Dearest courtney.. as someone who checks your blog daily.. i must say.. I am sick of seeing "The Marbles". Please update soon. Love, Lizzy.

I must apologize to all my faithful followers out there. I was sweetly prodded by my wonderful sister-in-law (and come to think of it...by my dad last week) to update my blog. After our backpacking trip we have been staying around home a little bit more. Shocker!!! I know. But even though we have slowed down this past month Grant is still growing and learning new things every day. He is constantly trying to figure things out on his own.

The Marbles

Paul and I took Grant to Poppop and Gammy's house in Florence, and we went backpacking. I am just recently getting into backpacking since it is one of Paul's favorite things to do. With a new baby last year we obviously didn't get a chance to go together, but were very excited to go this year. We went to the Marble Mountain Wilderness in Northern California. Our destination was Campbell Lake. We were gone for three days and two nights. Backpacking is something we hope can become a family activity. Paul is already ready to take Grant...we'll probably wait a few years though. I'm sure he had more fun with Gammy and Poppop and his Aunties. Although...he probably would have loved being outside in the wilderness...but then Mommy and Daddy wouldn't have had such a relaxing time!

Here we are...ready to go

The view from our campsite

We took a day hike up to Cliff Lake

This is what I spent most of the time doing...

And Paul, of course, was hard a work

He made us a wonderful campsite

And...we're done!

Chugga-Chugga Choo-Choo!

Medford has a really great train park. It is only open a couple days a month because it is completely run by volunteers. What a wonderful service these people do! There are tons of miniature trains that kids can look at and ride. The ride is actually really long and well worth the wait in line. It takes you over bridges, through tunnels, and all through the park so you can see the real size trains that are parked around. There is even a mini train track that has a bunch of little trains driving around for the kids to watch. Grandma loved taking her kids when Daddy was little, and was really excited to take Grant. Grant liked the experience, but I think it may be a couple years before he can completely enjoy it. We had fun though :)

Daddy's Boy

There is no doubt that Grant is all boy. He loves being outside and doing "boy" things. While we were camping at Union Creek, Daddy, Mommy, and Grant all took a little walk along the creek. Grant had the time of his life finding pine cones and throwing them into the creek. He would get really upset though when he couldn't get them back. I got some precious pictures of Grant with Daddy, and I just had to share them. I love the boys in my life!

Union Creek Camping

Grant loves camping! We went on another camping trip, this time with Daddy's parents and their friends, the Grantlands. We really realized how much Grant liked camping on this trip. He was completely dirty the entire time we were there. It is so much fun to see how little he cared about getting dirt absolutely all over himself. His favorite thing was to pick up bark that had fallen off a tree in our campsite and throw it in the fire. Our whole site was cleared of bark by the time we left. There was a creek flowing right by our campsite, so we spent some time by the water, and we also went hiking and bike riding. Most of all we loved just being together as a family.

Loon Lake Camping

So I am just a bit behind on my postings...We've been a tad busy this summer. But you know what that means...FUN!!! Way back in July we went camping at Loon Lake with Gammy, Auntie Allison, Auntie Katelyn, Sandy and Randy, and Kelsi and Nora. Kelsi and I have been camping at Loon Lake together since we were babies, so it was so much fun to go camping together with our babies. I am bummed that I didn't even get a picture of the four of us :( Huge mistake! You know how I love pictures to document everything! Grant loved camping. The big attraction at Loon Lake is the beautiful sandy beach. He had a great time playing in the wet sand...and throwing it. He was watching some older kids having a sand fight and wouldn't you know it, the next day he started throwing sand. It's scary to see how quickly they pick up bad habits. Anyway...back to the fun. There were many things at the campsite for Grant to explore. He loved playing in the dirt and finding rocks and leaves. The major event of the week was Grant's first tubing experience. He and Daddy went on a real tube ride behind Randy's boat. It was hard to tell if he really liked it, but at least he didn't cry. We had a great time and enjoyed the time with some of Mommy's family and friends.