I am sure you have all been having withdrawls while I've been away. It has been a crazy month. We moved into our new house and we love it. It is so nice to finally have a place that is all ours and we can do what we want to it without worrying what the landlord would say. We have been super busy unpacking, setting up furniture, installing blinds, etc. The last two weeks have been the busiest weeks for Jon at work. He works long days and then comes home and helps with the million things we have to do around the house. Thanks Honey for all your hard work. Luckily things have started to calm down. We just got the internet yesterday, which is another reason I haven't been updating at all. We still don't have TV. We really don't want to get cable, but no size or type of antenna is working to get regular TV. Apparently we are in a completely dead zone. It looks like we will be ordering Dish tomorrow. Now all we need to do is hang all our paintings and pictures, continue unpacking the last few things, reorganize the kitchen, start figuring out all the boxes in the basement, put in sprinklers, put in sod, do some landscaping, and put up a fence. Okay, don't worry we aren't going to do any of the yard until the Spring. :)
Here is a little look into what Shawn's life was like for a few days. Thank goodness for the portable DVD player. Too bad Shawn threw it across the room about a week ago and now no longer works. At least Jon got the DVD player set up to the TV so we can watch movies.
We have done some fun things along with being busy. We go out for dinner with the whole family on conference weekend. We decided to take all the kids to the park while we were up at Grandpas for the dinner outing. Shawn loves playing with all of his cousins. I must say that I grew up by the best mountains in Utah. Sorry to anyone that doesn't agree, but I am right.
We spent some time in the mountains. Jon, Shawn, and I went through Alpine Loop a couple times. It was so amazing. I love fall. Amy and I took the kids up to a little lake to let them run around and throw rocks. We did not plan on them getting in the water, but we let them anyway. Let's just say that I was sitting on the shore wearing long pants, a jacket and shivering. Now that's a good mom.
For Labor Day weekend we flew down to Austin to visit James and Allison. They live in Round Rock about 30 minutes outside of Austin. We had a really fun long weekend. Dad and Robyn went down to Dallas for the weekend and were in Austin with us a couple of the days. We were able to do a lot of things in the few days we were there. Thanks James and Allison for being such great hosts. We had a great time.
Our first views of Austin
The state capitol (largest in the country) On Saturday we went to Sea World. We were afraid it was going to rain on us, but it only sprinkled for about 5 minutes the whole day. There was so much to do and we didn't get to it all. It was a very fun day.
This is where you can feed the dolphins
Shawn loved being so close to the fish
Sharks
more fish
There is a big water park that is part of Sea World. It had lots of rides, play areas for the kids, lazy river, wave pool, etc. This was the highlight of the day for Shawn. He just loves swimming.
We hiked up to the top of this "mountain". James told us it was 99 stairs, but was actually 103 stairs. I was not planning on the extra 4 steps. It was a very quick and fun hike to see the views.
The boys made it. Congratulations!
You can barely see downtown Austin in the background
The gang at the top. Robyn was taking the picture
View of the neighborhood along the river
You are all welcome to come visit us when we live in this house or this one....
or this one. We haven't decided on one just yet.
After the hike we went downtown to see the bats. You may ask, why would you want to go see bats. That is what I said at first. Under this bridge there lives somewhere between 1-3 MILLION bats. They all come out right after sunset every night. We didn't get any great photos of the bats, but it was pretty cool.
This is simply to show you the crowds on the bridge not to show you our beautiful faces.
Jon and I thought this building was really cool until James said they call it the noseclipper. Thanks for ruining it.
Downtown Austin
Grandpa, Shawn, Uncle James
All the boats waiting to see the bats
The round rock that Round Rock is named after. This was a very exciting detour. Thank you James and Allison for taking us here.
For Labor Day we drove down to San Antonio. We first visited the Alamo and went for a little tour of that. Then we went down to a place called the River Walk. It is a river in the middle of the city with restaurants, hotels, and shops lining it. It was very beautiful and lot of fun. We ate lunch right along the river after the boat tour.
The Alamo
Shawn enjoyed the grass the most at the Alamo
James wore his belt buckle for the occasion There were lots of water features around San Antonio
James and Allison on River Walk boat tour
Jon and I on the tourAnother water feature
This building looked like it was a freestanding wall
Sporting the animal hats Grandma West gave him James and Shawn in Mr. Potatoe head glasses (James kept them on for about 40 minutes) When we went out to lunch Shawn and James kept dancing to the music at the restaurant. I missed their best moves. Every time Shawn would stop James would insist "Shawn dance....Shawn dance!)
or this one....
Another water feature
