Last night in Arizona :-(

The last night in Arizona was spent at a good old fashioned BBQ. We got to bring Cait and Cam to the party and as you can tell by their faces that the time was amazing. There is nothing like Smores, watching people shoot each other and trying to rope a fake calf. As you can tell by prior posts I kind of like the West, the dirt, cowboy boots, hats and the FOOD! It was a beautiful evening spent relaxing, telling stories, laughing at drunk Josh (I opted not to post the pics of him line dancing...didn't want to create an enemy) realizing that I can't rope a calf and in a gunfight I should just drop to the ground. As we left Arizona I was so glad to have my kids and my parents there as the trip was packed full of memories.

I'll be your Huckleberry...

I love Tombstone! Maybe it is because of Val Kilmer or maybe it is because my Dad made me watch Clint Eastwood Westerns when I was kid but when this movie came out I fell in love with a place I have never been. It may sound kind of crazy but I would have loved to live during this time, I loved the way people dressed and I have such a thing for a man in a black cowboy hat. Put me in one of those crazy dresses and I would have been the life of the party! I love to drink, swearing comes easy for me sometimes and I am scared of no one...I think I could have faired well in the Old West...plus Gold and Silver are my investment of choice right now!

I always loved the name Morgan, so Cait was going to be a Morgan Cait until we watched Tombstone for the 1000th time and they kept calling Morgan Earp "Morg" for short which made made me think well how awful will that be if people start shortening my daughter's name to that...so after that showing it officially became her middle name. When i told Cait this story in Tombstone...her reply was priceless "I am sure glad that you didn't name me after a boy"

I have never been the average girl so I apologize for this blog as most people might think I have fallen back in time when you get done reading this :-) but I sort of did...

Soooo I got the chance to take my whole family to Tombstone while we were in Arizona. It was everything I hoped for and sort of dreamed of. We started out at the Boothill Graveyard where they buried everyone who passed away in Tombstone during a certain time. Dead people scare me literally...but I found myself taking pictures of graves hoping to finds orbs in my pictures and telling the stories along the way with the kids. Cam got such a kick out of the gravestones and what they read.

On to the town that has been preserved over time in the middle of the desert. We stopped along the most famous saloons, and took the kids to a reenactment of the OK Corral and the actor that played Doc Holliday definitely was intriguing...maybe it's not a Kilmer thing but a Doc Holliday thing...so yeah I like the rough guy that smokes, drinks and plays pharaoh...that looks like he is going to die at any moment :-) Cait and Cam thought that the gunfight at the OK Corral was real so I spent about 5 minutes after it showing them that the actors did get up...Cam thought that this was the highlight of his trip.

The kids loved the town and all of the history along the way and so did my Dad. I have so many awesome memories with my Dad but this one goes to the top of the list as something him and I shared when I was young and I got to share with my kids. I highly recommend it but only if the late 1800's intrigue you...

Hot like Africa...oh I meant Arizona :-)

It's a dry heat, that is the first thing people say when you are going to Arizona to spend time in the desert. They are correct as the heat sucks every bit of moisture out of your body so sweating is not an option.

We spent the week in Arizona with our company for our annual outing with our reps. A great time is an understatement, you mix my favorite things together and you get an awesome time! Laying by the pool should be my job...why you ask? Because I am good at it, so good that I can spend hours listening to my ipod, watching the chicklets swim, chatting with my Florida/Michigan BFF Heidi on how to take better pics, eating salads, drinking Malibu Rum and of course trying to get a nice mocha color (safely with SPF :-). Cam almost got shipped over the Mexican border he was so brown. Cait however is a lovely shade of vanilla and enjoys umbrella time with me listening to Miley Cyrus - Party in the USA (over and over and over) Mom and Dad came out which made life easy for us and they got to see the desert for the first time.

This is the one time of year that I get to hang out with Heidi and I do believe the universe crashed us together. I love this girl, not only is she an amazing photographer, mother, wife and one of the most caring people I have ever met...but she is a close friend to my heart. I literally pushed Jeff aside when I saw him looking for her :-) Over a few months back I had peeked into one of Heidi's friends blogs and she made the comment "Everyone should have a Heidi", I couldn't agree more!

Cub Scout Mania

Camping can be something I do as long as their is indoor plumbing :-) I am not a fan of outhouses or the bugs that inhabit them. I met Tony at Cross Country Camp, we bathed in the lake for a week straight and made friends with an outhouse.

Tony and I have been camping quite a few times and we definitely roughed it, hiked 10 miles to put a tent up in the middle of nowhere, siphen my water from a pond (hoping not to catch a tapeworm) and poop near a tree.

Soooo when Cam joined Cub Scouts this year and all I heard all year long was Camp Camp Camp, all I could think of was my trips of the past. Which believe it or not always make me smile and laugh as we did them with friends and there was always alcohol involved. Maybe the alocohol killed the tapeworm :-) Anyways we did our first Cub Scout trip this year and we went to the Mud Hens game in Toledo where they have a campout on the field after. We had an amazing time, Cam loved it and I think he fell in love with baseball again...Uncle Brian will be happy. What a great family trip to wake up next to my babies all snuggled next to me in a tent...a memory I will never forget. Just for the readers pitching on a tent on a soft baseball outfield is about as good as it gets when sleeping on the ground.

Coconut Run, Pineapple Juice and a shot of Cranberry...

Tony and I spent the last weekend in April at a conference in the Bahamas at the Atlantis Resort...AMAZING! We went there for a work conference but had our afternoons completely open for sun and me laying like a lump in a lawn chair. My favorite thing to do is to lay there and feel the sun beat down on me...of course with my 33 SPF on :-) I burnt in weird places because I still haven't mastered the whole sunscreen thing and my winter whiteness was in full effect since tanning booths give you cancer! (probably not but the dermatologists hate them and now I have to listen) I loved every minute of it, the weather was warm and the breeze kept you cool. This vacation made me long for summer and what it feels like not to care about anything but what the next song is on your IPOD. I found my new love summer drink...coconut room, pineapple juice and cranberry...could have drank them for days, oh wait I did!!!