I guess it's time I introduced the two newest members of our family. One year ago we had a disastrous first experience with getting a dog. It lasted for two weeks and then it was either he goes or I go. So imagine my surprise when I was out with my sisters one Saturday and Jeremy decided he'd take the kids and pick up TWO dogs. I was very disturbed at first, but I quickly realized that this would be nothing like last year's situation. The dogs are brothers and are so cute and well-behaved. By the time I got home the day Jeremy picked them up I was so surprised to see that even Brody and Jace had taken to them and were sitting down letting the dogs crawl all over them. I'm glad I got to experience that evil dog from last year because I'm convinced that I never would've taken to ANY dog if we hadn't gotten a "rock-bottom" dog first. It's taking time for us to bond, though. We took them to get neutered a few weeks ago and when I went to pick them up the assistant brought one of them out and held him up to me and said all cutesy-like, "There's your mommy!" That's when I realized I have a LONG way to go to become a true blue animal lover, because that statement made me shudder really bad. It's been going great, though. The kids all love them and they're a great addition. The best part is I can stop feeling guilty for making the kids get rid of the evil dog.

We get to have Allie and Detmer come over sometimes for sleepovers and the kids always have so much fun. One of their favorite things to do is take a bath. They especially love taking one in my big tub with lots of bubbles.

Detmer and Brody are scared of the bubbles, so they waited patiently until I could get them in the good old-fashioned kid tub.

They all love watching movies. Tonight they got to watch a movie on the big screen downstairs that Jeremy splurged on earlier this summer.

It's been a fun preview to the real fun when they get to have a big sleep-over tomorrow night at Grandpa Greg's house. They are all so excited for that! He has them all over once a month and they just love it (and, of course, so do the parents).

Happy belated birthday to Jeremy. He turned 36, but age doesn't mean anything to us anymore. Since we both aged about 25 years when the twins were born, we can't believe we're still young enough to be in our thirties.

I'll just do a little bragging about him now. He's always known he wanted to go on and get his masters degree, and now that he feels he can finally do it without me heading to the insane asylum, he's gotten it started. He went for summer and is starting back for fall semester. He's done really well so far. His gift for bs-ing will really come in handy on his way to his degree.

He's also an assistant coach for Corben's football team, and seems to be really loving it. He takes Lance to practices and Lance is thrilled to have become one of the team's water boys. They practice every night for a couple hours and Jeremy has been very dedicated.

He's still working on base and doing everything he can to better his position. It's been a shock to his system to have a job that requires you to be there at a certain time in the morning, but he is long gone every morning before I even roll out of bed.

This is what I like the most about him: He knows when he really needs to be there for me. I have been really sad these past couple of days, and he has done everything to try and makes things easier for me. These are some of the things he's done the last couple of days that I couldn't tell you when the last time was that he did them: bathed the kids, cleaned the kitchen, rubbed my back, brushed the kids' teeth, and has just generally been doing whatever he can to make sure I'm okay. He even cancelled a fishing trip he had planned this weekend so he could stay with me.

I hate bringing this up because it makes me look bad, but I made him sell his motorcycle. The feeling came upon me suddenly and strongly that we needed to get rid of it, and though he loved that thing, he immediately gave in to my wishes. It was really hard for him, but I'm very happy to know that when I feel that strongly about something, he won't second-guess me. It was never even an argument, he was just sad about it. He had it sold within a month (I won't mention the two news articles I've read in the week it's been gone that were about fatal motorcycle accidents. Just more peace of mind that we did the right thing).

The last thing I will mention about his amazingness is SO amazing, that he doesn't even know it yet! Since Kira is going out of town this weekend, he is going to get up bright and early on Saturday and come to yard sales with me! Isn't he the greatest?

(side note: this story ends fine, just sharing an experience)

A few weeks ago Jeremy took Trevor in for his sports physical. He was otherwise fine, but the doctor wouldn't sign him off because of a heart murmur. Trev would have to see a cardiologist before the doctor would sign him off for football. Jeremy and I scoffed. Who doesn't have a heart murmur? I've heard of tons of people who do. So we made an appointment with Primary Children's Riverton office (so we could get in sooner. The main hospital couldn't get us in until after football would have already started). We decided to make a day of it since we were driving all that way so we piled all the kids in and headed to see the doctor. The doctor was really nice, but after a couple of initial tests he explained that he didn't like what he was hearing. He went into detail, saying an innocent murmur wasn't common in a child as old as Trev, and it sounded like the type of thing, he didn't say this in so many words, but implied that it could basically make a child drop dead if they are being too active. At this point Jeremy and I were both getting a little nervous. The doctor sent Trev in for an ultrasound. After that we were brought back into our little room and waited. And waited. And waited. After nearly an hour, the doctor reappeared. Now, a little advice to you doctors out there: After you have just told me my child quite possibly has a very serious heart condition, done further tests and made us wait for an hour before reappearing, don't come back into the room escorted by two other doctors. Or if you must, at least poke your head in the door first and say that you have two residents following you around observing. It was a terrifying few seconds until he casually told us that it was an innocent murmur after all and Trev was just fine.

After that lovely experience we went to try out a big waterpark in the area called Cowabunga Bay. I can't believe how much fun we had. I'm always a little skeptical to take all the kids to a water place, but it worked out pretty well. There were a lot of slides they could all go on, even the little ones, and the water is never very deep. It was such a fun day. After a hectic summer it was pretty much the first time in several weeks we had gotten to spend quality time together. It's definitely something we need to work on doing more. The only damper on the day was missing Corben because he was at scout camp, but I stopped feeling bad when he got home and told me it had been the best week of his life. Uh, don't know exactly how I feel about that.

My two cents about Cowabunga Bay: We did the cheapest deal they offer, which is two hours at the end of the day, and it still costed $65. They are way overpriced. Though it was a lot of fun, it definitely does not offer enough to justify what they charge.

Here are the kids all tuckered out at the end of the day: