Lake Powell Recap

So since I had just delivered Carter when my family went to Lake Powell last year, we sadly had to miss the trip. This was the first time in almost 12 years that I didn't go to Lake Powell during the summer and it nearly ripped my heart out!! But this year, with Carter not being a new born any longer (half sad half amazing) we took him with us!! He was a trooper in the car. He watched Mickey Mouse clubhouse, ate snacks, played with toys, even slept for a minute! And it was a great road trip to the place I love most. I thought I'd add a few pictures of my little guy since he looked DARLING 100 percent of the time in his life jacket-although he didn't love it...

Probably Carter's two most favorite things were driving either boat with Grandpa, and playing in the sand. He would just walk around in the sand forever and ever using his little hoe, pushing the trucks, then making a mad dash for the water. He liked the water a LOT which was great and a little worrisome. But we would just stand in the shallow water and let him splash and play around until he'd crawl back up into the sand again. Wet. Sand. yuck. But he was so durn cute I couldn't help but let him do his little boy thing. What a sweetie. Not so much about smiling for the camera yet though...

 Below is featured my AMAZINGLY good looking husband showing us how a real model uses the wind to their advantage.

Carter wearing Grandma's glasses. So cute while they were on his face for .2 seconds.

Haha and so now you meet Carter's little pouty face. He was worried about the swimmers in the water. Whenever I got in he would whine and even cry.

So we put him in the water too. This is his "whusat!?" finger. And yes he does like to say whusat to everything. :)

 This is me with my sister Erin- FINALLY enjoying the sun coming out!! It was actually pretty gloomy and overcast the whole first day we were there, but once the sun came back it was heavenly I say.

The great thing about the speed boat is that it had this weird lulling effect on Carter and he slept every time we went for a ride. Here he is below-our little muslim baby (we always had to keep a cool cloth or towel over him)

Captain Carter of the USS Pa's Conchubine Ship

The husband thinking he is going to OWN on the tubes.

The wife toughing it out- while the husband GETS owned.

To put it simply- I LOVE LAKE POWELL. One of the greatest places on earth. I have so many memories here and will love it til the day I stop kickin!!

Moving

I can't believe how quickly life changes! One minute you are living in Pleasant Grove Utah, near family and your home town-the next you are packing your things and moving across the country? Yes, Nate and little Carter and me are moving to Concord, Massachusetts near the Boston area. Nate being gone as frequently as he is asked his company about us moving to his area. Because my husband is a hard worker and so driven and wonderful- they said "Sure we will relocate you to Boston! What a great idea!" So now, here we are. Talking about selling cars and furniture, driving 3 days across the country, finding new renters for our current apartment, and flights home for Christmas. Call me sentimental, but selling Rhonda the Honda for me is daunting. Rhonda was mine and Nate's first car together. We paid for it all on our own! She drove us to Lubbock, TX to visit Nate's mission. She brought Carter home from the hospital! She has taken us on many road trips and been such a good car! Funny how things can gain personification...but more than Rhonda though I love her dearly, I am really sad to move Carter away from his grandparents and aunts and uncles. It's been so fun watching him with Aunt Roch and Aunt Erin, with Grandpa Newman looking for Max dog, following little cousins Keira, or Maddox and wanted to be such a big boy. I know he loves every single one of them! And so do I. Thankfully, to make our transition a little easier, my sister Karlie and her little family have actually just moved to Concord themselves!! We are even going to be living in the same apartment complex if you can believe it! So neat! We haven't had the chance to live around them for a few years at least so it will be so fun and so exciting still having family close by. Not to mention, Kar has her cute kids Dean and Ainsley (who is Carter's exact age) so cousins will still be close by! So although leaving is so bitter, this change will also be very sweet :) We are SO excited for this new adventure that we are going on!! And we are hitting the road September 25th. Just driving out on the open road!!!

Say hello to our new home!

Nate has already been through Concord, and he knows I am going to love it there. By what he's told me, it's very Stars Hollow/Gilmore-esc. Which is more than up my alley. Small town, a market, lots of bakery's and small shops-they don't have any chain stores really in Concord, except one. Dunkin' donuts-for the coffee. Thankfully there is a awl-mart and a couple other essentials just outside of town. Concord is also very old fashioned, and just being there a couple days my sister Karlie says they are very big into the "go green" movement. No bottled water? We'll deal. Not to mention there are no stop lights in Concord! To save energy, they had them all removed. Can you say "stars hollow town meeting?" (For those of you Gilmore Girl's fans out there this will all be very easy to comprehend) Now since driving is maybe more of an issue without the stop lights- they may put them back in. We will see. All in all, Concord sounds like my one stop shop to paradise. Have a look.

This reminds me of the Avonlea bridge. "I don't want down sunbursts or marble halls- I just want YOU Gil" -Nate and I plan to do a little Anne of Green gables reenacting here..

Concord is very historical, and still has so many darling colonial buildings and sights to be seen. I am truly so excited for our upcoming adventures!! I have no doubt that this experience will be that of a life time. No one I would rather go with than my two boys! Massachusetts better watch it... :)

And Yet Again...

The Newman Everyday consists of work for Nate and me, caring for Carter, hanging out watching movies with take out Chinese or Indian food, love notes, and what seems like will never be enough time with each other. Lately for the past six months it also consists of a lot of "goodbye's and hello's". Nate travels each month to Boston for work 1-2 weeks of the month sometimes. He will be gone a full week, then home for two, then gone another week and so on. Tonight just so happens to be one of the nights that my sweetheart has left again to get on a plane for the night-layover in NYC and then to Boston International. He was so sweet to me, because his plane was supposed to leave at 5:30 today- but in the attempt to buy us more time together, he switched it to the red eye which leaves at 11:40. It did earn us 6 more hours together but also I am assuming it earned my poor husband a crumby night with no sleep and a neck cramp. We got some good time in though and ate a lovely dinner of fettucine alfredo with chicken and broccoli, some baked bread, and then to top it off I made a great big texas sheet cake which we ate hot with some ice cream (divine). But sadly, no amount of sheet cake or chocolate will numb the instant heartache I got as I watched my Nate leave tonight. It's not an overwhelmingly long time to be apart, but it is the consistency that is tough. Saying goodbye yet again, knowing that the stress of the week with work and finding babysitters for Carter is all just beginning all over. I know now that I would never be cut out to be a wife of a Marine or a member of the US army. Long distances don't suit me well, and I am far to emotional of a gal to be able to tolerate life without the one I love for long periods of time. He leaves for a week and from my eyes you would see the world crumbling and empty! So consider this a little note for you Nate. I hate not having you next to me at night stealing all of the covers even though you always say you are hot...and I hate living off of mac n' cheese or cereal because cooking a meal for just myself isn't worth the time or effort without you to sing the praise of my culinary brilliance. And I hate having 20 conversations on the phone each day because we are always having to call each other back or the timing is not good. And I hate locking the door myself at night and knowing that i am the one that has to be strong and grown up. And I hate watching you pack your bag while I sit on the bed and wish I could unpack it and force you to stay. But I love that you are such a hard worker and that you do so much and make sacrifices to provide for your family. Consider this our first love note of your trip. I miss you already.
Here's to another week of late night Gilmore Girls episodes, and hoping that I don't find my cookie sheet empty of its sheet cake in the morning.
Love, me

Carter Is 1 !!

So a year has gone by since my little guy was born and it has gone so fast that I hardly know how it happened! But his big number 1 was a big success. Here are a few photos to remind us how fun it was.

We served fruits, veggies, meatballs, and for dessert- chocolate chip lava cookies with ice cream. YUM.

Nate picked out the "choo choo" birthday cake which was so cute.

Yes, Carter knows how to blow :) He does it  always before he eats anything. So cute. Then the eating begins....

 

And of course he made sure to slap a wad of red gooey frosting in his hair..

UMMMM.....OK. I want to eat this boy. 

I love love LOVE my sweet baby boy!!!!!!!!!!! I can hardly believe how big he is! He is my best little guy. What a sweetheart. HAPPY BIRTHDAY CARTER MOO!!!!! I know you won't remember a thing, but you were darling. Muah!!

Boston Pictures

   So the travel day was pretty rugged, but the rest of the weekend in Boston was truly wonderful! Here are pictures to prove it! Get ready for a million of them! I really love the way Boston looks. The red brick buildings and the colonial feel.

Romantic Fire Escape

These are pictures of Newbury Street. A really long shopping frenzy street with musicians all over the place and high end stores! Stores down those cute stairs and up! Everything you could ever hope for!

This pink little place above looked like it should be my home one day. A "You've got Mail" feel to it that I love!

Me and the man at Boston Commons (the beautiful City park!)

Catching my ride on the subway! This was so fun! I became a pro at the metro system out there with all my spare time while nate was in his Conference!

This restaurant was RIDICULOUS. So amazing, truly the best Italian food we have ever eaten. Nate got lobster ravioli and I ordered a chicken dish that we are going to try somehow to recreate. I could have drank the sauce. I truly have not had better food anywhere else. This was on Hanover street in the North End. They have all these little hole in the wall restaurants (most all are italian) and each one only has like 4-6 tables max! People stand in lines to eat there because it is so delicious.

Here is a place where people truly stand in line though. It's called Mike's Pastry, and the place was SWARMED! The line went all down the streets. They move at lightning pace though so we didn't wait long. This place is known for its cannoli. It truly was fantastic. And they wrap all their pastries in these cute little boxes! Every thing is the size of your head or bigger and we ate cheesecake there that is worth the flight again. WOW.

Cute cobblestone streets!

This is Paul Revere's home! Pretty neat! We were actually there on the anniversary of his big ride I think!

Sunday I went alone to the Museum of Fine Arts. It was SO neat.

If I had a lot of money I would buy this piano for my sister Steph to put in her multi million dollar home she will have one day for being so genius. 

These Greek pottery artifacts made me hope some of the people on them would sing like on Hercules

And all this Egyptian coolness made me think while I was in a museum of Egyptian history that the music to Aida would just start playing and the show would start. It did in my head a few times...

HUGE Painting. I don't know how an artist could manage that!

 
 Rino's place was a restaurant on that show "Diners, Drive In's, and Dive's." Watch the youtube clip and you will die. It looked unreal. So we decided to go before our flight home! You can tell by the look on Nate's face, it wasn't opened in time....heart break.

And this was the good ole rental car that took us this way and that! 

Boston is wonderful! I love it and would love to live there one day!