Pictures

We have been eating a lot of cherries lately (especially thanks to Grandpa Dave who commented this morning, "These cherries seem to be multiplying!" - he's the one who was bringing bags and bags home)!  Hannah has been having fun eating and wearing the cherries.

This is from Father's Day.  A few days before Father's Day, I suggested that Abby make a card for her dad.  She decided to make him a bow tie.  It was awesome.  He wore it on the way to church but took it off when we arrived so that everyone could see the pink tie she gave him as a gift.

We have started trying our hand at grilled pizza, thanks to this tutorial.  It is good.  (I like my toppings a bit more well done than what the grill can offer so we usually stick it in the broiler for a few minutes after we grill it.  Does that defeat the purpose of using the grill?)

Briton's received his first (much needed) haircut at the salon a couple weeks ago.  Mike said that he was somewhat terrified and that translated in him not moving a muscle and not making a peep.  That translated into him falling asleep in the chair.

More of our trip to the Mountains

Our trip to Durango was very nice.  I didn't really know what to expect of Durango, but it is a great little town.  It has a lot of touristy shops, restaurants and activities; seems to have a comfortable climate (at 7500 feet above see level); and is located in a very scenic area.

The Animas River runs right through the center of town and there are several companies that run rafting and kayaking trips and rent float tubes.  We rented this tube the last day and played in the river for a bit.

One of my favorite parts of our trip was our visit to Mesa Verde National Parks.  Every time I visit a new National Park, I am reminded of what treasures we have in our backyards!  Mesa Verde has Native American structures from 500-1300 AD.  These were built by the Pueblo tribes.  The most spectacular were the cliff dwellings which were built between 1200 and 1300 AD.  They were amazing!

Here are some pictures.  These four are from the Spruce Tree House.  Hannah was with us but she didn't end up in these.

As we waited for our turn to go on a ranger led tour of another cliff dwelling, we drove the Mesa Top Loop.  Here is Briton and Uncle Lance enjoying some scenery.  Also, here is a picture of another cliff dwelling that was not open to visitors, but that had a great view from the road.

These pictures are all of our tour of Cliff Palace - the largest of the cliff dwellings.  We didn't take Hannah on this tour because of the ladders and walking.  Lance, Bekah and Carter were our tour buddies.  It was very neat!

Our last stop in Mesa Verde was at the Junior Ranger station.  Abby enjoyed working on her booklet (and I enjoyed helping her) to receive her badge!

Here is a picture of cute little Hannah since she is painfully missing from this post:

Family in the Mountains

We have spent the past few days in Durango, CO with Mike's family.  We have had a very nice time enjoying the mountains...and especially the company!  One of the highlights was riding this train from Durango to Silverton.  It was a beautiful ride and the scenery was fabulous.  I do love the Michigan beauty, but visiting the west reminds me of how nice it is to be in the mountains.

Here is a picture of the entire group.  It is fun to have everyone here.

In addition to the train ride, we've enjoyed visiting some places in Durango as well as relaxing in the rental house.  Grandma brought bubbles and sprinklers for the kids to play in.

After the sprinklers we bribed the kids with cookies to get a picture of all 7 of them.  I was very impressed with their response:)

We went to a fish hatchery.

This might be my favorite recent picture of my children.

Happy 4th of July!

Happy 4th of July!  We had a relaxing (yet fairly productive) day and ended it with a barbecue with friends and a visit to the St. John's fireworks display.  This was our facebook inspired creation at dinnertime.  Our friend, Cheryl, helped put it together and perhaps it added to our display of patriotism!

 

On the Friday following the 4th, my friend, Crystal, and I went to see Wicked.  We had a really nice time.  While we were gone, Mike and the kids did fireworks in front of the house.  

  

Ford Stuff

After 3 1/2 years of living in Michigan there are (of course) plenty of things for us to still see and do in our new "neighborhood".  Yesterday we got to check one more thing off of our list.

Yesterday we started the day at the temple.  It was lovely and Mike and I got to enjoy a very nice morning together.

After the temple, we drove to Dearborn (25 or so minutes) to go on the Ford Factory Tour.  We've wanted to go on a vehicle factory tour for a long time and really enjoyed it.  Their were two videos at the beginning (that were pretty interesting) and then a walk around the factory overlooking the in progress work of building trucks.  It was mind boggling how intricate the process is.  It is huge and really neat.  We saw bare bones truck parts and fully-functional-drive-off-the-lot trucks.  They don't allow pictures in the factory, but here is one that Abby snapped of Mike and I in a small gallery at the visitors' center.

 

After we finished the tour the bus took us back to the Ford Museum/Greenfield Village.  We have used our pass to visit the museum a couple times, but had never made it to the village.  It is somewhat reminiscent of Nauvoo or This is the Place, but I believe it is quite a bit bigger.  We were only able to stay for an hour before it closed and we had 3 hot children so we didn't see much, but it certainly got us excited to come back for a full day!

  

Camping...finally!

The kids have been begging to go camping since last fall.  Last weekend we headed out to the Lake (the capital L lake, as in Lake Michigan) planning to camp and play at the beach Thursday thru Saturday.  Our trip got a bit of a rocky start when we showed up at the campground certain they'd have some unreserved spots, and they didn't.  Luckily (and miraculously) we were able to get the last spot at the state park 10 miles north of our original destination.  It was actually kind of fun to try out a new campground and beach.  We stayed at Muskegon State Park.

The most difficult part of beach trips is dragging everything across the big, wide, sandy beach down to the water.  We employed cheap labor though and made it.

 

Here are a few more pictures of us at the beach.  We had a good time, enjoyed having our friends, the McKays, join us the last day, and enjoyed good weather (up until the big thunderstorm that moved across the lake very quickly a half hour before we had planned to leave).  We'll look forward to going back!

     

Mitt in DeWitt

Mitt Romney did a quick stop in our town at our favorite local bakery last week.  I dragged the kids out to see him in sweltering weather and we had a fun time.  It's kind of a big deal for our little town of 10,000ish people.  Even though it was one of three stops in Michigan for the day, our little town's bakery got several pictures in several newspapers (including, we're told, the Wall Street Journal).

Here is Abby posing in line with a tooth-ier grin than usual.  (She had lost her first tooth the day before!)

Here are Abby and Briton dancing while we waited for the big Romney bus to arrive.  It is a very short clip, but they look cute.

Here's Mitt.  We were  fairly close to the stage but with all the people in front of me I couldn't see anything (and wasn't even exactly sure where the stage was).  I could hear fine though so I just listened.  About midway through his speech, I turned my head slightly to the right and, lo and behold, I had a very good view of Mitt.  It turns out the stage was slightly more forward than what I'd thought. I felt pretty silly (even though there was no one there to know and make fun of me:).  That is one of the joys of being short!  It was a fun and unique experience.

Toledo

On Memorial Day, we went to the Toledo Zoo.  It is about a 2 hour drive from our home and the kids had no idea where we were going until we arrived.  It was awesome!  I don't have many pictures (but lots of videos) to document our day, but here are a couple.

I put Hannah on the carousel and she giggled every time her horse went up.  It was very cute.

As you can guess by the glistening faces, it was a very hot day!  It was in the mid to upper 90s, but we still had a lot of fun.  Many of the displays and enclosures were shaded so we weren't very uncomfortable.

Speaking of enclosures, they were beautiful (especially the hippos and the elephants).  The kids' area was great!  There was a "house" with a pets display with birds and guinea pigs (to hold).  The kids' area also had a water play area, and areas to watch bees and leaf-cutter ants.

We'd recommend this zoo to anyone in the area and are glad that our friends D&C recommended it to us!

Here are the kids sitting in front of the otter pool.

Random thing:  We took a different route on our drive home and drove through Jackson.  The fundraiser coupon book from Abby's preschool has several coupons for Jackson area establishments that we never use so we decided to get dinner there with our coupon book.  We contributed less than $3.50 to the Jackson economy and got 2 pizzas and 2 good size ice cream sundaes from 3 different restaurants.  Dinner success!

Bike Weather

Abby and Briton are both enjoying their bikes!

The first couple weeks of spring Abby was really struggling with riding her bike and we were both getting fairly frustrated.  My neighbor (who is much more bike savvy than me) checked the air in her tires one day, filled them up and Abby took off.  I am pretty ashamed that I didn't think of such a simple solution.  She is doing really well now and Mike has practiced with her sans training wheels.  I am glad she is enjoying her bike!  (She really does wear a helmet - not sure how she got away without one in these pictures:)

Briton also started riding a little two-wheeler this spring.  We inherited it a few years ago from a friend. Mike gave it a bit of TLC and it is working well for Briton.  He is so little, but the bike fits him well and he looks cute on it.  He still spends a lot of time on his tricycle and big wheel, but I think he enjoys riding a bike like the big kids.

Hannah at 18 months

Hannah is growing up!

This past week she hit the big 18 month mark and went to the nursery at church for the first time.  We thought it would be cute to get a picture of Briton holding her hand, taking her in, but she just about ran into the room so that picture didn't work out quite as planned.  I think that she had a good time in her little class with only a few tears when she remembered she wasn't with mom and dad.

She is talking a fair amount.  Here is a sampling of her vocabulary:

• mama
• dada
• Abba (Abby)
• bubba (Briton)
• out (as in out of the crib or high chair)
• up (can mean up or down)
• baba (blanket or binkie)
• wawa (a drink - milk or water)
• hi
• bye
• Hannah (one of my favorites - when she wants something she screams out her name clear as a bell - it is very cute)
• ni-ni (night-night)
• tee (teeth, as in brushing teeth)
• /s/ (cheese)
• side (outside)

Hannah  has a blanket that she likes to sleep with. She likes to hit sometimes.  My other two have not been hitters so this is new territory for me and I must admit that I often find myself laughing at it (probably not the best way to curb the habit).  Hannah has had a bit of a rough spring with illnesses.  We are hoping that the last episode (ear infection and pink eye) are the last for a long time!

She loves playing outside.  Here is a trick she's pulled a few times.  We've learned to position her bike at a strategic angle so that she doesn't end up in the street.

She is adorable and we are quite in love with her.