Out trip to AZ (a little late) & RATS!

Here are some pictures from our quick trip to AZ in March. We drove there with our nieces who had stayed with us previous to the trip, so we had a full car, but everyone was a good sport (except maybe Colton - who screamed bloody murder for about an hour and half straight soon after leaving at 4 in the morning! - sorry Daryn & Alyxe). Anyway we drove down so that the boys (Nate, my brothers and my dad) could go on a golf excursion for a few days to Sedona, which had been given as a gift at Christmas. We were able to spend a day or so all together though before they left.
Here is a picture of Lexi & Tyler having gramma & grandad wrapped around their little fingers :) They're both having their arm/ back tickled...a favorite pastime inherited from their mom!

Colton enjoying some time with Gramma Suzie and a whole load of beanie babies. I just love his cheesy grin in this pic!

Colton with his "betrothed", once again, Maddy. I think it's so cute she's so enthusiastic in this picture and Colton's giving her this look as if to say "Take a chill pill, lady!"

This is Colton with his new best friend the Bingo dog (that you saw in the video from a previous post).

Mother and daughter racing around the pool on those super cool "wiggle cars" (I don't really know what they're called, but they're fun!)

On our last night there, my parents took us to Amazing Jakes (which for those of you who are from the Springs is a mix between Mr. Biggs and IT'Z). The kids had a blast - most especially with the bumper cars!! Tyler was like this driving maniac with a wicked laugh, it was so funny to watch.

Gotta love the tea cups!! You won't be finding me on that ride any time soon (I'm feeling woozy just thinking about the flashbacks).

Colton and Grandad having a ball!

OK, so from the title you might have wondered where the RATS fit in....well on our first day there my brother Ben and his family brought over 2 of their pet rats because they were sick (one had heart issues) and didn't want to leave them alone. Well I don't know about most of you, but I get a little squeamish around rats mostly due to their creepy tails. I was sooon educated on them and realized these pet rats weren't anything like the stereotype I had in mind. So here's my brother with their rat Eileen (named after my late grandmother - who is about the sweetest lady you could ever meet, farthest from a "rat" you could get) grooming him.

After seeing this and hearing it was a somewhat typical routine for the rat, I was totally grossed out! But again, I began to understand that this rat is like the "alpha female", very motherly and considers my brother Ben one of her own, I guess, and so out of an act of love she likes to groom the inside of my brother's mouth. I asked how he could stand it, and he said if you try to yank her out her claws will do some major damage as you can imagine. Anyway they are actually very clean animals and very loving. So after "warming up" to the rats a bit, we all took turns petting them (some still rather timidly - like myself) etc.

Here's Aunt Jamie introducing the rat to the kids.

Even Colton got in on the action, although I don't think he was overly excited!



Here's Eileen (atleast I think that's the one) exploring my mom.

And finally, here's me, trying to be a good sport with the rat. It was hilarious because the rat quickly crawled inside my shirt and almost instantly fell asleep! It actually took a nap in my shirt, snoozing away for like 10 minutes. It was quite warm and cuddly, yet still I was a little worried about how well "potty-trained" it was, so-to-speak. If you can look closely at the tag of my shirt, you'll see it says "ANXIETY".... fitting I thought for this particular situation!! Anyway, I now have been enlightened to the sweeter side of rats and no longer find them quite as creepy, although I don't think you'll be finding one in my mouth anytime soon!

Overall, it was short trip, but we had a great time seeing our family and good friends. Hopefully next time Colton will be able to handle the trip a little better.