Happy Birthday to Ellie!
Ever since we moved to Missouri, she has loved blowing bubbles outside. So we decided to have a bubble birthday! The party started outside blowing bubbles with my homemade bubble solution. I used pink dish soap to make it festive and glycerin which supposedly helps make bubbles better. I tried out the glycerin bubbles earlier in the week and it worked fine. However, when making it on a large scale in a punch bowl, it did not work as well (or maybe it was because someone was talking to me and I think I might have counted wrong or something! Arg!). The bubbles would pop almost as soon as they came off the wand. So we got the brilliant idea to use our hands. The kids loved this idea even more.
That is, until the kids had to rub their eyes. Yup, dish soap in the eyes. Why didn't I think of that before? It happened to one girl first who was barely 1 year old. It thought Ellie might be smart enough not to do it. But I was proved wrong. Moments later, Ellie needed her eyes flushed too. They were a little red, and she did cry, but hey, it's her party and she can cry if she wants to. We had tons of cake and cupcakes and I tried to make the cupcakes look like bubbles, but I wasn't really sure how to do that. It seems simple, right? Yeah, I just couldn't make it work.
We sent all the kids home with their own personal bubbles and lots of double bubble. And now whenever Ellie sees a gift bag with tissue paper sticking up, she says, "Ellie Birthday Party?"
The very next morning, the 29th of Sept, we flew out to Utah for my brother Stephen's wedding. Ellie was turning two on the 30th, so we did not purchase a ticket for her to fly out, but we did have to on the way back. She just stayed on our laps the whole time anyways! But we were honest, right? We got to stay with Craig and Meredith in Provo which worked out great. We love their little Brady.
And this is an awesome photo I took just outside their home.
I believe this was the day after it snowed in Provo (Yes, it really snowed the day we flew in! In September!) We had a great party with all our old friends and watched the BYU cougars win again. The next day was Ellie's real birthday. We didn't do a whole lot but had cake again and her Nana gave her a couple gifts as did Brad and I. It was pretty uneventful.
Two days later, Stephen and Brooke got married!!!
It was so beautiful. We know it took
forever to finally see this happen, but it did and we are so happy for them! Brooke looked so great! Ellie got her first taste of the temple and loved it. We have a picture of the temple on our phone and she loves looking at it and saying, "Picture temple!" Brooke and Steve had a lovely dinner/reception afterwards that was very intimate. It was fun to share that special day with them!
All in all, it was a fantastic few days. Brad loved the 3 day break from school he got to take. It made us more "home" sick for our friends and family in Utah and elsewhere. We loved every minute of being there. Our only wish was that we could have stayed longer! We'll have to come back for Spring Break!
She loved the whole fire truck. Speaking of fire... (nice segue)
Ever since we moved to Missouri, she has loved blowing bubbles outside. So we decided to have a bubble birthday! The party started outside blowing bubbles with my homemade bubble solution. I used pink dish soap to make it festive and glycerin which supposedly helps make bubbles better. I tried out the glycerin bubbles earlier in the week and it worked fine. However, when making it on a large scale in a punch bowl, it did not work as well (or maybe it was because someone was talking to me and I think I might have counted wrong or something! Arg!). The bubbles would pop almost as soon as they came off the wand. So we got the brilliant idea to use our hands. The kids loved this idea even more. 
That is, until the kids had to rub their eyes. Yup, dish soap in the eyes. Why didn't I think of that before? It happened to one girl first who was barely 1 year old. It thought Ellie might be smart enough not to do it. But I was proved wrong. Moments later, Ellie needed her eyes flushed too. They were a little red, and she did cry, but hey, it's her party and she can cry if she wants to. We had tons of cake and cupcakes and I tried to make the cupcakes look like bubbles, but I wasn't really sure how to do that. It seems simple, right? Yeah, I just couldn't make it work. 
We sent all the kids home with their own personal bubbles and lots of double bubble. And now whenever Ellie sees a gift bag with tissue paper sticking up, she says, "Ellie Birthday Party?"
And this is an awesome photo I took just outside their home. 
I believe this was the day after it snowed in Provo (Yes, it really snowed the day we flew in! In September!) We had a great party with all our old friends and watched the BYU cougars win again. The next day was Ellie's real birthday. We didn't do a whole lot but had cake again and her Nana gave her a couple gifts as did Brad and I. It was pretty uneventful.
It was so beautiful. We know it took forever to finally see this happen, but it did and we are so happy for them! Brooke looked so great! Ellie got her first taste of the temple and loved it. We have a picture of the temple on our phone and she loves looking at it and saying, "Picture temple!" Brooke and Steve had a lovely dinner/reception afterwards that was very intimate. It was fun to share that special day with them!
Oh my goodness. Justin and his dad have a whole big room dedicated to model trains. It is very intricate and quite amazing. Ellie thought so too. She loved watching the trains go round and round. She would sit so still and when a train was about to go by in front of her, she would fold her arms (so she wouldn't touch it) and almost whisper "oh my goodness!" 
She was in shock! She absolutely loved it. I was told that she is the first young girl to want to have anything to do with the trains at their house!
It reminded me or Harry and the Hendersens! AND, a squirrel ran right across my foot!! I totally screamed. There were wild squirrels roaming the zoo and apparently, this squirrel was in much too much of a hurry to try and go around me so it went straight over my foot! I don't know why I screamed. Was I worried it was going to eat me or something? Ellie did end up falling asleep right before we saw her favorite - the elephants. 
But I think she had a pretty good time anyways. She was such a trooper and rode in the stroller and got carried around everywhere. She even let Justin hold her for minute, too. 
and reconnected, found out they were in Tulsa and decided we could all meet up and go to the game together. We got to leave the kids at home and head out for some well needed adult time. We had a DELICIOUS BBQ before the game with Sam and Lacey and two of their friends and their beautiful home in Tulsa. The best part, though, was riding in Sam's rockin' no-top-or-sides Jeep. Even though the cougars lost, it was still fun. We ended up sitting right next to Tulsa's student section and we had some awful stares when we cheered for our cougs. There was actually one guy who thoroughly enjoyed flipping us off. Hey would yell, "Hey Mormon's!" and then so gentlemanly show us his finger. I must say, it was the first time I had ever been singled out and insulted for being LDS. I guess we're not in Utah anymore!
