Mark, Kristen, Reid, and Owen's Life. . .: Before I Backtrack

Monday, October 6, 2014

Before I Backtrack

Before I backtrack and tell you about the end of our summer I wanted to make sure I went ahead and wrote about what we did this past weekend. Mark was gone from 6 Thursday morning until 2 Sunday afternoon on a hunting outing with my grandfather and some other family. This is something he looks forward to every year, and while I am happy he gets to go and I am SSSOOOO grateful he has the opportunity to do something so fun and make memories with family, it is hard for me to have him gone that long. I will be the first to admit I love our weekends and guard them fiercely because having him home is so much more fun for everyone and he is there to help!

However, knowing this was our situation, I made other arrangements so I wouldn't be by myself with both boys for 4 days! We all benefited from this decision let me tell you. I ended up going to Tyler for the weekend to spend sometime with Mark's parents. We all had a blast, the boys love getting doted on by their Nina and Pops! We arrived Friday afternoon and hung out together. The next morning Edith and I headed out to Canton while Gaylon kept both boys all on his own! He is super man I tell ya! He actually said they had a GREAT TIME together. He kept them busy and outside (it was a beautiful crisp Saturday) at a park, petting dogs, throwing rocks in a pond, eating ice cream, you name it! He said by the time he brought them in at 1 o'clock they barely made it through lunch before crashing for a nap. That is success my friend. I am so grateful my boys have such a wonderful Godly man to look up to in their lives. Edith and I got back late that afternoon and were quite impressed.

Sunday was our last morning there and we all went to the zoo. On this particular day if you brought a phone book you received a ticket in for free! Um, yes please!!! So we loaded up some old phone books and hit the road. The boys LOVED LOVED LOVED the zoo. It was another beautiful day and they had the best time looking at each animal. They would roar at the tigers and lions and such, waddle like penguins, chirp like birds! Reid even went into the bird exhibit, where there are hundreds of birds flying around. He had been scared of it, but when I took Owen in, he decided he needed to come test it out for himself. All in all, they had some serious fun. After we ate our lunch outside the park, it was time to head home. Of course no one wanted to leave after such an amazing weekend.