Heading to Salt Lake City

Collin spent a lot of time while we packed watching "his shows". They are a couple Baby Einstein's. He LOVES them.







My parents flew down to Phoenix to help us move back to Utah. They came down a couple days early. Wednesday we took it easy by hanging out at the apartment and then eating at one of our favorite restaurants, Oreganos.















Grandma let Collin try the lemon in her water. He seemed to like, then came the face!

The funniest thing was, he wanted more!





We had a lot of fun hanging out with Grandpa and Grandma before making the long, hot, stressful drive up north!

Yummy!

These cupcakes are SO good, they require their own post. The first time we got these divine cakes was at the suggestion of Greg's sister Beckie. We were making a trip to Scottsdale, and she told us that there are two places she always goes when visiting Scottsdale, the Goodwill and Sprinkles Cupcake Bakery. We attempted the Goodwill, but Collin was done with the trip by the time we were ready to get Sprinkles. We made a separate trip to get them. I researched the bakery online before we went and found out that one cupcake cost $~@!*. I wasn't sure that a cupcake could be worth that. I wanted to try them though, so I didn't tell Greg the price til we were nearly at the bakery. Then with both of us skeptical, we entered the bakery. It was late, so there weren't many choices left. Greg got one of the best sellers, the Black and White, and I wanted something more fruity and decided to try Orange. We sat down outside the bakery with our expensive cupcakes and wooden forks. After the first bite, the look we exchanged said it all. We were in love with these cupcakes! We had to remember to save them for special occasions, or at least only once a month. Then as we came closer to our move date, we wanted to savor them and got them a few extra times. Which is probably why we're moving back to Utah with a couple extra pounds.
All I can say is Yummy!

FOOTBALL!!!

YAY!
Go team!
(Put in Max Hall...)











Before we left Arizona we HAD to go to a Cardinals game. It just gave us more motivation when we found out that Max Hall, former BYU quarterback, was attempting to make the team. We bought tickets online for pretty cheap and were really excited. It was a long drive, and we didn't have a parking pass (the parking attendant was nice and let us park anyway, mostly cause he couldn't get us out of the lot once we were in...) but we did it!
Collin enjoyed it. It was loud, but he cheered right along with the rest of the fans. As you can see our seats weren't great. We were right behind the stairs and people kept walking up and down, up and down, up and down. But Collin kept us busy and football has lots of breaks, so we didn't feel like we missed a ton. (If you ask Greg though...)

Overall, it was an awesome experience. We both LOVE, LOVE, LOVE football and we're hoping to pass this love onto our little ones.

Monsoon Season

I'd heard so much about the monsoon storms in Arizona. I mean there are grates on the sides of the freeway for getting rid of water. But it was so hot and dry down there I didn't believe it until I saw it. And this storm was a WEAK one! It was amazing.















Our little buddy is 8 months! It's gone so fast! He's crawling like a pro, and almost at the same time he began cruising. He can pull himself up on nearly everything in our apt and then he will walk along the furniture. He hasn't attempted walking without furniture though. He's even hesitant to walk just holding our fingers, but I'm sure that will change soon!

Nap Time?

So Collin was having trouble napping. We decided to try a little "cry it out". We put him in his crib, and left him for five minutes. When we turned the corner in the hall this is what we saw. Couldn't help but grab the camera to document how much our buddy didn't want to nap, but play with us!

Lake Powell with an infant is not recommended.

I have found a kink in one of my all-time favorite vacations: going with an infant.

Greg and I were pretty confident that it really wouldn't be that bad. A couple years back a couple of friends brought their infant for nearly the whole week and they seemed to do fine. We were slightly worried because that infant was the only one on the trip and Collin would be one of 4 young kids (the oldest being 4). But we were only going for 2 and 1/2 days, and Collin is a really good baby!

Lets just say, it wasn't the fun, relaxing vacation I remember. We had lots of willing helpers with my family there. My mom even crawled in a cramped bunk with Collin to try and put him down for a nap. There was just too much going on for Collin to get a good nap, and that made the night time sleeping rough. Also, I'm a worrier. As Collin, and the rest of the boat slept, I lay awake thinking "Is he too hot?" "Is he too cold?" "Did he eat enough to sleep through the night?" "Can I get to him before he wakes up everyone else?" I just couldn't relax. We'd planned to stay til Saturday, but had to leave Friday evening because we were just too frustrated.

Honestly, it could have been much worse. I think that we were just so used to being able to control our environment, and on a boat with 17 other people we just had NO control. And that was very stressful for both of us.

I still LOVE the vacation, but I will never do it again with an infant. We'll see if we attempt it next year with an 18-month-old...but something inside me doubts it. Maybe we can talk my parents into a different Smith family vacation...