Minnesota Trip- July 2010

From July 3- 13th, all four of us went to visit my parents at their new lake home in the SUPER small town of Lakefield, MN. My mom inherited property on a lake and for the past 3 years they have been working and saving hard to build her a home there. She was raised there as a farm girl and is excited to be back. 3 years ago, Justin went up to help my dad clear the land. Last year, we all went up to help them put the house together ( it is a pre-manufactered home), and this year we helped out where Mom and Dad needed us to.

We arrived on the 3rd and got to my parents house super late due to flight delays. On the 4th, we woke up and went to church and then afterwards, we joined my parents, my uncle and cousin and watched the Okobena parade!

Ethan loved seeing the firetrucks, trucks, and tractors (old and new)...

But who am I kidding...what he really loved the most was the candy! That kid scooped up the candy off of the sidewalk super fast and had a look of pure joy on his face while doing it!

Grandma held the loot in her shirt until it was over-flowing with candy. Then, we filled up the back pack.

Ethan was so funny when people would throw him objects other than candy... For example, someone threw some bead necklaces at him and he looked at it on the ground, kicked it back on the street and said, " I no want necklaces. Only candy!" Spoiled? I think so :)

Miss Ellie and I enjoyed watching the parade/ her big brother as well...

While Ethan was shoving his mouth full of candy, Ellie was chomping away at my hand! She loves to do that.

After the parade, we went to the nearby park. Ethan and daddy had fun playing on all the equipment. I just love this picture below! Pure happiness!

That night, we went over to my Uncle Mike's house and the boys popped some firecrackers. Ethan was "so afwaid" and insisted on hiding from the firecrackers like this....

He is so funny. Everything seems to be ok if he has his back turned to whatever he is afraid of!

Ethan loved riding the 4-wheeler with daddy until Justin took him by the hog barn, showed him a dead pig, and then parked the 4-wheeler right in front of the hog barn fans! He wanted nothing to do with the 4-wheeler again! I think that's enough to scare a poor little 3 year old!

But Ethan definitely couldn't get enough of all the tractors and dirt. Little boy heaven!

We worked hard outside doing things like:

Helping grandma put up the bird feeders. Ethan especially like this one. He called it the temple :)

Hauling dirt to fill in low spots....

Clearing some more of the lake view

Using the tractor to pull the freshly chopped down trees to the burn pile...

And watched this good looking guy work hard :) (The wind was blowing his shirt. He really isn't a hunchback)

The work was totally worth it for a beautiful view like this....

Isnt their view beautiful?! They get to look out at this from their back living room window!

Honestly though, I really didn't work very hard doing the things mentioned above. My husband, father and mother? Yes. Me? Not so much. I was busy taking care of these little cuties :) I dare say that I had the best, most fun job!

I know. Gasp. Ellie is actually without a headband!

But my mom would occasionally take breaks and read with our kiddos. This is her most favorite thing to do and Ethan loves to read with her!

We had a great trip and it was so much fun to get to see my parents again! We thoroughly enjoyed having no cell phone service, internet, etc. and just chatting in the evenings and spending time together. Thanks Mom and Dad for having us! We are already looking forward to next year!

New Calling!

We have been in this ward for about a year now and I have had 3 callings. I've been a nursery worker- which I loved and it was SUPER easy, Gospel Doctrine Teacher- which at first terrified me but I learned a lot and really I am quite sad to leave it... and my newest calling is 2nd counselor in the Young Women's Presidency! I am so excited for this opportunity to work with the Young Women!! Here's to completing my goal of finishing my personal progress! (Dont worry, Im still a ways away from doing so :) Wish me luck!

Ellie Marie- 4 Months

It's hard to believe how much this little girl has grown! I LOVE this stage Ellie is in.. I had forgotten how fun it is! Here is what our little lovebug is up to...

• She has found her hands and grabs at everything! She will grab her feet and roll around from side to side, grab objects on her play gym, and if I am holding her, she will attack anything I have in my hands and want to hold it. She has just started to put the objects in her mouth as well. Today I was eating a granola bar and she attacked it with her hands and shoved it in her mouth before I could stop her! So I spent awhile fishing around in her mouth for any pieces :) It is also a lot of fun watching her akwardly put her binky back in. She cant quite do it yet, but she is close.
• I think she will be a blanky baby.. She loves to hold anything in her hands but especially something soft. It calms her right down.
• She is a bottom lip sucker! She doesn't even want her binky most of the time because she sucks on her bottom lip... It is so cute though when she is sucking on it and looks up and gives a big closed mouth smile with those chubby little cheeks!
• She watches everything we do! She is constantly following us around the room with her pretty blue eyes...
• When she is on her back playing, she will arch her back and push with her feet. She is always in a different position than when I left her.
• We finally got her to laugh! Only once though...See post below..
• I haven't had a well check for her yet but she caught a nasty sinus infection and when we went to the doc this week she weighed 14lbs 1 oz
• She still eats every 3 hours although in the next month or so I think I'm going to work on getting her to an every 4 hour schedule. Maybe.
• She sleeps from 8pm to 6am and it is heavenly!

As usual, I can't ever decide on just one or two pictures so.... here's a truck load of them:)

She always pulls her headband down over her eyes but she never seems to complain about not being able to see. I will almost always find her like this when I get her out of the car... silly girl :)

Ethan had to jump in on the camera action too...

"Look Mommy! Brudder and Sister!"

Oh man. I love these two kids SO much!

I LOVE this picture of Ethan... isn't he such a handsome little boy?! I think so. But I may be biased.

Laughing

We just got back from a 10 day vacation up to Minnesota to visit my parents so that is why I have been MIA for the past little while. In the next few days I will try to post all about our trip, but this video of our little Ellie laughing I just couldn't wait for!

We have been trying to get this girl to laugh for a long time and we have only been able to get her to the point of almost laughing... I guess this day she just decided to let it all out! We haven't been very successful in getting her to do it again but I just love hearing her cute little chuckle on this video. Enjoy!