Sweet Sixteen

 Elsa loves her cousin Pepper!! We are so sad they will moving at the end of the summer.

But until then we will enjoy them!!

The cousins are due two months apart.

This picture was taken the day before little cousin Lincoln was born.

Our new little cousin!! 

What a beautiful family!!

 

We got to celebrate Pepper's two year birthday!!

 

 Pool time is their favorite!!

We got to make ice cream!! Homemade ice cream is one of my favorite treats! Elsa seemed to enjoy it as well!

Aunt Ashley got married! We were so happy to have so much of our family here!

What a good excuse to have a family picture taken!

Wedding pictures always take forever but Elsa did a pretty good job chilling between shots.

Daddy helped in on the fun!

Blake and Slade worked hard that week and made the cupcake tree for Ashley's wedding cake and cupcakes.

I got to make Ashley's wedding cake and all 200 cupcakes.

I'm obviously rusty on my fondant skills but I'm hoping nobody noticed.

Cousin Sawyer taught Elsa how to climb.

We loved playing with all our cousins!! We wish there was more play and less work when everybody was here but we're glade Ashley's big day turned out as beautiful as she was!

Mommy loves the Fourth of July!! Fireworks are so pretty!! With the view we had you could see millions of  fireworks going off!

Elsa enjoying mommy's birthday lunch at Tucanos!!

We had a fun month with all our family!!

Unfortunately it won't slow down any for a while.

Fifteen

A little late... better than never!

The Eensy Weensy Spider is Elsa's new favorite song...

Elsa has mastered the stairs! With Jim and Romona coming home and all their guests up stairs, Elsa makes almost an hourly visit to them. Thank goodness we haven't had any big tumbles yet and hopefully we wont have to experience that!

Elsa is an official walker!! The last three weeks she has learned to stand up all by herself and walks all over the place. She loves to be outside!! From the moment she wakes up until I do as she asks, she always saying "side" for outside. She'll even run to the garage door to make her point stronger.
Our routine everyday after naps is a popsicle with a walk...


Then Elsa gets to play outside until mommy gets too hot or its time to put on more sunscreen...
Elsa loves to push her stroller around.

 Bubbles!!

Elsa and cousin Pepper playing at the park!!

 Elsa sure does keep me busy...


and daddy busy...

We did get to go on a date this month!
We thought it would be fun to visit all the different temples close to us...
remembering to take a picture is the hard part.


 We love our Elsa!! She brings such joy to our family! She is growing up to be a sweet little toddler... not saying she doesn't have her moments but smiles dominate our home.

Update on baby Blake:
We are 31 weeks and he's an active little guy! I've never felt some of the flips he does with Duncan or Elsa. Some of those flips lands him on my sciatic nerve, which is a jolt of pleasure... umm, not. Other than that and getting huge... I've been feeling great physically! Which is a great blessing so I can keep up with Elsa!

Month Fourteen

This last month was great!! Even though we only spent a short time at home in Utah. We had a blast visiting everyone!

The month started off with Mama Dee visiting Utah for a short time to attend Uncle Corban's graduation! Yippee for Corban!!

We got to play with cousin Pepper outside with BUBBLES!!

Playing with Mama Dee! Elsa loved playing with all of her pretty necklaces!

Then we were headed off to Etna, California.

Great Grandma Elsie passed away so we went out to be with family and attend her funeral. It was great being with everyone. The service was wonderful, what an amazing woman that raised a wonderful family and lived a loving and service filled life. We will miss her and can't wait to be with her again! I'm sure she is keeping busy in the spirit world. We love Grandma Elsie!!

Elsa was such a good sport with all of the driving. 39 hours of driving in 4 days, Utah to Etna, Etna to Utah, Utah to Missouri.

Singing Head Shoulders Knees and Toes for the millionth time.

Just a little bored.

Eating on the go! As you can see she still likes to put stuff in her hair but she is getting better.

Very bored!

Elsa really did a great job on the car ride. When we finally arrived to Missouri and Elsa was free of her car seat we noticed that her head was crooked... poor girl's head was kinked to the left. She could barely move it and when she did it was done lopsided. It eventually worked out but it was so sad to see.

While we were there we through a baby shower for my sister. Russell's this year are being blessed with three boys! Duncan won't be the only one now.

Russell girls! All we are missing is Teneill.

Two of the three boys.

Neesha's nursery theme is black, white and bright green elephants. So we had to incorporate it into the party food! We had fruit and veggies, Micah's famous artichoke dip with black and white chips, mini brownies with peanut butter frosting(elephants love peanuts), Pistachio ice cream (Neesha's favorite and it's green) sandwiches with green chocolate elephants on them, green elephant sugar cookies and regular and candy peanuts! I love party food!!

Anna our big helper!

Hopefully she wont make this a habit...

Micah and I made a bedding set for Neesha. Micah made it happen! I didn't touch the sewing machine once. I think it turned out pretty cute and we got it done in less than a week.

I won the pattern for a puff quilt from HoneyBearLane so we thought we would give it a try.

A visit to the KC Temple!

Daddy and Elsa being silly!

A visit to big brother Duncan!

Hanging out with cousins and aunts!

Elsa loved playing with her cousins Anna and Adiline!

Elsa does this thing were she waves her finger side to side and says "no-no-no".  During the time we were with my family, Adiline bit Elsa and as Micah was giving a serious talk to Adiline about how we dont bite and it's a no-no, Elsa stops crying, whips out her finger shakes it back and forth and says "no-no-no". Everyone was laughing for the rest of the day.

Back at Grandma and Grandpa Thackeray's house...

 

 Blake and Slade picked up a new hobby while we were there.

Chilling out in the pool!

 Already following their daddies footsteps.

I wish I had taken more pictures of the trip. Elsa loves all of her aunts. She warmed up to them pretty quick and would even walk to them. Elsa loves her Grandma Thackeray! Elsa loved to crawl to her room and explore. When Grandma took a nap, Elsa would crawl over to the door and point and talk to her. She didn't like Grandpa very much, only when he gave her ice cream.

Elsa loves playing with cousin Sawyer! Getting runny noses from each other, stealing toys, getting bonked in the face with a snack cup and getting splashed in the pool. How much more fun could two babies have? It really was fun to see them play and interact together.

Such a handsome little man.

Sad to say goodbye but happy to be home!

Three weeks of being away from home really makes the dust settle so I've kinda been in a spring cleaning mode(or could it be nesting?). Since there wasn't much in the fridge I thought it would be a good time to do a deep clean!! Elsa was a big help!!

We loved spending time with our family and friends!! The long drive is definitely worth it!