Labor Day Weekend

We had an eventful weekend! First, Don came home with a puppy. Carter LOVES him. Jaxon has a love/hate relationship with him since Jaxon must look like a chew toy to the pup. As most of you may know, Deedee died about a month ago. She was completely fine one evening and the next morning she was lying on the grass stiff as a board. She had vomited blood and we found diarrhea all over the yard. We have no idea what happened. (We're guessing she ate something bad? She ate rabbits, mice, and birds all the time.) I cried. I got teary eyed every time Jaxon would go outside and call for Deedee. It made me so sad. We have had the worst luck with dogs! Hopefully 3x will be the charm. Jax calls this one Deedee all the time too. I named off some names to Carter and he fell in love with Buster and didn't want any other name after that so Buster it is. Welcome to the family, Buster! Buster is a mix of breeds. He'll be a smaller dog which will be perfect for our little house. I'm trying to potty train him right now...it's real fun, but in the end I know it will be worth having a trained dog.

We were able to get dirt dumped in our backyard this weekend too! Don asked me what I wanted for Christmas and we both agreed we wanted a yard! I would like to slap whoever lived here before us thinking it would be a good idea to put gravel around the whole house. When the rainy season hits in the summer the weeds grow if you don't have grass. And grass isn't easy to grow either! We're still smoothing out the dirt and unfortunately we don't have enough dirt to cover the entire yard so we're doing what we can for now. We have to plant winter grass within this month so we're just trying to hurry and get it done! I'm so excited! Especially for the kids. 

We were also able to spend a little time up on Mt. Graham with Don's parents. We spent the night Friday and Saturday. It was sprinkling most of the time, but we still had fun hanging around the campfire and getting dirty. Carter enjoyed the marshmallows the best. 

Squished in the truck on the drive up. Carter insisted on holding Buster. 

Putting up our huge tent. We seriously could fit 2 families in there. One of the best investments we've ever made! Jax helped hammer in the stakes.

We found a fort someone built by our campsite. Jax and Buster were the only ones who could fit in it.  

When Jax needed to sleep we just went for a drive. We drove to Grant Creek Friday afternoon and looked at the waterfall. I'm definitely chubbing up these days, but my boys look cute!

Carol and Gary

Papa and Carter doing a little hike along the waterfall

Funny story: Buster peed on Carter's sleeping bag when we were getting ready for bed. I was so mad! The dog had been outside for most of the day and waited to pee until he was in the tent. I said, "That damn dog!" in disgust and kicked him out of the tent for awhile. Don came in the tent and asked what happened. Carter replied, "That damn dog peed on my bed!" Don and I were trying so hard not to laugh. Of course we proceeded to tell him that damn is a bad word, but I couldn't believe Carter learned his first curse word not from his dad, but from me! Don will never let me live that one down.

I couldn't help it. He's such a boy decorating the tree with his pee.

Carter did all the pushing in the swing. It was awesome! He's a good big brother.

Don's job is to make sure there's a fire from the moment we wake up till we go to bed at night.

Saturday we had our friends the Norton's come up for the day. I didn't get any pictures of them! Their three triplet boys loved getting dirty too. 

This was the aftermath of our mountain trip. Jaxon slept horrible in the tent and poor Carter got cold without his sleeping bag no matter how many blankets he had. Two nights of camping was plenty for us! Even though they were tired they played so well up there. Plus, it's always so nice to be away from civilization and not have a phone or tv!

Here's our beautiful dirt. The boys would have been happy to keep it like this. 

Getting the dirt spread around. Next, we have to string the yard to make sure everything is level, block off it off so grass doesn't spread to the gravel, then plant grass! Whew!

The boys watching the Bobcat. Yes, that's an old washer on our porch. Maybe someday Don will take it to the dump.