Wednesday, October 22, 2008

FHE at the Cabin


We got to spend some time with our cousin's Miriam and Ellie at the Cabin for FHE. Grandma provided a fun Halloween lesson with puppets. We always enjoy throwing sticks and rocks into the water, and Ellie is just always happy!

Happy Birthday Mia! #2



My sweet baby girl is now 2! I'm still having a hard time processing. She sure is fun, and is enjoying getting older, to be like her big brother Aidan.


Here is Mia doing her most favorite thing...READING! She loves books, and is frequently found in her bedroom entertaining herself. We love that she loves books, and hope it continues!

Day at the Park


One of our favorite places is Salem pond. We go there to feed the ducks and just enjoy the beautiful scenery. They have a fun playground, and a nice walking trail around the park. We like to go here in the winter just to get out of the house!



Monday, September 29, 2008

The Grotto




The Colors


Saturday we were lucky enough not to have plans and were able to go up the Canyon to enjoy the beautiful colors. We took some pictures of our friends, enjoyed some scenic views, and took a hike to the Grotto. A perfect hike for little kids. It contains several log bridges over the stream that they find fascinating. We had to take some pics of the kids, as they're growing up way too fast for us. They're in such a fun stage that we'd love them to stay in for awhile. But, I'm sure that more will come....right?

Cute Sayings

My kids say lots of cute things, and I need to write them down more often so that I remember them. Here are a few from today.

Aidan is asked what else he wants for breakfast "I only eat chocolate mommy," Dad had given him a granola bar earlier (with chocolate in it).

Our favorite "Aidan talk" is during the prayer when he says "Bedankdee"- We thank thee

Aidan's ALL-TIME constant, favorite thing to do is tell us what we're going to be. "Mommy, how bout you can be Nala's mommy, I can be Simba, Daddy can be Mufasa and Mia can be Nala". Within 10 minutes, our roles are changing to car colors, dinosaurs, The Incredibles etc.

Mia's favorite Movie is also Lion King, which she calls TATA for Hakunna Matata. This goes for any of the figurines, the book etc.

And after pulling up into the garage, Mia announces our arrival with "WAHOME".

Casey and I look forward to coming home, for Mia's welome. She runs to us with open arms, screaming either Yay Mommy, or Yay Daddy.

During Aidan's nap one day Ali and Randy brought by a slide/playground set from Aunt Carolyn for our backyard. When Aidan woke up and looked outside, he asked.." How did that grow there daddy? With lots of rain, sunshine, and love?"


Sunday, August 24, 2008

Yellowstone Trip

Wow, I can't believe this summer's almost done. We were lucky enough to take a trip to Yellowstone before Casey started back to work. We spent 3 nights there with the kids in a tent...and we had a blast.

The kids were great, loved the outdoors, and surprisingly slept wonderfully. They were excited to see all of the animals and play in the dirt to their hearts delight. We were able to see quite a few Buffalo/Bison up close and also some elk, but no Moose or Bear (I'm okay with that). The campgrounds did a great job of posting signs in the restrooms of Buffalo and Bear attacks to keep you on your toes. We had some sporadic weather while we were there, but we survived and it kept it interesting! Our tent issues started as we arrived past midnight our first night. We then discovered that we had forgotten our rain fly, and the forecast was for rain. We placed out picnic blanket on top of us, but got lucky in that it didn't rain that night as we all cuddled up on the floor together. The next day we moved sights and placed out tarp over the top, which came into good use several times throughout our trip.

One of our favorite stops was a trip to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone and it's falls. They were beautiful. We hiked down the 375 steps to reach this lookout point, which was beautiful. More amazingly to us, was that Aidan was able to walk all the way down and back up with no problem. He has sure built up a lot of strength in this last year and it doing great!
Our kids have been pretty good at posing for pictures lately. So much so that at times, they won't give you a nautral simle, but we love them!
Here are the falls from another lookout point. It was great to see it upclose, and then to see them from this distance made it's grandeur more amazing.



Old Faithful, was very true to her name. We were able to check it out twice, and we tried to see others... but just missed them. We got to snack on our favorite treat though (ice cream), as it was a very hot day, which we were a little unprepared for.

Overall, a very successful trip that was enjoyed by all. One of my favorite memories if of Mia waking up and chasing the moles/squirrels and calling them "mousey's". The only part I would change would be the drive home. I would have borrowed by neighbors DVD player, as the kids were quite ready to be home. Here are the last of our pics, hope you had a fun summer too!