Ritchie Family Reunion 2010

June 17-19 was the Ritchie reunion. All my mom's brothers and sisters were there and we had a great time.

We had several activities planned.

Here we are at Harris Pond.

One thing we do each year is hold an auction to raise money for the following year's reunion. We got this snake for Cole made out of a tie.

Cousins having fun on the train.

Back at Uncle Neil's house, Brady is riding a tri-cycle.

Glen, Brady & Scott

Taking a walk.

Cole shooting off his bottle rocket.

Enjoying the trampoline.

Our Busy Day

On Saturday, we went to Twin Falls to get a few things and then had lunch in the canyon. It was a lot of fun and I can't believe I have never gone to the bottom of the canyon much before. The kids liked it and I plan on going back more often. I didn't get any pictures of that. Later in the day, Brock asked if we would like to go four wheeling so we did. We went to Oakley and started out from the town with Cole riding with Brock on one four wheeler and me, Jason and Brady on another.

We drove all the way to the top of the mountain almost to Bostetter where there are camp sites. It was a lot of fun. Both boys fell asleep on the way back on the four wheelers.

We saw a lot of cows and Brady was really excited. Cole and Brock even drove right through some cows.

Walking

This morning Cole & Brady were in the living room & I was in the kitchen & Cole said, "Brady's walking." I looked over but just saw him standing there. I waited but nothing happened so I thought sure, we'll see. A little later, Cole said it again & sure enough, he was right. Brady took his first steps today! Thanks Cole, you are a great big brother & you are always looking out for your little brother.

He has been walking around with his step n ride a lot lately, but he hasn't wanted to walk.

I got better footage on video.

It's pretty hard to tell he is actually walking with these pictures.

He took 5 steps at the most today. We'll see how far he goes in the days to come.
He turned 14 months today & today is also Grandma Joyce's birthday!
We are so excited that our little guy is walking. Just in time for summer!

4 Already!

Cole is 4! Wow, he sure has changed a lot over the past year and he is so smart. Here's a look at his awesome day...

He got $4 for turning 4 from Gm & Gp Page, Jess, & Jordan as wells as color changing markers & a coloring book.

He wanted a white cake with chocolate frosting and he really wanted it to be orange thus the orange writing. This color worked out perfect since we had a Diego theme this year.

Exactly what he wanted, play-doh from Angie & her girls!

Washable aka kid markers from Gm Ann!

And much more including a card and $ to buy a present from Gm & Gp Petty. Thanks everyone for making Cole's birthday so special!

What We've Been Up To

This past month has kept us busy, here is a recap of the recent events:

Grandma & Grandpa Petty came to visit the last weekend in March.

The boys & I took a trip to IF on March 31st & visited Tosha and her girls & also saw Christa's family on our way back. We had a great day.

The kids playing Xbox a couple days later.

Easter morning...

At first glance, Brady sees an Easter egg, or as he calls it, a ball.

What is this?

I think I'll just dump it out all over the floor! He loves to do this with everything. Totally the opposite of his older brother.

April 14th Cole just hopped off the coach to go behind our massage chair, or to his "cave", & his face hit the wall & the cord to the chair leaving him with a 1" scratch. We took him to Dr. Grandpa because I was sure he needed stitches because of all the blood. Luckily no stitches were needed, but he did have it glued together & had to wear this band-aid. Turns out he had a reaction to the band-aid and broke out with a nasty rash a few days later. Now the rash is clearing up and hopefully he will not have a scar! Let's hope not.

My little angel having fun with the newspapers!

Happy 1st Birthday Brady!

I can't believe my baby is one! This last year has flown by. We are so blessed to have Brady as part of our family. He has 7 teeth, says ball, mama & dada, and crawls everywhere. The theme for his party was a sports theme. This was perfect because he loves to play with any kind of ball.

We had a lot of family and friends over...

we all fit in our apartment, luckily.

Cole sure enjoyed playing with his cousins.

The cake turned out wonderful and we had enough for everyone.

Brady had fun with his cake but wanted the frosting off after playing for a while.

He received many fun new toys.

His cousins were very helpful bringing him the presents and helping to open them.

Thanks to all who came and shared this very special day with our sweet baby boy. We love you Brady!

Walgreens Trip

We just started receiving multiple Sunday papers this last month and have been putting our coupons to good use. I will admit it is a lot of hard work from looking for the great sales to having success with a cashier who knows how the coupons should work. Luckily, I have been getting great advice on how to juggle everything with the help of some wonderful coupon blogs. These sites are amazing and they give you links for internet coupons that can be used right away with a store's weekly ad. They also tell you what newspaper coupons to use and how to use them.

Today I went to Walgreens where their Purex laundry detergent was buy 1 get 1 free. I had 4 coupons for buy 1 get 1 free. So, I was able to get all 8 for free! I bought dish soap for $.89. I didn't think I could really get all of these for free, but it worked. This is what I look for, things that my family uses everyday at a great price. I have a great stockpile started for many things already.