Welcome Home Grampy and Grammy

     David's parents served a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Las Vegas, Nevada.  We are so proud of them for their service and dedication to the Lord.  We missed them dearly and were so glad when they finished their mission.
     We were able to pick them up and then met all of David's siblings and their families at Bryce Canyon for a few days for a reunion with everyone.  We had such a wonderful time.  We love our family!

 

 

We stopped at the St. George LDS Temple on our way to Las Vegas.  It is a beautiful place.  It was a great stopping point. 

 

 The trip was long and hot so we had to find a way to cool off!  A nice cold drink hit the spot.

 

We spent a few days in Las Vegas not only helping David's parents pack but also visiting my brother, as he and his family had just moved there a few weeks ago.  We had a lot of fun playing in the splash pads trying to cool off.  The temperature was 117 degrees.

 

Here are some highlights of our trip at Bryce Canyon. 

  

All of the cousins are climbing the wall in back of us...so much fun!

 

Clarissa's first time on a horse.  She is a natural!  She wasn't scared at all.

 

We hiked to some falls.  It was a beautiful hike.

  David, his mom and a few others hiked back into the falls.  Apparently, the falls are from a sink hole from the lake above.  It was pretty neat to see. 

 

 We explored a few caves. 

 

 

 

Fun moments together!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Adam taking Clarissa for a ride on his long board.

 

And then we came home...

Summer Fun

The summer is going so fast.  We love the summer!  Here are some highlights:

On Memorial Day weekend, we took a day trip to Silver Lake, up Big Cottonwood Canyon.  It was beautiful.  We were surprised that there was still snow.  We went on a trail as far as we could go and not get stuck in the snow. David tried to go in the snow but we soon learned a stroller doesn't go very well. It was a fun outing.

 

 

 

This is probably one of our all time favorite pictures of Clarissa. 

In the first part of June my family always runs in the Art City Day's 5K run.  It is always so much fun.  I think this is our 18th year running the race.  It is such a fun family tradition.  We look forward to it every year. 

 

 

 

The end of June was our 12th Anniversary.  We celebrated by going camping at Crystal Hot Springs.  It was so much fun.  It was our first camping trip with Clarissa.  She did so good.  Swimming in the hot springs was such a blast.  The hot springs were heavenly. We didn't want to come home. 

 

The Joys of Motherhood

Motherhood is a journey to be enjoyed and I am trying to learn this lesson every day.  Some days I have to laugh or I would cry.  Here are a few of those moments:

Clarissa is taking every book off the bookshelf for the tenth time of the day.  She seems to relish in making a mess.  Her expression shows her glee as she tosses the books out!  No amount of persuasion can deter her from her task at hand. 

 

Clarissa broke the cupboard safety lock for kids on our pantry door.  (Go figure!) So now it was free game to pull everything out.  She proceeded to empty the cupboard, spilling out about 10 pounds of sugar, mixed with other spices and grains.  I didn't say anything but left to go get a camera.  When I came around the corner, I think she thought I was going to be mad as expressed by the expression on her face.  Her face is priceless. I think she knew she did wrong as she had the broom out trying to sweep it up. 

I was doing laundry and I normally put the clean clothes on the bed to fold them.  Well Clarissa likes to climb on the bed and take all of the clothes and shove them behind the bed post.  It ended up that 90% of the clothes were behind the bed instead of on the bed.  She just laughed as I fished them out. 

 

Clarissa loves to climb on things.  She likes to get on the desk and run from side to side as fast as she can.  It about gives me a heart attack as I know it is just an accident waiting to happen.  I try to not let her get on the desk but she pushes the chair from another room to the desk and climbs on it. 

Motherhood isn't all crazy as these moments.  There are tender sweet moments that melt my heart.  I love seeing her interact with her cousins. 

 

 

She has also started to say a few words.  One of the few words she says is "Pa Pa" meaning Grandpa.  She really loves my dad.  This is a tender moment when we were going for a walk and she only wanted to hold Grandpa and Daddy's hand. 

She loves the park and the swing. 

This is the one and only time she has let me do her hair.  Normally she won't let me put anything in her hair and if by some miracle I get a bow in, she immediately pulls it out.  She looked so cute.  I wish she would let me do it more often.

 

Spring has sprung!

I am SO excited that spring is FINALLY here!  I just love when the spring flowers start to come out!  It has been a long, wet, cold winter.

Although I am so excited for spring, I am a little sad to see our cute little Clarissa put away her snowsuit.  It just makes me smile every time she puts it on. 

 

 Clarissa has become quite the little "purse girl".  She loves my purses and she will fill them with her stuff and carry them around all day.  I like purses too, but did she really get this from me??

 It has become quite a pastime for Clarissa to jump on our bed.  She begs to get up on the bed and then she jumps and jumps.  It is so cute.  How do you stop something that is so cute?  I guess I will have to learn this whole discipline thing.  But for right now I am enjoying the fun moments. 

Valentines is always special, especially sharing it with my two favorite people--David and Clarissa.  David gave me these beautiful flowers. 

 Say "Cheese!"