Our vacation

As mentioned earlier in my blog - we went with the johnson clan to jackson, tetons, and yellowstone - we kind of hit it all - it was a ton of fun - and the best part was bob got us tent cabins so they had bunk beds with matresses and then down the way they had flushing toliets, and showers - aahhh- so as far as camping goes it was good - we still had to cook and be out in nature but we could do it clean and on a comfy bed! -it was the best

This is me, gracie, amare(my niece), and layne(brother-in-law) out in the canoe on the lake - i was freaking out at any little movement because i thought it might tip- that is why you can't see our faces in the picture -because all of the closeups -my face looks retarded! but gracie loved the canoe- anyone that would take her out she would go with - it was cute

Gracie at yellowstone

picture of the tetons- can you believe some of us climbed up and over that thing! it is amazing

gracie fishing - of course i couldn't help because the idea of fishing is a little too much for me - but luckily gracie has uncles that are willing to take over that job!

There was plenty more fun but this is just a glimpse of it!

Gracie is three!

Gracie had her birthday yesterday and we had a lot of fun - we went to the zoo- it was alot of fun - although towards the middle of the afternoon when temperatures reached 100 we left because the heat was a lot for gracie to handle! anyhow but it is cute she tells everyone that she is big now and when you try to explain that she is going to keep getting bigger - she doesn't want to hear about it because in her mind she is big and there is no way she could get any bigger! Ben with his turkey vulture arms!

Bens sister, Bobbisue, and brother, Brian

Gracie and grandma

Gracie getting her cake Trying to blow out the candles - it seriously took her ten times to blow out that last candle - which was good for me- the camera person - because i missed it the first few times! hahah

Gracie also got to go swimming with the boys- which was a lot of fun - but man was it hard to keep an eye on multiple kids when you are only used to one!

I took gracie down the slides a few times but the last time she got dunked and was DONE!

answered prayers

We took this fabulous vacation with the johnson so the tetons and yellowstone - which i will eventually post pictures about - but one of the days we took an extremely difficult long hike up the tetons starting in idaho and over the tetons ending in wyoming! - it was a long very fun hike-after it was over - anyhow part of hike did not have a trail we were leaving one trail and trying to connect with another trail - well it was snowy and steep and i was freaking out that we were going to be the idiot hikers that would be on the news the next day because we had died because we had left the trail- at one point we came to a ridge that dropped off - so we hiked over to another ridge - and as we were walking over to the other ridge i said a prayer just asking that please let us be able to go down safely and could i please just have a miracle- because i did not want to freeze on the mountain or die trying to go down something that wasn't safe - anyhow so i say my prayer and i look up and my brother in law is at the edge and it looks like he is waving at someone -

Well i come over to the edge and there is this old man coming up what we are trying to go down - anyhow i couldn't believe that my prayers were answered! and not just that we could go down but that someone had been sent to help us- tim - that was the mans name- had come from jennys lake - which is where we were trying to go - anyhow he told us he had been hiking this way for 20 years and had never seen anyone come this way before and that he must have be inspired to come today - which i totally agreed with

anyhow it may seem silly that i prayed for a miracle because really the shape or steepness of the trail wasn't going to change but i still just can't believe that Heavenly Father knew i would say that prayer and so he inspired someone to get out of bed, pack a backpack, and then go on a hike - just so that my prayers could be answered! it reminded me that we are all important and the smallest prayers -if they are important to us - can be answered

We have been trying to have a second child and it just doesn't look like it is in the stars for us and so sometimes it seems that my prayers are just hitting the ceiling - but i couldn't believe the love that i felt from above - that told me my prayers are being answered when they can - i loved our vacation and will always have good memories but this will always be something i remember and the best part of my trip - knowing that my simple prayer was answered in such a big way

it was quiet too long. . .

Yes - gracie tried to turn herself purple - luckily it was washable! - and yes when i gave her a bath it turned the water purple- funny kid

alphabet art

Thanks to my neighbor kim who found this cute book called alphabet art - gracie and i started doing it to try and help with learning her letters - anyhow it is super fun and she loves playing with paint and glue and all sorts of fun things - and hopefully in the end it will help her learn her letters! this picture above wasn't a letter but they were brazil carnival masks which we made in honor of alex living in brazil for two years! This was the letter E and it looks more like a butterfly than an elephant but that is what it is suppose to be - it was also fun because we crushed up egg shells and glued them to our letter E - which gracie loved being destructive and ben couldn't figure out why there were egg shells all over the house that day!

D as in duck - this one kind of turned out - gracie is actually pretty good and does most of the cutting herself!

This is a cat for the letter C and gracie was so funny - she named it suzy and would make it do tricks and make me pet it and give it food - to her suzy was a real pet!

This was suppose to be a butterfly - and i never got a picture of the end result because i couldn't believe it but gracie called me in later and anyhow she had drawn a picture of mom- as featured below - it was so cute - and i didn't know she was old enough to draw people! i love it! i think this will be one of my favorite pictures ever - her first picture of mom :)

you can tell we do this in the morning - because gracie is always in her pajamas and her hair is crazy - maybe i should start getting ready first and then doing the crafts so that we get some better looking pictures hahahah

scissors & markers

Gracie loves scissors- what kid doesn't - anyhow her favorite thing to do is cut paper into teeny tiny bits and then scatter them all over the house - it is great fun trying to pick it up - i was nervous at first about letting her use scissors but i threatened her life and gave her examples of all the horrible things that would fall upon her if she should ever cut anything other than the paper i gave her - luckily she has listened quite well - so that is nice -

Markers - another item that moms are afraid of and kids can't get enough of! anyhow i just loved that i came into the kitchen and gracie is laying on the table with her legs on the window just hanging out

Firepit

We love going to the Johnsons and playing around the firepit- there is always stuff to make smores, hotdogs and this time layne made everyone banana boat things - which looked good! anyhow we love it - ben gets to play with fire, gracie gets sugar, and i get to smell like campfire smoke - which are all fun things! anyhow so thank you Johnsons!

This is as close as i let gracie get to the fire to roast her marshmellows - if you notice you can't even see the fire - i always laugh because so far she hasn't really picked up on the fact that everyone else has hot marshmellows and she doesn't