Ensign Peak

As mentioned earlier, hiking is something that Cass and I love to do as a family.  It is a great time to spend talking to the kids with minimal distractions.  This year we finally made it to Ensign Peak in Salt Lake City.  I have been wanting to do this small hike forever and we finally made it.  Alden is turning out to be a great hiker.  He made it all the way to the top and back down on his own.  I think dad's shoulders are very happy with this accomplishment.  This was a great little hike with spectacular views at the end that I hope to do many more times.

Taking a break on the way up.  Some scouts were nice enough to let us sit down.

Almost to the top.  This was the steepest part of the trail and Alden did amazing to walk it all by himself.

Look we all made it :)

The actual Ensign Peak.  It has a plaque that gives the history of coming up here to survey the valley for settling.  Sadly people make this hike just to vandalize it.

One more family shot just for fun.

May 2016

Another month that was good to us.  Here are some candid pictures from May.

Gracie got this adorable dress for her birthday and we had to document how cute it is as well as the fact that she left the headband in for more than 10 seconds, win!

This is rare, but sometimes we tire the boy out.  I particularly loved that he kept ahold of his snack for the entire nap.

This is Gracie's new favorite place. She will stand and look in the refrigerator forever if we would let her. She also loves to eat so I assume the two go hand in hand making sure we have her favorite snacks for when she is hungry again.

LaWayne bought Alden these socks when she went to Toronto early in the month with my parents.  Alden put them on, pulled them up as high as they go, and then asked to have his picture taken.  

Again our library does an awesome story time for families on Tuesday nights.  One night we learned about another country and then the kids got to make hats.  Alden decorated this all by himself. Side not can you tell that his favorite color is orange.  He can't wait for this outfit to get washed so that he can wear it again.

Getting Outdoors

In April the weather stayed consistently warm so we took advantage of being outside and shaking off the winter blues.  We hit up the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point and enjoyed the gardens.  Alden really wanted to roll down this big hill like he saw other kids doing.  It was one of the cutest things I have ever seen, he could never go more than about 4 feet before he was rolling side to side instead of down.  He got frustrated after a couple of minutes, but I still think it is adorable.

One of our favorite places in the garden is the Secret Garden.  Cass and the kids were kind enough to pose by one of the fountains for this lovely picture. 

Just thought the umbrellas were fun.

Gracie did not :)

We also took time this month to hike to Battlecreek Falls.  A little waterfall that is not too far from our house.  Alden was amazing and did the entire hike by himself for the first time. So proud of little hiker, we hope to continue this family activity for years to come. 

Checking out the little "cave" on the trail.

Family selfie

And no trip to the waterfall is complete without throwing a couple of rocks in to the water.  Love this family of mine!

April 2016

Here is a quick snippet of some of the fun things we did in April!

Date night at Color Me Mine.  We did a platter that turned out better than anything we have ever made there before.  Love this guy!

We trade babysitting with our friends the Lattins for date nights. The week after we went out we had a drive in movie at our house for the kids. These three boys made cars out of cardboard boxes and then sat in them for the entire movie.  It was kind of a miracle to see them sit so still.

Gracie loves peanut butter and sometimes will beg to be able to eat it with a spoon straight out of the jar. And with a face this cute she sometimes gets to do just that.

Our library is amazing!  One night for story time they had a puppet show.  The lady who did the puppets did a great job. I am so thankful to have such a great library so close with so many activities for us to do together as a family.

We got the opportunity to clean the church this month and the kids were excited to help so we put them to work.  Cutest window cleaners ever.

For Family Home Evening one night we talked about temples and then made a temple out of rice krispy treats.  Alden did a great job designing the temple for our family.

Just because she is so cute with those 2 bottom teeth.

Spring weather means more days at the park.  Slides and swings are our favorite things.

Alden got his first apron from Aunt LaWayne and was so excited to help me bake. It cracks me up that he put a spatula in his pocket.

And finally our friend Trey was the realtor who sold our house.  As a thank you for giving him business he paid for us and our friends the Smiths to spend the night in hotel suites in Salt Lake.  The hotel had a waterpark and a movie theater room you could reserve.  The kids thought they had died and gone to heaven.  This is all of them minus the 2 littlest girls that had already gone to bed.  We are so blessed to have good friends who are a positive influence on us and our children.  Hopefully these will be lifelong friendships.

March 2016

March brought a lot of fun things for us, but most only have one or two pictures so the whole month will fit in to one post.  

March had some really nice weather so we went to the park often with our friends the Lattins.  Gracie and Zoe are just 2 1/2 months apart and will hopefully be good friends one day.  For now we just make them do things together because they can't tell us not to :)

Cass and I made it to another temple in Utah, Payson, we now only have 1 more to go until the Provo City Center Temple opens up.  I love this time that we have to share together with no cares in the world.  And it is fun to work towards the goal of visiting all of the temples in Utah together.

We continued to go to Kangaroo Zoo a bounce house playground near our house.  Gracie is starting to get more confident on the inflatables and it is fun to watch Alden be so gently and sweet with her.

Most notably in March we moved in to our new home.  After spending a month with Cass' parents in Springville we closed on our second home on March 14.  I have no pictures of the outside of the house or other rooms, but I am very proud of this new dining room table we bought.  This is our first big furniture purchase as a married couple and I love it!

Gracie just being cute snacking on asparagus while we grocery shopped.

And then there was Easter in March.  Alden loved the Easter egg hunt in Grandma and Grandpa's back yard.  And Gracie enjoyed looking through her loot, she is still not walking on her own so she wasn't quite as in to finding eggs as the other kids.  

Look how many eggs this boy found! The hat came with the swimming suit Grandma Peterson gave him as is the Easter tradition for the Peterson family.

Here is what the Easter Bunny left at our house.

And finally at the end of the month we went to St. George with LaWayne for her to claim her Christmas present from BJ, a ticket to see Jay Leno at Tuacahn.  LaWayne has always loved Jay Leno and after she saw him once in Vegas she has always wanted to see him again.  I went with BJ and LaWayne an we had a great time.  The weather was perfect Jay Leno did a great, clean, comedy act which was great to not have to worry about inappropriate jokes.  I couldn't get good pictures on my phone though because it was dark so here is the best I could get.  

Although we only stayed over night this was a fun trip to see BJ and enjoy some warmer weather.  I hope we can do this again someday.

Happy First Birthday Gracie

Gracie turned 1 on February 28, 2016!  We are so excited that we made it through a whole year with her.  She is incredibly sweet, but also incredibly opinionated and will let you know when she doesn't like something.  Because we were going to Elko in mid February for something else we decided to celebrate a little early with the Norton family so they could be a part of this special event. 

Here is the birthday girl with her tiara.  I think it's safe to say she liked it.  

After presents, during which she got spoiled; a cloud pet, lots of new clothes, mickey mouse pizza set, and new shoes there was cake.  We did cupcakes in Elko, but Gracie didn't seem to mind that it wasn't the size of a normal cake.

On her actual birthday we celebrated with the Peterson family at Sunday dinner.  We did a rubber duck theme and it turned out pretty cute.  Alden loves his sister and wanted to help decorate the cake.  here he is mid decorating.

And here is the one year old in all her glory.  She can't walk on her own just yet, but she crawls everywhere and pulls herself up on everything.  She sleeps and eats great so no worries there and we are so blessed that her and her brother love each other so much.

The cake for Gracie and cupcakes for the rest of us.

Opening presents with help from her brother and Samantha.  We got her this walker to help her gain balance and confidence to walk on her own.

And Grandma and Grandpa got her clothes and shoes.

And now the fun pictures of Gracie eating her cake.  She didn't make much of a mess as all she wanted to eat was the marshmallows off the top, but she was adorable doing it. 

Thanks for hanging in there for a year with us Gracie Clair hopefully next year won't be quite so hectic.  Either way we can't wait to see how you grow and change.