Ellie's Blessing

Ellie was blessed by her daddy on Sunday September 18th at our house. Eric gave her a wonderful blessing. It is so awesome to have a husband who can bless our children and hold the priesthood. That in itself is a wonderful blessing we have in our family.

We were so happy to have the Williams here with us but missed the Psillos'. Next one is in New York!

We love you Ellie. We are so happy to have you here in our family!

She wore the girl's dress and it was a tight squeeze. If we waited any longer I don't know that she would have fit in it!

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He is obsessed with her. He loves her, sometimes a little too much.

This is the face I fear. Clenched teeth and trouble eyes. He is about to squeeze too hard. Poor Ellie.

Diapering 101

What a sweetie pie, right? Well, don't let this sweet face fool you.....

or these ones.....

This little girl likes to make me clean! Look at the blow outs she has daily. When I get her up from a nap this is what I usually find. Sweet. I didn't dare get a picture of her undressed.

Colt has taken an interest in diapering as well. Barney always needs his bum wiped and is "stinky."

Every time I got to get a wipe out the first few are always used and stuffed back in.

Hard at work getting that diaper on Barney.

Lots of diapering going on around here. Ellie is not going everyday any more so there has been a break from the extreme clean ups. But since she is such a great baby and sleeping at night I will gladly accept blowouts. I am just glad Colt doesn't have blowouts!

Halli's Baptism

My niece Halli got baptized on September 3rd. It was awesome to be able to be there with her on the special day. She looked beautiful in her baptism dress and did awesome during the whole thing. We are so proud of you Halli and the wonderful choice you made to be baptized. Thanks for being a great cousin and setting great example for all of your little cousins!

The girls were excited to see Halli get baptized. We talked about if for Family Home Evening that week and practiced "baptisms" with the girls dolls to show them what would happen. They still are not sure if they want to be dunked like that! You've got a few years girls!

Just Because

Eric brought me home these beautiful roses the other day "just because." It was very sweet of him and they were gorgeous.

The girls insisted they were for them since he had already gotten me flowers another time (Valentine's Day).

There he is! Of course he wouldn't stand with the flowers so I had to sneak him in the picture! Thanks Eric for brightening my day. You are wonderful and I love you so much!

Izzy

A few days after we left New York our dog Izzy disappeared. She was always wandering and always came back but not this time. Two weeks later a man saw Izzy's missing sign and called to tell mom that two weeks prior he hit her with his car on accident. It was raining and he couldn't see her. She had no tag on, thanks to my kids who were playing with her collar while we were there, so he didn't know who to contact. Then he saw the sign later and called.

We will miss you Izzy. Even though you didn't like all the little kids, they loved you.

Izzy would be 18 years old next month. She as been with us forever and I felt like she always would be. It will be strange going home and her not being there.

I knew when she died it would be sad but it surprised me how emotional I got about it. I didn't think I would cry but now a days you can count on me to cry about everything. I'll miss you Iz. Even though I didn't give you lots of attention you were a constant in my NY life and I will miss you.

I wish I had some of the pictures when she was a young fluffy puppy. They are so cute.

Bye, Izzy. See you on the other side.

Yay for Sprinklers!

Just a fun night in the backyard fixing the sprinklers and trying to fix all this dead grass!

I love this picture! Finally both looking and real smiles! Love you kiddos, even when you drive me nuts!

Just Everyday Stuff

Just some pictures from around here. Some new favorite things to say this week: "I shut door,"

"I sorry," "mine," "eww, yuck, gwross," and two all time favorites "no" and "what happened ..." That is finished with everything. "what happened baby?" "what happened Rachel?" "what happened beep beep?" (ear thermometer) "what happened da-dong?" (ding-dong door bell)

Colt wearing Livy's old Thomas the train pajamas. He loves wearing "choo choos."

Rachel hiding from me. We are attempting to get her to stop the thumb sucking. I know it will be a long road but at least she is willing to try now. We don't carry cat around, we put the gross stuff on her thumb (the yuck), and we have a sticker chart/toy motivation. Hopefully we make progress! She has been doing better than I expected so far. Thanks Rae!

Ellie and Mom, 2 1/2 months old.

Some pictures of Ellie. Just hanging out. She's pretty good at just hanging out for a while. She likes the play mat and gets excited to be on it but hasn't tried to roll at all yet. She does twist so she can see the tv though! She sucks her thumb more now even when she is awake when she can get it in there. She is super smiley for me but still camera shy! And she loves when her brother and sister are near her. She loves to watch them.

Play date with Jamie's kids, finally. I had to document it because it had honestly been a year since we got together to play! Between last years opposite school schedules, extra curricular stuff, sickness, travel, Ellie, etc. we haven't seen each other in forever! Jamie and I are the best phone friends but it sure is nice to see my phone friend once in a while! And the kids miss each other. My girls love playing with Kylie and Savannah.

Self portraits of them riding a camel at the zoo in New York. Thanks grammy and poppy for taking us! We loved it!

The girls new favorite line "If you don't buy us this (or let us do that) we aren't going to talk to you anymore." They pulled this for the first time last week at the store and had me rolling, along with the lady in the isle with us. Now they use it a lot. If only they followed through on their threat, even for a few minutes!