Our last hoorah before the baby.

As a fun treat for our family, we decided to take a little vacation.  Well, our initial plan was to take a last BIG vacation but due to lack of planning, we settled for a small vacation.  We drove to Oklahoma City to spend a couple of days in a nice hotel and to enjoy some kid-centered fun.  We did some really fun things while we were there.  But of course, the highlight of the trip was the hotel pool.  We treasure our time together and are glad we were able to do it before I get tied down to nursing for hours on end.  :)

My Ashy-man.

She is growing up so fast.

Be still my heart!  I love these boys.

Super-Zaddy!

This may or may not be a dunking attempt. 

Crazy kid had no fear of the pool.

Splashing brothers.

Levi planning his next move.

My goal is to get another Healthier Steps blog this week!  See you then.  -Little Wife

My sister's kids.

After our mother/daughter trip, Jolie and I got to spend a night with my sister Heather (Aunter) and her sweet family.  It was so fun to be able to have time with just the girls.  Well, Uncle George was there but he just took care of us. 

Now I have very special feelings for all of my nieces and nephews.  They are precious and I love them all.  I have gotten a lot of joy out of getting to know them and in watching them grow. 

But there is just something about my sister's kids.  I remember when Ava, the oldest, was born.  I loaded up my 3 kids and drove 3 hours to get to the hospital.  When she finally made her appearance, I was just amazed.  She was beautiful and chubby.  I just couldn't believe that my little sister was a mommy! 

I got to spend a little bit of time with Heather before I had to take my kiddos home.  It was her first baby but she was a natural.  I spent my last few hours there kissing and squeezing and rocking and smelling my new niece.  I admired my sister and the way she took to her daughter.  I knew it was love. 

But when it was time to leave, I felt a bit of panic.  I couldn't understand it.  I wasn't worried about Heather or Ava.  I just didn't want to leave them.  Leaving my niece was like leaving very own flesh and blood.  It was a feeling I had never had before.  And when I finally did leave, I cried for a bit and then kept feeling like I had forgotten something.  

It is still that way for me.  Maybe it's because we don't get to see each other very often.  Or maybe it's because I still feel protective over my sister so I feel protective of them too.  Either way, I love Miss Ava Grace and Miss Liv Marie. (Livie Lou!) 

Jolie and I had a great time with them and can't wait to see them again. Thank you Heather and George for making them such sweet and wonderful girls to be around!   

Silly little girls!

Ava is 5, Jolie is 10 and Liv is 2

Have you ever seen such a sweet face?

We brought the girls a sweet treat from Ruidoso.  Livie Lou was giving it a taste.

This is the big thing to do at Aunter and Uncle George's house.  The jacuzzi tub!


We had a wonderful weekend.  Thanks to our boys at home for letting us go!

Mom and daughter road trip!

Matt and I know that having a large family means that each kid get less of mom and dad's time.  While we make an effort everyday to give moments of special attention, we also have made plans to have "coming of age" trips for each child. 

We want to make each trip a special one-on-one experience with each child.  Our hope is to start with local trips for younger kids and then progress to bigger trips as the kids get older.  We pray these are times where each child gets a chance to be who they are apart from our herd. 

Our first trip was with Jolie.  She turned 10 this year so we did an out of town trip to Ruidoso, NM.  I grew up in Roswell, which is an hour and a half away from there, so I knew a bit about the town.  The drive was about 4 hours to get from the prairie to the mountains.  It was a long drive but it was worth it.

We didn't plan anything special.  All I had on the agenda was spending time with my girl.  That is just what we did.  She got to choose what we did and when we did it.  She had a blast and I treasure that time we got to spend together. 

Being the oldest child is not always easy.  She has a ton of responsibility but is held to a higher standard because of her age and ability.  Then, when she tries to take care of (or boss) her brothers, she gets in trouble.  It's a hard station to be in.  So I pray that all of the time we get to spend with her, whether it be a trip to the grocery store or a trip to the mountains, will reinforce how special she is to us.  I pray the same for our sweet boys. 

Here we are in our lovely hotel room.  I have a little bit of a hard time relaxing in hotel rooms. (I'm just never sure of the cleanliness factor)  Jolie however was so excited and rolled around all over the beds and used every amenity they offered.

She just had to practice her ballet on the beds.

Little monkey.  (Every kid has to do this at least once on a hotel bed!)

The best part of our stay was the pool. 

There were many tricks preformed.

My sweet girl heading back to the room for some cookies and a movie!

Here we are starting our day of shopping and lunch.  It was so fun!

We finished shopping for treats to bring home to our boys and had lunch.  After that we got to visit a museum which was very cool.  Then, we left Ruidoso and went to Roswell to spend the night with my sister Heather and her sweet girls.  I will post more about that later!

El Reunion

July is reunion time for my husband's family.  Everyone loads up all of their camping gear, every bit of food they own, and some sweet talent show skills and heads to the New Mexico high desert.   It is always a fun time spent with our sweet family.  The kids LOVE it!  They just roll around in the dirt and eat cookies whenever they want.  It's a kid's paradise.  The grown ups; my husbands cousins, aunt and uncles, grandparents and some old friends just enjoy being together.  Of course there are pictures!   

Usually, my Jolie is over-run by boys.  Not true with these cousins!  Girls were everywhere and Jolie was content.

Did I mention these were her kind of girls?

These are some of our boys.  They were like wild animals.  They were hard to spot.  When we did, it was even harder to get a picture!

With the exception of occasionally messing up a girl picture.

  People get my husband and his brother confused. This is not my husband.  This is my bro-in-law with my niece Emma. 

This is the heart of the reunion and the family!  We love you Popper and Grandmother!

If Grandmother and Popper are the heart of the reunion, then this is the stomach.  Not sure which is bigger! ( Okay, so the heart must be bigger because the stomach couldn't handle all of that food.  Can you say leftovers?)

This is the Mullins/Stokes compound.  We had a nice cozy spot beneath the trees. 

And my fear of snakes slithering around the campgrounds came true.  Thankfully my husband/hero caught it and thankfully it was just a bull snake.  The kids were so excited!

iPhones on a camping trip?! Hey, can you check my Facebook?

We finally got to meet Ms. Teddie.  (Teddie's mama Rachel is not only family but is also a blogger friend. Cozy Green Cocoon)  Now they have gone East.  We won't get to see them again for awhile so we were all thankful for the chance to hug them!

This was the only time I saw my son all weekend.  He turned Survivor Man on us.  We got him back when it was time to leave but he had a thick coating of dirt all over him and wouldn't let go of the weapon he had fashioned from a stick.

You know how everyone has a crazy uncle?  Well, this is ours and he is glorious!  We all love Uncle Brad.

You know that dirt coating I was talking about?  Here it is in action.  Nice uni brow son.

Matt and his cousin AJ.

He's the handsomest.  Sweet Popper.

We got to celebrate Grandmother's 80th birthday.  It was so special to have everyone together to honor her.  It was a surprise party that really surprised her because her birthday is not until November!

The most beautiful girl in the world!

These littles played into exhaustion everyday.

We have a traditional talent show at every reunion.  The kids put on a great show.  This year, Popper participated with his Magic Hat trick.  Everyone was gathered in anticipation.

It was a great trick!  See the awe, confusion and excitement in their eyes.  Priceless!

My little wolf cubs emerging from the cave.  They slept like rocks and woke bright and early.

It was a gorgeous weekend.  God was merciful and gave us cool weather and beautiful sunsets.  We couldn't have planned it better.  We feel blessed to be a part of a family that has so much love to give.  Everyone had a blast bonding with cousins that live far away or getting to know each other better.  I pray that these moments will be included in some of my kids favorite memories.  I know that they are in mine.

Our thanks to the following sponsors...Our husbands!

In continuing with our weekend's activities, during Friday night's dinner my MIL pulled out a letter from SIL Sara's husband, Brad.  When she read it we found that Brad had planned a little something special for us but that we would not know what it was until the next morning.  We were told to be ready by 9:30am with more instructions to follow.  We, being girls, were very taken with the romance of it all.  It was quite exciting to talk about what it could be and what he had planned.  We went from horseback riding to professional portraits.  We had no idea.

This is us on Saturday morning having no idea. 
Rachelle: Hmmmm, I really hope it involves some type of chocolate.
Sara: Did I eat fondue twice yesterday?
Molly: What is that flashy thing?!
Amanda:  Like totally, what?

As we followed our second set of directions, we were taken to a massage studio!  See how excited the girls are!  (Thanks Brad.)  Now my history with massage is not good.  I have only had it done twice and I was preggo both times.  It's hard to be comfortable when you are preggo.  I will say that this massage has changed my mind about the whole industry.  It was so relaxing that I was afraid I might drool.

After the massage the lady at the front desk handed us a third envelope!  More surprises! 

Brad had purchased cupcakes and coffee for four at this wonderful shop down the street from the massage studio.

This is us before the cupcake coma set in.

Can we have a moment of silence please?

Shhhhhhhh.

SHHHHHHHHHH!

We had to shake it off quickly because IKEA was our next adventure!!!

We had to survey the damage.  It was not pretty.

We are hoping our husbands think this is cute.  We love you husbands!

And while NOBODY will think this is cute, my MIL insisted we get a going away pic of the end of our weekend.  This is reality people.  We still did our paparazzi stance just in case.  If you could see a bit further down, we all had one foot in front of the other to create an elongated line of the leg.  What's that you say?  Our legs are the least of our troubles in that picture?  Well you know what?  We had a wonderful time and we are not about to let a bad picture spoil it!

Here's to us ladies!  And here's to next year!