We are back!

finally... since I last posted Wheeler has turned ONE!  We celebrated his birthday, then we rushed off to Oregon to visit with Jerry's family for a couple of weeks, which was fantastic.  We went to the beach, the zoo, the aquarium, we visited with cousins we only get to see once a year, we enjoyed COOL summer weather, we went to the park, we had family time at Starbucks, we had a great time.  We got home late last night, and woke up this morning and visited with friends who are in town for a short while, and then my family came to hang out this afternoon.  The boys start a two day a week school tomorrow, whew, and Jerry has to go out of town for five days, part business, part fun, so we have been busy busy busy.  But don't worry, what I thought was only about 500 pictures, is about a 1000 pictures from our trip.  I am currently uploading them, it is taking forever, and will start to sort and edit.  I should have pictures up soon!

Now that the boys are going a couple days a week, and I will have some breathing time, I will be updating things more regularly around here.  Stay tuned.

For those of you wondering about pictures from Wheeler's birthday, I don't really have any.  Unacceptable, I know.  I am still without a camera, again unacceptable, but my mom was kind enough to loan her baby out with her nice lens, which is where all of our trip pictures came from.  Thank you mom, you are the best.  Back to the birthday, my mom took some amazing pictures from his birthday, and here is where you can find them.

Here are a few teasers from the trip....

a visit to wine country, where we got married...

a super cute Wheeler...

the aquarium...

spending some time at the beach...

this is Jerry's sister Cathy and her fantastic family, we miss you already.

First haircut...

We had Evee over to play this week...

GG made this amazingly sweet Tepee for Wheeler's first birthday present.  It is crazy cool... and the boys love it!

We had a play date with the Kozloski boys.  Kaine and Kaleb are such cuties, we met them at the bounce house and ran and ran until we passed out.  

Kaine is on the left, Kaleb in the middle and Hut on the right.  Kaleb and Hutson are only 6 days apart in age.

We got haircuts last week too!  It was Wheeler's first haircut, and it did not go that well.  He hated it, and it took three of us to hold his head still, but, he looks so darn cute!

Hut getting his hair cut...

Wheeler waiting for his turn...

 Wheeler in the chair...

  a before shot...

the during shot...

the after shot...

We decided to take a little trip to get some frozen yogurt after the cuts.  I am so loving the frozen yogurt rage, there is a place on every corner now, and it is so yummy!

Hutson decided that he and the gator needed a little work done outside.  He picked up all the random leaves in the yard and crunched them up in the back of the gator.

Tomatoes from our garden...

Bath time fun...

recap

I have been somewhat remiss in blogging...  I hadn't intended on taking a hiatus, but I guess that is just life.  We have been keeping busy in the last couple of weeks, and been trying to keep cool and out of the heat.

My camera is pretty much shot, I look through the view finder and all I see is black, yes the lens cap is off, so I haven't been able to take any pictures.  (Guess this means I will HAVE to splurge and get the camera I have been lusting after for months.)  The above pictures are our weekend recap taken with the hipstamatic app on my iphone.  No pictures from fish taco Friday with the Hankins, or Latin food night at Jeff and Lee's.  Both evenings were full of yummy delicious food and good peeps.  Jeff and Lee have posted pictures here of latin food night.

This is my favorite picture of the weekend... (a little grainy, its from my phone)  We are working on potty training.. yeah- its not going so well.

Since I last posted we have celebrated our 4th anniversary, yea!  We did manage to get out on the town and celebrate since my parents were willing to come and babysit for us.  Okay, so we really didn't get out on the town, we really just went and grabbed some grub and a movie, and were home by 930pm.  Yes, that seems somewhat pathetic, but when you know you are going to have to get up at least once in the middle of the night and then again at 6am for the day-it doesn't make staying out late that much fun.

My favorite hubby brought me home a delightful little gift this weekend... he is so thoughtful.  It is a little anniversary/Wheeler push gift.  (He gave me a gorgeous necklace as a push gift for Hutson, he likes to give them right before the first birthday.)  Aren't they gorgeous?!  I love them!  

Thank you JerBear!

Wheelie is WALKING!

and DANCING!

Unfortunately we do have some sad news in the Clayton Clan to report...  Willie is gone... notice I say 'gone' and not 'dead'.  Our hounds do frequently get out and go on 'joy runs', they usually come back on their own within 12-24 hours if someone doesn't pick them up first.  I have their names and my phone number embroidered on their collars for this reason.  In the past we have picked them up as far as 7 miles away by car.  Waylon came home, or rather went to the neighbors on Friday night (they left on Friday morning), and we have yet to see Willie.  We are hoping that someone picked him up and has decided to keep him... he is our sweet gentle one.  People frequently tell us that they would have kept the dogs if I hadn't picked up their phone call, we are hoping this is the case.  We will keep you posted should we hear news of our boy.