Tiny Ballerina

Randoms

We took the boys to the zoo while mom and dad were visiting for Hannah's blessing. They had "bugzillas" all over the park, so there were giant bugs of every kind all over that moved and that the kids could climb on and learn about.

 Stephen bought himself a set of golf clubs to go golfing the one time a year that his office has a tournament. Good lookin guy!

 Brad and Heather recently visited, so we took them to Wheeler Farm out by our old house. The kids loved getting to feed the horses...even though they weren't supposed to. Oops.

 My loves.

Lucas was nice and gave Hannah his baby and blanket to keep her warm.

 I can't get enough of this cute girl! Everywhere I go I get compliments of how beautiful she is. Indeed! She is starting to laugh and smile more and more every day. She is two months old and weighs 11.11 lbs. She is in the 75th percentile in all categories, so she's above average. She lights up the whole room when she is present. We are so glad to have her!

We took the boys to Black Island Farms for FHE this week. Their favorite thing were the slides. They couldn't get enough of them. they had lots of different slides and straw mountains to climb up and through. There was a corn pit, animals to pet, food, pumpkins, and the corn maze. Zander really wanted to do the maze, but it was really big and getting late. I didn't want to take the whole family inside the maze only to get lost, so we'll have to do that another time. There were also a lot of mosquitoes. Being right next to the lake has its downsides, so next time we'll bring bug repellent too.

My Happy Place

General Conference weekend ended up being cold and rainy. Saturday we loaded up the kids, between sessions, and took them for a walk around Silver Lake up the Big Cottonwood Canyon. We promised to take the boys to the mountains a few weeks earlier just to get out of the house as a family since we had kinda been cooped up since Hannah joined our family. I wanted to get one last hike in to see the changing of the trees before it got too cold.

We made an attempt two weeks prior to this trip, and we ended up getting lost and unable to get to the trail head because the roads had been washed out. I tried to find a new place we hadn't been before, but it didn't work out too well, so we went to a place we knew. We had visited Silver Lake two years ago when Zander was just a baby. It was easy enough for the kids to walk, and I could take Hannah in a stroller. It was a nice little outing and the boys loved it. Lucas had to stop and look at everything, and Zander liked to run on the path. We saw a chipmunk and two ducks. I love the mountains. Just driving through the canyon looking at what beauty surrounds us feeds my soul--it lifts my spirits. It is my happy Place. I want to make it a goal to go more often next year. It's harder to get out and do things like that with three small children, but I'm hoping to instill a love of the outdoors in my kids, or at least an appreciation.

Sunday morning Stephen got up and made donuts for breakfast. The boys helped, and sampled everything Stephen made including the dough to make sure it was good. They were. Especially with sprinkles.

Peeling Peaches

We went to Twin a few weeks ago to can peaches with grandma. It was a nice quiet visit for a few days. The boys played outside a lot or with grandma. I didn't do much to help with the canning though even though I wanted to. I was about four weeks postpartum and the night we worked on them I wasn't feeling very well. Mom stayed up super late to get most of them done without me. I felt bad because I wanted to work on them together, but I just wasn't up for it that night. I was exhausted and feeling sick. Dad took Zander on a man trip to Elba over night. To say he was excited was an understatement! Lucas was sad he had to stay behind because he and Zander do everything together. The "men" came home the next morning so I asked Zander what he did on his trip. In his words: "We went to great grandpa's house in the mountains, and I got to eat three breakfasts! I had pancakes, and donuts, and toast. Grandpa showed me a dog movie, and we went on the four wheeler to get Jack, and Libby, and Misty, but I got tall grass in my face; it scratched me. Mom, I am a man now." When they got home Lucas got to go with grandpa by himself to the store for his man trip for an hour or two before mom and dad headed out to Spokane for Ezra's baby blessing.

We went to Joseph and Trish's to celebrate Devin's 11th birthday that night. The boys had fun playing with their cousins. When we got back to the house Brad drove up to get some ice cream, and didn't know I was in town (or forgot) so he invited us over for breakfast the next morning before we headed home. Heather fed us peach waffles, and sausage. YUM! Hannah pretty much slept through that whole day with the exception of eating here and there. She must have been really tired. We stayed at Brad's the whole day, so we stayed another night at mom's because I was too tired to drive home in the evening. I ended up cutting up the rest of the peaches mom didn't get to and bagged them for peach crisp or pie. I found that peeling peaches is really therapeutic! It was really relaxing and satisfying peeling the whole skin off as I stood over the kitchen sink in the dark with just my thoughts to keep me company. I knew I needed to get to bed, but I had to finish the peaches. Hannah would be up soon to eat again anyway, so I did what I needed to do so we could leave early in the morning so we could be back home in time for church. Hannah slept til 6:00 that night. What a blessing!

I love getting to visit mom and dad. I'll take any excuse I can to go to Twin. I need to get it all in before I have kids in school that will hinder our frequent visits.