A Family Affair

 

This last weekend was general conference for the LDS church which meant no one had to go to church to fulfill church callings and instead were free to travel.  Both of my parents had the weekend off work and were willing to take time out to come to Utah and help prepare for the arrival of our little boy by painting his room.  Since my parents were coming we also decided it would be a great idea to have BJ, Rudy, Jamie, and Jonathan come up so that we could all meet the new addition to the Norton family. The plan turned out perfect and Cass and I were lucky enough to spend the whole weekend with my family.  Up above is my dad meeting his grandson for the very first time in the hotel parking lot.  Aren't they cute :)

Below are pictures of the manual labor that was required for people who came to visit. I don't know if you can tell from the pictures, but the entire room was a terrible mauve pink color.  I mean the entire room, walls ceiling, base boards and trim, everything was pink.  It is now a tan brown with white trim.  Much more nuteral and appropriate for a little boy we think.

 

This is all I was allowed to do before I was ushered out of the room and scolded for exposing myself and the baby to paint fumes.

Thanks for all of your help boys.  Sorry we didn't get a picture of you Rudy, but thanks also.

While paint was drying we had a picnic on the deck.  Also on Sunday in between session we enjoyed some exciting rounds of ladder golf, but those pictures didn't up load and I am frustrated with blogger right now so I will not be trying it again, but believe me the games were pretty intense. We were so lucky to have amazing weather for the first weekend of October.

Me and my adorable nephew!

 

Jonathan was pretty much the center of the weekend so get ready for a lot pictures of this tiny baby boy

With uncle BJ.

 

And uncle Cassidy.

 

Rudy's sister and her husband live in Provo so they were also able to spend a lot of the weekend at our house getting to meet their new nephew.  Here is is Rudy's sister Mara with Jonathan.  On Sunday afternoon we had 10 adults and a baby in our two bedroom apartment to watch conference.  It is a good thing we are all family and have to like each other because it was pretty tight quarters.

Good work Jamie and Rudy he is so stinkin' cute!

An Adventure 25 Years in the Making

 Last weekend was Cassidy's birthday, the big 25!  To celebrate we went camping in Marysvale, UT with his parents and 3 other older couples.  We were by far the youngest people there, but we had a pretty good time full of unexpected adventures.  We had two full days of four wheeling and the first day started out beautiful like this (don't pay attention to my hippie outfit sometimes in four wheeling necessity out weighs fashion).

When we stopped for lunch the sky changed to look like this and we quickly began to realize how unprepared for rain we were.  We were able to borrow a poncho from Cassidy's aunt and uncle and Cass had a make do one out of a garbage bag. 

 

Ready to ride :)  It got so cold and started to hail at one point.  The last 25 miles back to camp were definitely an adventure between the sun coming out and then more rain. 

 

Here is a view of the road after the hail storm.

These are Cassidy's parents.  Lucky ducks had a roof for when it started to rain.

 Friday was Cassidy's birthday and we started the day with presents in the trailer.  He got a new BYU shirt to wear to the game that he also got a ticket for next month.  Look at the excitement on his face :)

Cash is always nice

And from his wife a pair of strippers :)

After the crazy storm we went to the local restaurant Hoovers to get ice cream.  Instead we ended up at a table with cobbler.  We had eaten dinner there the night before and I think the waitress was pretty surprised to see us back again. 

The birthday boy with delicious cobbler and free birthday cake ice cream.

This is just a funny sign we passed on the way to the restaurant. 

 Saturday morning we headed out in search of mountain goats.  This meant we had to head to the mountains and it was another cold day.  I guess I should have expected that at 12000 feet, but is was still a surprise.  Here is a fun couple Ernie and Shirlene that we spent the weekend with.

 Although we didn't see much wildlife we did see a couple of golden eagles and a few deer along with a lot of cows and sheep.

 On the way down from the unsuccessful trip for goats we stopped at an abandoned mine town.  It was a pretty cool place to look around.

 

That night we had shared potluck dinner with everyone and Cass the spoiled boy got to celebrate his birthday for another day with Strawberry rhubarb pie.

 Just when we thought the adventure was over we got a flat tire on the trailer on the way home.  By the time we noticed it was flat this was all that was left of tire.    

Making the Most of the End of Summer

 

Since Labor Day is supposed to be the end of summer we have tried to fit in as much as possible before the holiday.  Last weekend we went to our Annual August Bees game to commemorate our first date.  We were lucky enough to have our friends Kyle and Megan come with us this year.  Unfortunately we have not been fortunate to see the Bees win yet, maybe next year.  At least there was good company and fireworks after the game :)

 Thanks Kyle for taking all of the pictures at the game.  This was my favorite self portrait.

 

This weekend we spent Saturday night with Karen and Ben at the Timpanogos Story Telling Festival.  While this sounds like a very old people thing to do it is actually a ton of fun.  There were 7 story tellers that told hilarious stories.  It is more like a comedy club than a story telling festival.  Thanks Karen and Ben for turning us on to it last year.     

 The picture above is waiting for the show to start and the one below is of the stage and to try and give some idea of how many people were there.  We showed up 40 minutes early and still had to sit at the top of the hill behind some people with chairs because the only other open grass was behind the stage.

 

And what Labor Day weekend would be complete without a little camping?  We spent this Sunday night up at Miller's Flatt with Cassidy's parents four wheeling and hanging out with his aunt and uncle.  Although it was a short trip we had a good time on the four wheeler and saw a lot of cool things.  The first night there were tons of deer out and on Labor Day we were able to get pretty close to this hawk.  We also took an early morning trip out to Cleavland Lake just to enjoy the peace and quiet of being in the outdoors.  We hope you all had a great holiday weekend as well. 

Ballet or Baseballl???

 

So we finally had our twenty week ultrasound and got to see our baby.  It was so exciting to see how much it has changed in the last twelve weeks and how amazing that it looks just like a tiny person even though it is only 6 inches long and weighing in at about 1 pound.  The baby is perfectly healthy and we got to see the heart, brain, kidneys, and bladder.  I tried not to post too many pictures because I am sure nobody cares as much as we do, but here are some shots of the little ones profile, spine, and feet.  If you are really interested in seeing more of the baby come on over we have a DVD of the whole ultrasound :) 

 And just in case you are wondering this last picture is exactly what you might be thinking his little boy part.  Thank goodness he was not shy today because I never would have made it another day to know what the gender was.  We are so excited to welcome a little boy in a few months and hope that he and Jamie's baby will be best friends!

Lets Get Married

 

In the last couple of weeks we have been to two weddings or receptions.  August was a busy month to get married.  The first wedding was in Idaho Falls for my cousin Blake and his new wife Miranda.  I love this picture because my three year old cousin took it and she is the only one who can get Cass to do this cheesy grin :)

 The second wedding was for a friend that Cassidy grew up with, Andrew and his new wife Kimmy.  Their reception was so fun because it was at the BYU Paleontology Museum.  The met on a dinosaur dig in Moab Utah so it was very appropriate.  

 The same day as Andrew and Kimmy's reception we went out on the boat with Cassidy's family. 

 This was the biggest feat of the day getting 6 year old Treygann up on the wakeboard with his dad.  They saw a picture of this on TV and wanted to try it.  After a few failed attempts and a couple of tears on Treygann's part he made it up and actually had a good time.  When I told him he learned faster than I did he replied "That's because girls aren't as good as boys."  What a character :)