October

Look who turned one!

 

 

Lilia had a great birthday!

 

She got some great toys and had some good company!

 

 

Then it was cake time!

 

She was a little confused at first...

 

 

But she figured it out.

 

 

And made a glorious, happy mess!

 

She got some help cleaning up from Mama when she was finished.

 

---

 

The next day, Lilia gathered her new toys around her...

 

...and we woke up to...

 

A SNOW DAY!

 

In OCTOBER!

 

Here's what our backyard looked like when the snow stopped falling:

 

Can't see half the fence!

 

And, the next day, it was still gorgeous outside.

 

Before it mostly melted and Fall finally showed its face.

 

Basically two days later.

 

Welcome to Wyoming's wild weather!

 

---

 

Lilia also got some great gifts from Gammie and Grumpa!

 

---

 

Sundays we have a family dinner at Mama's.

 

The following video is the perfect description of the typical Sunday there!

 

 

---

 

And, Lilia started WALKING!!

 

 

She preferred to hold my hand, as you can see.

 

---

 

Seth likes his soda! 

 

He drinks so much, we figured out that we should just ask the server for a pitcher.

 

---

 

It was great having an entryway to our own place to decorate for Halloween.

 

 

It was also great getting to dress up this little cutie.

 

We had a church party where the kids got lots of candy...

 

And Porter got to go trick-or-treating again for even more!

 

Happy Halloween!

 

(Porter is an animal control officer, if you can't see the badge)

Robbie Turns Six

Robbie, my nephew, celebrated his sixth birthday with a Ninjago party!

 

Says: Spinjitzu Go...Ninjago

All the kids got ninja headbands to wear...

 

 

...then wrapped each other up like a ninja...

 

...before doing an impressive obstacle course only ninjas can complete...

 

 

...in order to get..

 

...their golden swords!

Then it was time for cake and presents!

 

 

 Where Robbie received four of these:

 

 

 At the end of the party, the kids all got a chance to hit a pinata.

 

 

It was a great party, and was so fun!!

 

Porter talked about it for days.

 

Happy birthday, Robbie!

Oh, The Traffic is Terrific

Travelling with a brand new little one is harder than I remember.

Maybe that’s because there were two little ones this time instead of one.

And, maybe because this little one is a girl and requires quite a bit more “stuff”.

For Christmas, we took the longer route to Twin so we could visit Jo and Kory in Pocatello.

Mom, Dad, Vanna, and Mikki met us there the day after we came and we stayed until Christmas Eve.

It was a lot of fun!

We enjoyed lots of food, games, and company.

So much so that we forgot to check and see if Porter remember to put on his Pull-up one night (sorry again).

We drove to Twin Christmas Eve night and joined the family for our traditional watching of “Scrooge”.

One of my favorite traditions that we will have to add to ours when we start doing our own.

Lilia’s Blessing Day

We were able to bless Lilia the Sunday after Thanksgiving.

 

 

Keeping up with my tradition, I made her dress.

 

Luckily, she was able to fit it since I had measured it two weeks earlier.

 

During her blessing, she was great, and didn’t even cry!

 

After, though, she was ready to eat, so I had to make an early exit.

 

 

My best friend since birth, Suzanne, was able to make the blessing!

 

 

She sat with me and exited when I did because she wasn’t able to spend more time with us at the

luncheon we had planned after the meeting.

 

I’m so glad we took these pictures out in the foyer!

 

(grabbed from her Facebook)

 

The luncheon went really well!

 

I wasn’t able to take many pictures of everyone there—mostly because everyone scattered when the camera came out—but there was a lot of support.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was so great to see everyone and spend some time together.

 

The babies got to enjoy their Gammies’ arms for a while…

 

 

…and we all got to celebrate our sweetheart's arrival.

 

Halloween Happenings

We went to my brother's house for Halloween dinner.

 

Halloween is also my Papa's birthday, and he lives with them.

 

My sister-in-law, Wendy, is super creative, and made Hawaiian haystacks with Halloween labels complete with a bubbly cauldron.

 

 

Totally awesome.

 

Seth was performing at a Halloween play, Deep Love, that night.

 

So, Porter, Lilia, and I went Trick-or-Treating with the cousins.

 

This was Porter's and Lilia's first actual door to door Trick-or-Treat excursion.

 

Well, Porter's anyway.

 

Lilia was in her stroller the whole time, asleep.

 

Asleep, that is, until she was hungry.

 

Then she threw a fit.

 

At least by that time Porter was done because his bag was "heavy", so there was no argument from him.

 

The two blocks back to my brother's place were full of upset Lilia screams.

 

I guess it was pretty fitting for the holiday.

 

After getting her food, she got to be held by Aunt Kathryn

 

It was so great to be with and see family!

 

There were so many cute costumes.

 

Sadly, I didn't get a picture of the kiddos.

 

But, I did get this unplanned one...

 

"Did Rob dress up like Potts?"--Emily (in the phone)

 

And then when I got home, I was sure to get this cutie...

 

Seth got home about the same time as we did.

 

He quickly got his "costume" on and we took our group shot:

 

Happy Halloween!!