To be easy, I’m summing this year up until Christmas in one post so I can catch myself up:) I hope you are all wonderful!
Spring 2017:
Peyton and Conner playing their favorite sport! They both did so great:) Peyton made All-Stars, but chose to go work at his grandpa’s farm instead. He made a lot of money, and still has not spent it months later! We love watching the boys play baseball.
We sneak off to Galveston to the beach any chance we get! We live about 50 minutes away from there now:)
We planted an awesome garden this year and it went crazy! We even named one part “the crazy garden” because we had so many cucumbers we could not even eat them all.
Learning to tie knots for homeschool
Easter 2017!! I loooove Easter!
I always hide a gold egg with $5 in it. Conner finds it every single year! Hahaha, so this year I hid two in hopes Peyton would find one, but alas Conner found both!
My dad was in town so he helped to be the Easter bunny.
Esme’s first Easter!!!
We then set up an Easter party/brunch for my sister and her family and our MawMaw to come over!
Daddy Easter bunnys
We both wore rompers without knowing it:)
Our handsome Easter egg hunters
Peyton finally found one!!
Vesper and her cousin Dawson could play play-doh for hours
Spoon egg games
I looove my nephews soo much!
All my babies love Auntie so much
Cascarones and water balloon fight!
Conner turned 10! I surprised him with Chicken Minis and a jumbo Starbucks-he was so happy. We went to Great Wolf Lodge that weekend to celebrate him and Trek!
Trek would have been 6 years old this year:( We miss him and talk about him constantly, even Vesper talks about him all the time which makes me so happy:)
Great Wolf Lodge for Trek and Conner’s birthdays-my sister and her family joined also! This place holds such a special place in our hearts. We spent Trek’s 1st birthday here and have been back many times in honor of him and because its so much fun!
Vesper looooves characters-she freaks out anytime she sees one and must meet and hug them.
The last of Trek’s pjs that Esme fit into:)
Vesper in her leotard for gymnastics. It was even cuter then I thought it would be and she loved it:)
I get one of these swings at every house. They are my favorite baby rocking swings and they always make me think of the hours I swung with Trek in Maui.
She is just so much fun and sassy.
Going to Mexican food with my dad and my grandma. My grandma lives with my sister nearby, and my parents (my mom could not come this trip) come all the time to see us-its been a nice perk seeing family back in the US.
All the yummy things from our garden! We even canned 30 cans of salsa with all the veggies we grew.
We got a fire pit for Trek’s birthday so we could sit outside and have fun and think of him.
My handsome guys on take your kid to work day:)
The boys participated in National Lemonade Stand day outside of Kroger. They donated part of their money for a cure for NPA and had so much fun. They have had 3 lemonade stands so far in their life-one in Galveston, TX, one in Hong Kong, and this one. They have made over $200 each time! I told them they should go into business-they are such engaging and sweet salespeople.
Produce from our garden!
Mother’s Day 2017
Vesper turned 3 in May!
Jarrett travels about half of the time. We will go on more trips with him when I’m ready to brave the 20 hour flights again with the girls-haha:) We are sticking to his closer trips for now. We always miss him so much when he is gone. This was after one of his trips to Asia, the girls would not let him out of their sight! It was so sweet:)
My sister, Amanda, and her family live about 45 minutes away. We try to see them 3-4 times a month. She has a pool, so the kids love going over their when its warm:)
Summer 2017:
Jarrett’s company owns a lot of fun hotels, restaurants, and amusement parks. The kids get to do a lot of fun stuff-thanks dad! ha:)
13 years married to this hunk! I love him so freaking much.
We play so many board games with the boys, at least 3-4 nights a week. This was a special night-I finally won Risk!!
The salsa we canned:)
Cousin time!
The boys getting back from their Colorado trip to see my parents. They had an adorable brother-sister reunion at the airport:)
Vesper turned 3 in May and Esme turned 1 in July. We decided to have a joint Frozen part for the girls-it was so fun and special.
We filled a baby pool with water beads-all the kids loved it:)
My mom and niece were in town, so my sister, the girls, and I loaded up and headed to American Girl store! It was a dream come true for me-haha:) We had a blast and started something very dangerous as the store and bistro is only 30 minutes from our house!
Vesper loves the Bitty Baby dolls, and we bought Esme her first one.
Our stuff from Hong Kong did not arrive until July!!! We had already been in the US for over 6 months-ha:) We decided to not ship our furniture from HK, as it was all from Ikea and not worth the shipping price. We were able to buy almost all our furniture from craigslist here, it was a blast decorating our house! But we still had a lot of toys, keepsakes, and clothes that we needed to ship, so it was like Christmas in July:)
Esme’s first 4th of July-it was special it was in America:) We read the Declaration of Independence, went to our community pool, and saw fireworks-it was perfect!
Vesper and Dawson (cousin and nephew) playing in our flower/sand garden.
I have sooooo much fun matching and dressing the girls! My goal this year is to not purchase any more girl clothes for the next 365 days-one day I’ll show you their closet and you will understand why!
Family beach day. This day was pure magic and we truly felt Trek with us while all playing in the ocean.
Cousins!
The boys in the mountains of Colorado with my parents-fishing, 4-wheeling and having fun.
We canned so much food this year! Anything to do with kitchen fun is my favorite. I could cook, bake, and preserve all day long. Its so fun for me to teach the kids and having them help me.This is the boys picking pears at Granny and Granddaddy’s farm. We canned some pear preserves.
Fall 2017:
The first part of 2017 was spent getting back into a US living groove and getting settled in our house. I still am not completely finished decorating-ha! Homeschooling 2 cool boys and having 2 toddlers and cooking them food each meal takes up every second of every day! But by August we were ready for a travel adventure. Jarrett has to visit a few stores in Mexico, which means the trip is a longer one-these are the ones we like to go on so we are not apart for too long. Thankfully Mexico is a 2 hour flight from Houston, so I was all in. We ended up spending 1 month in Mexico in September and it was pure magic! We will always tag along on that trip with Jarrett:)
Jarrett went early to a store in Puerta Vallarta, we met him in Cancun a couple days later. The kids freaked out when we found him:) Passport stamp count: Peyton #14, Conner #14, Trek #4, Vesper #6, Esme #3 
Our first stop was a hotel while Jarrett worked. Planning a trip for one month that is fun, yet affordable and where I’m alone most of the time while Jarrett works takes me a lot of time. I’m not complaing-ha, but even though I’ve gotten it down pretty well what works and doesn’t work for our family-we have gotten bigger! So we need lots of beds, which is hard to find in a traditional hotel. Thankfully Mexico is very family friendly and we found a few great options. Jarrett was even able to talk the guy into upgrading us into the biggest 2 story hotel room they had for just $40 extra for the entire week! It was perfect:)
Eating at Bubba Gumps in Cancun-it is one of my favorite Bubbas-mainly b/c it had a full on play place which your kids could safely play in while you ate!!!
Vesper loves the sand, she will still bring up the sand in Mexico and ask to go back:)
The first week was at a resort and a complete blast. The boys were in awe of all you can eat and all you can get fancy drinks. They had a kids drink menu and the boys tasted every single one.
After a resort week, we moved across town to a house rental in a local neighborhood. It was nice for the extra space and to get to explore the local life. We definitely ended up having some adventures on this side of town! Sadly while out walking with the children one day around town my wallet was stolen with all the cash I had just pulled out of the ATM:( It was a huge bummer as it was our entire spending money for the week. And then another day taking the kids to the beach we had a fiasco with a taxi driver scaring all our Uber drivers away, and then ended up having to use him to get back to our hotel! But all in all, it was still worth it and an amazing experience.
I brought some school along to do this week, that we stayed in a house, while Jarrett worked. We always have fruit while we do school, and it was fun to find Rambutan fruit, a favorite from Thailand.
There was a Plumeria tree out front-Trek is always with us.
Jarrett loooves Mariachi bands, which I think is so cute and funny. Vesper obviously does not agree!
This lady set up a taco stand in a median across the street, we had it for breakfast a couple of times-it was so good.
Monopoly and pastillitas
Waiting for the taxis that never came for over an hour, we finally found one, thankfully the kids were total troopers.
After Jarrett was through with work, our family vacation began! We headed over to Tulum, Mexico to stay in a treehouse for a few days. It was so peaceful and stunningly beautiful.
View from our beach house.
We went to Tulum ruins and Coba ruins while we stayed there. The guys climbed this one, it was awesome to watch.
If you are ever by Cancun you must visit Xelha. It was one of the coolest things we have ever done on our travels. It is an all-day event and basically just a huge water park, but completely in nature. It has waterslides into the ocean, a kiddie park, hikes, cave swimming, snorkeling, zip-lining into the bay and all kinds of fun stuff!
Even Vesper and Esme went cave swimming!
The boys were able to go and play by themselves for part of the day. They were so sweet and cute and had their pictures taken at a bunch of the sites for me b/c I love pictures of my kids so much. This place was awesome and had self-service cameras all over the park. You just scanned your bracelet, got in place, and it snapped your picture. Then they were all stored on your bracelet, so you never had to carry around a phone or camera.
Peyton ziplining
Peyton cliff-jumping
Tulum Ruins
Coba Ruins-the girls had soo much fun! I thought they were so cute climbing in their ruffle butts:)
Esme loved the Mexican salsa
Conner cliff jumping
We ended our trip on Isle de Mujeres, an island off of Cancun. It was a blast! So relaxed and we got to drive a golf cart around the island all week. It reminded us a lot of Utila, Honduras.
While we were gone Hurricane Harvey hit Houston. Thankfully our house was safe and dry. Our van was parked at the airport and had water up to the green dot, but thankfully not a drop of water inside! We were very thankful!!!
to be continued with Winter 2017:)
