I'm hesitant to write a post about this because it seems that everytime I blog, whatever I say in my post becomes the opposite of what I've said! I don't want to jinx all my new found sleep :) but here goes.
       Our house only has 2 bedrooms upstairs. There used to be one for Ty and one for us. Then Stevie was born and that meant he would need to sleep in our room with us. I mean, how do you trust your 21 month old (at the time) to be alone in the same room as your newborn baby? That means Stevie has  been roomin' with us for the past 7.5 months. I knew eventually we would have to move the baby in with Ty, but when? I was afraid Ty might try to share his bottle or try to get in his crib with him and land on top of him or that one of them would cry and wake the other one up. But lately none of us have been sleeping. Our typical night goes as follows: We go to sleep and about an hour later Stevie will wake up to eat, then as I'm falling back asleep Ty will wake up to go potty.  Then Stevie will wake up again a few hours later and then Ty again. Then John will get up for work then both kids wake up an hour later and I feel like I have been up the entire night! I just want ONE good night of sleep!
I had asked Ty a couple of times if we should move Steven in his room and every time I asked he would say no. But I've been realizing lately that it is harder to wake Ty up then to keep him asleep. Apparently he is a heavy sleeper like me! So one day we just switched his room around to fit Stevie and laid Stevie down for a nap. It's much darker in Ty's room so he slept longer than usual. I told Ty that we had moved Stevie in there and he didn't say much. Then he came up to me and said, "I want to go to bed." It was cute but I said, "Sorry bud, we need to let Stevie sleep." He kept asking me if he could go in there. He was so excited that the baby was in his room. It was sweet. So that night I got the baby down for bed then went in a little later to get Ty down and told him we needed to be really quiet so we didn't wake him up. He kept saying, "shhh..be quiet." Then he got in bed and went right to sleep! I thought for sure the first week or two would be a big adjustment with even longer nights but I've never had so much sleep! They've both been napping awesome and sleeping though the night! Last night Steven slept for 12 HOURS. TWELVE. He has never slept more than 6 or 7 and that was on a very lucky night!  This is a miracle. I keep kicking myself for not doing it sooner! It occurred to me today that Stevie probably woke up so much in the night because of me! I've had the worlds worst allergies since march which means I've been super congested and cannot breathe. So at night I've become a super loud snorer! The poor thing, I hadn't thought of that being the reason before. He's probably loving all this sleep. He's been so happy. And Ty loves having  his brother in there with him! He's been such a good listener and been so quiet and he has been sleeping all through the night also. He probably hated being alone in there. I feel bad for all of us that it took so long to make the switch! I feel so blessed this week! I love my babies. I can't wait for them to be able to really play together. Ty will love having a built in buddy! Love you boys!

This week we went to Cherry Hill and Lagoon. We went on this vacation every single year as kids but it'd been a few years since we went last so I was excited to go and I knew Ty would love it! Everyone who asked where we were going had no idea what Cherry Hill was, (its a water park/campground) so I figured when we got there it wouldn't be busy like it used to be but it was super packed! Lots and lots of trailers and people. We came prepared to camp in a tent but when we checked in for the 2 nights it was almost 70 bucks. We were both surprised it was so much for just a patch of grass, so John figured it'd still be cheaper to drive back and forth every morning and night. At first I was like heck no, I'm not driving an hour back and forth every day (twice a day). But it ended up being only 45 min each way, both kids fell asleep for the night 45 seconds into each drive, and I was able to get further into my book. (how do mom's ever finish books?? I get interrupted every 5 minutes) So it ended up working out. We got there on Monday around 4 pm, had dinner and just hung out and then we hooked up a projector and watched Madagascar 2. We drove home and came back then next morning and got an all day splash pass. Ours included all the pools, waterslides, lazy river, mini golf, a maze, little water boats for Ty, and a little jungle gym. It was a really fun day for Ty and it was fun watching him. We had fun, too, but this was our first year that we didn't go for ourselves; we went for our kids. It's an interesting switch! Couldn't do as many things with a baby and toddler as we used to, but it was really good :) I didn't get too many pictures the first half of that day since we were swimming, but after lunch before we went swimming again, we took Ty to the maze and little boats and the jungle gym. He was in control of his own boat so he kept going around in circles. It was so funny, he couldn't straighten it out.

 

 

They had a ball pit so we put Ty in there and he had no clue what was going on and wanted to get out. On his way out, he reached down to grab a ball to take with us.

 

 

(Had to put it back of course)

 

There was a room with little air guns and tons of balls that we went in and tried out, it had amazing AC so it felt good to be in there. There was a black light so we glowed like crazy!

 

 

We went mini golfing and I, of course, lost. But it was super fun. Ty loved it too even though he was pretty bad, like me. :) It was so hot and we were all dripping sweat, so we got back in the water and played. Then later that night we went on the water slides again and again and again. I think that was the best part of the day. Ty loved it every single time and didn't want to stop. He was so happy all day despite not having had a nap the last few days. It was so fun to see him have such a great time! We played another round of golf, but the sun was down so it wasn't as hot when we played. I lost again but it was still fun! We drove home and then back in the morning to Lagoon.

 

Waiting to get in:

 

I was really curious to see how Ty would do on the rides. He absolutely loves big water slides and never wants to get off so I was hoping this would be the same. The first ride he tried was this one:

 

 For some reason he was trying not to smile, it was so funny cause you could tell he was loving it but he was trying to keep a straight face. I didn't know two year olds knew how to do that! Hilarious. He finally cracked a smile and said he liked it and wanted to go on another ride. John wanted to take him on the mini rocket, I thought for sure he would hate it and it would ruin all the other rides for him.

 

He loved it and laughed and even waved! It was cute. We found this little roller coaster called bombora (I think?). It was big enough and fast enough to give me butterflies, it went up and up then down really fast and then all around and he just laughed. His little head was shaking and moving all over because it was so fast but he had this huge smile the whole time. Every time it ended he'd look disappointed and say I wanna go again! We probably went 7-8 times throughout the day. The last few times all the people in front of us put their hands up and waved them around in the air so he put his up too. It was really cute :)

Again it was such a hot day so a couple of hours after lunch we all wanted to go on rattlesnake rapids. For some reason Ty hates getting his clothes wet. He will spill a drop of water on his pants or shirt and say, "It's all wet! I need new shirt." So I knew even though he was hot and needed to get wet he would hate it. And he did. It was almost 5 o clock so way past his bed time anyways so he was already more touchy than usual. But we had his trusty binky so it helped him be happy. Him and Stevie chilled in the stroller while we got some ice cream.

 

that cheered him right up!

Messy messy ice cream in the heat, trying to help him keep it clean:

 

We walked around for a bit and he saw all the balls, then all he wanted was to do was play basket ball:

 

All 4 babies, Stevie, Lincoln, Annie, & Russ (April decided last second on Monday to pack the boys up and come join us! She's super woman! We're so glad you came!)

 

Dad, Mom, and their 8 kids (well almost. We miss you sarah! excited to see you in 6-ish weeks!)

 

 

Love my sweet boys:

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks mom and dad for the fun trip!

 

 

 

We got to go to Lake Powell a couple of weeks ago, I love that place! This year was way better than last year. Last year I was pregnant so I couldn't cliff jump or go tubing or do much else and it wasn't great weather. This year I could do all those things and the weather was awesome! We rode down with John's parents and Mary. We took out one of the backseats so we had the whole back to ourselves. It was pretty nice! Very roomy. My legs were all the way extended most of the ride!

The water was super cold, but it was nice once you got used to it. It was really hot outside for Stevie so he cried a lot on the houseboat, but he loved the freezing water. I was surprised! He let me put him in all the way multiple times and never once cried. He did more of a laughing scream, it was so funny. He also loved taking a ride on the little boat. He cooed the whole time and fell asleep right as we pulled back in. It was cute :)

(look at that smile!)

 

 

 

This picture is pretty blurry, but these were the 4 babies down there this year. (Blake, Stevie, Nora, & Link) They were all so great! Stevie cried the most. :)

 

 

We had such a great view of the lake. Its so amazing down there!

 

Me and my hunny. Love him

 

It was so nice when he'd actually fall asleep, his naps were only 30 min long but every little bit helped him be a little bit happier.

 

This kid seemed to be starving while we were there. I keep waiting for another tooth to pop through! He loved sucking the juice out of my apples.

 

We got kid duty while everyone finished cleaning the house boat. They were all so cute throwing bread to the fish. There were even a few fish that swam up and ate the bread. They all did great waiting in the heat!

 

It's always sad to say goodbye. But I was anxious to see my Ty buddy. We had to leave him behind. We didn't want to lose him in the water or on land! He did have a blast at Shannon's house though, THANKS shan!!You're the best!

 

 

 

 



Until next year!

 

 

We have gone swimming a lot this summer, Ty is really starting to love it. Thank goodness! I don't think I could take both kids alone, what would I do without mary?? She is amazing, she's not only my friend & sister but pretty much my live-in nanny! Thanks for all you do Mare! love you :)

Had to document this one, I got john to come once! :)

 

(his crazy hair is from lake powell :) )

I have been so bad at documenting this summer! Its been pretty fun so far. We went camping at the beginning of June with some of John's fam. It was so fun. We went to a place called Pine Valley. It was about 4 hours away but so worth the drive! Look how beautiful it was:

We were supposed to leave Monday morning, so naturally we waited til sunday night to pack. We went home after dinner and started packing when we got a call from Bobbi & dave wondering if we wanted to leave that night instead and drive to Richfield to surprise Ashley & Tommy. We decided that would be fun so we hurried and got everything together and took off! We spent the night there and drove the rest of the way in the morning.

Right before we headed to pine valley



the babes

As always, Ty was in the sun the whole time. But this time we were more prepared :)

We had so much fun while we were there, I wish I would have written it all down earlier! I'll show our trip in pictures though. Thanks for the invite Bob & Ash! And if you have access to Bobbi's blog, go read hers! She covered all the really awesome/funny moments :)

On our hike to the beautiful lake!



Shading him from the sun

 

 

 It's not camping if you don't get dirty!

 



 

 Playing the newly wed game. So funny!

 

 Tired Ty

 

 

Think we got enough chocolate chips in there John?



Lily and Ty had so much fun playing at the water spigot I didn't realize he was getting sun burned! He got a nice farmers tan but his right ear got a huge blister, it was really sad. He was burning hot and really mellow the whole ride home:

 

Cuties hangin' in the tent

 

 

 

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