Family Time - Utah!!!

We got to spend the end of June and most of July with family in the west. We started at Grandma Neff's house, with the kids favorite toy!!!

On the first Sunday we blessed Chloe.

Here is the beautiful girl in her dress.

It was great to have some much family there. Both sets of grandparents were there, as well as, my brothers Steve, John and Dave and sister Sandy with their families and Brian's brother David and his sisters Wendy and Christa with there families.

Afterwards we had a dinner at my parents house. It was fun to have our two families together, many of them had never met before.

Chloe also got to meet her cousin Emma who is almost a month older then her.

They next day, my brother from California showed up. We had fun playing with them.

And they had fun playing with us! It was fun staying in the same house as them. We also got to go to the zoo together, even though I have no pictures of that.

They had recently gotten a new little sister. She is only about 3 weeks old when we met her. This little baby got to go see "Eclipse" with many of the older girls in the family and some friends.

Sadly, after a few days they had to return home, they had been gone for a while and we just got to see them for the last few days of their trip.

We also went on a tour of the 'Sweets' factory. It was fun to see where the candy was made even though many of the stations were closing up for that shift so we couldn't see much action, and get to try some freshly made candy. Next year we will have to do the tour earlier in the day. They even made us wear hair nets since we were on the actual production floor.

My brother Steve and some of his family was able to come with us on the tour!!

Another day we went to visit Brian's sister Christa and see her new house. On the way home we got to see my niece march with her school marching band in a 4th of July parade. She is the first one in the second row carrying her flute.

On the 3rd of July we went to the This Is The Place State Park for an extended Johnson family reunion. It was a lot of fun. There was much family there both that I knew and that I didn't know as this family went all the way back to pioneer days. The kids had fun in a watermelon eating contest. Some of my brothers and others of the kids gave it a try as well. I think this picture was taken at the end of the contest. They ate lots as you can see.

They also got to go on a train ride.

Mine for gold which they then traded in for candy.

We also did some crafts. Saw the saddlery of one of the Johnson sons, and many other fun places. I wish that we had more time there. There was lots to see so we will have to do it again some day!!!

The next day we had to say goodbye to daddy and I was left alone with the kids. Thankfully, I still had lots of family around to do fun things with. We went to a fun wild west themed park.

Had story time with cousins.

And played in the sandbox and slide in the back yard.

I know that we did many more things but I wasn't always the best about taking pictures. I did get to help my dad put together a Grandfather clock for my sister, and enjoyed being able to work on a project with him again. It did seem like we stayed busy and got to see lots of family, I just can't think of what we did. It was great to be so close to everyone and reminded me why it would be great to live in Utah, maybe someday.

A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Bed. . .

On Thursday night I went down to get a drink before going to bed and found a cookie on the counter next to the stove, instead of on the plate with the other cookies. I thought this is odd and put the cookie back on the plate. I asked Brian if he had put a cookie next to the stove. He didn't remember doing so and I don't remember getting a cookie out that I didn't eat. A little while late I decided to go downstairs again to check on the cookies. This time there was a rip in the plastic wrap covering them and something was definitely eating one of them. The mouse traps come back out. Since then we have caught two mice. Will they ever stay away?

This is the second time that mice have been found in our house. I am very thankful that Brian is around this time. Interestingly, to me, is that both time they have been found out by chocolate chip cookies. The first time I heard the mouse walking on the crinkly wrapping on some cookies given to us. They aren't even the good kind of chocolate chip cookies, that I would usually make, but ones that we haven't liked as much. Maybe I just need to not have chocolate chip cookies around and then the mice will stay away.

Update 9/5/10 - Three dead mice and no signs of more.

Our Growing Baby!!

Well I realize that I have not been very good at blogging for the last almost five months since we welcomed a little sister into our family.

So, I thought it might be fun to have a blog filled with pictures of her to see she has gone from this newborn baby . . .

to this cute little baby.

Here she is still in the hospital.

At two weeks old or so, as she is saying goodbye to Grandma.

How her brother and sister love her and love to be able to hold her.

(About 2 months old.)

Lizzie always wants our little girl to sleep in her bed.

The kids love their sandbox and loved having Chloe join them for a time.

All clean and wrapped in her towel.

(Three months)

Here she is all dressed up for her blessing. She just keeps getting cuter all of the time.

She has been able to meet some cousins close to her own age.

This one from Brian's side is about a month older.

And this little girl is my brother's daughter who is about 2 months younger.

And here she is will both of her cousins that are within a month older then her. They are all four months old in this picture.

Now for a close up of my baby girl! I might be bias but I don't think babies get much cuter then that!!!

Here is my tired girl after some family pictures.

In her new bed. She looks so small in such a big crib.

The kids are still happy to be by here, where ever she might be!!

And most recently, yesterday we went to a lake and she enjoyed getting her feet wet and wished that she could have gotten in more.

It is amazing how quickly they seem to grow and how quickly one forgets what they were like. Next week she will be five months and babies do seem to just get cuter as time goes on. She has really found her voice in the last few days. It is amazing to think that just a short time ago she was such a little baby. She hasn't yet started doing tricks like rolling over or sitting up, but she is getting stronger and she has really started finding her voice in this last little while. She smiles easily and sleeps well. She will put anything she can grab into her mouth and if she grabs your hair it is impossible to get her to let go. Lizzie will often come to me with a handful of hair that Chloe has just pulled from her head.

Here is a video from the day before she turned two months when I finally got on video her laughing. It is long but it is the best sound to a mother's ears.

We are so grateful to have this little one in our family!!!