Zoo Boise

We have been dying to take Elsie to the zoo since she loves animals so much, and today was the perfect day. The weather was gorgeous and so pleasant to be outside. Now, the Boise Zoo is not the most fabulous zoo ever, but they have tigers and monkeys...and we knew that's all we needed to make Elsie happy. Those are two of her best animal sounds thanks to the Wiggles song. It was a great day, Elsie was fascinated with the animals (well, most of them!), and it was nice to be together as a family.


Daddy was great about lifting Elsie up to see all the animals. He also carried her around most of the park until I made her start sitting in her stroller. We've got to get ready for Disneyland! She loved the tigers!

Yes, we had to bribe her to get her to do her cute smile. She's hating having her picture taken recently.

She's getting to be quite the big girl. She wanted to go down the big giraffe slide all by herself...over and over again!

Her most gleeful moment of the day, however, was when she got to ride the carousel. She didn't want me to hold on to her at all, so I had to sneak my finger into her belt buckle.

There's nothing cuter than when she sits up on Aaron's shoulders and leans into his head. She looks so comfy...I'm sure she could stay there for hours. She loves to play with his hair while she's up there, too.

I took a few short videos of Elsie at the zoo. None of them are really amazing, but you can see how excited she was to be there. Oh, and she wouldn't put her full effort into performing any of her animal sounds and actions for the camera, so I sound like a big dweeb trying to get her to do them.

We were watching this monkey swinging and climbing in his little area and then suddenly he swung down right in front of us. I was holding Elsie and she got so scared when she saw him coming down. She was very startled and her body totally shook in my arms. Too funny!

Like I said, she loved the slide. What a big girl!

can't get enough of this girl

We were playing outside the other day, and Elsie wasn't ready to come in when Aaron and I did. So, I let her hang out in the backyard by herself. She just plopped herself down on the grass and played with her feet. She was in heaven out there all by herself. I was trying to get pictures of Elsie earlier today because I actually did a little something different with her hair. She did not want to take her eyes off the screen (yes, she was watching Mickey!).

(Okay, I did threaten to turn off the show if she didn't do her cute smile for me. How mean!!)

Then I had the camera right in front of her face to get a close up and she just kept staring at the tv. She's just like her daddy!

She makes me laugh!

baby mama

The most common words out of Elsie's mouth these days (well, besides "NO") is baby, mama, dada. Anything small is a baby, bigger a mama, and so on. She says this over and over and over and over. I don't know why she is so obsessed with the size of things, and I'm trying to get her to say small and big...but she won't. It was kind of cute, but now she just walks around saying "baby mama" all the time.

Thanks Gigi!

As we were eating dinner tonight, we saw the UPS truck drive up in front of our house. I was surprised until I remembered that Angie had told me that she ordered a little present for Elsie. I told Elsie the package was for her and she got so excited. We opened it up and saw this adorable blanket specially made for Elsie. It's purple, with a little Minnie Mouse in the corner, and her name embroidered in the "Disney" font. Oh, wow! This gift was a homerun! Elsie could not get enough of it. She was rolling around in it and kept saying "purple, purple" and "yeah, yeah, yeah". She was pumped, to say the least! It entertained her for a couple hours and she insisted on sleeping with it tonight.

We are taking a trip to Disneyland in September, and I can't wait. Elsie's favorite show is Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and even that makes me happy. I love everything Disney, and am forcing it upon Elsie as well. I'm so glad my sister feels the same!

while I was away...

Aaron was happy to be in charge of Elsie while I was away with my family. It didn't hurt that he was going to his parents house and would have lots of help. He was even able to get away to hang out with his buddies, which makes him very happy!

Elsie helped Grandma make some cookies for Harper's blessing get together. I'm so excited that Elsie is getting to the age where we can do fun things like that. Craft time will be a regular thing at our house!

They all picked me up on Sunday morning to head to Sandy for Harper's blessing. We were a few minutes late for the sacrament meeting (it truly wasn't my fault...even though Aaron would like to think so!). Piper was stressing and rightly so! Gary was the one giving the blessing. But we made it and it turned out wonderfully. After church we headed over to Greg and Piper's for pizza, cookies, and visiting. I wish we could've hung out longer but Elsie was SO tired. It turned out later that she had a fever and wasn't feeling well at all. Her fever never went away, so Monday we relaxed hoping it would. We ended up having to take her to the Urgent Care place that evening because we were getting worried. We wanted to make sure she didn't have another UTI. It turned out to be an ear infection...thank goodness. Not a very exciting end to our vacation, but oh well.

Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for helping out with Elsie over the weekend. We all had a blast!

earl girls just wanna have fun

(I'm definitely not the first to blog about our girls' weekend, so there's no news here. This is purely for me to remember!)

I was so excited when we started planning our cousins' reunion. When Alysha brought up the idea, I was all for it. In fact, I had been thinking about the same thing and just got lazy in asking about it. Good job, Lysh! We finally decided on the weekend (crossing our fingers that it really was going to work for everyone!) and got the ball rolling. Angie found a great house for us to rent in Salt Lake and got us all organized. Oh, it was fabulous!

When I arrived at the house, several people were there already. As I was walking up to the front door, I was all giddy and kind of excited-nervous. It was weird...I had to laugh at myself. The second I walked into the room, I knew it was going to be a blast. We were all so excited, chatty, loud, and ready to party.

Needless to say, I did not even attempt to diet on this trip. We were surrounded by way too much good food...stuff I hadn't touched in quite a while.

We talked and talked and talked even more. I loved getting updates on everyone, really knowing what's going in their lives...not just the things they put on their blogs. I loved trying to listen to three different conversations at once. I loved laughing so hard my jaw and tummy hurt! I felt so happy and satisfied being with my family, these girls that I grew up with, who know me so well and I feel 100% comfortable with and glad to be with.
Aren't we funny?! The thing is I was actually laughing in this picture because the first time we tried it no one was looking at Alysha and she was getting all paranoid. So, we were laughing about it before this shot.

Yes, the sexy shot. Wow, I am not sexy. Maybe I never was...I just thought so.

The whole group at Mimi's Cafe. Yummy food, good conversation!

We talked a lot, like I said. We got into all sorts of crazy conversations...some a little too intense for these girls. He he!

We missed everyone who was not able to make it. I know we'll do it again! Love you girls!

Side note: Aaron said I was acting so dramatic for the rest of the day on Sunday after he picked me up. I guess that's what happens when you've been around girls all weekend...especially this bunch!

i'm here, i'm alive

We've had a busy, fun-filled week and I have so much to write about. We just got home last night from Utah, and Aaron has had the computer all day. I'll get to blogging, but for now I'm too busy checking in on everyone else!