The Asay's

Weekend away

2009-11-06T17:51:00.000-08:00

Last weekend we got to get out of town for a weekend away! Twice a year we head for Kearney, NE for stake conference and make a weekend out of it. We live 2 hours away from our stake building and Christian always has meeting on Saturday so we make it a mini vacation instead of spending 4 hours driving . This year we shopped...YAY, went out to eat...yum, swam, and went to church. The boys had TONS of fun swimming in the kiddie pool! Here are some pictures of the boys enjoying the pool!

It's going to be a long winter!

2009-11-02T18:28:00.001-08:00

We got another big snow storm Thursday night (I have a feeling it's going to be a long winter!), so Friday morning Christian and Carson went out and did a little sledding on the hill across from our house. Carson had such a fun time that next time it snows, we are headed to the big sledding hill at one of the parks in town for sure!

Pumpkins!

2009-11-01T13:45:00.001-08:00

I'm a little behind on my blogging! For once, I have more to blog about than I can handle! We carved pumpkins last Thursday evening. Carson was WAY anti pumpkins. We was all about doing it, but didn't want anything to do with the scooping out part! I was really surprised. Travis, on the other hand, had a grand ol' time digging into the pumpkin. He thought the "guts" were weird, but he wasn't afraid to get into it. Carson drew his face on and Christian did his carving. I ended up carving Travy's pumpkin and my own. Here are some pictures from our night. The first 3 are from today. I couldn't get pictures of the boys with their pumpkins the night we did them because it was raining. Enjoy!!

Trunk or Treat

2009-10-29T13:04:00.000-07:00

Last night was our Branch's Trunk or treat. We started out the night by trunk or treating the cars and then we had a soup supper and ended with carving/decorating pumpkins. It turned out really well! There was a great turn out and I think everyone had a good time! Carson was a knight, and if you know Carson...this is no surprise! Travis was a 3-eyed monster. I was a witch and Christian said he was a stud!

Our family

My cute kiddos!

My knight in shining armor!

My little monster!

Christian and the guys

getting ready to eat with our friends the Bogardus family

The kids carving pumpkins

Caramel apples

2009-10-26T13:34:00.000-07:00

I love fall! I love the smells, the colors, and the fun things that we get to do. One thing we did this year that we haven't done before is make caramel apples for the families that Christian home teaches. It was an interesting process, but fun. The caramel ended up falling off the caramel that night, but they still tasted good!

Snow day = fun play!

2009-10-23T13:51:00.000-07:00

Yesturday, we woke up to a few inches of snow on the ground which made Carson super excited to go out and play! We had 2.5 inches of rain earlier the day before, so it was SUPER wet snow, making if perfect for building a snowman! We were even luckier because Christian got to stay home and play with us! We had fun building our snowman...that the dog later tackled, and throwing snowballs at eachother! Travis thought it was the coolest thing to eat the snow! He would stand in front of the snowman and eat the snow off of it. It must have tasted good because he kept saying "nummy"!

Assembling the snowman...

Yummy!!

Pumpkin Patch!

2009-10-20T14:11:00.000-07:00

The only request my parents had while visiting us was to go to the pumpkin patch. Neither of them had been to one before, so it was fun to take them there. It's always fun to pick out your own pumpkin. We each picked out our own pumpkin and are looking forward to "fixing" our pumpkins, as Carson says!

Taking the pumpkins in to get weighed! We had like 141 pounds of pumpkin!

Our happy little family!

Travis protecting our load.
Carson had to take a break...lots of wondering involved in picking out a pumpkin!

LOTS of pumpkins!

Good buddies!

Carson's pick!

Travis with the gord he carried around the whole patch

Carson and Grandma looking for the perfect one.

Travis enjoying a ride on dad's shoulders.

My parents

Visit from grampa & grama Foulger

2009-10-18T14:15:00.000-07:00

This last week we were lucky to have my mom and dad come and stay with us. They came Sunday and left Friday and we were busy every day in between! It was kind of yucky weather the whole time they were here, but, on the bright side, it made for good painting weather. Ever since we moved into our house, I have wanted to take down the wallpaper boarder that's been downstairs and paint the light green bathroom. We attempted one weekend to remove the boarder, but stopped so the kids could nap...and well...we should have never stopped because we never finished! Once we got that down, we decided to paint the walls and ceiling. I've known that the ceilings weren't very white, but I had no idea my walls were so unwhite! It's amazing how much brighter and even how much bigger the basement feels with white walls and ceiling and no boarder! I love it! We just need to install new light fixtures and clean the carpet and we will be totally done! I've been holding offf decorating downstairs until we had it "fixed" so I'm excited to decorate!

Before pictures...(these were taken before we boght the house)

The green bathroom...

We did manage to take some time to play while we had grampa & grama Foulger here...

We raked leaves and the boys played in them...

And we flew an airplane in the backyard!

Travis hiding behind the bread machine

One request my parents had was that while they were here was to go to the pumpkin patch, so we did that too but that's another post!

A Stay at the Asay Bed and Breakfast

2009-10-12T14:28:00.000-07:00

This weekend we made a trip up to Laramie for UW's homecoming game. We stayed two nights at Matthew and Charlene's apartment, the Asay Bed and Breakfast, and had lots of fun. Friday night we got to help Matthew feed the goats and then it was off to Corona Village for our favorite Mexican food. Saturday morning we woke up with good intentions of going to the homecoming parade, but woke up to 6+ inches of snow and a temperature of -9 with the windchill! Needless to say, we felt more like singing Walking in a Winter Wonderland than Ragtime Cowboy! We lounged around and had some yummy breakfast and then got up the courage to brave the game. We ended up only staying for part of the first quarter and the beginning of the second because Travis was extremely angry about being in his monsterous coat! We went back to Matthew and Charlene's and got a few things ready for their bbq that night while Christian, Matthew and Carson went to try and check out the geology museum. It ended up being closed, resulting in a very sad Carson. Christian had been telling him about the dinosaur bones for quite a while and he was pretty excited about seeing them. When Charlene and I got done with our few preparations, we decided to go have some fun of our own and do a little shopping. That night Matthew and Charlene put on a bbq with some friends. We are so thankful that Matthew and Charlene will put up with us and our boys. We stay with them quite often and the are always so much fun. They spoil our boys and us! Thanks again guys for the fun weekend!

Travis enjoying a movie in the car with his "earphones" as Carson calls them.

Carson and Christian outside of the Geology museum. At least he got to see one dino!

The gang at the bbq!

Travis, Charlene and her sister, Sam enjoying a book.

Braving the game!

Carson helping Matthew feed the sheep.

The snow we woke up to Saturday morning...brrr!

Picture with Cowboy Joe.

Travis riding the sheep. I think I see a future mutton buster!

Feeding the sheep.

This is what it was like when we left McCook, a beautiful fall day! We had NO idea what was in store for us when we got to Laramie!

Whistle while you work!

2009-10-07T14:21:00.000-07:00

Travis is in the stage right now where he LOVES to get into the drawers and pull EVERYTHING out of them. This past week, he had discovered that there are some pretty cool rags in one of the draws in the kitchen. About once a day, usual in the evening when I'm getting dinner ready, he goes to the drawer, pulls out a rag and goes and wipes things up off the floor and cupboard doors...too cute to watch! We have been cleaning up around the house the last couple of days in preparation for my parents to visit next week, so I decided to put Travis' curiousity and Carson's good work to use and had them dust for me. They do a pretty darn good job of it! It gets me excited for when I can finally pass of bathroom cleaning duty to them!

The past week had been pretty uneventful for us. We were all sick over the weekend with a cold. The boys and Christian are still hanging on to theirs, but are on the mend. We are excited for our trip to Laramie this weekend to see Matthew and Charlene and to go to the UW game...if we don't freeze to death! We are also looking forward to a visit from my parents who are coming Sunday night some time! We enjoyed probably our last nice today. It was in the 70's today so we walked to the park and played. It's supposed to turn cold next couple of days so I think our park playing days are over...sad day!

On the Road Again!

2009-09-29T14:18:00.000-07:00

Last week, we were able to go back home to Wyoming and visit our families. Christian is finally done checking fields and hasn't gotten into the full swing of soil sampling and harvest yet, so we took advantage of some slow time to go and see everyone. Plus, one of the big reasons was so he could do a little recruiting at Northwest College, so we got to use company time and vehicle! On our way down we spent the night with Matthew and Charlene. They are always SO nice to let us stay with them on our trips. I don't know if they know just how much we appreciate them always being willing to put us up for a night and feed us...they are the best! After a night in Laramie, we headed and stayed 2 nights in Powell with my family where we got to meet my brother's new baby, Isabelle, visit my grandparents, see my sister who came home from school to see everyone, went on a date with my hubby without the kids, and had dinner with all the family! We then spent 2 nights in Lovell with Christian's family. While there, we canned salsa, helped chase cows, went to the General RS broadcast and got to hang out with everyone. Before we knew it, it was back to Laramie with Matthew and Charlene on our way home! It was so nice to get away as a family and be able to see all of our family! We are looking forward to Thanksgiving when we can see everyone again! (sorry for the pictures being backwards...I didn't have enough patience to fix them today)

Our family before we left to go home!

On our way home, we picked up lunch and went over to Cabelas and picniced with the ducks. The boys LOVED watching them!

My cute boys!

Carson with all his "weapons". He and Jacob played bad guys for a good portion of our stay.

Carson riding on the tractor with a cat. These poor cats get MAULED by all the little kids...and they don't seem to mind!

Riding on Ralph

Carson riding the horse all by himself. He was so excited to tell me when he got back from helping do cows that he rode it all by himself!

Writing on the sidewalk

Jacob taking all the little boys out to pick tomatoes

Family Dinner

Jason and Gramma holding baby Isabelle!

Riding the bike

Going on a fly hunt with auntie butts. These fly guns are too fun! It sure makes killing flies a good time!

Deocorating cookies

Bonfire fun!

Cooking hotdogs over the fire and playing with firworks

Carson filling up the truck with "gas" while Travis enjoys himself a coke!

Carson making himself some steak...

Getting ready to cut some grass

Enjoying lunch outside

Fall Festival

2009-09-20T14:26:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we took the boys over to a fall festival. It was perfect for Carson! It started with a parade and then fun in the park. They had rides just perfect for little tikes and a bunch of game booths for the kids to play. It was fun to watch Carson enjoy the rides!

Christian even got in on the action by jousting with Lance, a friend of ours.

Even though this video shows Christian getting knocked off, he actually won two out of the three face-offs. When I asked Carson who was going to win, he obviosly picked his dad, but was more concerned if there was going to be lots of blood or not...he didn't want his dad to get hurt, I guess!

Husker Harvest Days

2009-09-17T10:04:00.000-07:00

Tuesday, we had the chance to finally make it over to Grand Island, Ne, to experience Husker Harvest Days. Christian has gone the previous years we've been here, but this was the first time we had the opportunity to go. Husker Harvest Days is a HUGE, by huge I mean it sits on 1,000 acres and has 500 to 600 venders there, farm type expo that is all outdoors. It was rather impressive...we were there for 3 hours and only made it around about half of it! It's full of seed and chemical companies, car delerships, tractor dealers, and just about anything else you can think of related to agriculture. They each set up amazing information booths that the public can come and learn more about the products they produce. I wish I had taken pictures from up on top of a tractor so you could get the idea, but I wasn't that on top of things. Anyways, it's a kids paradise...especially for little boys who love hats...every company gives out different types of items that advertise their company and hats tend to be a very popular item! We had lots of fun walking around looking at the tractors and cows. I didn't really know what to expect, but I was really impressed. Next year we will plan on getting up there earlier so we can spend more time before the boys poop out on us!

Carson posing in front of one of the corn fields that a company was doing demonstrations in

The company Christian works for's booth (there's was pretty low-key compared to some of them...I'm sure some of them spend 10's of thousands of dollars on their booths!)

Carson taking a second to pose in one of the tractor tires! This was just before he decided to jump in a puddle and get mud all the way up his pant legs...crazy boy!!

This is my FAVORITE picture! He was posing so cute!

Up, Up and Away!

2009-09-15T20:14:00.000-07:00

This weekend was quite a busy one for us. Saturday night we went to McCook's annual Balloon Fest. Each year they bring in a bunch of hotair balloons from around the country for 2 days of lifts. They do two runs each day, one too early for us, and the other one at night. We decided to check it out this year and were actually quite disappointed...only one actually took off! Next year will hopefully be better. Carson liked watching them try to get them full of air and it was fun to see how big they really are.

Carson launching the straw out of his caprisun pouch! He almost took out a couple of eyes doing it!

Waiting for one to actually fill

My boys enjoying some bbq

Sunday we were invited to a bonfire with some friends of ours. They always cook the best dutch oven food! Christian gets especially excited when they invite us because they always cook either goat or lamb and this time he was very spoiled and got both of them!
The guys playing a round of Annie Oakley

Watching the guys shoot their guns

playing around with one of the many shotgun shells...not so sanitary...I know!

Travis and Raine playing the ever famous baby game...I throw it down and you pick it up game...he was loving it!

And, just for the record, our long time...well...long for us...pet fish Tutter fish died this weekend. We gave him a proper burial...down the toilet. Carson was sure eager to go and find a new Tutter fish today while we were shopping in Wal-Mart today, but we decided that it would be better to wait until after all the holidays were all over so we don't have to worry about not killing another fish while we are gone.

Sundays with the Asays!

2009-09-07T13:55:00.000-07:00

Sundays have always been one of my favorite days for many reasons. One of the reasons it's a fave is becuase it's probably the only day of the week that we are all home and don't have things going on! Here are some random things that we did this Sunday!

We played outside

We went on a cecada hunt. These bugs invade Nebraska each summer and are the loudest, biggest bugs I have ever seen. They live up in the trees and they are all you can hear during the day. About this time of year, they shed their exoskeleton on tree branches and eventually die so they are all over the ground. One of Carson's favorite things to do is go outside and count all the "skins" on the trees, and then go around the yard and find as many dead bugs as we can. These are the ones that we found yesterday on our hunt. There were actually 2 more, but one flew away (guess it wasn't quite dead) and the other one the dog ate...he loves to "play" with them. Right now, there are about6 exoskeletons on our trees. The boys went and played disk golf today and they counted 18 of them on 1 branch!

We also had a sword fight!

Boys will be boys!!

And just becuase it's funny...I was folding clothes yesterday and Travis thought it was the funnest thing to wear his brother's underwear! He'd find a pair, bring them to me and want me to put them on him, so he wore a pair of underwear for most of the afternoon! He thought he was pretty cool! Maybe this is a sign that he'll be easy to potty train...

I just love Sundays, but mostly I love them because I get to spend them with my family!!

P-A-R-T-Y Time!

2009-09-05T08:32:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we finally had a chance to celebrate Travis' birthday with a couple of family friends. We celebrated with a bbq and cake! It was delicious! Our theme for the party was an ocean "one"derland, so I made a whale cake just for Travis to eat. I'm definately NOT a cake decorator, but it worked great for Travis. I had a slight catastrophe the night before when I was decorating it...the stinking tail of the whale fell off! Thanks to all family that sent gifts and cards...he was totally spoiled, but Carson sure had a great time opening all the gifts! Here are some fun pictures from our night!

The food

The friends

Singing Happy Birthday!

CAKE time!

Travis was definately NOT scared of digging into his cake...he LOVED it! He started out pretty cautious...

...but that didn't last long!

Enjoying the cake!

The damage...

Opening presents

The kids playing in the sand

Travis was pretty obsessed with Carson's "horn hat" as he calls it.

Travis showing off his skills!

What a spoiled little guy!

The birthday boy!

Travis' cakes

Happy Birthday, Travis!!

2009-09-01T07:42:00.000-07:00

Today is Travis' 1st birthday and I have to say that this has been the fastest year of my life! Travis is such a fun-loving little guy! He has the best smile in the world...mostly because I love his funny teeth! We are so blessed to have him as part of our family! Here are some fun things about Travis:

*He always wakes up happy yelling "Dad"!

*He has 6 teeth

*He's been walking for a month now

*He still doesn't sleep through the night!

*His eyes are a mysterious green/brown color

*He is a GREAT eater!

*He loves to follow his brother around

*His happy place is having his thumb in his mouth and a handful of my hair

*He hates to be covered up when he is sleeping

*He's discovered he can point to things and get them

Here are some pictures of my baby during his first year!

1 day old

1 month

2 months old

4 months old

6 months

9 months

1 year

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, TRAVIS! WE LOVE YOU LOTS!

Fishing FrEnZy!

2009-08-31T07:43:00.000-07:00

That's right, we went fishing this Saturday, after the boys had taken naps, with some friends of ours and you would not believe how crazy the fish were! We caught probably 15 fish in the hour we were there! They must have been extremely hungry because just about every time we threw our line in we got a bite! They were loving grasshoppers and some bread that people had left there (people take bread to these ponds and feed the geese that live there) It was so fun for Carson to be able to catch SO many fish all by himself! Most of them were pretty little but he didn't care!

Travis wanted the fish SO bad!

Our biggest catch of the day!

The first fish Carson caught for the day! He was pretty proud!

Christian's Whopper of a fish...this is actually the smallest one we caught, but the rest weren't much bigger!

A favorite!

2009-08-26T20:36:00.000-07:00

I was going through my picture folders and came across this picture of Carson that has always been one of my favorite pictures of him.

Christian's parents have a fun little red tractor that Carson has always loved to play on. He's about 1, or 1 1/2 in this picture. Then, I realized that while we were home last time, we snapped another picture of Carson on the same tractor. It's amazing how much he has grown up in two years! I wish now, I had taken one each year to see how much he has changed and grown!

A corn pickin' good time!

2009-08-18T14:03:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday, we went out as a family to pick some sweet corn from one of Christian's farmers. We helped them fill a trailer full of corn that they were going to sell and picked some for us to freeze. Carson had fun out in the corn tearing down corn stalks and putting corn in the buckets.

Friday night, for our date, Christian and I shucked,

Travis joining in on the shucking fun!

blanched,

cut them off the cobs,

Cuttin' some corn, cuttin' some corn! Can I get some butta' please?!

and then bagged it to be frozen.

We got 25 bags the first night and a total of 47 bags from doing 2 more times. It was a fun experience for us and we are so excited to eat it this winter. Ther is nothing better than home grown sweet corn!

Some other events of interest from last week included:
a very unwelcomed visitor...Mr. Bat! This bat spent the entire afternoon on our screen door. I threw several different things at the door to try and get it to fly away, but...not such luck. We had to wait for Christian to come home before it went away and it wasn't an easy task! Christian slammed the screen door atleast 4 times...each time it would fly away and come immediatly back. The last time it flew away and rested on one of the slats on our deck. Christian grabbed a stick and poked it but it would just move to the other side of the slat! Finally, after getting poked a few times it took off and didn't come back.

This weekend we made our way to Imperial, NE for the Chase County fair. We had missed our fair here, the one in the county north of us and the ones back home, so we decided to go to this one. We had heard that it was supposed to be pretty good, and it was. It reminded us alot of the Park County fairs at home. This is the first year that Carson has really had the desire to ride the rides and he had fun doing it. He only wanted to ride 3 of them, which was fine with us...we both have really weak stomachs when it comes to rides. We had yummy indian tacos and listened to the country band Little Big Town while we ate. Our evening kind of got cut short because of rain, but it was fun to get away to somewhere new for the evening!

Checking out the tractors...!

Visiting the grandparents!

2009-08-13T14:09:00.000-07:00

As promised, here is the rest of our trip to Wyoming. The second week of our stay was spent visiting all our family. I love that we can go home and visit everyone while we are there! While visiting my family, we...

boated

Travis enjoying an ice cream bar after an afternoon on the boat

swam in the pool

lunch with Uncle Jason after a hard afternoon of swimming

had fun in the truck

and played around!

Cousins, plus one more on the way

When we visited the Asay's, we had fun:

working hard (as Carson says)

went up to Five Springs in the Big Horns for a picnic

getting Travis' first haircut

before...

after...

...bye bye curly mullet!

having yummy dinner at Michael and Emily's

watched Uncle Daniel climb power poles

and enjoyed playing with everyone!

The Asay grandsons and Uncle Jacob

King Jacob and his knights Carson and Stetson

Christian met us in Laramie on Sunday so we also got to stay the night and see Matthew and Charlene! Carson was really excited to see his girlfriend!:)

Not so sure about those crazy goats!

Matthew and Charlene had a pen for a dog they were going to get and the boys absolutely LOVED playing in it! Carson had a blast pretending to be a dog and Travis loved shaking the sides of it! It was too cute!

Reunion!

2009-08-10T14:39:00.000-07:00

Yikes! It has been forever since I have been on here. The last three weeks have been FULL of fun and it will take me a few posts to document everything that we did. Three weeks ago, my mom flew out to Nebraska to spend a week with us. It was so fun to have her here and hang out. After being here a week, she flew home with me and the boys. We stayed in Wyoming for two weeks and were going non-stop the whole time we were there. The first week my mom's side of the family had a family reunion in Big Timber, MT. It was so much fun to see so much family. Currently, there are 173 members of my mom's extended family with 3 on the way. Out of 173, 115 of us were there at the reunion! It was amazing!! While we were at the reunion, we...

fished (Carson's favorite part)

Carson showing us where he caught the fish at

Carson's fish

played games

It's tradition at Savage family reunions that everyone runs in foot races. Carson was in the 4 and under group and didn't come in first (but was close) but definately went the furthest. He kept going and going after they were supposed to stop!

There he goes!

walked

went to the Natural Bridge

and just hung out!

My mom and her siblings except for my aunt Arlene who couldn't be there!

Roastin' mallows!

Watching movies

waiting for everyone to get ready

Eating olives the best known way...off your fingers!

I'm so blessed to be part of such a great family! It's not too often that this many people get together for this long and all get along! I have a great family and love being a part of it!

*more pictures to come from the rest of our trip!

Weekend Adventures

2009-07-20T13:36:00.000-07:00

This weekend we kind of layed low. Friday night, we decided to drive down to Kansas. We have lived in McCook, which is only 12 miles from the Kansas border, for 2 years now and this was the first time I had been down to the Kansas border. We went to the closest town after the border and had some dinner and then drove back home. Saturday we went and walked around down town where Crazy Days was going on. They had a big obstacle course and giant bouncer that Carson had a blast going in. We grabbed what are called jiffy burgers (ground hamburger topped with potatoe salad on a homemade bun), a local favorite here and went up to the park for lunch. After lunch we let the boys play for a while then went home for naps. After naps we headed down to one of the parks that they stock with fish and went fishing. We were there for about an hour and were ready to leave when the fish started to bite. Christian caught 3 and Carson caught 2 the last 20 minutes we were there. Carson was so excited to actually catch a fish. The first one he reeled in he called it a "monster" fish because he thought it was SO big...but from the pictures you can tell they were just little guys! It was such an enjoyable weekend. I always love spending time with my boys. Even if we don't do anything overly exciting, I'm so glad to just be with them! They sure do brighten my day!

Swimming machine

2009-07-09T14:17:00.000-07:00

Carson completed his first round of swimming lessons this week. He had a blast! His favorite part was when they got to play on the all the cool floaties (the last 5 minutes the instructor brings out all the animal floaties for the kids to play on). He did a pretty good job and is quite a good kicker, bubble blower, and good at going under the water...without plugging his nose...something I still don't like to do! Good job, buddy! It was fun to watch you!

Fourth of July FUN!

2009-07-05T14:44:00.000-07:00

Wow, we had a fun 4th of July! We were so excited to have Matthew and Charlene here for the entire weekend to party with. They got here late Thursday night. I was afraid Carson was going to explode with excitement waiting for them! He's totally in love with Charlene...or as he calls her...his girlfriend! Friday we had great plans of heading to the pool while Christian and Matthew worked, but it was really overcast and the guys got home before the pool even opened. So we just hung out Friday afternoon and took naps...real exciting, I know! That evening it was our turn to clean the church so we enlisted Matthew and Charlene's help but rewarded them with dinner at the Mexican restaurant here in town and it was yummy...as usual! After dinner we stopped at the new park to play for a while. Saturday we got up and made breakfast and then hurried to the parade. After the parade, Carson really wanted to fly his kite so they went to a vacant field close to our house and flew it a while. When they returned, we started getting food ready for a bbq. We ate a late lunch/early dinner. We decided to work off our lunch with a game of baseball. We played with Carson first and then after he went down for a nap, we played boys against girls. I found out just how out of shape I really am! After naps, we shot off our fireworks, had some dessert and headed to the fairgrouds to watch the city fireworks. This year they handed out 3-D glasses to wear while we watched the show. It was pretty cool but it was even funner to listen to Matthew and Charlene ooo and ahhh as the fireworks appeared to get closer to them! We had so much fun having Matthew and Charlene with us and miss them already! Thanks for sharing your weekend with us...we loved you having you here!