disclaimer...listen to these more than you watch because my camera stinks and my hand isn't steady so they are super shaky at times...SORRY!

(Emilee is always top row, far right)



First is one from October...



These are from her two Christmas shows. One was formal (thus the robes) and the other was for fun for a school assembly. I know two of these are repeats, but I wanted to make sure that you got to see Emilee and that I got both parts of the Elvis solo up.





And this last set are from a district wide performance in March.  The first is their formal performance and the second is a critique by seasoned choir teacher.  I love how she got them moving around a bit and having fun.  Emilee's choir teacher in Oklahoma used to have the kids doing that and it was super entertaining to watch!