Brothers

These 2 can fight but man, sometimes they are just such good buddies! 

Melts my heart...

Swim Lessons

Although Chase had swim lessons at our rec center a few years, that was really just meant to introduce him to the water.  As he is getting older, now we want to make sure he REALLY knows how to swim!  Chase loves to swim like crazy but he wears a floatie and we want to be able to get rid of it and make sure he is safe on his own!

We decided to enroll him in swim lessons at our gym and he just finished his second month. The experience so far has been outstanding!!! Chase's swim teacher is Mr. Daniel and there are only 3 kids in each class.  Lessons are every Wed night for 30 minutes and at first I thought, "Only 30 minutes?  He will never learn to swim!"

But I have been so pleasantly surprised with how awesome his teacher has been and how far Chase has come in 2 months so far!  He is floating on his back, swimming about 5 feet apart and diving under the water to grab rings off the floor of the pool.  He loves going to lessons and we just decided to extend his lessons through October.  Hopefully he is close to being a little fish without a floatie and I know Craig and I can breathe a little easier having 1 water-safe kiddo under our belts!

Hoelting Family Reunion

Nazareth, Texas is such a special place for our family.  This small town of approx 350 people is where Craig's parents met in preschool and so much of our family history lies.

The first weekend in August we had the Hoelting reunion (held every 4 years) and about 500 people flooded the town for a few days of visiting, dancing and fun!  I have been to Nazareth about 5 times now for different events and it is always so peaceful and simple to visit the farm life for a weekend. (Well chasing a wild 1 1/2 year old is never peaceful but you know what I mean!)

No one has more fun than all of the kiddos!  Out of the 500 family members, I would say about 300 of them are probably kids!  They run around from sunrise to about 11pm like wild ones and crash and burn at the end of the night - lol.

There really is no way to fully explain to anyone what these reunions are like but maybe this will help.  Below is a piece of the family tree that covers one of the walls in "The Hall" which is the building where the whole weekend is centered around.  We have 995 people in our family - 995!!!!  This particular reunion stems from all decendants of Craig's great grandparents, so his Grandpa was one of the 9 children.  Each of the 9 branches wears a different color, we are green, and on Sat we take a huge picture in the football stands where each section is a different color!

We hit the road about 6am on Friday morning and made the 8 hour trek to Texas...

And a few hours later - lol...

During our road trip the boys were so excited to see some tractors and even get to pet a horse.  You never know what you will find when you stop on the side of the road for a litttle break!

 

We arrived in Nazareth about 4 pm and got cleaned up and ready to go to the hall to see all the relatives!  That night there was a dinner for everyone and then just mingling, drinking, singing and kids running all over the great outdoors :)

 Chase hanging out with Austin & Kyler...

Adult cousins enjoying catching up

Saturday morning started with an optional baseball game.  Craig, Don, Kyler and Austin played and we tried to convince Chase but his shy nerves kicked in and it wasn't happening

Brady checking out some new cousins he hadn't met yet...

Brady having an absolute ball on the blow-up slip and slide!

Waiting in line with his cousins and Cameron taking good care of him!

After swimming Brady and I headed back to Craig's Aunt & Uncles house, where we stayed, for a little nap together.  In the meantime Chase had a blast riding 4-wheelers at another Aunt & Uncle's house.  I don't have any pictures but he told me all about it :)  After napping we headed to church for a mass where literally the entire congregation is our 500 family members separated in the church by our colors!  Then we headed to the hall for more playground fun and a BBQ dinner.

I had to take some some photos of Brady & Chase playing on a zipline on the playground.  We have always thought Brady is the world's strongest toddler so these pictures were cracking me up..holding on all on his own!

Next it was time for the football stadium family photo.  Brady making his way over to sit in the stands...

By the time we took the picture the entire stand was full of Hoeltings!

An attempt at a few family photos in our green...

And a few last photos of the big dance and party at the hall Sat night!!

 We had a great weekend in Nazareth and look forward to our next visit!

Cell Phone Post

The last few months I was locked out of my blog so I got waaayyyy behind!  In an effort to catch up I am dedicating a post to cell phone pictures taken over the past 2 months...

Boys chilling in their lawnchairs watching shows together

So proud of his trio block creation

Kenny Chesney/Tim McGraw concert with a bunch of couples from our neighborhood!

All the girls

Our original seats...

After we snuck down to the lower level - woo hoo!!

King Sooper's horsey rides are a MUST!

Poor Brady had a week in July of major bumps and bruises.  First he fell out of a chair on our concrete deck out back and got a huge bruise and welt on his forehead :(  Then a few days later he was pulling on a curtain rod at daycare, pulled the rod down and it hit him in the head and gave him a good gash.  I took him to the pediatrician and they had to glue his little cut back together.  He was a trooper and is healed with no scars but he looked like quite a site for a few weeks!

Then...if that was bad enough...this poor kid somehow got Hand, Foot & Mouth disease :(  It was at the very end of my parents weekend visit the end of July and he started getting a little rash around his mouth.  Quickly it turned into tons of sores around his mouth and red spots all over his feet, hands and butt.  It was horrible looking!!  Thanks goodness it doesn't hurt or itch so he was pretty happy still.  This disease is basically a common strain of a cold in children and there is nothing you can do - just wait it out.  It is really contagious though so that meant a week at home with Mama!

I snapped this picture one morning as I was waking the kids breakfast for daycare.  Poor Case was exhausted and passed back out on the couch - lol!  I let him sleep a little and took them a little late that day ;)

When my parents came to visit in July my Dad got a chance to come back for one day after his conference in Steamboat Springs.  I snapped this picture of him and Bradz as he was heading to the airport...

Broncos first pre-season game...go Manning!!!

Grabbing some grub together

Saturday morning walk with my littlest man!