1st airplane ride!

here are a few pics from beckam's 1st airplane ride - our adventure from calgary to portland! it was all good while i had my mom with me to pull the crazy heavy suitcase or push the stroller with my 2 huge carry ons or hold becks, but when i was left to do all 3 of those things by myself, the adventure began!

 

i held beckam facing forward and pushed the stroller with one arm and then pulled the suitcase behind me through the 30 minutes we spent in the customs line. then, i looked like an idiot while i searched for all of our documents with becks in my arms, and when i finally made it to my gate (5 minutes before my flight was supposed to take off), beckam put on an intense poop grunt show, and i had to change him on my lap cuz it was time to board! haha it was quite the overwhelming experience!

 

once we got on the plane, becks did pretty good. it was a tiny plane, and we were seated next to this body builder of a guy of course, but luck was on our side when they moved him to an empty seat to give me some more room. becks slept for a bit and played with his toys and looked out the window and was a real trooper! every time he fussed, i felt bad for everyone on the plane and tried to shush him with something, and we made it without anyone freaking out on me - phew!

 

our plane was an hour late, so we eventually found dust wandering around looking for us, and i couldn't have handed the suitcase over to him any faster! we were so excited to see him, and becks was all smiles for his long lost dad!

 

overall - a little overwhelming and i learned that 2 is better than 1 when you're traveling with a baby :)

 

good bye holidays!

we are officially back in portland, and we are excited to be back to our normal little portland life but at the same time miss our holidays and our families! here are a few pics of the last few days with continuous entertainment for becks :)

cooler fun! i swear only grandmas and cool fun moms (obviously not me) think of using common household things like coolers to entertain the wee ones, and the cooler did not disappoint :)

 

becks laughs at most loud noises, but i wasn't sure how he would feel about riding on a loud noise machine. turns out he is a lawn mowing fool and loved driving around with grandma!

 

here is the one picture i got of becks with his grandma peterson, and sadly grandpa peterson was at work :( he's always got big smiles for his G & G peterson though, and we miss you guys and can't wait to put our camera to better use next time we're in town!

 

good bye to the animals that provided endless entertainment for little becks around the hill house too. beckam loved the dogs and the cat, and they were great distractions for him when he was tired or fussy or whatever. thankfully, they're pretty gentle animals too and let becks explore their faces and ears and whatever he could reach with his hands! haha he loved them.

 

my dad is often found reading the newspaper and catching up on current events and the latest obituaries at our house, and becks got in on a little newspaper action with grandpa before we left. of course, he was more into eating the current events but whatcha gonna do!

 

beckam loved hanging out with his grandparents and auntie kait over the holidays, and i did too! miss you guys :)

family reunion fun!

every 2 years, the smith family gets together for a little reunion. my grandpa and grandma have lots of grandkids and are racking up the great grandkids too, and we get bigger and bigger every year which means we have more fun too! we stayed at a cabin in mountain view this year, and it was a grand old time :)

here are some cousin shots from our 4 days of fun. kim is the oldest of us cousins, and it was always me and her hanging out together. this was the 1st time in a while that we both made it to the reunion though, so it was all about catching up and comparing prego stories as her little guy should be arriving soon! we have the best cousins ever, and we all get along and have so much fun together. yay for cousins!

 

here's becks at his 1st smith family reunion. he tried his 1st pickle and loved it. he was sucking down the apple juice at the lake and loving uncle colin cuz he was the one with the bottle, and the little mesh thing and strawberries were our friends when the fussiness hit!

 

smith's got talent! we always have a little talent show at our reunions, and there have been some pretty amazing acts. we are lucky to have some pretty talented cousins and aunts/uncles cuz we usually sit and enjoy the show from the side! haha i was the host this year, and there were some good laughs as usual. the 6 sisters decided on a tribute to michael jackson and tried to learn the dance to thriller 10 minutes before the show - good times is all i can say about that! between the singing and piano playing, i was amazed yet again at the smith family talent pool, and our judges didn't disappoint in the entertainment field either :)

 

 

games are always a big part of our reunions too, and we had lots of fun this year. grandpa got in on the indian leg wrestling with grandma cringing with fear for him on the side. we had some good mafia games going on, the 2's beat the 1's in guesstures by 1 (go 2's!), and there were rook games going on constantly too. us smiths love our games!

 

my grandpa and grandma smith are amazing and have a pretty amazing family. we love coming together every few years for a few days to get to know each other again and to get caught up and to have some fun, and i just want to say that i love you grandpa and grandma, and thank you for the great family that you are at the head of :)

mountain fun

it's just silly to come home to canada and not visit the wonderfulness of waterton. so, when it came to the last day or two before dust left back to portland, we figured we better brave the not so great weather forecast and take in the beautiful mountains and sights of our nearest and dearest national park :)

 

lucky for us, the weather cooperated, and it was a gorgeous day! we had lots of fun just throwing rocks in the lake and eating our usual waterton hoagies, chips, licorice, and treats, and we got some cute pics of beckam's 1st of many trips to waterton :)

 

here is grandma hill up to her usual grandma tricks - beckam also tried his 1st pepsi and his 1st lick of ice cream on our waterton trip! anything to make her the favorite grandma i guess! i don't think he really got any pepsi, but he loved the ice cream!

 

 

 

 

oh and here's some pics of the new raymond pool! me and kait took beckam and cousin abby and had lots of fun in the warm water and with the new waterslides :) it doesn't really look like it belongs in raymond, but we'll take it!

 

true north strong and free

so i can't say much more about july 1st in raymond than that i absolutely love every minute of it :) there's always the family softball tourney and the 10K race and the parade and rodeo and fireworks, and it's just an all around great day! this year was even more fun for me though cuz we had little becks to join us in the festivities!

 

dust thought to get some canada day tatooes, so we maple leafed beck's little cheeks to match his canada day shirt, and he just took the whole day in. he loved the parade until he fell asleep in dust's arms, and he was just so stinkin cute with his little get up and with that big smile of his! here's our little fam at the parade, and as you can see, beckam was totally into it!

 

 

dust and i watched the out of this world raymond fireworks on the front sidewalk cuz becks was in bed. ok......they weren't exactly out of this world, but they were fireworks in raymond on july 1st, so they were good enough for us!

 

here's our little canada day boy with smiles for everyone :) can't get enough of this kid and his cute little smile combined with my bday and july 1st and good july 1st food made for a pretty sweet day!

 

happy bday me!

i love my birthday! i love celebrating another year of my life with another year of canada's life :) i get a parade and a rodeo and a yummy bbq and a little family reunion and fireworks for my bday every year, and july 1st is just a great day around these parts! not only do i get all of that, but i usually get a few gifts too. this year was no different unless you count the fact that i got my 1st present from my boy becks! dad helped becks put some footprints (well that's what they were supposed to be anyway!) on a little pillow case for mom this year!

 

 

haha it was going to be a surprise, but it didn't work out quite like dust had planned, and becks was so cute with paint all over himself that he called me up to take some pictures of the birthday present shindig :) beckam was loving the paint, and i LOVED my footpring blobbish pillow case more than anything!

 

oh and did i mention that i'm going to see keith urban?!?! that's right! dust totally took me by surprise and made me put together this little puzzle with clues along the way that made up my present. i didn't realize it at 1st, but every clue had a keith urban song in it, and i am sooo excited to hear him sing those songs in sept! dust is such a creative present giver and always does so good, and this year was no different :) thanks friend - it was a super great birthday!!!

summer smugglers

dust and i have started a little tradition without even really knowing it. our 1st summer after we were married, we went up to calgary and stayed over in a hotel and went white water rafting and had ourselves a little holiday. while we were there, we hit up this restaurant called smugglers. my dad introduced us to it, and it's a steak lovers heaven! because we loved it so much our 1st summer, we did the same thing last summer, and i'm happy to report that we just completed our 3rd straight summer smugglers run :)

 

 

 

 

we didn't get to stay over this time, but we did leave becks with aunt kait and took the day to enjoy a little drive to calgary and a little smugglers steak and salad bar - mmmmmm sooooo good :)