Our Midway Getaway

Because we're rich and sophisticated and stuff we decided to spend a night at the Zermatt Resort in Midway this weekend. Or possibly we decided to stay there because Cole painted our buddy's basement, and our buddy has rich parents with some sort of connection to the resort, so to say thanks he hooked us up with a free night there. But if you want to just go ahead and go with the "rich and sophisticated" idea, that would be fine by me.



When we checked in the guy at the front desk asked me for a credit card for incidentals, then looked at the account more closely and said, "Oh, I see you're the owner of this suite. I'm so sorry. A credit card won't be necessary. Please excuse me."

I replied, "Think nothing of it, my good man. Pish posh, and all rot," and then laughed like a snobby Englishwoman. Then the guy said, "I guess a room packet won't be neccessary, since you are the owner. I'm sure you know you're way around." And then I had to admit that I didn't even know which room number it was, or where it was. And thus the illusion was shattered. He gave me the info, I told the boys, "Pip pip, tallyho!" as I herded them down the hall, and then we went inside "our suite" and jumped on the beds. In a rich and sophisticated manner.

Of course there was swimming. Lots and lots of swimming. But the pool was pretty cold, so Tukk and I spent most of the time in the hot tub because he was "shibbering so much!" I totally would have bought a suite at this 4-star luxury resort, but the pool was just too cold. Hmpf. The snow made me so excited for Christmas. We had pizza for dinner while the kiddos drew robots and Star Wars battles all over the table.


Our friends have 3 boys, so combined we had 5 boys under 8 at the restaurant. Plus Tukk, who counts for about 3 kids. And 2 tornados. And one nuclear explosion. The pizza joint was super happy to have us there. This is Caulder showing off his cool face. Friday he told me he had a new nickname: CDawg. He gave it to himself. I'm pretty sure this is what being the CDawg looks like.Then Saturday Cole spoiled us with a swimming trip to the Crater at the Homestead Resort. It was so amazing. It's naturally heated, and the water is the perfect temperature: 90+ degrees. Not even Tukker got cold.

The boys thought it was so cool to be swimming inside a cave.

We thought it was so cool that Tukk wouldn't take off this adult-sized snorkel mask the whole time. It was so much fun. We really like having ridiculously nice friends who have ridiculously wealthy, ridiculously nice parents. It makes for a ridiculously awesome weekend.

It's Big News

At just over 3 years old, Sir Tukker the Enormous has finally exploded his way onto the growth charts. He's in the first percentile for weight and the third percentile for height.He weighs 26 pounds and is just under 3 feet tall. Average weight for his age is 33 pounds and height is 3 feet 2 inches tall.

He may be smaller than pretty much everyone his age, but five bucks says he could eat any of those kids under the table. Especially if there were donuts involved.

Personality Quiz

This picture shows my boys' personality differences perfectly. While we were waiting at the airport to go to San Diego, Caulder played with a single goldfish cracker the entire time. Why just one? Because his imagination is awesome... and because Tukker dumped the rest of the crackers all over the floor along with a bottle of water, then climbed up on a chair and rode it like a horse, then crammed his tiny body behind the row of chairs and tried to sneak along the window to freedom. Once we got on the plane we had to strap Tukk in to keep him from sprinting down the aisle, but he wiggled out of his belt so he could lift the window shade up and down and up and down and up and down and try repeatedly to push the flight attendant call button. Luckily he's too short to reach it. While we were wishing we had a bottle of Benadryl to pour down Tukk's throat, Caulder was listening carefully to the safety presentation. He even asked to see the safety card, which he studied intently, and then he said, "We're not sitting in an exit row, are we? Because I'm not 17."

I'm pretty sure that as they get older Caulder will study out a way to solve many of the world's problems. Which is good, because Tukkzirra seems bent on destroying all. At least together they'll bring balance to the universe. Unless, of course, they decide to team up. In which case they'll take over the world and rule with an iron fist as tyranical, destructive evil geniuses. It could really go either way.

October

I love the fall. It's my favorite time of year. Mostly because the Red Barn has pumpkin donuts and people give out free candy. It's awesome.

A couple of weeks ago we took the kiddos to Cornbelly's. Yaya paid for CJ to shoot corn out of the corn cannon. He was a deadeye, and he thought taking out old trucks with an ear of corn was awesome. It gave me a glimpse into what may be coming up during his teenage years. It was a little frightening.

Besides the corn cannon and the hot dogs, the boys' favorite thing about Cornbelly's was the inflatable slides. Tukk climbed up and slid down about 4,000 times. He started getting really tricky after awhile and going down head first, on his belly, and then even sideways. It was the first time I've ever seen a sideways slide. Impressive.

As you can see from the picture below, Cole's favorite thing was folding himself into a tiny cow car and riding the cow train. The hills you ride over are almost a foot high. What a rush.
We went through some of the spooky mazes.

And most of us managed to get through the inflatable dragon intestine maze. One of us (cough, Cole Bott, cough cough) got scared and lost in the dark and headed back out the opening. The rest of us made it all the way through and exited out what I'm pretty sure was the dragon's butt. And let me tell you, emerging out of an inflatable rectum is really quite terrifying.

We also had a pumpkin carving night with some of the cousins.

Cole and his dad engaged in extreme pumpkin carving using power tools. We're still not sure why. I guess just because they're men, and that's what men do. My boys were more interested in the homemade donuts than the pumpkin carving. At one point Tukk even decided to show off his hands-free donut eating skillz, which are really quite impressive. When you don't use your hands you can get your face that much messier, so it's really a win-win for the world's dirtiest child.And we conquered a corn maze with my side of the family. It was hot, so we almost lost Caulder at one point. He went down and I didn't know if we'd get him back up. There's not a lot of shade in a corn field, you see. And we almost lost Tukk multiple times because he'd wander off through the corn rows, and his entire body pretty much fits behind one corn stalk, so he kept disappearing. But somehow we all made it out alive, and then Grandpa Babe & Yaya bought everyone ice cream so we refueled and cooled off. The best part about having the cousins come visit from Idaho? Slumber parties.

And then we celebrated Halloween. Poor Cole was at work, so the boys and I had to trick or treat without him.

It was hands down the best night of Tukker's life. We went to a trunk or treat first, and every single time someone would give him a piece of candy he'd hold it up triumphantly and yell, "Mom! They give me canny!" One guy gave him an extra handful just because Tukk's reaction cracked him up. Free candy while you're dressed up like a Transformer? It doesn't get better than that.