Ward Camp!

From June 13-17 Carlos and I went up to Bellows AB and attended our Ward Camp.  Luke joined us on the last day/night.  We had a fantastic time!!  I wish I had taken more pics, but that's ok.  We spent the first day setting up camp and then went down to the beach for a couple hours before dinner.  I bought us a new tent this year since our old one was just a 3 person tent and that would not fit a pack'n'play plus all our stuff and my air mattress so the upgrade was much needed.  I LOVE our new tent!  We got the Coleman Instant Tent and let me just say that it is by far the coolest tent I've ever seen (or owned for that matter).  It literally took less than 5 min to set up!  So if you are in the market for a new tent I highly recommend it! :)

Anyway here's how our week went:  We would get up at about 6 AM (thanks to it being bright outside by then and that's what would wake up Carlos) and then we would pretty much spend the rest of the day at the beach.  Carlos only took one 2 hour nap on the beach one day and all the other days I was lucky if he took a 30 min nap.  Luckily he at least he slept really well at night.  Carlos went to bed at about 8 PM every night and woke up with the sun at about 6 AM (It was LOADS of fun getting him to sleep in longer than that after that week...but we're back to getting up around 8 AM now which is a much more pleasant time for me than 6 AM). Every night we had a big group dinner and let me tell you, the food was AMAZING!  After dinner we would then have time to prepare kids for bed and then there was a devotional around the campfire.  I usually went to bed right after the devotional because I knew Carlos would show no mercy come 6 AM ha ha.  The second to last night I stayed up a little longer and played some games with a couple people.  I learned a new game called "Pirate Dice" from Pirates of the Caribbean.  It was super fun!  I might have to invest in a game myself :)  The last night we did skits which was fun.  Each auxiliary group had a skit (Relief Society, Primary, YM, YW, Priest Quorum, etc) and they were all so fun to watch and be a part of!  We got rained on really hard that last night though so it put a damper in the Movie Under The Stars for the little kids, but they still tried to watch it every time the rain let up for a few minutes.  Friday was just breaking camp day pretty much.  I'm really glad that I decided to go.  I had so much help with Carlos and I knew that he was having a good time with all the attention he was getting from the older kids.  Everyone just thought I was such a trooper, but I knew that there would be a helping hand just a few feet away so I didn't feel any kind of stress at all which was soo  nice!  Carlos even tried to keep me on my toes by having an eruption in his diaper while he was in his stroller so I got to enjoy cleaning that up and all I could do was laugh.  I'm surprised I didn't freak out to be honest.  And people stepped in and helped me clean his stroller while I cleaned him up.

Going to Camp made me realize just how lucky I am to have been in this Ward.  I will miss every one soo soo much!  It will be so hard to say good-bye to everyone :(  but the time has come for us to move on to a new chapter in our life.  I just hope I continue to get lucky and have another awesome Ward where ever we end up!

Here's some pics from the week.  Enjoy!

me and my belly buddy :)

Today was pretty productive for me. I took the car into the service center this morning and they just need to replace a couple parts to the transmission, but since it's ok to drive I was able to have my car back after lunch. The best part about all this is that it doesn't cost us anything since the transmission is still under warranty :) that made me very happy!

Anyway, this afternoon I spent some good quality time with one of my best friends, Erin and her little girl Maggie. We went to Walmart to pick out fabric for Erin to make me a baby sling (I'm so excited!) and then went back to their house for a couple hrs before I went to run errands. It was nice just spending time with someone instead of sitting at home all alone till Luke gets home from class. She is the friend of mine that is also expecting a baby boy, the only difference is that she is due this coming Sunday and she's pretty much ready to have him any day now :) I'm so excited for her!! I can't wait to meet their little guy! We had her husband take a couple pics of us with our bellies (since she will soon not have her's anymore and I will still have mine for a couple more weeks). Here's a couple of the pics he took of us:

Me and Erin being silly ha ha

Me, Maggie and Erin
Maggie was touching the bellies (which also tickled me ha ha)

Aren't we cute with our baby bellies? I think so :)

Well that's pretty much what went on in my life today. I'm really grateful for good friends and this chance I have at becoming a Mommy with someone else! I can't wait for the playdates we will have with our boys!

Anyway, it's time for dinner so I better go feed my other boy who is playing Xbox at the moment ha ha. The poor guy is in ALS right now (Airman Leadership School) which is a taxing course that SrA (E-4) have to take before they sew on SSgt (E-5). He has long 8+ hr days of class time and then comes home to hrs of homework every night. This makes for a slightly grumpy and oh so hungry husband that I get to welcome home each day ha ha. He's taking a break today for an hr before hitting the books though(hence the Xbox). Anyway, I better go make us some dinner now so ttyl!

~Nicole

Baby Shower!

Today was my baby shower that my friend Jasmine hosted for me. She made enchiladas and taco salad for lunch and brought a white chocolate raspberry cheesecake from Cheesecake Factory for dessert (my FAVORITE kind from there!). The food was amazing, and I don't have to tell you how delicious the cheesecake was :) Here I am enjoying my tasty frozen pomegranate lemonade:We didn't do any games, but just chatted with eachother which was nice too.

Then I opened my gifts! I LOVE star stuff :)And handmade things are pretty sweet too :)
(my friend Erin made me the nursing cover)
I got a ton of diapers (probably a weeks worth though ha ha), diaper bags (for the poopy diapers), some cute cute outfits, bath toys, a stuffed giraffe, a baby monitor, a shopping cart cover, bottles, a bath tub, a crib sheet, butt paste, pacifiers, swaddlers, burp cloths, bibs, nursing pads, a night light that is also a room thermometer, a nursing cover (Erin made it for me!) and some lotion for me :) I love everything I got! It makes me even more excited for the baby to be born! He's such a lucky kid :) Here's me with all the gifts:

Here's some pics of the decorations (didn't get all of them because we cleaned up and I had forgotten to take pics before hand).
Well, I need to go write the Thank You cards now so I will talk to you later.

~Nicole

Happy Birthday Lucas!!

The decorations with some friends too

John and Joy being goofy

Today is Lucas' 25th Birthday!!! We celebrated it last night at a friends house since I have to work today :/, but we definitely had fun! I baked cookies and homemade brownies for his cake. We put waaayy too many trick candles on it and had fun trying to take them off too lol.
We played a really long game of UNO and just sat around talking. All in all it wasn't extravagant, but it was still fun to hang out with friends. I can't wait to play the new Settlers of Catan games I got him!! I love that game! Even if I'm not very good at it lol.

Hope you enjoy the pics and the video (I filmed him this morning..it's pretty funny). Gotta go to work now so talk to you later!

Luke Sleeping on his Birthday