Brit's wedding

One of my best friends, and former roommate for 4+ years, got married last weekend! She pretty suddenly moved back to Eastern Washington (she grew up in the Tri-Cities) last year and we were pretty sad to see her go. But, it looks like things worked out pretty well for her and we're just so happy about that!

As soon as she told us she was engaged we started planning a road trip up to Kennewick to be there for the wedding. Justin is so awesome and encouraged me to go from the beginning. I love that about him. Friends are very important to him and he makes sure he is there for any big events. He even makes a concerted effort to keep in touch with friends that live far away ♥

I offered to take Bran-man with me to make things a little easier for him. Luckily for me, my friends are also awesome and didn't mind bringing Branson along at all ☺ They really are the best!!

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I missed my two other boys about 2 seconds after we got on the road so I had to send a text to let them know I was thinking about them. 

I didn't mind starting at this cute face for a 10 hour drive. Branson was seriously SO good!! We didn't really have to stop any extra times for him and he didn't even cry that much. For a 10 hour drive. Man I'm a lucky momma ♥

Lots of Hamilton and listening to Pride and Prejudice got us through the long drive ☺

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Branson's sleeping quarters at the hotel.

Gotta sprinkle the binky's around ☺

They held the wedding at their friends house, the Egberts.

♥ Brit and Fred ♥

So beautiful and so happy!

Me, Lis, Brit, Sara, and Sue -- Besties! 

(Not sure why this pic is so grainy, oh well)

Brit's dad is the best and just loves babies! In fact, when Nolan was about the same age we all went down to St. George and stayed with them. He and Johnna so kindly babysat Nolan so we could go play pickleball. Of course this time he had to hold Branson too!

Opening presents

Branson always has fun exploring new places.

We stayed at a Marriott right on the Columbia River! One night we took a nice walk along the boardwalk.

Branson was amazing on the long drive home as well, only getting antsy the last hour. It was definitely stressful because he literally cried the whole last hour. Poor guy just wanted to get out of that car! I mean, so did we so I get it. But he was just so incredibly good the whole rest of the time that I couldn't really complain.

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Justin sent me some pics of the fun times they were having with Grandma and Grandpa Bailey.

At dinner.

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The lighting was so perfect in the morning at the hotel, and Branson was so adorable, that we just had to have an impromptu photo shoot ♥

Stopping for a bite to eat in Idaho on the way home.

Car pals! Branson, Sara, and Sue.

Branson and I were so excited to see daddy and Nolan...but...they weren't home when we got back! :( They were still coming back from Gm and Gp Bailey's house. Worth the wait though because B and I met daddy and Nolan outside in the parking lot and there were smiles all around. Branson non-stop smiled when he saw daddy and Nolan AND Nolan gave Branson a big hug. Adorable and perfect moment ♥

Independence Day 2017

Our plan this year was to spend Independence Day at my grandparents cabin. But on June 17 some dummy using a weed torch in dry conditions started a massive fire :(. As of the end of June neared it still was less than 20% contained, even with firefighters working around the clock, so we pretty much wrote off plans to go and, as the fire got closer to Mammoth Creek, wondered if we'd even have a cabin to go to at all! :(

Luckily the fire never got too close and I even had some family go up there a few days before the 4th, but we ended up rescheduling anyway. The fire ended up burning around 70,000 acres! So sad.

This is the church we go to in Panguitch.

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So with our regular plans cancelled we enjoyed a low key weekend and then decided to spend Monday and Tuesday with Gm and Gp Bailey. Sunday night we headed down to Highland to spend the night.

 Nolan slept in our room and Branson in the next room over. Poor Nolan woke up a little confused the next morning. He got up and ran towards the door until I called his name from the bed. He looked a little startled, turned around, and gave us a relieved smile as if to say, "oh, there you are!" It was pretty sweet.

Nolan excited to wake up at Gm and Gp's house!

He loves this big ball!

Monday morning Justin, Doug, and I went golfing at Cedar Hills. It was sure nice and made me want to golf more! Gee, do you think we're Cougar fans??

Nolan helping grandma water the plants.

Later that day we drove south to check out the Provo Rec Center and it did not disappoint! First of all, it was cheap (only $4 per person), it had a ton of stuff to do (both a huge indoor pool area AND an outdoor pool area) and, most exciting to me, Nolan really conquered some of his fears! (Although you wouldn't know they were fears by the way he acted).

Backstory: Nolan doesn't really like tube slides -- not at the park and definitely not at the pool. There is a small, straight tube slide at the Holladay Rec Center where we have swim class that he's gone down a few times, but usually because we've kind of forced him or gone with him. And he hasn't even gone down that one in months!

So when I took Nolan to the kiddy area of the Provo Rec Center and watched him walk up the stairs I had absolutely not thought that he would go down the slides at.all. I figured he'd walk up, check it out, then walk back down. Nope! He walked up the stairs, right up to the blue tube slide, and slid down without the slightest hesitation! I seriously still don't get it. Not only was this slide new, it was very dark inside, you couldn't see the end of the slide, and there was a lot of rushing water (kind of deep too). I ran over to the other side of the play structure so I could catch him at the bottom, totally convinced that he wouldn't want to do it again. But when I grabbed him from the water he was all smiles and said, "I want to go down again!!" I told him I was so proud of him (I probably said that 100 times that day) and excitedly pointed out the other slides to him. You couldn't wipe the smile off his face! It made me so so happy ☺

He alternated between the blue slide and the green slide and the red slide for the next hour at least and loved every single minute of it.

Now, if it wasn't exciting enough that Nolan was having so much fun going down the tube slides at the kiddy area, I was floored when Justin asked him if he wanted to go down the BIG slides outside, and he did! They went down the orange one ☺

I was worried about so many things (I'm a mom, I know) - would Justin be able to keep his head out of the water at the bottom? Would he be nervous going up the big stairs? The dark tube?

No need to worry mama! Justin said Nolan was smiling the whole time they were in line on the stairs and kept asking him if they could go up one more step.

It's kind of annoying, but they made him take off his goggles which was probably the only thing he didn't like, but not too bad. He liked it!

Branson was excited when it was finally his turn to get in the water. He LOVED splashing around!!

Anyway, I'm just so excited for Nolan. That day changed so much for him! He's so much better at holding his breath under water or when water comes up in his face, he's no longer scared of tube slides (he's done down the Holladay one about a million times now), and he loves his swimming goggles (we got him prescription ones).

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Photoshoot with Branson ::swoon::

By the way, as soon as I gave Branson this football, Nolan came up and snatched it away #bigbrotherproblems.

Getting in some extra sleep and snuggles with daddy.

On Tuesday we went to the park. I was holding Nolan's hand and said to him, "I'm so happy to be your mom." To which he replied, "I'm happy you're my mom." Awwwww ♥ It's hard sometimes, but I love these boys more than they will ever know!!