The Reed Family: Labor Day Weekend

We headed up to the cabin for Labor Day weekend with the Bridges. Margaret and I both had been worried all week that one of the kids would get sick and we wouldn't be able to go, but Friday got here and all seemed well. Hudson woke up and was eating breakfast and said his mouth hurt. We looked in there, and there was a little sore--nothing major and certainly nothing to be concerned about. However, an hour later, his lip and cheek were swollen so bad that he could hardly talk! It was terrible! It was really hurting him too. Of course, we headed to the doctor, hoping and praying that it was nothing serious. Thankfully, Dr. C. said it was either a bite of some sort, like a spider that may have crawled into his mouth while he slept, or it was an allergic reaction to something. We have no idea what it could have been. After some Benadryl and some antibiotics, the swelling went down and we were good to go!

We got there around 4 that afternoon and the Bridges arrived around 5. Hudson was SO excited. This was his first real sleepover too as he and Haines were sharing a room! Margaret even overheard them talking about how they were going to stay up all night! :) Thankfully, that did not happen! They were actually perfect angels and even napped! They insisted on sleeping in the same twin bed (even though there are 3 beds in the room that we put together!).

We played and played Friday night, ate dinner, and then went to the brow to do s'mores! So fun!

I hate that my phone went blurry on this picture!

Then, it was rub a dub dub, 4 babies in a tub. These kiddos were dirty!

Matching pj's!

The kids actually went to bed pretty easily (we were shocked!), and the adults stayed up way too late talking! It was really fun, except when you don't go to bed until 12:30, and then there are terrible storms from 3:30 to 4:30 that had the whole house up, and all kids were up by 6:30, that's not a whole lot of sleep! Oh well, we managed! That's what naps are for!

Saturday morning was hike day! We first went and saw Desoto Falls.

Then, we headed into the park and did a hike. Of course, Margaret came prepared and had a scavenger hunt for the boys. They had a list of things they had to find along the hike. They loved it! I have to admit, it was really cute and fun for the adults too!

Harrison LOVED the hike! He just had the biggest grin on his face the entire time! He did pretty good too! Sarah did good too, but she spent most of the time in her mama's arms!

Joel is showing Harrison a caterpillar!

Big boy with his walking stick! Clint found all the boys walking sticks and that was a huge hit! I think they even came home with us. :)

We found a spot near the creek and the boys just loved throwing rocks in the water and getting super dirty! They wanted to swim SO bad. They might as well have just gone in because they had walked all in the water and were just as filthy as could be!

Snack time!

Sarah had to wear her jersey just like the boys. She turned into a cheerleader that night!

We hiked for over 2 hours. We could not believe we made it that long, and unfortunately, by the end, the kids were showing it. Well, mostly Hudson. He fell (for the thousandth time) and cut his hand and you would have thought the world had ended. He was just exhausted. Overall though, the kids did awesome! We would totally do it again!

The kids were so dirty that we got out the baby pool when we got back and let them clean up. Clothing was optional. We only had one "incident" on the deck! :)

After LONG naps for all, it was back to playing and getting ready for the big game! There was a lot of gator riding on this trip!

Again, Miss Crafty Margaret brought these adorable lizards for the kids to paint. They had a blast doing it. She also brought hand towels and we made some really cute ones with the kids hands and feet! You can tell in the picture below that Harrison is painting his hand instead of his lizard. Clothing was again optional. For some reason, Harrison would not stay in just a diaper. If we took his shirt and shorts off, he wanted it ALL off!

As you can imagine, it was a wild house and Margaret and I did our best to keep the kids occupied so the guys could watch the game. We were able to get the kids down and watched the second half and that was fine! Again, we stayed up way too late, but it was so, so fun. I can't wait to go back with them! Might have to be an annual thing!

The Bridges left on Sunday and it was a really sad goodbye! Hudson was so sad that his buddy was leaving him! We actually went down to the lake for the day, so that took his mind off of it for a while, but it really hit him when we got back to the cabin that night. He cried and cried for his buddy!

We had a couple of really good long boat rides while at the lake and Harrison has finally decided he likes riding in the boat! It's just amazing how different this child is now that his ears are clear.

On Monday, we decided we needed to experience some culture and so we headed to Mule Day in Ider, Alabama. We had heard it was fun, and boy, was it a sight! Ha! We weren't able to stay very long because it took us longer to get away from the cabin than we had thought, but it was still a good time.

They had a little train that rode around the event and my train obsessed kids just had to ride it. Forget the mules, they just wanted to see the rinky dink train!