Fall Into Spring

We have a 15000 sq ft lot with, I think, 14 trees. This means in the fall we have a lot of leaves on the ground. This is very different from when we lived in El Paso and had one 4 foot tree on our little lot. Jeff spent a lot of time over the fall and winter seasons trying to figure out what to do with all our leaves. He didn't want to pay someone to deal with it, but they wouldn't magically go away either. So he had to think of something. He tried mowing them but that just made them smaller. He tried blowing them but ended up just spreading them around. He prayed for strong winds to blow them somewhere else, but again, no luck. Ultimately he decided he was just going to have to rake them the old fashioned way. It took him till February to make this decision and then he opted to only do the front yard and leave the side yard and back in its leaf covered state.
I am in no way saying Jeff is lazy. He actually loves yardwork and is out there doing something every chance he gets. I guess he just doesn't like raking leaves. I can't imagine it's really that bad, but I've never done it!! So after he raked up some of the leaves he let the boys jump in one of the piles and have some fun. And they did!

If any of you have ideas on how not to have to rake leaves in the fall, I'm sure Jeff would appreciate them!

Handsome Boys

We took the boys to get some nice church clothes for Easter (planning ahead!!) and found some great deals so we took advantage. If you know Jeff, you know that he would have these boys dressed in suits and ties for every occasion!
Our church just finished building a new building for us to meet in and it's right across the street from our house. It is finally done and Sunday was the first meeting there. We decided it was the perfect time for the boys to try out some of their new "handsome" clothes. We had to hurry and get the pictures taken before they got dirty--that walk across the street is way too far to guarantee they'll stay clean!!
The boys were so excited to be able to see the inside of the church building. While it just looks like a regular church, they have be able to watch it being built from our backyard for the past 9 months. They have talked about it almost daily and were thrilled when it was finally done. We were even on time this week!!

Houston Rodeo Week

Max's school had a Western celebration last week. I had no idea what this was for other than the fact that it was Houston Rodeo Week. He spent the whole week learning all about Texas, the Alamo, cowboys, Texas flags, armadillos, and blue bonnetts. I thought it was kind of dumb that they spent all that time talking about Texas just because the rodeo was in town. I mentioned this to Jeff and he said, "Well isn't it Texas Independance day or something?" I said, "Oh, maybe it is. How should I know?" Then he reminded me that Max goes to school in Texas and will probably spend some time learning about Texas history. I felt a little dumb, like I should have realized that. I said, "Well I guess now that we live in Texas, I should keep up with things like this." He laughed and said, "Lori....we've lived in Texas for 6 years now!" OH! OOPS!

Anyway, so here is a picture of my cute little cowboy who now knows WAY more about the state of Texas than I do. I guess I have some reading to do!

The Great Name Debate

Thank you for joining us for the great name debate. Our little guy will be arriving in less than 3 months now and it has been quite a struggle for the 4 of us to decide on a name that would be just right for him. So we put it to a vote. Jeff voted for Charles Anthony with an option to call him Charlie, I voted for Nathaniel Joseph with "Nate" as a nickname, but the boys teamed up against us and pulled out the majority for a win. Therefore I am happy* to announce that Baby Boy Orwin #3 w ill now be known as...

TARZAN JEFFREY ORWIN

(although Max has stated that if the baby is born with horns and green skin he's changing his vote to Shrek)

So what do you folks think?? Do you like it?? If not...you try to come up with something better because I'm clueless. We have discussed every name in the book from simple standards like Michael or David to off the wall choices like Promethyus and Archemedes and we've got NOTHING! My big thing is I want to make sure the kid has options--like Maxwell can be Max and Zachary can be Zach--and I want it to kind of go with the other boys names (Maxwell Alexander and Zachary Xavier). I've even given up on trying to use all the letters in the alphabet, even though we only have S,B, and Q left.

Jeff keeps whining about finding "the RIGHT name". I don't know what that's all about. He thinks that divine intervention is going to lead us to the right name, which is fine but I'm a planner person and am starting to grow impatient waiting to figure out "the RIGHT thing"! (Doesn't sound at all like me huh???)

So here is a list of our top 10 names that we sort of agree on (my picks are at the top and Jeff's are at the bottom-as they should be).

1. Nathaniel
2. Joseph
3. Daniel
4. Michael
5. Christian
6. Bradley
7. Jason (i still like Jasper better)
8. Charles
9. Anthony
10. Caleb

We are also open to using Jeffrey as a middle name this time if it works, but not committed to it. PLEASE feel free to comment, vote, or add something that you think we might like and just have neglected to fully consider.

So until we come up with something better, welcome to the family baby Tarzan!! (And my mom thought Xavier was a bad name!!) :)

Fun Times in Tremonton

We go to Tremonton about once a year (where Jeff grew up) to visit friends, family, and evidently the cows. Jeff has a lot of dairy farmers in his family and most of the Orwins have at some point in their lives worked on a dairy farm. This means that once a year Jeff feels the need to go back in time and see some cows. So we made our annual trip to the dairy farm to see the cows. This is never my favorite part of our vacation. I've done it 7 times and twice I've been pregnant. All I really have to say about cows is that they stink and I'd rather not think of where Walmart gets its milk.

On this trip we also got to meet Baby Connor-Jeff's sister's newest little one. All we heard before we met him was that he was a grumpy fussy baby. Does this look like a fussy little guy?? I thought he was a delight. Maybe he just likes me best!!

The boys really wanted to go camping while we were out there, but due to time restraints, weather, and the fact that I hate camping, we decided this wasn't the best time for it. Nana was nice enough to set up the teepee in the backyard though and the boys thoroughly enjoyed themselves. Maybe next year we can do the real thing--or maybe not!!

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Dead Fish

Max and Jeff decided they wanted to try out fishing while we were in Utah. While my husband is an avid fisherman (I've never seen him touch a fishing rod in the 8 yrs I've known him) we decided to bring along Bill (Jeff's brother, who actually does quite a bit of fishing) to make sure we had a successful day. I wasn't sure that Max would be able to sit still long enough or be quiet enough to catch anything but he actually surprised be quite a bit. A fun day was had by all and no one had to gut a fish in the end!! Check out Max sitting still and quiet!! Amazing :)

Of course, Zach had to join in on the action too!

I accidently caught a fish while watching Jeff's line when he went to go get lunch for us. Ewwww!! We threw him back.

Jeff wouldn't let us leave the pond until his boy had caught a live one. Fortunately we didn't have to wait TOO long for that! We threw this one back too. I'll stick to getting my fish at the grocery store.

After sitting and fishing all day (more like 2 hours) the boys needed to run, so off they went!

Tough way to learn about gravity

Zach had a tough time staying on his feet during out trip to Logan Canyon this fall. He loved to stand by the creek and throw sticks and rocks into the water. Unfortunately he didn't realize how top heavy he is and ended up falling head over heels into the ice cold stream. Fortuantely his Uncle Sam was close enough to quickly scoop him up so no real harm was done. But boy was that baby cold!!

Later the same day he tried climbing up the hill like the bigger boys and found himself rolling down it instead. Poor thing. I guess he's not quite as steady on his feet as we had thought!!