The Moodys' Musings

Okay, so I'm finally getting around to posting about our trip to the barn during Easter weekend. It was a beautiful day and my mom, Judson, and I took full advantage of it. Judson especially, as you will see. The barn (and animals) are on the other side of my parents' ranch, so we drove over there. Judson thought the chickens and kitties were fun, but was most enamored with the "tractors" (he calls all types of equipment "tractor").

He was interested to see one of the cows who'd just had twins...until a cow behind him "mooed" and scared him. After the cows, we had to walk to the lower fields to see the sheep and their lambs. I carried all 33 pounds of him the whole way, as he was still carrying on about the cow. :)

All of a sudden, as we were walking along in the field, we stepped into this invisible-to-the-naked-eye huge marshy area and there was water covering our shoes. Judson fell and I took a picture because he was wet. Ha! Little did I know...

We continued walking, and just as my mom said something about the fact that he'd probably fall again, Judson fell into an even bigger "puddle." He was SO happy! And I was so thankful to have my camera to capture this special time for him...and thankful that he just got wet, not muddy.

Yes, there are a ton of pictures here. I took A LOT more than this, however. I think you'll agree it was a picture-worthy event. :)

Sitting in the "puddle"

One of the many times he fell as he ran around. You can see how much he hated it. :)


Look at that water pouring off of him! He probably played for fifteen to twenty minutes before we hauled him away, kicking and screaming. Literally. It was not a fun walk through two fields and up the hill. I had to carry him the whole way because we'd stripped him naked and wrapped in my jacket. The flailing to get out of my arms was what just about did me in... It was totally worth the trouble, though! (And, thankfully the drive back to my parents' is short, because he was N.A.K.E.D. in his car seat. Never thought I'd let that happen...)

We had a fabulous LONG weekend in Bandon to celebrate Easter. Nate has Good Friday off every year (Garmin's headquarters are in the Bible Belt). It didn't used to affect me, because I didn't have Good Friday off when I was teaching. Well, now I love it! He was also given half of Thursday off because Garmin's humongous three year project was completed and oh-so-successful. And, because of ALL of his HARD work on the project, he was given some extra days off this year. Thus, he decided to use a day and came home at lunchtime on Wednesday afternoon. So we basically had four whole days in Bandon. Sadly, we hadn't been down there since Christmas. Of course the days flew by, but we really managed to pack a lot into them.

On Thursday, my mom and I took Judson to the barn (on the other side of the ranch) to see the animals, tractors, and so on. I'm saving that for another post, because Judson had quite an adventure. :)

Friday was gorgeous and we spent lots of time playing outside - at Jim and Kathy Cowan's house (who have lots of fun toys!) and at the park. Anna and Macy walked over and met us at the park Judson had a blast. We went to the park after visiting a couple of Mom's friends at the elementary school. (It was Earth Day and there were lots of activities going on. My mom {and I} thought he'd love to see the baby chicks, butterflies, etc., but he did NOT. I think it was being in a new environment with so many people around, but Judson acted terrified of the animals. {And he's currently obsessed with butterflies...notices them everywhere, though it's mostly in books at this point.})

He LOVED this truck! Kathy actually sent it to my parents' so he could play with it while we were there.

Poor Macy wasn't feeling good, but she was still such a trooper. (Yes, I just got my hair chopped off. I went back the following Monday for a little "touch up," but you get the idea...)

Judson used to love swinging, but lately hasn't wanted to swing at all. I told my mom that, and then of course he proved me wrong by swinging for about forty-five minutes and squealing happily most of that time.

We were at the park a lot longer than we planned to be because he was so happy and it was actually (FINALLY) kind of warm. We headed home at 1:30 and still had to feed Judson before his nap (which usually starts by one). It was totally worth it though.

After Judson's nap, we dyed Easter eggs. He was fascinated. He loves the color purple and points it out constantly. The cool thing about that is that Nate is color blind and can't differentiate between blue and purple. I've wondered if Judson would be color blind, but so far, I'm not thinking he is. In fact, he learned a couple more colors this weekend because we did so many Easter egg hunts for him. He's really consistent with orange (which he also called "beaber" {beaver} for awhile) and generally pretty good with blue, green, and white. His little mind amazes me!

Of course our kit didn't come with purple, but we did some mixing and got a pretty good purple when all was said and done.

We had a great time at Morgan and Anna's on Friday evening (my parents went to church). We had pizza and played a game. Poor Macy was not herself at all (complete with an after-fever rash), but eventually went to sleep and stayed asleep.

On Saturday, we had multiple egg hunts outside before the rain came. Judson caught on right away and loved it! He'd walk around the yard saying, "Eng" (egg) over and over. Precious!

After his nap, we headed to the Phillips' for our annual Easter get together with the Cowans, Goddards, and Phillips families. Sadly, very few of the grown children were home this year. It was still lots of fun, though. The Phillips' granddaughters loved Judson and he eventually loved the attention. :)

I'm not sure which of the twins Judson is sitting on. I do know that he was nearly as big as her...and she's almost seven! (Macy on the other end of the couch...)

Not a great picture, but it shows the twenty week baby bump

We went to the Easter Vigil at my parents' church that night because Macy was being baptized. It started at 7:30 - past Judson's bedtime and near Macy's. Both kids held up well, and poor Macy still didn't feel great.

On Sunday, my mom, Nate, and I went to the sunrise service in Bandon. It's done by the ministerial association and we hadn't been to it in years. It was a great service and a special way to start the day. We loved having the rest of the day to spend time as a family and not have to go anywhere (except back to Salem, but we didn't leave until 7:40 pm).

Before we got dressed up for dinner, Nate and I took Judson back over to the barn for a ride on Bob's Kubota ("tractor," according to Judson). We took a long ride, clear out back and around Bob's cranberry bogs.