Families are Forever

I absolutely can not go to WA without going to the temple, our temple. This was Adelyn's first trip to where our family officially began. I LOVE visiting the temple and bringing our children to where we were sealed together 6 years ago. The grounds, as always, were completely stunning. I love the hydrangeas that are in bloom right now. So gorgeous!  They just got done planting some new trees and such. I can't wait to see how they grow in the next couple of years.  Visiting the temple is always so 're-centering' for our family. Our temple marriage is what anchors our family in the gospel, and I'm so grateful for that.

Twins Reunited

One of my dearest friends, Jana, that I've known since I lived in Germany lives in Vancouver, WA.  I'm sure most of you have heard me to refer to her as my twin, since we have so much in common. Her little girl Ellie is 3 months older than Addy. I hadn't met Ellie yet and it had been torture!  So, when I was in WA, we had a girls' day and slumber party and Addy and Ellie played while Jana and I crafted!  It was perfect and sooo wonderful to spend relaxing time together.  I love when you go somewhere and just immediately feel at home. That's how it is for me visiting Jana.  I immediately felt at home and comfortable.  I just know Addy and Ellie are going to be life-long friends like Jana and I are.  It was so fun to see our girls together.

Ellie really love Addy's bows.

The girls actually didn't let us craft a whole lot, so we stayed up late watching a movie and crafting away.

And here is our mostly finished products: Jana's are on the left and mine on the right. The material under the onesies are going to be skirts. :D We made lots of adorable hairbows for our girly-girls. :)

We tried to do a little photo shoot with our girls and we got some cute photos that definitely illustrate our girls at 1 year and 9 months- silly!



Addy really loved Jana's sweet kitty Pepper!

This picture just makes me happy.  BFF!

Liam came the next morning and gave Miss Ellie Bean a few hugs.


Someday, Jana. Someday we'll be neighbors!  Can't wait for that day. We miss you guys so much already!

The Beach

When we took our trip to San Diego, Liam went crazy over the beach. I also love love love the beach, so we really wanted to spend an afternoon at the beach. We know it's not a southern California beach, but it's a beach all the same.  Before we got to the beach, we had to stop at the Tillamook Cheese Factory.  As many trips as I've made to OR/WA, I still hadn't been there. It was a lot of fun and really cool to see the processes associated with making cheese.  We had to take the photo op with the Tillamook cows. ;)



Just a cute pic of my cuties:

Then we headed down the beach and just had an AWESOME afternoon. It was cool and breezy, but we just had a blast chilling out.  Liam and Chris and Tristan had a blast digging and playing in the sand. At one point, Liam even made himself a little sand gotee. So funny! Addy even enjoyed the beach.  She was all smiles.

Washington 2011

Wes was having his 10 year High School class reunion this year, so we decided to make a vacation out of it and all headed to Washington. The drive there was less than ideal (Addy cried pretty much the whole way) but we had a lovely vacation once we got there.

Liam enjoyed helping Kelsey, LaVon, Tristan and Chris (the last three are Wes's parents' foster kids) pick green beans and jumping on the trampoline. He had a lot of fun with the kids and enjoyed playing with them.





One day we went  to the Portland Children's museum. It was a ton of fun! Liam enjoyed all the kid-sized things such as the grocery store, water works play area, and most of all, of course, the stage! 



Addy and I were a little over-excited about the water area. ;)





Liam was in HEAVEN when he got to go up on a 'logging loco'.  He thought it was sooooo cool! This was his favorite.




I have a few more posts of different activities during our stay- so stay tuned!

Ten Montheroonies!

Well, it's already that time again-- Addy is 10 months! I can't believe she'll be a year old in 2 short months. We are just loving every minute with this sweet girly.

Here are a few fun things about our girl at 10 months:
*She is very active and mobile- climbing stairs, walking along furniture, crawling like crazy, etc. She gets the biggest smile on her face when you walk into a room and then she crawls after you as fast as she can and squeals. SOO sweet. When she knows she's climbing stairs and is not supposed to and you come after her, she squeals and giggles and thinks she's hilarious.
*We had an eventful visit to the allergist a few days ago which revealed allergies to egg, milk, peanut, and cashew. More about that in another post. :(
*She lights up whenever she sees her brother. They play all sorts of 'games' together. He taught her how to do "SO Big, BYE BYE!" which is a combo of, you guessed it, so big and bye bye. Pretty cute.
*After our trip to Washington, she officially hates being in the car. She used to be SUCH a good traveler, but hopefully she'll go back to that.
*She's working on using a sippy cup as well as eating all sorts of solid foods now.
*I know I say this all the time, but this girl is pure happiness. She is so easy going and just a JOY to have in our lives.

Science Camp

During July, Reno does a program called Art Town where there are numerous activities all throughout the month, related to all different forms of art. Liam and Izzy attended a science camp where they learned all about space and did many different forms of art related to space. At the end of the week, they put on a little play. It was sooo cute. Liam was, of course, at the center of it all as the sun. lol. The teacher said we definitely need to feed his theatrical side. :) He did a great job with his lines and performance. I could tell he had a lot of fun. Izzy was a sweet little butterfly.   It was definitely a fun way for Liam to spend some of his summer time.

Sooo Big!

I don't exactly know why or where this came from, but we did the whole "How big is Liam?" and he'd stretch his arms really high when we said, "SOOO big!"  It was sooooooo cute. :D  So, we decided to teach Miss Addy and it definitely hasn't lost its cuteness. Liam has had so much fun teaching Addy and doing it with her.  It's pretty fun to watch.