Audrey is One!

Who can believe our baby is a year old? We can't! But she is. Life is crazy.

On June 29, Miss Audrey turned one. It was Flaming Gorge days, so we went to the parade in the morning, then went down to the island so Joel could help man the station for Castle Rock and the kids and I walked around and played a bit. It was a hot day! In the evening Audrey got to open presents and eat her cake! She didn't care too much about presents, but she did enjoy playing with her toys. She cared a lot more about the cake, and she reminded me of Adam with his birthday cake because she was actually pretty efficient in her cake eating. She was a holy mess by the time she was done, though!

Some things about Audrey at one:

She's not walking yet, but she cruises along the furniture and walks with someone holding her hands.

She basically knows the difference between "Mama" and "Dada".

She loves to pull things out in the kitchen and the pantry. Preferably crackers or pretzels. She likes to make a mess.

She likes being outside, but doesn't like crawling on grass. So she bear crawls on her hands and toes.

She takes two naps a day and sleeps through the night. Overall she's a great sleeper!

She likes to crawl on Dad, or Mom if Dad isn't available. She will crawl over, under, around, or wherever, and it's the best when she takes a rest and lays her head down on us.

She likes to scream. When she's happy or sad or mad, she screams. It can be very loud. And very piercing. It's not our favorite.

She has eight teeth.

She calls all food "nanana". She will eat just about anything, but I think her favorite food is still cheese. She likes fruits and veggies. She's just starting to get pickier about eating. I'm hoping it won't continue.

She loves her brothers and sister and will crawl after them to try and keep up with the big kids.

Here's a few pictures from her big day.

Her cake looked better in person, I promise. :)

We love you, Audrey! Thanks for being part of our family!!

Lovell for a Family Reunion

Shortly after we returned from Mesa, I packed up again and the kids and I headed to Lovell for a slightly extended stay. Joel had to stay in Green River and work. :(

We stayed with Brenda in Cowley, which is always great. My Mom's house was stuffed to the brim will everyone from out of town.

We did lots of fun stuff while we were there. We went bowling, took a trip to Five Springs with a short stop at Devil's Canyon overlook, had a foot race, the kids played in the park behind my Mom's house (a LOT), we checked out a local bakery, made some trips to the honey candy store, played with cousins, enjoyed the family reunion, played games, talked, and did a lot of hanging out.

I have a lot of pictures, but not all of the ones I'm posting are from my camera, so they are somewhat out of order. I think most of the pictures are self explanatory, but I'll probably caption a few here and there.

I'm guessing Adrienne got a strike? :) Side note, one of the funniest things I've ever seen took place right here in this bowling alley that's featured in the following pictures. There's a chance that a certain sister (Laura) had an incident with a bowling ball falling out of her hand on the back swing (is that what you would call it?) of one of her bowling attempts. I might have laughed so hard that my abs were cramping. Good times.

Jenna and I. Do we have matching bowling styles?

This is what Audrey looked like almost every time I bowled. She didn't like being handed off.

Mary and Adrienne like their s'mores with melty chocolate. Delicious, but messy.

Jenna and James were trying to catch the cotton in the air.

Mary challenged us all to a foot race after a recent experience with James. It was hilarious! Jeanine (my cousin Allen's wife) beat us all. Go figure. :) We were looking spiffy and excited while we were warming up!

Allen gave interviews afterward. :)

After the main foot race a challenged Jenna and Will to a race. I beat Jenna, but just barely. Then Mary grabbed me and wanted to race again so Mary, Jenna and I raced. Logan got some finish line photos (that small tree was the finish line). I thought they looked pretty cool, even though I look pretty not cool in them!

The family reunion started out at the park, but after lunch we had some crazy weather blow through so we moved over to the church gym. Here's my Mom and all of her siblings.

 These were taken on Sunday after church. We had to have an  updated sister picture!

And back to the reunion. Joel had fun playing some horseshoes.

We were happy that Joel was able to come up for the reunion. When he left on Sunday he packed up my Mom's piano (now my piano) in the back of this truck and brought it home for me. Thank you! We had so much fun being with all of our family. I think this is the first time in many years that all of my sisters and their families have been to the family reunion. I miss them all already and I can't wait until we can all get together again.