Washington Trip

2 weeks ago we took a family trip to Washington for a family reunion. We stayed at Ensign Ranch. It was a lot of fun. I always love getting together with James' family. I grow closer to more people each time.

First though, James' aunt called me 2 days before we were supposed to leave asking if we could house them for a night. We are the half way point from Utah. So I of course said yes. Funny thing though, she was like, "well wait, hold on, let me see if you have enough room for all of us...there will be 9." I said, yup, we'll make it work.
They arrived late and I let Ellie stay up which, hello, big people to hang out with, it was like Christmas for her. My neighbors basketball hoop was quickly taken over. See Ellie? Always in the action. I don't think she realized how little she is.
The 9 of them left at 7:30am. We left at 9:30am and we all got that at the exact same time. It was kind of funny. They apparently made a few stops.

I hate when I don't take enough pictures. I wish I had pictures of each little thing we did. I like remembering those things. When we arrived they had a 3 on 3 basketball tournament going on so while James played I put our room together. We slept in the lodge part of the camp. There were like 6 rooms I think in the lodge and they each had 2 sets of bunkbeds.  We were lucky to be in the lodge so that I could put Ellie down for her naps or bedtime and I was still in the same building with the baby monitor. If we were in a cabin that would be a little more difficult.

I'm going to skip many details of the great trip and just explain photos.

There were always balls around and as we know, Ellie loves balls. This basketball had some holes in it and Ellie discovered a cool trick, "floating ball."

Only one of James' brothers, Thomas, and his wife Kristen were able to make it which was sad. But I'm glad they were able to come! Thomas has 3 girls and he wanted to sign them up for horseback riding. It was very simple, someone just leads the horse in circles around the corral. Nothing crazy. I didn't sign Ellie up because I wasn't sure if she would like it but I wish I would have and just sat with her or something. We asked if we could take her picture on a horse and once she was on she starting pushing her body forward and back as to try and get the horse to move. I thought maybe she was comparing it to those horses on a spring at the park that you rock back and forth? But she loved it. No fear what so ever. Her great grandpas would be proud.

One of the activities was a carnival. Our game was Toss A Cross. We wanted it to be tournament style but it just ended up being a regular game. Kids had fun though. As well as James.

Someone else in the family took this picture but I loved it. I didn't even know Ellie was roaming around shooting baskets.

 Our cousin Amy wanted me to take her family pictures while we were there. We wanted to do it the day we arrived but it was chilly and windy so we opted to wait until the next day. The weather was perfect. We did have to budge on the time though. Too many activities planned for optimal shooting time. Darn. But they turned out great. Her boys are too cute!!

Right after pictures it was time to do skits. Too much to explain, but they were funny. Everyone did a great job.

This was Ellie's best buddy the entire time. I have no idea why she loved him so much but it was so cute to see her reach out for him or wave as we walked by. Actually, I didn't realize it at the time, but she was teething bottom molars and was happy but super clingy on this day and would only let James or I hold her. But...she would leave me for Shaden.

The horses came up to the fence and a feeding frenzy erupted. It was cute watching the kids though.

Until next time...

So Seattle was only a little over an hour away from where we were staying so we extended out trip and spent 2 days in Seattle with Thomas' family. Our first stop was the Seattle Aquarium. I was so excited to go. Ellie loves the Aquarium here in Idaho and I'll be the first to tell you it's nothing special! I had such high expectations for this one but I was pretty bummed out. It was great when comparing it to the one here at home but it was just eh when compared to one in like Monterey Bay. The kids didn't know the difference and we all had fun, but we finished much sooner than I anticipated.

We made sure to make it in time for the feeding the fish "show."

I wanted to show the girls this one fish that was hiding and I lifted them up to see. I knew they were a lot heavier than Ellie, but man, so awkward trying to lift a big kid. Thomas sure captured the truth of that! I need to work on those muscles.

After the aquarium we were walking towards Pikes Market Place but I wanted to stop by the antique store. There was a coin operated horse out front that Kristen let the kids ride. I really don't think Ellie enjoys that stuff very much. She looks miserable. (wink, wink).

And long story short, we walked all the way back to where we started for dinner at Ivars. Ellie kept asking to walk and James told her she could walk if she held his hand the entire time, and she DID!

We made some changes to our plans for the second day and decided to hit up the zoo. Again, compared to Idaho, this zoo rocked! We were there the entire day and still didn't finish seeing everything. We all loved it! Wish I could go back.

  I wanted to show you all of these next pictures. These are literally one after another. Look at how many faces Ellie can make within seconds. 

Getting to play with her cousins was so fun! SO happy we got to do it.

Pictures galore. Great trip. Good memories.

Aquarium and Zoo pictures were take by both Thomas and I.

18 months old

Before we start talking about Ellie, let me talk about myself. I have a problem. I can't delete pictures. I can't ever narrow them down. It's a real problem. When I go to take Ellie's "photoshoot" pictures I go crazy. She goes crazy actually. Which means they all turn out so cute and because of that I have to share them all with you. So Enjoy.

About Ellie: She's 18 months old. That feeling of, "I feel like it was just yesterday that she was born," is going away. She is developing into a fun and spunky toddler. She is growing up before our eyes. She is meeting all her milestones and beyond. We went to the doctor today and she couldn't be more impressed with Ellie's language and communication skills. I swear she starts speaking a new word everyday in addition to her signing. She is also forming short 2-3 word sentences.
She LOVES to be outside. She cries and whines when I tell her no (mainly because I'm not ready to go for a walk at 7am when I'm in my pajamas). She is starting to get restless legs too when we go shopping. She wants to walk "wa" around the stores and run free and explore. But ya, that doesn't happen. So more tears.
I have annual passes to the Aquarium and Zoo so we go there often which is nice. She looks forward to it when I tell her we're going. She also goes to Music time at the library once a week. She knows all the songs so well and we practice at home. But when at the library she sometimes gets shy and just stares at everyone else doing it rather than show off her skills. But she really does know most all the motions to the songs. It's impressive.
She is still passionate about Yo Gabba Gabba which is fun. She gets goofy about it now too and sings the songs around the house (her 2-3 word versions). She loves to play outside in our backyard where she can swing and go down the slide and pull at the flowers and herbs that are growing (Grrr...). She also says "weee" which is cute. I have also caught her a few times coming back inside to get some toys and bring them back out go to "weee" too. It's so fun to see her imagination blossom.

We'll see how long the tradition lasts but 1/2 Birthdays call for 1/2 Birthday Cakes. "yummy yummy"

Picture 1: "Mmmm"
Pictures 2: "hahaha" (I'm so funny for saying Mmmm).

18 months also means it's time to officially be on the roll for Nursery. Our Nursery is small so she's been welcomed in for the past few weeks. But she loves it! (Except for last Sunday when they brought her to me crying. Not sure what happened. But I got her to go back in and she was fine the rest of the time.)

 I wanted to get her picture out front real quick. You know. Big day and all. And very first picture, "BYE!!" I'm pretty sure that's some foreshadowing. Tear. Last picture is her funny run when she throws her arms back. 

The rest of these pictures are from her 18 month Photoshoot.

These are the Yo Gabba Gabba characters. She'll carry every single one of these around the house sometimes. She usually sleeps with one or two but some days she's adamant about figuring out a way to hold them all.

It's even better when she's holding them wearing the this hat...

I have no idea what brought this on, but she has that toy where you find the matching hole for the shaped pieces to go into, she takes one half of the sphere and puts it on her head like a hat. We call it her space hat. She literally walks about the house with it on her head. I'll be sad the day her head gets too big for it.

She heard a doggy so this is her signing dog and then pointing to it. She stomps her foot and slaps her leg. The real way to sign it is slap the leg and snap the fingers. But most babies modify signs.

Well, that's all for now. Sweet Ellie is 18 months old. Crazy to think about. Baby turned Toddler overnight. 

Stats from today:
Height 29inch. (0% tile)
Weight 18.4lbs (3% tile)

The rest of March

Here are pictures to finish off March. Ellie was 15 months old

Mommy and daddy were vacuuming out our cars and the bed of the truck turned into a fun playground.

Our "family away from family" have dinner together every 3rd Sunday. St. Patrick's day fell on a Sunday so we had a rainbow/green themed dinner. I brought the fruit.

I was loving this outfit so it was picture day at the park.

Obsessed with balls is an understatement. Daddy wants her to be a soccer player. So far, I think our chances are good.

There was a high school Lacrosse game going on while we were at the park but afterwards Ellie wondered away roaming the grass. Then she found something and started walking towards us holding the item and brushing it against her head. I can't remember what we joked about what it could possibly be that she thought was a brush, but...

...she showed us this flower hairbow she found. She was trying to put it in her hair! Such a smarty!

She also had been obsessed with my keys for quite awhile and loved to push the red alarm button.

We had a play date with another little girl in our ward. Ellie and her are less than 2 weeks apart. So they'll be in nursery together starting Sunday! (eeks!)

Ellie has been getting really good at learning that we say prayer before bed. This particular night she was being so silly and not wanting to come into the room. I said, "Come here we need to say prayer." So she stood outside the door and folded her arms.  

Your typical messy eater pictures.

It took Ellie a few months to get big enough to ride the roller-coaster on her own, but now she's a pro. We just have to give her a little push.

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 She is also tall enough to get on and off the zebra all by herself.

And...

That was March.

p.s. It's hard to write past tense when some things are still relevant now so ignore the grammatically incorrect use of tenses. Thanks.