Ethan's Blessing

This Labor Day weekend Bryan and I were able to drive to Utah to be part of Ethan's blessing. Whew, we have sure made a lot more trips to Utah this summer than last! Ella had just had her 3rd birthday so we were able to celebrate with her on Saturday as well. It was a very busy weekend filled with friends and family!

I feel like I am always taking pictures of other things so I wanted to get something of the two of us. Bryan and I still love each other a year and four months later! :)

We decided to go to the Treehouse Children's Museum in Ogden. On the way there I helped Ella put together this fabulous birthday crown. What a cute smile she has!

The museum has tons of different sections from music to politics, even. Check out my very presidential husband! Watch out, Obama!

Ella loved running to all the different places. The museum was surprisingly empty this day so she mostly had free reign of the place. Bryan and I thought it was a pretty awesome place too!

We all attempted to the pull the sword from the stone but I suppose none of us were meant to be king.

Ride 'em cowgirl! She loved it when we'd rock the horse back and forth really fast like she was really riding a galloping horse!

Bryan thought he was giving me antlers here but it looks more like jazz hands to me... This ended our fun at the museum. We then stopped at Super Target (we don't have any here in Boise, unfortunately!) and ate dinner at Taggart's. I was full for the rest of the night and what felt like in to the next day!

We got up incredibly early the next day and drove down to Lehi for Ethan's blessing. It was a great experience and a beautiful blessing.

Ella decided in the middle of the family festivities that she really wanted me to take a picture of her wearing her apron that I made her. Glad she liked it!

Ethan is such a sweet little baby. I got to hold him for a very long time and it was really nice.

Uncle Bryan held him a little as well! He started squirming at one point and Bryan, unsure of what was going on, handed him back to me. I thought this was just kind of funny.

We spent the entire day there at Shelley's and it was a lot of fun. We played games and laughed a lot. I am so lucky that I married into a family that I feel I can be entirely myself with and whose company I truly enjoy.

The next day we had to leave to return to Boise but not before meeting up with the Pfaffs and Jasps for lunch at Kneaders in City Creek Center. What an awesome place!

We brought Callie as well and left her at Bryan's moms. She mostly stayed in the basement with us and had free reign of that, which I think she enjoyed. We tried to have her come upstairs a few times to socialize with the dogs but she was pretty wary of them. Hopefully she will eventually be able to be friends with them. You can kind of tell here that Callie is ready to escape should Guinevere try anything but Gwen is just being a happy dog. She was the most interested in Callie of the two dogs.

Well, this September is going to be a very busy month for us! We'll be in Utah again for Bryan to do recruiting at BYU for Clearwater Analytics. It will be crazy to be back there! Then we will go to Maryland and be a part of Sylvie and Jack's blessings. I'm excited to meet those two!

For now, I think its nice to be back home in Boise. We sure do love living here. 

The Fair

This past Saturday Bryan and I went with our friends Lee and Suzanne to the fair here in Boise. Someone asked us the previous week if we were going and we hadn't even heard about it. I didn't go to fairs very often as a kid so I kind of assumed we wouldn't but, to my surprise, Bryan really wanted to. He said it was a tradition in his family to go to the fair each year so we went. It sounds like a nice tradition to have. I really shouldn't have been surprised because a fair, rather than a carnival that just passes from town to town, is really a community oriented event. Bryan loves to feel like part of a community and give back to it, if he can. I was excited to ride a ferris wheel with him for the first time but he was more excited about seeing the animals and looking at all that was contributed from people in our community.

Here are a few pictures I snapped, mostly of animals.

I took these two for our niece Ava, who very much loves lambies and has already decided to be one for Halloween!

These ducks were simply massive!

Bryan got to brush this cow. I pet a calf who licked my arm! It was kind of sweet, actually.

What a tender little horse moment.

Piglets!

From the top of the ferris wheel! I didn't think it was scary and didn't realize how many people do think so. It has been so smoky here in Boise for the past little bit. We desperately need some rain and have been having some fires.

Of course you have to eat funnel cake when you go to a fair!

Then we caught a twenty minute illusionist show before heading home. He was actually pretty good!

I'm glad we went-- I'm sure it will become a yearly tradition for our family!

Camping

My parents didn't take us four girls camping very much when I was growing up. We went maybe twice, but I can really only remember one time distinctly. I did go to girl's camp for a week each summer from ages twelve to seventeen but, call me crazy, I really like air conditioning, showers, electricity, soft sheets and not getting eaten by bugs. I'm what you might call 'indoorsy'. Regardless of all this, I was pretty excited when Bryan mentioned to me that he wanted to go camping. It would be our first camping trip together!

We decided to do a short one night camp trip this past weekend and spent the week excitedly preparing. Bryan researched tons and tons of campgrounds to fit our needs. We went out nearly every night getting things we would need and making lists. The plan was to pick Bryan up early from work on Friday and go to the DMV (we needed to get Idaho licenses) and then pack everything up and drive to a campground near Lake Cascade. Then, we'd set up our tent and Bryan would build a fire using his awesome boy scout skills and we would roast hotdogs over the fire for dinner and then have smores and hot chocolate. Then, we were going to relax and just hang out until around midnight, where we would find somewhere nice and open to watch the Perseid meteor shower. Then we'd go to bed and when we woke up the next morning we were going to fry some bacon and eggs before breaking down camp and heading back to Boise. That's how it was supposed to happen.

Let me tell you what really went down. Everything at the DMV went fine and we came home, packed up and started out. To get to Lake Cascade we needed to go down highway 55. We'd been going on this road for a little while when we saw a sign saying the road was closed in 25 miles. We weren't ready to turn around yet and the drive was really beautiful. I thought that surely there would be a way around it and as long as we had our GPS it could easily find us an alternate route if it came to it. The closer we got the more information we received. It turned out that the highway was closed due to a fire-- we started getting a little more nervous but hoped the signs were old. We followed a camper driving that way hoping they would be able to get through. Well, we reached the road block and there was no way around. It had been an electrical fire and the man there said the best alternate route would add three hours to our trip!

We decided to turn around and I tried to find a new campsite on my phone even though the internet kept going out due to our more rural location. The other parks we'd been looking at were a couple of hours southwest of Boise whereas we'd already gone an hour northeast. We were also worried that, since it was getting later, availability would be a problem. We had thought most camping was first come first serve but now plan to make reservations in the future. I didn't want to give up and go home because of all the planning and preparation that we'd put into this. Finally, I found a campsite in Caldwell that still had some tent sites available and it was only about 25 miles from Boise so we decided to go there.

When we arrived we realized this wasn't really a great campground. It was right next to the highway so we heard cars passing the whole time we were there. It wasn't really in a forest either and there were a ton of RVs and we realized that a lot of the people actually just lived there. There wasn't really a forest around and not really any privacy between campsites. We'd been planning on making a fire but the person at the desk told us they were wary of fires right now and encouraged us to use the charcoal grill. So, with all these disappointments we settled down anyway and set up camp.

We had to go into "town" and buy charcoal. Because we'd had a plan for it with the fire but not the grill, we had to scrap the plan about the hot chocolate, bacon and eggs. We'd brought a skillet and small pot and Bryan was going to making a little stove of sorts but we realized that the grill wouldn't supply sufficient heat to these things. So, we just decided to go home earlier in the morning and make those things there.

Here we are, camping. Note all the RVs in the background and, if you can tell, limited privacy.

We played some card games on Bryan's Thai rice mat.

We had to reteach ourselves how to play golf.

We had meant to try and leave our phones alone for the most part but gave in just a little.

Around 10:30 I was really tired and starting to get a headache so I decided to shut my eyes just for a little bit. We didn't end up going out to watch the meteor shower. There were people outside randomly fishing in the dark so I felt awkward just going out there. We opened a "window" on our tent and looked out that way. I think I might have seen a shooting star earlier in the evening and Bryan says he thinks he saw one too.

We got up, packed up, headed home and ate delicious eggs and bacon. We decided that, even though it wasn't the greatest place and that the trip wasn't all we'd wanted it to be, it was at least practice. Next time we'll know better and plan better and, hopefully, it will go a lot smoother.

And now, in case you didn't click the link above, I've provided this hilarious clip for your viewing pleasure:

So Long, Farewell

This weekend our friends David, Weston and Alicia came up to Boise for a visit. David and Weston are moving in a week across the country so its unlikely that we'll see them even as often as we could with us in Idaho and them in Utah. We had a fun time going to the Farmer's Market, eating a lot of food, adoring Callie and playing one million games. It was sad to see them go. Hopefully Alicia can visit some, at least. Here are a few pictures I took from their time here.

I am covetous of that shirt. Here is the aforementioned Callie adoring.

Playing "Say Anything" and "Loaded Questions". The boys also played a lot of video games and Alica and I played Skip Bo. For those who have played, are the very low numbered cards blue or purple? This was a very big debate.

David didn't want me to take a picture of him.

For some reason David's abs became a recurring theme in our jokes over the weekend so of course we had to take a picture (clothed).

It was really hard not to spend 100% of the time adoring Callie.

I just wanted to document the video game playing. Poor boys-- they grew up together playing video games and this probably the last time for a long while that they'll all be together doing it. Of course, I'm the one being sentimental here. The boys are probably like, "Uh... yeah. Okay." Oh, boys.

I made this delicious cake. Seriously, this is some of the most moist chocolate cake I have ever made or had.

Anyway, goodbye friends! We will miss you a lot!

Lastly:

This is probably the best thing I've ever found between the couch cushions.

Our Recently Adorable Life

This post is mostly about cute things. What can I say? A lot of cute things have been happening to us lately. For one, we got Callie about a month and a half ago. She is a joy to have around. I realize the next two pictures are almost identical but I couldn't help myself.

Believe me, I have taken oh so many pictures of this sweet girl. I'd say 90% of the pictures on my phone are of her. Woops. Am I turning into someone who talks about her cat all the time?

She is pretty much a hoot, too. She does the silliest things. She is easily transfixed by lights on the ceiling or floor. She used to arch her back and prance around like that whenever she saw her reflection. She tries to be very sneaky. This is just one video I happened to get of her being her silly self.

I also have started trying to get into crafting. I decided to make one of my nephews a baby blanket. It mostly turned out great.

Except for the edging... That's going to take some practice to get down.

 

I also stabbed (not pricked, stabbed) myself in the hand with a quilting needle while putting these ribbons in. Don't worry, I didn't get tetanus but Bryan was worried.

Here is baby Jack (my sister Natalie's new baby) modeling the mustache pacifier I made for him. Unfortunately, baby Jack lives across the country from me and I've yet to meet this sweet little thing. That pacifier seriously didn't seem this big when I saw it. He is just a tiny little guy.

Last week, Shelley had her baby as well so we drove down to Utah this past weekend to meet baby Ethan.

He was a very sweet thing as well. We got the opportunity to see him and hold him several times while we were there.

There is nothing like holding a sleeping newborn. So precious and innocent.

It was a nice weekend but, sadly, we had to leave on Sunday. Check out this gas station we stopped at near Twin Falls on the way back. There was basically no one there. I felt like it was a scene out of a movie or something.

We are just awaiting one more adorable little addition to our family! She should be arriving no later than Wednesday!