Summer in Estes

Our good family friends have a beautiful home in Estes that they often let my parents and our family use to get away.  It is in a gorgeous location and really is just the nicest place to be.  We're close enough we can walk in to town from the "cabin", but when we're at the cabin, it feels like we're far away from everyone else.  There's a big fishing pond and we're right along a bend in the river.  We feel so blessed to be able to retreat there with our family on occasion.

When Carson was at Cub Scout Day Camp the weekend before, he'd started not feeling well.  On Sunday at sacrament meeting I looked over at him and realized his face was covered in a rash.  We took him home and a high fever set in.  Dave took him to the urgent care in Fort Collins.  You'll never guess the diagnosis...scarlet fever!  It was a long and miserable week.  Carson's antibiotics took much longer than the standard 24 hours to work.  He was definitely not himself for several days.  We put the girls on antibiotics as well, just in case.  It was a last-minute decision, but by Friday everyone was healthy and we were able to go on our planned trip to the cabin.

We went up for a long weekend with Grandpa and Grandma, Riley, Kacie, and Tara.  The kids and I drove up earlier in the day on Friday, and Dave joined us late after work that night (it's a long drive from Denver to Estes, especially on a Friday night).

Emma and I had an appointment Friday afternoon to go horseback riding for a mother/daughter date.  We drove to the ranch and waited for our guides to get the horses saddled up.  I'd envisioned sharing a horse with Emma, but she got her own...and he was big! Emma's horse was Lance, who the guides liked to call LanciePants or Lancelot.  My horse was Johnny Cash.  Emma was a fantastic rider.  As all the horses lined up, she got several horses in front of me, so I wasn't even close enough to help her if she needed it (like I could actually help...I was having a hard enough time controlling my own horse!).  We went up a mountain, stopping by a gum tree where everyone puts the gum you're given at the beginning of the ride on the trunk or branches of a tree.  All the way up, and then we stopped for some pictures.

Emma and LanciePants.

Sheer joy.

Mounted and ready to go. 

And she's off...three horses ahead of me!

Kissing horses.

At the top of the mountain.

Ready to head back down.

I think going down is kind of scary, but Emma handled it beautifully!

When we got done riding, I looked and found gum in Emma's hair!  It must have gotten in her hair as we passed the gum tree!

All the guides (including the first guide, Emma Louise) couldn't believe how well Emma did riding on her own for the first time.  She was calm and collected and had a great time.  I'm so glad we got to go on such a fun date together!

We spent most of our time at the cabin outside in the boat or fishing.  The weather was perfect!

A little rest and relaxation.

Carson caught his first fish!

He didn't want to touch it.  Good thing Uncle Riley was there!

Sitting and watching for fish.

Little fisher woman

Everyone is fishing!

Let's try doing this in the water.

Emma and Uncle Riley, floating in a boat.

Joely loves Tara.

Date night?

Beautiful Emma

Favorite uncle.

Picture a crab and lots of birds and fish singing "Kiss the Girl." :)

Getting ready for our hike.  Apparently we have a couple who aren't happy campers. Or should I say happy hikers...

 We decided that we simply had to go on a hike while we were up in Estes.  Grandma knew of a free hike that was up behind the Stanley Hotel.  It was about 2 miles to a lake.  Tara and Riley left Estes to be home for work and other responsibilities, and Grandpa's back and knees wouldn't hold up, so he drove home while the rest of us went for it.  It was a beautiful hike, but it was hard.  Little legs that aren't used to hiking (including mine...and yes, they're short compared to Dave's) had a hard time and needed lots of stops. 

It's easy to see why they're called the Rocky Mountains.

Sporting Grandpa's hat.

It was a steep incline from the get-go, and those of us with short legs needed lots of rests!

Now she's a happy hiker!

Rock climbing

Snack Time!

Water break.

Loving the view!  We only made it about half way to the lake, but everyone who had hiked all the way up said this view was good enough.

I'll take the mountains any day.

The nearest church to Estes is in Lyons.  It was a long drive, but very interesting to see all the damage the flood did last September.  Everyone was rebuilding, which I think takes a lot of courage.  The devastation in some areas was immense, and in other areas it didn't seem bad at all.  Strange how circumstances can be so different based on a little bit of ground. Church was great.  After we got home, we noticed that Joely had a rash on her stomach.  It was quickly spreading to the rest of her body.  Scary!  We called the nurse hotline and a nurse friend, and everyone agreed that we should give her benadryl and just keep an eye on her.  She seemed happy and unbothered by the rash and didn't exhibit any other symptoms, so that's what we did.  We stopped her antibiotic and the rash diminished quickly.  Thank goodness!

Grandma and Kacie put together a scavenger hunt for the kids after church.

They went all over the cabin and the property finding their clues.

It was a hit!

Hanging out in the "Harry Potter cupboard."

On Sunday evening we walked in to town to see a magic show a street performer was doing.  It was pretty neat, and we were all baffled by his magic!

Monday morning Dave left super-early to get back to work.  The rest of us cleaned and fished and went out on the boat one last time.  

Grandpa caught lots of fish!

Feeding the fish was our favorite...they were awesome to watch as they jumped and flipped around in the water.

Kacie got taken for a nice boat ride by two little oarsmen.

Isn't it picturesque? :)

All weekend long, the kids had been begging to ride on the Rainbow Slide.  So, on our way out of town, we stopped and took two rides down.  It is so much fun!!  At $1 a ride, it adds up quick, though.  Everyone was sad we couldn't go again, but we'll do it again the next time we're up there in the summer.

Racing down the track.

Will it be a three-way tie?

Let's do that again!

Carson clearly has the lead.

What a ride!

We all give it a two-thumbs up!

It was a fantastic weekend!  We can't wait to go back!

"Garage-Sale-ing"

I grew up in a family that loves garage sales.  On nice Saturday mornings, that's just what we did.  Dave has never been a big fan of them.  And since I'm not overly fond of waking up early on a Saturday, we haven't shopped garage sales much in our married life.  But this Saturday, the neighborhood next to ours was having a neighborhood garage sale, and that makes it much more appealing to me.  If I know I can hit a bunch of garage sales without going too far, I'm interested.  We didn't wake up early, but dropped Carson off at Cub Scout Day Camp and then moseyed on over to check out the garage sales.  I happened to have a fair amount of cash on hand and brought it all, which ended up being a good thing.  Dave had a heyday!  :)  For a man who has never cared for them, he had an awful lot of fun shopping!

Golf clubs, a compressor, a vice, a nail gun, and a weed eater...

Dave had golfed for the first time in our married life the Saturday before and realized that his golf clubs (grandpa's hand-me-downs) were too short.  It made for a funny game of golf.  He was thrilled to find a longer set for cheap!

My favorite purchase of the morning was a bike for Joely.  Her little trike just wasn't big enough for her and she couldn't keep up with the big kids at all.  She's thrilled with her new $5 bike!

So, we ended the day poorer than we started it, but I think we had some good finds!

One Year Older

June 9th came again...time for another birthday for me.

Riley and Tara came over to babysit while Dave and I went to dinner at On the Border.  I love Mexican food.  Especially when there's guacamole involved.  And cheese...lots of cheese! Oh yeah, a free birthday bowl of queso to share isn't bad either.  :)

We window shopped for a little bit after dinner (gotta walk off the full feeling) and then we went home to join the kids and Riley and Tara for birthday cake and presents.  The cake was good, the company even better, and it was a great birthday!

Johnstown BBQ Days

The event of the year in Johnstown is BBQ Days, and we'd been hearing all about it since even before we moved in.  The day starts off with the Firemen Pancake Breakfast, and the firemen get everyone up and out of their beds by driving their fire trucks through town with the sirens blaring at 5 in the morning.  We were lucky and the sirens didn't wake any of us up!  We opted out of the breakfast, but the kids and I headed over to the parade route while Dave drove to Fort Collins for a golf tournament hosted by one of his subcontractors.  We are used to parades in Utah, where you have to save your spots early on and the crowds are incredible.  I was pleasantly surprised that we could show up about 20 minutes before the start of the parade and get great parking and good seats right on the curb.  Definitely my kind of crowds!

Waiting for the parade to start.

 The parade was great. There weren't a lot of floats, but tons of vehicles and politicians.  It was the candy and popsicles that were handed out that made it fun! We couldn't even keep up with all the Otter Pops that were handed out.

When the parade was over we followed it down the road until it stopped at the park.  The carnival was going on there, with tons of free activities, booths, and food vendors.  We splurged and tried funnel cake and fried Oreos (YUM!!!), jumped in the bounce houses, watched a duck race, visited with friends, and enjoyed watching others try out the hamster balls and the giant obstacle course.  We thought it was great.

That night, Grandpa and Grandma came and went with all of us to see Nonsense in the North Woods, a hilarious musical put on by our community.  There were tons of members of our ward in the play, and we laughed and laughed.  It was my favorite part of the day.

When the play was over we headed out of the auditorium and watched a great fireworks show.  It was a pretty awesome day and made us understand why everyone was always talking about BBQ Days!  We love our little town and all the people and traditions that make it wonderful.  The only drawback to the day was that someone ran into our van and didn't leave a note or anything, so our van has a big dent in it...

Carson's Baptism

May 31st had arrived...a day we'd been anticipating for eight years.  Aunt Eliza was staying at our house and helped all morning keeping kids entertained, getting food ready, and keeping me sane.  :)  We finally had everything ready to go and headed to Greeley for Carson's baptism.  Plenty of time for lots of pictures before the big event.

A picture with the cake before driving to Greeley.  Carson looks so sharp in his suit!

Three generations of Jon Jex.  Jon Fred, Jon David, and Jon Carson.  Love them.

Carson is our family leader, leading the way into the waters of baptism.

Aunt Eliza flew to Colorado for Carson's baptism.  We're so thankful she came!

We are so, so proud of Carson's choice to be baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Baptism whites.

Like father, like son.

I love you, Carson.  Forever, for always, and no matter what.

We're grateful to be close to Grandpa and Grandma McClure.

We were the last baptism of the day, and Carson was the only child being baptized from our ward, so we got to plan the whole program.  Grandpa McClure spoke about baptism, and Grandpa Jex spoke about the gift of the Holy Ghost.  Joely, Emma, and I sang "When I Am Baptized," which went well despite our not having practiced beforehand.  Joely belted it out and made certain the microphone was aimed right at her, which caused me to giggle a bit, but she and Emma were very cute.

We moved from the chapel into the Relief Society room for the baptism.  Carson had to be dunked twice, but he was officially baptized.  Dad confirmed him a member of the Church.  The font was draining as the confirmation happened, though, and it made a terrible sucking noise.  It made it difficult to hear the blessing, but in the end it all worked out.  Silly, memorable moments to add to one of the most important days of Carson's life.

We gathered outside the stake center for cookies and visited with the good friends and family who had come.  Brother and Sister Neasbitt and Sister Terry (Carson's primary teachers) all came, along with Hailey Hunt (the primary chorister) and her sister Hannah.  Sister Hunt, the Johnsons, Rocknaks, and Child's all came as well.  Brother Nye conducted the meeting.  Combined with all of our family that came, we had a great support group to celebrate Carson's baptism with him.

Brother and Sister Neasbitt

Cookies!

Carson and his buddy Kaden Rocknak.

We drove home for a taco bar to celebrate with all the family.  Sjani and Ryan, Myra and Craig and their kiddos were already there waiting for us.  We ate lots of tacos and taquitos, visited, and then ate some more with an ice cream sundae bar and CTR cake.  It was great fun to have so many of our relatives at our house for the first time and to get to show Grandpa Jex around the house.  The weather was nice so we could spread to the front yard which was good...we didn't all fit inside very well).

Throwing a ball with Grandpa Jex.

Cute Madi.

You scream, I scream, we all scream for ice cream!

Uncle Craig, Aunt Myra and Madi

Aunt Sjani, Uncle Ryan, Atti, and Elli

All in all, the day was everything we'd hoped it would be.  Carson made an incredibly important decision and is now a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  We are proud of him and the path that he is now on.  Way to choose the right, little man!