The Wolf's Den: August 2009

You know you're in blogging trouble when it takes you three different days just to upload the pictures!
Ahem... onto Our Summer Trip!
What a whirlwind of fun! We started the trip out in San Diego with Rudy's family. We were able to fit it a lot of fun in the time we were there!

We were able to celebrate Rudy's 29th Birthday (Dr. Wolf, you're gettin OLD! :)
Rudy had some great help opening presents, blowing out candles and eating cake...the tough jobs!

Some good quality time was spent with Oma and Opa.
Some yummy food was eaten- with some great company!
And, of course, Oma and Opa's pool was a HIT! Tucker became quite the swimmer while we were there.
I'm sure he became such a good swimmer because of the great teachers he had! :) (Rudy showing his excellent dog-paddling skills)
We were able to go to Sea World. It's so fun to go back to places with your children and rediscover a magic only kids can see.

Tucker's become quite the comedian. His faces and jokes keep coming and keep us laughing.
A rare couple shot. So fun to share all this with you! Love you, babe!
We got to go with Oma and meet up with Rudy's ol' buddy Ryan Mcknight with his wife, Jen, and their little girl, Kayla.

As if that weren't enough fun, we went up to Big Bear to the cabin. We enjoyed a trip to the local 'zoo'.

We got to take the Miller's (Oma and Opa's Big Bear friends) boat out for a day to do some serious fishing.
The boys seemed to really enjoy being on a boat.
And I've got mad skills catching seaweed.Heading to the Big Bear ward for church with our handsome boys (Tucker sporting Rudy's or Adam's old suit)
One of the really nice parts about this trip was that Rudy was finally able to relax. He had no tests to study for, nothing looming over his head. It was fun to watch how much fun he was able to have. He was able to participate in some serious 'man-boy bonding'.

Then this is the part in the trip where the road, and pictures, split. I left with Cooper to go to Utah for a few days to do a mural and see my family. We all wanted to be able to go, but with cost of travel, we decided it'd work best if I went with the 'free flight child' and Rudy and Tuck stayed back. It was a fun adventure and so nice to see the family, but Rudy and Tucker were definitely missed in Utah.

Picture of the mural I did...blow it up...it looks better ;)

The rest of my and Coop's time was filled with fun, games, and family. Cooper LOVED being around all the cousins, aunts, uncles, and Nana and Papa. So much so that he got quite perturbed when he was left alone.

Nana showing Cooper (and Ginny's cute twinners) the 'Gardner ways' of game playing early on in life.We had a 24th of July family party, where Rudy and Tucker were really missed, but it was really nice to have almost the whole family together!

Although I have all boys and love it, I LOVE my 'girl group' of friends that I have in my family!

So, do we look like we're related?

Rudy and Tucker missed us terribly and were barely able to get out of bed while we were gone...wait, NO. :)
Rudy called me every day with a new adventure.
They went to the science museum together, swimming, shopping, parks, etc.

Tucker loved his bonding time with Oma and Opa, while Rudy enjoyed a lot of I'm-pretending-I'm-a-bachelor-again time with his some old friends and brother, going to 'fight-night', deep-sea fishing, surfing, etc.) It was a fun week for us, but nice to be back together again!
Coop and I came back to San Diego for the last couple of days before we all made the long flight back home to Richmond. We got in touch with the Bramwell's (Rudy's family he lived with for a while after he joined the Church), and we were able to go visit them and enjoy a little more swimming and then head over to a kid's play place and get some ice cream with Oma as the last party day came to a close.

The small picture just doesn't do the true ice cream mess justice.

After a looong flight and lack of sleep, we made it home again! We're still trying to play catch-up on all the things that should have gotten done while we were too busy playing. :) But that's what summer's for....right??
That, and Keepin' Kool. Nice shades*, boys.* the shades were actually 3D glasses from a movie that Rudy and I got to see in the Theater!...wow. that was fun. It had been SOO long since Rudy and I had been to a real theater. Like, SO long that when they told us, with a discount, the total for the two of us to see the movie would be $28, we laughed and told him, oh, sorry, you must have misheard us, we just wanted 2 tickets. Yeah.