Jason's First Campout

This past weekend we had a campout scheduled for the boy scouts (I'm assistant scoutmaster). I was planning on taking Jason with me and Kate got him extra prepared for it by telling him how fun it was going to be. When we showed up at the church on Friday to go the only other person who showed up was another leader. The other leader had already reserved our campsite and asked if I wanted to take Jason anyway. I thought about just doing a campout in the back yard, but I wanted to give Jason an actual camping experience. So I decided to take him. We went to one of the campsites at the base of Mount Timpanogos on the Alpine Loop.

Here is Jason helping set up the tent:

While setting up the tent, Jason pinched the palm of his hand on a tent pole. It ripped his skin and was pretty painful. He was out of commission for about 10 minutes while I finished putting the tent up.

In order to help settle him down, I decided to get the fire going. He was very excited to build a fire and roast marshmallows:

My favorite part of the night was while I was working on the fire. I was crouched down blowing on the flames and Jason walked up behind me, put his arms around my neck and said "I love you Dad". Even though he hurt his hand, he was still having a great time.

In the morning we took a quick hike. The original plan was to hike Stewart Falls, but without the Scouts I decided to take a walk around Bridal Veil Falls.

At the bottom of the falls they have a little pond where you can feed fish. I didn't have any change to buy food, but a nice guy gave Jason a handful of food to throw in.

Even though I had a hard time sleeping, Jason slept  pretty good. He woke up once saying he was cold (he had slowly made his way out of his sleeping bag), so I pushed him back in and he quickly fell back asleep. Overall, we had a great time!

Work Party

Each summer my work puts on a Summer Party. This year didn't originally sound as exciting as previous years, but it turned out to be a hit for Jason. He loved it. I think it ended up being a great party for the whole family. They reserved a pavilion at Sugarhouse Park and then paid a company to cater dinner and provide a bunch of games and activities. They had a bounce house, blow up slides, a blow up obstacle course, rock climbing, and other activities. 

Interestingly, the bounce house was pretty empty most of the night. Jason tried it out at the beginning of the party and I was going to go in with him, but when I asked the teenager monitoring the bounce house if an adult could go in he paused for a little while and then responded "sometimes." We took that to mean that he didn't know and so I played it safe and just let Jason go in. 

They also had snow cones!

Kyle's New Baby

Kyle has a new baby. Actually it is his long-awaited Father's Day present. He got a Mac desktop. Kyle's laptop that he got for high school graduation finally died out on us nine years later, so we needed a new computer. Happy Father's Day, love! You deserve it.

Promotion

Hooray for Kyle. He got promoted at work! Way to go you smart, hardworking, handsome guy. I am so grateful to Kyle for working so hard for us so I can stay home with the boys.

Summer Stuff

We've been able to enjoy one of our favorite summer activities with grandpa: boating! Noah did pretty well. Jason can't get enough of tubing. I chickened out this summer and didn't want to ski in the cold water, but Kyle braved it and got up his first try. Great job, handsome.

We are also the proud new owners of a double stroller. Now we are one of those families with FOUR strollers. Ridiculous? Yes. Necessary? Totally. You need the Snap-n-go, the single umbrella, the double umbrella, and the jogger (although we don't use this last one as much as we should).

Potty-Trained!

Jason is potty trained! We did it the second weekend in July, right after he turned three. I went in with low expectations, and Jason exceeded them. We put him in underwear (Toy Story and Cars themed) and made him sit on the toilet every 30 minutes, and we also let him run naked when we were outside doing yardwork. We also gave him a skittle every time he tried to go potty, and two skittles every time he actually went potty. The first day seemed quite dismal. So day two we upped our strategy to include a star chart. That star chart was magic for him. He pretty much had the potty thing figured out by day three. He was so excited to work towards the toy of his choice: a color changing car. We actually ended up doing three star charts because they were so motivating for him. Night time is still hit and miss, and accidents still happen when he is having too much fun playing, but overall he has done awesome.