Doug & Sadie come to visit...

May also brought our favorite people!!!! :) Doug and Sadie came to visit with their little guy, Jacob. It was Jacobs first visit to Spokane and we had a great time, as usual.
We went down to the river one afternoon with the kids to skip rocks and just hang out down by the river.
The guys with the kids...

And for your viewing pleasure, a closer up of the chubs...

Yes, those are hot pink crocks! :) Because she walks so much.
Did I mention that I got a new diaper bag? And did I mention that it is exactly like Sadie's? I saw hers after she had Jacob and fell in love with it. I had a hard time deciding between the red and the green one. I LOVED Sadie's green one. Green is usually my color. I love green. I decided on the red one and love it too! Maybe if I ever have another child, I can justify a splurge and get the green one and rotate! :) Good idea, no? For more cute cute cute diaper bags, go here! :) Thanks Aunt Kayla, I love love love the bag!

We went to Texas Roadhouse :) Our new favorite place. We left Tucker with grandpa but took the babies.
Here they are. They are going to be best buddies. :)

Jacob is the happiest, most smiley boy I've ever met. He is so much fun to have around! :) Look at that cute face! :)

Thanks for coming guys! We always love it when you are here.

Window on the wall...

Oh, P.S.... While I was in Portland, my wonderful husband hung this on our wall! It was a big bare wall and I was always at a loss for what to do with it.

I just love it. It was taken from a job they did with Sentinel Windows and had been in their warehouse.

I need to go out of town more often, that's when things actually get done around here! :)
I'm thinking about putting square black and white pictures on some of the openings, what do you think?

Mothers day...

How can you not have a great mothers day when these two are involved?

I am so grateful that they call me their mother!

It's the greatest-AND HARDEST-thing I've ever done! :) And I love them SO much. I can't imagine my life without them.

Tucker is such a good big brother. He loves Taylor so much and helps me out all the time.

My babies snuggling...

Here, he wanted to lay by himself on the other side of the couch. Taylor is holding on as hard as she can to keep that blanket! :)

And, of course, being the bigger sibling, Tucker gets it! Poor Taylor, always gets the shaft! :)

I had a great Mothers day hanging with these two!

Random Portland...

All in all we had an enjoyable time in Portland and got to do everything on our to-do list. Other things we did while there were:
Visit the fish hatchery and feed the fish.



We saw the HUGE sturgeon! Tucker was pretty impressed!

Lots of swimming and dance parties in our hotel room:

And Kayla got in as much snuggling on this little girl as she could before heading home!

Another fun thing we did was go to VooDoo Doughnuts as featured on this show. We love Man vs. Food! :) And I love doughnuts! It was a fun little place, sadly, no pictures! I was glad to get home and rest from this non-stop and emotionally exhausting vacation.
Now on to the month of May! :)

The Campbell side...

Also on our to-do list in Portland was a trip to visit my Aunt, cousins and their kids. We had a little BBQ planned and it was so great to see everyone! This is on my dad's side. They have lived in Alaska my whole life, which meant that I didn't get to see them a lot growing up. I spent a summer up with them when I was 12, and occasionally they would come down to visit us, but it wasn't often. Within the past few years my aunt and two of my cousins, with their kids, have moved down to the Portland area. We don't get to Portland too often, but definitely more than Alaska, so it's been fun seeing them at least a few times within these past few years. And it was especially great this time because we actually got to spend some time with them, rather than just a quick stop on our way out of town to say hello. We met at my cousin Misty's house and had a delicious BBQ. It was so great!
Me, Kayla and my aunt Jeanette:

The girls: me, Taylor, Kayla, my cousin Misty and her daughter Leiara:

Me and my cousin Kris:

This is who Tucker spent the most time with... :)

And the whole gang.

They do have another sister who still lives in Alaska. We missed you Dawn!!!
There is nothing better than family!

Sweet Natalee....

This post has been a hard one for me to wrap my head around. I just wasn't sure how to do it. No matter what I say, it won't be enough for what I am feeling. Maybe subconsciously that is why it has taken me so long to get this trip posted about, I just wasn't sure of what to say or how to say it. Many of you remember that I had a little 12 year old cousin who was diagnosed with Renal Cell Carcinoma, which essentially is Kidney Cancer in May of 2009. She was treated, and healing for a while, but after about 7-8 months the radiation and the drugs stopped working, after lots and lots of praying and faith, my aunt and uncle decided to take her off the medication that was making her life miserable. It wasn't shrinking the tumors, and it was making her so sick and miserable. They knew the cancer was terminal, and were advised to let her live the last few months of her life comfortably. Natalee passed away in June of this year, after just a little over a year of fighting the cancer. She was 13.
I can still remember my senior year in high school when my aunt announced to us that she was pregnant with Natalee, none of could believe it! We hadn't had a new cousin years. But we were so excited. In fact, my aunt Sherry kept it a secret except to my grandpa, and he called up my mom and my other aunt and made up some story about a girl he knew being pregnant, and I'm not sure the rest of the story, but somehow he got my mom and my aunt to go down to his house in Oregon, and they both thought that there was a possibility that they would be coming home with an adopted child. Somehow he had tricked them into believing that this baby would need a home and they were both willing to accept. They, in their minds were going down to work out the details. They got to my grandparents house to find my aunt Sherry large with child! :) My grandpa was always pulling stunts like that. When Ben got home from his mission, he lived in Portland with his sister and brother in law for a few months. While he lived there, I would go to visit him and would stay with my aunt and uncle. Natalee was in the third grade and I can remember going to her class with my Aunt Sherry to help out with activities. We also always watched a lot of sponge bob together while I was there. Natalee was so much younger than me I don't have a ton of memories with her, but she was just so cute and sweet!
While we were in Portland we went over to visit Natalee, my Aunt and Uncle and other cousins. All of their kids were in town from college, Utah and Idaho, and we wanted to see everyone. I also took some family photos for them. Natalee at this time was very weak, so we just stayed on the couch and chatted and laughed. It was a nice visit. They were on their way out to the Oregon Coast for the week, so we weren't there very long. But I am so glad that we went. Natalee passed away just a month later.
We miss you Natalee!

Me and Kayla and all of our Walton cousins, in white.

The Oregon Zoo...

Next Stop on our non-stop trip to Portland was the Oregon Zoo. Portland has one pretty cool zoo. Another one of my favorite stops in Portland since I was little. And that's a lot coming from me, because we all know how I feel about animals! :) Tucker loves them though, so we were in the right place.

They have a really great little petting zoo, which Tuck loved! No thanks for me, I was quite content being the photographer! :)



Aunt Kayla was getting in on the action with him though!

Next up was the train ride! This is my way of enjoying a zoo! :)



And apparently Taylor's too! :)

One cool fireman dude:





Aunt Kayla seeing how she compares to the bears...

And me and my little man! I love this guy!

We had a great day at the zoo actually! I love watching how excited Tucker gets seeing all of the animals! And we even got lucky with a beautiful day, as great a day as you can get in Portland in April! :)