Mommy Moments – Paulin returns home to France

Well Sarah is still gone on her BlogHer conference trip. After we drop of Paulin at the airport, we get to pick her up later today as well. We are so excited!

The past 5 weeks we have had my (Matt’s) 9th cousin from France stay with us. At first Sarah was a bit timid about opening our home to a stranger. I was all for it from the beginning but she doesn’t do well with new things. After a few weeks of gentle persuasion she came to me and said that she was OK with the idea. So right before Independence Day Paulin H. flew in!

The kids were so excited. And poor Paulin was so tired from the long flight.He had such a short lay over in Seattle that his bags ended up coming in on the the next flight.

We drove to my parents for the fireworks. He played with the kids almost the entire way.

We stopped at Craters of the Moon, Idaho.

He saw the July Fourth parade

He saw his first Baseball game on July fourth as well.

He saw how crazy it is to sit out early in Idaho Falls for their huge firework show.

We took him Ice Blocking

We drove through three states and took him through Yellowstone National park.

He saw his first bison. It was only about 15 yards away.

He saw his first hot water pools, and Old Faithful.

We made it there just as it went off –  what timing!

We went on a 50 mile hike that was 5 days long in central Idaho –

Oh don’t worry he was like a mountain goat up there. He loved it.

He helped with the kids and feed Maveric.

If he kept the food out of his mouth.

He did the Big Juds Challenge and won! 1 pound of meat plus toppings, basket of fry’s and a large soda.

He burned it off with Matthew and cut our grass while he was here.

We went to the rodeo. It was the Snake River Stampede – one of the top ten rodeos in the nation

He leaned over during the bull riding and said ” This I Like!”

He was the only one that could get Matthew to ride a pony at a birthday party.

The kids had a blast with the presents from France!

We all went to Roaring Springs water park for the first time… our first as well.

We took him shooting with about 10 different guns. He says that was one of the best days!

We went to Chuck – E – Cheese

 We had so much fun with him. He is such a well behaved, mature 16 year old. Very polite, well mannered, helped out SOOO much, played with the kids, buckled them in the truck almost every time, and was always so thankful. The world would be a better place if all teenagers were like this. We did so much more then the photos here. The times talking and eating had each their own special and fun moment.

We are saving to visit him in France at a Barrand family reunion where about 800 other Barrand’s all show up in a small town. Hopefully the blessing will work out! Thanks Paulin, and his mom and dad for this wonderful summer. We will miss him!