Nate graduated last Thursday, so I decided to surprise him and have his parents come out for his graduation. I had been keeping this secret from Nate since January, so it was really exciting to surprise him. After I picked them up from the airport Reid really wanted to hide in the laundry room and jump out when dad got home!
Surprise!
Nate was SO excited! He wanted his parents to come SO BAD. Best present ever!
At BYU they actually have TWO graduations (I did not know this until the day before...). One commencement ceremony for all 6,000 graduates and one smaller ceremony for each department. This is all of the students at the Marriott Center. Crazy! My graduation at Western was NOTHING like this!
There were so many students there I was pretty sure I would never find Nate, but we spotted him! AND he was close enough so I could snap a picture. What a handsome graduate I have!
In case you can't tell (because of the lighting) this is Richard G. Scott giving the commencement speech.
Proud parents!
Nate's brother, Greg and his family also drove down for the event (17 hours from Bellingham!). We were so happy to have them here! His three girls watched our kiddos for this ceremony, and pretty much kept them entertained for the entire weekend. Awesome!
This is Reid and Greg's daughter, Emily. These two were best friends (and trouble makers!) the whole weekend!
The next day we went to Nate's graduation for all of the engineers. When the graduates all started to come in Katrina said "here come the nerds!" So true, so true.
Crystal and Katrina were awesome helping the boys make it through the LOOOOONG ceremony. They got a job in Alaska for the summer, so we had to say goodbye to them again for the summer. Boo.
All of the nerds!
I'm not much of a photographer, but Nate is getting his diploma somewhere in this picture...
The fam! 
These boys are so proud of their daddy! AND they're so excited to be out of that boring ceremony!
I just have to say that I am so proud of Nate. I know that a Bachelor's degree isn't a big deal for a lot of people, but this degree is eight years, three different majors, three different schools, almost three kids, two states, and one full-time job in the making. He also graduated with a 3.7 gpa with all of that going on. Proud is really not even the word for how I feel about this guy. He has worked so hard and accomplished so much. I sure love him! Congratulations Naters, and thanks for working so hard for our little family. We are beyond lucky to have you!
On an unrelated note, I am having this little boy tomorrow, and luckily Nate's parents decided to stay, and my mom flew in this morning. I am actually pretty nervous even though I have done this twice before. Wish me luck!
Grandpa Tulett really got us into the Easter spirit by dressing up like the Easter Bunny. Look how excited he is to be wearing these ears!
We had a fun little friend/family birthday party with an Easter theme. Link was pretty grumpy that day, but all of the other kids seemed to have a great time!
We had a little Easter egg hunt for the kiddos, and it happened to be the ONLY nice day that week. Lucky us!
Brenadan found the golden egg!
Link got pretty excited when he discovered that there was CANDY inside the egg. This boy is a little bit of a sugar-holic like his daddy.
All of the kiddos enjoying the loot!
It was kind of windy that day, so we got his candles to stay lit for approximately six seconds, but at least he kept the ears on...and had a huge smile on his face...ish.
Cupcake time!
So, I bought cupcakes this year instead of making a cake due to all of the activity, AND due to the fact that I am not a great cake maker, so why stress myself out? I still felt like kind of a bad mom though...
Linkers got some great gifts from all of his cute friends. Thanks everyone!
The next day they had a city-sponsored egg hunt that we took the boys to, and it was sort of a disaster. There were a million people there, and they had each age group roped off and asked all of the parents to let the kids pick up the eggs, so naturally as soon as they said "Go!" all of the parents in the 1-2 year section that Link was in started shoveling eggs into their kids baskets. Link didn't get ANY eggs. He did find one piece of candy that fell out of an egg though. Lucky boy! After the 30 second hunt they announced that any kids that didn't get eggs could come over to the pavilion and get a few, but the parents in THAT line were pushing and shoving too. It was INSANE. I couldn't believe what some ADULTS would do for free candy. Yikes!
We had Easter dinner (made by yours truly!) Saturday night because Greg and his family were leaving on Sunday, and I gave the boys their Easter baskets and matching outfits (of course!) that day as well.
a little more candy can't hurt either...
As a fun side note, we took Link for his two year check-up and here are his stats:
Weight: 23 lbs-3rd %
height: can't remember-15th%
Still just a little guy, but he has literally EXPLODED with talking in the last few weeks. I was starting to get a little worried because he didn't say much of anything for the longest time, but now he sings songs, reads book with me, repeats everything I say and has even started asking for things he needs. Hallelujah! Just in time for baby brother to come!
One thing I have always wanted to do here in the great state of Utah is go check out Moab and Arches National Park. Another thing I have been wanting to do is get some camping and hiking in before this little one arrives. SO last weekend we invited our great friends Logan and Sara to hop in our car and do a little camping with us, and since they had been there several times we had our very own tour guides! Also, do you love how Reid is crammed into the third row with all of our stuff? 4 adults + 2 children + camping stuff for three days all in one Honda Pilot= not very much room for Reid (or one almost 9 month pregnant woman!)
To our chagrin it was the start of stupid Jeep week in Moab so EVERY camp site was filled by the time we got there on Friday. This was a major bummer, but we made the best of it and shared a motel room for the night. Then we got up bright and early the next morning and found a family that was leaving that day, so we could claim our spot!
After we unloaded some gear at camp we all headed up to Arches to explore the park. It was so fun, and Reid did so well on all of the hikes we did. AND I'm not gonna lie, 80 degree weather was right up my alley!
Love this picture of Nate and my Linkers. I think we will need to take our family pictures with Link in the hiking pack from now on. He always seems to be smiling in that thing!
Sara and Reid! He is sort of in love with her. It's pretty cute-too bad she's a little old for him, and already spoken for!
My little mountain goat! When I asked Reid what his favorite part of the trip was he said; " climbing on all of the big rocks!"
Sara and Logan (or should I say Indiana Jones...)
Love this face!
You know, I never liked this terrain before I moved here, but I just love living in a state that has such a variety of climates (without all of the rain that we used to get when we lived in Bellingham!)
We all did the hike up to Delicate Arch, (the one you see on the Utah license plate) and Reid got a little tired, so Logan kindly carried him like this up the steepest part of this hike. What a great friend!
Reid and Sara again
We finally made it!
Link was in heaven with all of the red sand. He seriously looked like a little red-headed boy by the end of the day. He got so filthy!
Right across form our campsite Logan and Sara and I found this awesome little hike that would have made for an excellent trail run, but I was pretty pooped by the end of the day. In fact, going to Moab made me want to run, hike and bike SO. BAD. After I am not nursing this little guy anymore I am going to need some girlfriends to camp and play up here with me!
Nate's favorite part was hanging around the campfire eating s'mores. Anything involving both chocolate and fire is a winner with my guy!
This is me waking up from the worst night of my life. I don't care that I look terrible, I had to document how horrible this night was. First off, the air mattress we brought didn't work, so we had to sleep on the ground (why did I want to do this 9 months pregnant again?). Also, Link had started to get sick when we left, and ended up getting a fever and puking most of the night (yikes), and then both boys got cold so, I had Reid and my BIG belly in my little mummy bag, and Nate had a feverish puking boy in his. Not a great night. At all.
Do you love the irony of this picture? We had so much fun, but were ready to head home the next day. Yay for camping!
Nate graduated last Thursday, so I decided to surprise him and have his parents come out for his graduation. I had been keeping this secret from Nate since January, so it was really exciting to surprise him. After I picked them up from the airport Reid really wanted to hide in the laundry room and jump out when dad got home!
Surprise!
Nate was SO excited! He wanted his parents to come SO BAD. Best present ever!
At BYU they actually have TWO graduations (I did not know this until the day before...). One commencement ceremony for all 6,000 graduates and one smaller ceremony for each department. This is all of the students at the Marriott Center. Crazy! My graduation at Western was NOTHING like this!
There were so many students there I was pretty sure I would never find Nate, but we spotted him! AND he was close enough so I could snap a picture. What a handsome graduate I have!
In case you can't tell (because of the lighting) this is Richard G. Scott giving the commencement speech.
Proud parents!
Nate's brother, Greg and his family also drove down for the event (17 hours from Bellingham!). We were so happy to have them here! His three girls watched our kiddos for this ceremony, and pretty much kept them entertained for the entire weekend. Awesome!
This is Reid and Greg's daughter, Emily. These two were best friends (and trouble makers!) the whole weekend!
The next day we went to Nate's graduation for all of the engineers. When the graduates all started to come in Katrina said "here come the nerds!" So true, so true.
Crystal and Katrina were awesome helping the boys make it through the LOOOOONG ceremony. They got a job in Alaska for the summer, so we had to say goodbye to them again for the summer. Boo.
All of the nerds!
I'm not much of a photographer, but Nate is getting his diploma somewhere in this picture...
The fam! 
These boys are so proud of their daddy! AND they're so excited to be out of that boring ceremony!
I just have to say that I am so proud of Nate. I know that a Bachelor's degree isn't a big deal for a lot of people, but this degree is eight years, three different majors, three different schools, almost three kids, two states, and one full-time job in the making. He also graduated with a 3.7 gpa with all of that going on. Proud is really not even the word for how I feel about this guy. He has worked so hard and accomplished so much. I sure love him! Congratulations Naters, and thanks for working so hard for our little family. We are beyond lucky to have you!
