Summer Sunshine

One major perk to this apartment living is the easy access to a pool. Brylie would live there if I'd let her. Every morning she asks if we can go swimming today and has turned into quite the mermaid. She swims all over, dives in, and has no problem being thrown into the water. 

Lauryn is perfectly content floating around in her floaties or reading a book by me. 

We all have been enjoying this summer sun...at least we were until the 90s hit this week. :) 

 

Sunday Afternoons

Sundays are the only day we get to spend an entire day with Shawn. It is his day to relax and usually the day I am ready for an outing. To accommodate us both, I was hoping to have a relaxing Sunday drive to see the Atlanta, GA temple. The temple was beautiful, but unfortunately surrounded by a locked gate. After driving 45 minutes to get there, I was a little disappointed to say the least. The girls however are more easily pleased, and were thrilled about the soft thick grass that was at the church next door. So we still were able to see the temple from afar, and do a little relaxing (and rolling) on the grass.

Where in the World is Papa Geno??

 Brylie is always very intrigued with how frequently my dad travels. She wants to know everything about where he is, what it is like there, whether it is day or night where papa is, and of course...when does she get to go with him??  Since that may be a while, I told her we would spend one night each time Grandpa went away learning all about his new destination.

 Our first night was all about CHINA. We broke out the fun facts, colored the Chinese Flag, found out which zodiac sign we were...Brylie, is a dog. Jaycie gave us a presentation on Pandas, we ate Chinese food with chopsticks, and finished the night off watching Kung Fu Panda 2.
So although we didn't get to join grandpa on his China adventure this time, we still had a fabulous time learning about it!

Finding Joy in the Journey...

 

Our 30 hr Road Trip Across The Country

Somehow Shawn managed to convince us all into joining him in a 3 day journey to Georgia where he will be working this Summer. After a LONG process of getting everything ready we headed out on May 9th...with an extra car in tow. ( which may I just mention turned out to be a TERRIBLE idea!..the extra car I mean; not the entire trip.)

 
 Here we are packed up and ready to leave our lovely home in Cedar City, UT
The girls had a great attitude, and were excited to get started on our new adventure.

 

Driving into Arizona the girls were 100% positive we were driving though Radiator Springs. 

(You know the little town from the Disney movie Cars.:) I must admit it did look A LOT like it. The girls were super excited about this, and after a LONG discussion about the town, the characters, & the movie, they decided it must be a sign they needed to watch the show right then.

(So sweet how excited they get about such small things.)

Like any road trip it did not come without a few unexpected delays. We made it just outside Albuquerque, NM before our first small disaster occurred. We ended up having some trouble with the car dolly we were pulling when a pin came loose. This resulted in our family stuck on the side of the freeway in the middle of the night with a broken bumper, and a broken hand for Shawn. :( 

 

This is Lauryn @ 1:30 am, upside down in her carseat while waiting for the tow truck to arrive. 

She does not let anything get her spirits down! Brylie was just thrilled that she was allowed to stay up so late ...Seriously these girlies have such a good outlook on things. 

We weren't able to get away very early the next day due to the fact that Shawn spent the entire morning trying to rebuild the car dolly...one handed I might add, but still made it across the entire state of Texas before stopping in our old summer home of Oklahoma City for the night.

Back on the Road Again...

 

On day 3 we drove through Arkansas & Tennessee then hoped to find a hotel where we could relax and revamp. Even this turned out to be a process...we could not seem to find a decent hotel that had a room available until Mississippi, and once again the car dolly turned out to be a major pain. We got stuck in a parking lot when other vehicles blocked us, and the tongue of the trailer broke completely off. Luckily Shawn used his iphone to find a VERY, VERY nice man that was able to weld it back together the next day, and we safely completely the last 5 hours of our trip.

The kids were AMAZING throughout this entire journey. They kept us laughing the entire time, even when we felt more like swearing. :) They sang Disney songs and Taylor Swift beautifully, colored pictures, watched movies, told jokes and took everything in stride.

 

This little man was also amazing. He slept so good in the car, and when he was awake his awesome big sisters were quick to entertain and give him his binkie when necessary.

 

FINALLY!!!

Saturday- Day4,  we arrived to our new house in the sky.

 Mcdonough, GA 

Despite all of our minor hiccups along the way I genuinely enjoyed our LONG, LONG journey together. The scenery was beautiful, the company was fantastic, and Shawn was forced to listen to everything and anything I wanted to talk about. :)

Baby Linkon

 

One Month Old 

.... and I am in LOVE!!!

 But someone please find the pause button, he is getting way too big!

Easy Peazy

My Delivery Story...

After a long restless night of cleaning, packing, showering, shaving, painting my toes and more cleaning; we were ready to head to the hospital at 3 am Tuesday morning. They got us all settled in and started me on Pitocin around 4. I spent the next few hours tossing and turning while Shawn slept soundly on the cozy sofa couch. At 6 am my new nurse April arrived-LOVED her. She was amazing at her job and we bonded. :) It was so nice to have someone to visit with and pass the time, because let's face it Shawn is not the best company that early in the morning.
I probably dealt with extreme contractions for maybe 10 minutes before she rushed to get me my epidural just after 7, and from that point on it was smooth sailing.
I felt so wonderfully relaxed, I was actually able to enjoy myself for a couple hours while we discussed name options and waited until I was fully dialated and effaced. It was a little after 10 when my nurse decided it was time to call the doctor in, and I pushed a total of 3 times before our little man arrived purple and screaming @ 10:48 am.

Grandma Jo must have left Kanab the second she received Shawn's picture message because she arrived at the hospital exactly 90 minutes later being little Linkon's first visitor.



Of course his big sisters followed shortly after.

Cousins Summer & Londyn were SOOO excited about new the baby and couldn't wait to see him...but since they weren't allowed in our hospital room..they had to take the back way up the gravel hill to the outside window where they got their first peek at the little one.

Other hospital visitors included Grandma Shawna & Lexi, Aunt Jessica & Lisa, and even Jaxon & Terrell stopped by to check him out in the nursery window.

Going Home.