Idaho

Last week Jacob had to go to England on a business trip, so I decided it was good timing to go up to Idaho with my mom for my Grandpa's wedding. My grandma died in 2007 and Grandpa has been pretty lonely since then, but now he has someone to spend time with and he's happier now than he has been since Grandma died, which is great. It was nice to get to go meet Pat and see family that I haven't seen for a long time. And Rachel LOVED the ranch! Every morning she would wake up and climb the stairs, then run over to "her" chair by the window, climb up and say "moo," pointing to the cows outside. Even though it was pretty cold the whole time we were there she constantly wanted to go outside to see the cows.

Here are a few highlights that I caught on camera: (if you want to see captions, click on the slideshow)


It is so beautiful up there with the fields and the mountains as a background. And it was fun for Rachel to get to do things most kids don't ever experience. We fed a calf its milk, and Rachel let the calf suck on her fingers (whole hand, really) once, then decided she didn't really like it much, so she wouldn't do that again. She loved feeding the cows hay. She even got to go ride the tractor with Grandpa when he was taking hay up to feed the cows in the fields and she thought it was so cool how they all lined up following the tractor to get the food. She even does a pretty good impression of a cow chewing.
Rachel had a good time riding the 4-wheeler, too. She liked to pretend to drive it herself. Who knew that going 5 mph could be so thrilling?
She had a ball playing with my Aunt Reah's grandkids-Rachel's second cousins, I guess? She thought it was so cool to have so many kids around. She and Sophie are about 6 months apart and they were so cute, both in pigtails for the wedding, hanging around together in the yard afterwards. It was a lot of fun.We're looking forward to the reunion in July.

Pima County Fair

Yesterday Rachel and I went with my parents to the Pima County Fair. Unfortunately Jake is in England for business, so he missed out. Rachel went on 2 rides and we all had a good time. Here are some of the highlights.
We got a ride from the parking lot to the entrance being pulled by a tractor.
Rachel and I got to ride an elephant, which after a few steps she kind of didn't like it and was asking to get down. So I just held her in my arms instead of having her sit on the elephant. She thought it was pretty cool after that. She's pretty good at making the trumpeting sound that elephants make.
Then Rachel and Grandma went on the train ride, which she loved. Especially because it played one of her favorite songs: E-I-O (or Old McDonald for those who don't speak Rachel).
I rode with her on the Merry-go-round and she neighed most of the time, apparently having a grand ol' time with all the horses.Then we went to look at all the animals. She liked looking at the sheep, but if they came close enough to touch she backed away.
This friendly pig wanted to give her a kiss, but Rachel wasn't in the kissing mood. But she did like his snorting and grunting.
And here are the cheesy photo ops:And with the grandparents, too.

We also went in the petting zoo, which was fun. They had lots of goats, a donkey, chickens and a rooster, 2 llamas, and 2 mini kangaroos (I think they're wallabies). Justin, this picture's for you. Rachel was a little intimidated by the big llamas. This one had some cool hair and a mustache going on.
Overall, we had a really fun time. I'm glad we went. Especially since it was discount day--only $2 to get in. :)
And now I'd better finish packing. We're flying up to Utah tomorrow, then driving up to Idaho on Thursday for a few days. Colder weather here we come.... (It's been more than 90 the last few days here.)

Week in review

This last week we've kept ourselves busy. We've been to library storytime, the zoo, the movers and shakers class (which Rachel loves), the park, and more. We had a YW campout that I just got to go to the first night that was pretty good. Then Saturday I had a stake 4th year pre-camp hike that I went on that had some beautiful views. Here are some of Rachel's fun times this week that I captured on "film":

Helping with the laundry

Helping "cook" some PB&J's (hers we cut into the shape of an airplane with a cookie cutter).

Painting! So fun and messy.

Yes, that painting smock of hers is my good ol' "Feel the Power" t-shirt from my BYU days.

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter everyone! Here's a great video of what Easter is all about:


I loved Elder Holland's talk at conference last week!

And here are some pictures of our Easter fun:

Decorating eggs
get ready...

get set...

GO!

ANGER! She didn't like it when I moved some of the really messy stuff out of her reach.

Happy again!

Here's her special egg. After splashing around and "stir stir stir"ing in the dye, we got her her own bowl of water (which soon turned blue from her egg and hands) and she happily dropped her egg in there again and again

Having dropped her egg enough times, it cracked plenty, and when we peeled it it turned out to have it's own cool pattern:

I think her hands got dyed more than the eggs did

And so did mine.

Here are some of the finished products:

Rachel's Easter egg hunt our back yard:

As soon as she got a few eggs in her basket she would turn it upside down and shake it until they had all fallen back out.

Rachel's Easter basket:

Grandparents' visit

Jacob's mom and dad came down for a few days this week and we had lots of fun. We got to go to the Titan Missile Museum and to the Pima Air and Space Museum with them which were both really cool. We also got to color Easter eggs and Jake and I went on a date while Grandma and Grandpa stayed home with Rachel (we found a new restaurant that has TASTY empanadas! Mmmmm!).
Here are some pictures from our adventures (egg pictures to follow in another post):

Rachel wearing Grandma's curlers

Tickle, tickle!

Reading with Grandma and Grandpa

Once there was a snowman tall, tall, tall!

Titan Missile Museum
on the way there-whenever she's wearing her sunglasses she declares herself "coo" (cool).

The Titan missile (one of 3 during the cold war designed to carry a nuclear bomb as payback if the U.S. got hit by one)

Rachel enjoying her lollipop after the hour-long tour (which she only lasted maybe half that time).

Pima Air and Space Museum

Rachel and Grandma as pilot/co-pilot

The SR-71 (an invisible plane when it's on the move)

WWII barracks and lots of airplanes

Cool girl

So, our heads are not positioned the right way...oh well.

Our budding pilot

We had lots of fun! Thanks for coming to visit, Grandma and Grandpa!

homemade food

So this week has turned out to be a week of cooking. Yes, I actually did more than just dinners (though I skipped a few nights of cooking dinner). Here are my masterpieces:

Homemade pita bread-actually pretty easy and tasty

(the white spots are flour, not mold)

Homemade yogurt-First time ever making it and it actually was really fast to make and pretty easy. And not nearly as sour as store-bought plain yogurt.

And the yogurt tastes pretty darn good with....

homemade granola. Also a first. I learned how to make yogurt and granola at enrichment this week and decided to try them both out because they seemed so easy. And they are. And this granola is mmm mmm SO good.

And I fed my child occasionally during the week, too. :)