Thatcher-Reeder Reunion [Day 1 & 2]

It was one of those trips that I think my family will never forget. It was filled with memories of generations of before for future generations to come. I know for one that McK was a changed boy this trip. He went from a drug store cowboy to a real rip roaring Cowboy....(in his mind of course).

Day 1 - June 30th, 2011

To begin our trip, we flew up to Great Falls Montana. I've been to Montana before...It was 14 years ago, before Mark and I were married and we were on our way up to his Grandpa Reeders Funeral. Mark decided to take his turn at driving, so he took over at the wheel. I remember it being late and I didn't feel well I dozed off to sleep. I woke up sometime later to the sound of words that shouldn't be named, bright green reflective signs that listed "Billings" as the upcoming town, and the harsh realization that we had been going the wrong direction for the last 5 hours. I was a bit shocked that my dream guy was directionally challenged. His brothers quickly took over and needless to say he still hasn't lived that one down. Even the Reeder family still joke about it.

Back on track....

We explored Great Falls a bit since we arrived 8 hours before anyone else.

We found a great store call "Big R" so we could buy some cowboy hats for the reunion rodeo. It was such a great place. It was like a Home Depot, Intermountain Farmers, Big 5, and Boot Barn all rolled into one package. I've never seen anything like it. Shot guns and Rifles were out on shelves where you could pick them up and handle them. Not behind counters like everywhere else I've been. It was really refreshing to see a state with more freedoms. We loved that store! We then retreated to a hotel for the night , which the boys thought was pretty cool. It reminded me of an Embassy Suites gone 2.5 star. We weren't complaining a bit but our neighbors in the room next door did. I guess the Thatcher crowd is a little noisy, which I like to blame on Mark but I guess I was raised close to a barn myself.

Day 2 - July 1st, 2011

We set out early Friday to make our drive to Canada. It is estimated 2 hour drive from Great Falls to Cardston. However, it took us nearly 5 hours to get there. Why? Humm....well let's just say that we didn't want to hurt any gas station's feeling by doing a drive by......oh and I guess we were traveling with a lot of lil' ones with small bladders. ;) We arrived at a cabin that we had rented in Mountain Home. It was perfect for a large group like the Thatchers. It had 8 bedrooms and 6 bathrooms and a large family and dining area.

There was the large Reeder reunion that night that we went to. It was a lot of extended family and I felt like I didn't know most of them there, but it was so beautiful there and we got to see the home that Grandma (Smith) Reeder was raised in. The boys had no problem making themselves feel comfortable with the grass so tall and everywhere, they couldn't help but play in it.

Dead Rope Drop

This was fun!! Our trip to Europe was great in many ways, but this one thing is hard to beat. Switzerland is an awesome country! The fact that they let us do things like this makes it one of the best countries in the world!!

This is as close as one could ever come to feeling like Spiderman. That is the reason for me slinging some webs before the drop :).

Where's McK?

It's 11:30 p.m. and I make my rounds of checking on my boys one last time before I crash into bed...and steal a few un-protested kisses. But when I got to checking on McK this is what I found:



"Ohhh..how cute, he's snuggling with Logan." I thought. McK sometimes succumbs to Logan's squawks and will go in and try to help him go to sleep. When I opened Logan's door, this is what I found:



Yes, Logan was awake! He has been been on a weird schedule lately and it's driving me tired! So after I got roped into singing a song and snuggling, I continued my search for McK. I thought maybe he is on the floor in my room. McK frequently tries to sleep in our room by hiding under the covers on the floor or even on the bed. So I checked and found this.



Nothing.....which is really rare since my room is always a mess. After I shake off the surprise of nothing on my floor, I direct my efforts back to McK. At this point I think McK is playing a trick and is hiding or something but at the same time I'm thinking he has got to asleep somewhere. So I decided to check in the last strange place that McK has been known to sleep and so I checked the office where we have Claire's portacrib set up.



Now I'm starting to panic. Where is he? I try to remember where I saw him last in my house. I remembered helping him do a load of laundry (per his request) so he could wash some stuffed animals he won as a prize from school. I left him watching his animals spinning around in our front loader washer. Was he waiting for the load to finish washing? I checked in the laundry room and this is what I found.






I laughed so hard when I saw this. Actually I'm still chuckling as I'm writing this post. He made himself a little nest out of the clean laundry basket (thankfully).  I don't know how he fit in the basket but the only thing hanging out was his head. He looked completely comfy but I thought he might have a kinked neck in the morning, so I had to wake Mark up to carry my 75lb lil' guy to bed. He is one most creative kids I know and I sure do love him and all the love and laughter he brings to our family.

Poop side up!

Naptime, what a challenge.  Logan was supposed to be napping but I heard some banging and some singing and a few shouts.  After ignoring him and hoping he would just go to sleep, I decided to check in on him and this is what I found......



I guess he had decided that if mom wasn't going to pay attention to his so called needs that he would take matters into his own hands....literaly! Independent little guy! He needed his diaper changed and so he did it himself I have say that I just laughed when I walked in on this, and then I was quite impressed. All the dirty baby wipes were organized on the bed poop side up. I love how clever all my boys can be but Logan has quite the knack for watching how things are done and figuring out how to do it himself. For example, we have had to put child protect covers on the door knob of his bedroom so that he will stay in his room for nap-time and bed-time. I'm sure he thought "no, problem", because he figured out how to take the plastic device completely off and get out of his room. He then would quickly tell on himself that he "I boke mom...boken" and pull my hand to have me come see.

Some other crazy things that Logan has figured out.
-how to unlock the car with keys, open the door, put the keys in the ignition and start the car....SCARY!
-pull up a chair, get my purse off the counter, and eat a whole pack of gum in less that 1 minute, which remides me that he did this yesterday and when I changed his diaper this morning, it has a stong minty smell to that almost completly covered the bad smell......I don't think this is a good thing
-Turn on the electric piano and find a tune to dance to.
-get out two sharp knives and scrape them against each other. He must have seen me sharpening my knives before....SUPER SCARY!
-get a screwdriver and twists on the screws of his toys. He thinks he can change the batteries and who needs mom anyway.
-move his fingers to move the mouse on the laptop mouse pad, regular mouse agility skills are already mastered, even with the click

I love how he figures things out, even if it make my mom job harder.

Lukie and Animals, its all in the Genes

Do you see a resemblance?   Grandpa Reeder was always one of my favorite people in the world.  He had the ability to make you feel like a million bucks.  He was as charismatic as anyone I knew.  Grandpa also loved animals and had a way of communicating with them. 

Little Luke has some of those same skills...

Grandpa was an awesome animal trainer and was able to get animals to difficult stunts.  

Grandpa would bring his Horses out every year and teach us how to ride them the right way.   He would try and break us of all our bad habits we learned from riding our horses.   

This is Luke and Mesa in the back yard finding out who is the alpha dog....

Luke and Nacho...  
Bugs are great to! 
He wanted to take the tape off its mouth..

Stew,   Luke talks about Stew every day

This is a rattle snake the we caught over our wall.   Luke wanted to touch it before Dave had it in a Safe hold....

Lukie loves all animals. It does not matter if it is a rattle snake we find behind the backyard wall, a scorpion, alligator, Turtle, 500 different lizards, his pet parakeet, Dogs, Cats, Ducks, all Zoo animals Cyotee, bugs, well I think everything. 

The little guy has such a soft little heart! 

Ducks in the park are not just for lookin... They need to be tamed.


Luke wanted to catch it.. 
Woody... 

Orlando Vacation -Day 3 - Universal Studios

We went to Universal Studios today. It was fun and we did a lot of walking, which is good for Mark and me, but not so much for McK who is in a cast. The rides were fun but we all agreed that Islands of Adventure was more fun. It had more rollercoaster rides where Universal had more 4-D simulator rides.