We were very lucky to have Christina's Mom & Dad stop through on their way back to South Carolina. We got to see them at the beginning of the month in Nebraska, and they have gone everywhere in a month's time. After NE they went up to the cabin in Montana for a reunion and to work on things. Then they headed to Oregon, then down to Nevada, and a sleepover in Utah, then to Nebraska, and onward! They are amazing drivers, and we have no idea how they can drive straight, but we're glad that they can because we love being able to see them.
We met with Sarah's family, and Renee's family (who are driving back with Mom & Dad) at Taco Bell for some yummy dinner. Then we took everyone out to our "house." (We are just waiting for the written approval to come through, but they are sure taking their sweet time.) It was fun for us to show them our house-to-be, especially at this stage so they can be impressed when they come back after we've worked on it. We hope that they have a very safe drive back! We love you!!

These are 4 of our cute nieces: Morgan, Tori, Annie, Elisabeth

We just got back from an awesome weekend trip with our good friends James & Kelly Barton. We drove to Scofield where James' family has a cabin. It was close to a 3 hour drive, but it was well worth it. Carter did ok during the trip, but he had a first hard night falling asleep. We tried to put him down as usual, but he cried and cried. We finally got him out and tried to snuggle him to sleep, but he just wanted to play. So we let him stay up until past midnight! Crazy, we know, but then he went down pretty quick after that. Unfortunately he didn't stay asleep nearly long enough into the morning.
Anyway, let's not dwell on the lack of sleep, but on the super fun time we had! We enjoyed lots of 4-wheeling. Mike & James took the 4-wheelers all the way to another part of Scofield where there was a private lake that we had access to...legal access that is. ;-) It was super dusty so Mike's semi-white shirt was no longer white. We'll see if it will ever be again.

One of our favorite parts about the trip was shooting all of the guns. There was this shooting target that everyone else could nail, but it took Christina about 2 rounds to get 2 hits. Carter quickly got use to the sound of blasting guns. He was just more interested in the 4 wheelers.
Oh well, it was fun anyway. Christina's favorite part though was shooting the rifles into the lake. It made the coolest noise and explosion in the water. James & Kelly were super nice to humor us and let us use all of their ammo.

Talk about too much food! It is a tradition for James to make tin-foil dinners. Only 3 of us ate them, and as you can see on the portion size we could have fed 3 people per plate.

Of course being over Pioneer weekend, we had to play with fireworks. This video doesn't do the extent of the flame justice, but we think that you'll still be impressed.

We so enjoyed the time away, and we are so thankful for all the Kelly & James do for us.

We've tried our best to get out on a hike at least once a week during the summer. This week we went with Terry on the relatively short hike to Cecret Lake. Yes, that is how it is spelled, but it sounds the same as Secret. Anyway, we couldn't have picked a better time to go. The weather was perfect, not too hot or cold.
The only thing that was kind of annoying were the bugs, especially when we finally got up to the lake. We didn't go much further because it was late, but it made for a great night. Carter of course loved it. He always does really well on hikes. Mostly because he thinks his Dad is the coolest and funniest guy ever!

He especially loved the camel pak.

Carter's 1 year stats

Height - 29 inc = 41%
Weight - 20.9 lbs = 18%

It looks like our little guy is shrinking and getting fatter. We're not surprised that he put on a few pounds with the way he eats. He had to get 4 shots and 1 liquid one, so "needless" to say he was not in a happy mood. That is until he got a yellow sucker. Then life was good again.

Happy 1st Birthday Carter!!!

Wow! We can't even believe that a year has gone by! We wanted to include all of our family and friends on this special day so we sent out a ton of invites for food and fun at a church pavilion. We had a great turn out, despite the weather. When we first arrived it was extremely windy and rainy. Luckily 20 minutes later, after we got the keys to the church, it calmed down so we bustled to get everything set up outside as originally planned. We couldn't have pulled this off without everyone's help, so THANK YOU!! Everyone was so good to bring food and presents for our little boy.

Carter very much enjoyed his birthday lunch. We let him have it with the supervision of Grandma Jenson while we mingled a little bit and just kept things running. We had about 60 family and friends there, and hopefully everyone had a good time.

CAKE!!!

Of course this is the favorite part of every 1st birthday. We got the 2 cakes for everyone else, and we had just a little one for Carter.

As we sang Happy Birthday to him, he looked like he was going to cry since it was so loud and everyone was looking at him. Then he got a taste of the frosting and the stage fright disappeared!

We couldn't get enough of the cake eating pictures, especially since Carter didn't help us by looking at the camera. He was loving his cake way too much. He was just eating the frosting at first so Christina tried to help him get down to the cake. As soon as he saw the spoon that was his new favorite way to eat his cake. Although, it somehow seemed more messy.


Jared had just turned 1 a couple of weeks ago, so we thought that he should join Carter in the fun of eating, especially since his family was traveling and he didn't get to experience eating his own cake. So we stripped them both down to their diapers and let them have at it, but Jared wasn't so keen on the idea. Carter was willing to help him out though, and tried to give him a few bites.

Unfortunately the video of him eating the cake was actually too long to upload on the blog, but here is the aftermath.

Carter was doing just fine in the mess until he was done and wanted us to pick him up. That is when we had to take him and tried to clean him up. There is no easy way for it to happen unless you have a bathtub. We had a gallon of water, a wash cloth, and wipes. After the 10 minutes of screaming he was pretty happy again. :-)

PRESENTS!!!
Everyone was way to nice! Carter got way more presents than ever expected or needed! He was actually pretty cute with opening them and getting excited about what was inside. He got lots of new toys and clothes. We don't know where we'll put them, but we're excited for all the great stuff.

We love how Carter has his own line of clothes. It makes it fun, especially for the Just One Year line. ;-)

This spinning globe was a Walmart find, that Carter picked up on right away. He is always pointing at all the lights so we thought that this would be perfect, even though it says for ages 5 and up.

We were lucky to have Christina's cousin Andrea & Carl come. They have to get on a bus a few hours earlier than the party, so we're grateful that they made the effort to come.





This was a Kid to Kid find! It is a magnetic board with these cool gears that you can hook up in all different ways. Right now it might be a little old for Carter since he just likes to pull them off, but it kept a bunch of kids, and even a couple of adults entertained.

We are so so SO grateful for everyone's help in making the party a success. It was so fabulous to see everyone! Christina's old roomie, Kristen, even joined in the fun. We are just so lucky to have each of you as family and friends. We are also super lucky to be Carter's parents. He is just a joy to everyone he meets, and we're grateful that you could celebrate with us.

His Loot! :-)

After taking a nap we topped off Carter's birthday with a slurpee from 7-11. This will definitely be a birthday tradition, although we'll have to try and get there when they still have free slurpee cups. Either way, it was fun and Carter of course loved them. Happy Birthday sweet boy!!