Blogging Again

This morning I woke up in the best mood. I went to bed late cause I was up talking to Mr. Neilson about all the football drama I heard roaring from my window. He gave me the play by play of each dramatic advance, I love when he talks sports. It's pretty cute. I love that we can hear the stadium from our window. The campus bells. The bird that squawks outside our bedroom window every morning at 6 am. Yes, 6 am. Squawking. My hubby valiantly got out of bed this morning to investigate and sick the dog on it when he found to his surprise that our friend was not in fact a bird, but a squirrel and one who's squawking will not be deterred by dogs or tennis balls. He continued to squawk so I thought I'd get out of bed and make a glorious breakfast for our kiddos that were ever so perfectly sleeping in. Once I got up I realized they were in fact all awake quietly watching Mary Poppins in the Grotto (our sunken family room). I ran in to tickle them and they all responded with the appropriate squeals of delight I was going for. Quickly they all dog piled me and whit followed closely after growling at us from the stairs. Charlotte ran in to the kitchen, "Are these brownies or steaks?!" Etta ran through screaming, "Can we have waffles?!? Do we have butter? And syyyyruuuup?" (sung, of course, as syrup should be) Liam was doing karate kicks exclaiming happily he wasn't coughing anymore as he hacked up a lung and Squeaky was squeaking like usual waiting for someone to feed him, again. These kids are truly the best and my best friends. I love all their funny little ideas about life and I love cloudy Sunday mornings. Now let's see if I can wake up Mr. Neilson to shower all these stinky nuggets for church so I can put my face on.

Halloween! I'm always one holiday behind...

We had so much fun at Halloween this year! From friends parties, to ward parties, to pumpkin carving, and trick or treating...it was an awesome year. Especially because both little lovelies were so excited about it this year.

Especially my Etta. For a long time she said she wanted to be rapunzel...I was a little bummed thinking that was kind of cliche and every other little girl would be dressed like that. But I'm all for letting the kids pick so I figured I go pick up a dress and wig, nice and easy. Then my mom gave us the movie Aristocats and Etta was hooked. She wanted to watch it everyday and even got all her little friends to start playing Kitty Cat in the neighborhood. Her favorite was the mom, Duchess. So she adamantly decided that was the costume for her. To make a very long story short I was amazed how hard it was to find cute white cat apparel. So I thought how hard could it be an decided to make it. Let's just say it was harder than I thought but now that I've done it once it'd be a cinch! It all turned out great except for the mounds of fur every where in our bedroom and she loved every minute of being Duchess.

By the way if you're wondering I'm a child of the seventies...or my mother. This was her dress she left from her wedding reception in. Kinda cool. I didn't get quite as decked this night with jewelry and braids and such...

Knock, knock, knockin with Cass and Oakers err Alice and the Rabbit!

Mickey did not start out in the best mood.

He got a bit happier once he got some Cheetos...

Hopefully I can get some pics of our friends party where the boys dressed up too. :)

August 2011

This summer has been super fun and obviously wore us out a little bit.

(See the flashlight? haha)

We had some fun trips to the zoo to see the dinosaur exibit.

Lovin our cousins...

Look at these cuties...

Oh Aunt Jacqueline you're so silly...

And Etta started school!!! I can't believe it!!! We decided to put her in preschool this year and after much research and consideration I decided Kids Village was the place for us...and we LOVE it!

She was so excited for her first day of school! (And a little nervous)

She's loving her teachers and new friends. She goes to music, art, cooking, and science. Then she has a general class everyday where she learns reading and other preschool basics.

Rob went to Argentina with the Youth National Team. It was such a cool experience. He spent a little over a month during the summer training the team before they went to Argentina for the World Championships at the end of August. They placed very well for the USA team and he had an awesome time...

As you can see in this picture. The man loves him some volleyball. Or maybe rather competition at a high level and working hard to accomplish something.

Then Rob started the school year along with the EMBA program and here we go again!

Tin Foil Dinners!!

I love camping and I LOVE tine foil dinners. Over the years we've perfected (at least in our minds) the tin foil dinner. It's just the standard ground beef, carrots, onion, and potato but taken to another level. Mmmmm...

So we headed up to our spot in the upper bridal veil falls right by the river with my fam.

Look at my cute sister.

And my cute BIL.

The kids had SO much fun running around getting dirty and if you know Etta you know there's nothing she loves more than picking flowers. Everywhere we go (church, grocery stores, neighbors) she wants to pic the flowers and I won't let her. So when I told her she could pick as many as she wanted she was in heaven.

And this all boy, boy of course didn't want to pick flowers...he just wanted to throw around the pigskin.

Every one sat around enjoying themselves...

while I slaved over the fire...;)

Which made my feet look like this. Who wears flip flops? I actually love it though. Usually I don't get to let the pyro in me come out because Rob takes over fire duty, but he met up with us later so someone had to get things movin!

All of the bubbling sizzling gloriousness.

Rob testing the delectations.

Grammie

Papi

Awww...while Rob was gone for three weeks this picture brought Liam to tears from missing his dad so much and remembering the good times! I really think he thought Rob was never coming back! :(

Preggos preggos.

Kurt so strong man.

We had so much fun and can't wait to do it again again. There's nothing better in my book than being outside, with no distractions, good food, and family.

Cody Here We Come

So back in July Rob's family had a little reunion in Cody, Wyoming (where rob's mom grew up). Unfortunately Rob was out of town with the Youth National Team till a couple days in and had to leave straight from there to return to work. In light of this I decided to drive with the kids (including our infamous little vomiter) to Wyoming on my own! Sounds like a great plan right?

Realizing this was a horrible plan my mother-in-law offered for us to drive with her.

Most people thought I was crazy when I told them I was driving with my MIL sans Rob to his family reunion in Wyoming of all places...but I assured them that if they knew my amazing MIL (and family) they would understand.

So we set off...very early...

And made lots of interesting bath room breaks...Mindy being the biggest trooper, driving 7/8 months preggos alone with her four kids!

We stopped for ice cream at an old mom and pop store in the middle of nowhere (a neilson tradition)

which of course the kids loved...

Then after long last we arrived in Buffalo Bill Town, Cody Wyoming.

It was really beautiful and the town was quaint and charming.

Margaret's family were amazing hosts and so generous with their time and love.

And Margaret and Bob arranged for us to do all sorts of fun activities...

We went river rafting!

To Yellowstone...which I opted out of with the baby and the vomiter on the all day windy drive...I've seen it before and I'll see it again I am sure. But the rest of the gang had a blast!

We went horseback riding in and absolutely beautiful mountain landscape...

We went to a great cowboy review show, trolly tours of cody, the famous cody rodeo, and more...it was sooo fun to just spend time with everyone!

We also ran into some friends at dinner one night...what are the chances that you're at the same restaurant, the same night, in cody wyoming? So crazy the way those things happen!

Then the last day we had a fun family reunion with my MIL's fam.

They put out a great spread and we laughed, played, took loads of pictures and had a wicked water balloon fight!

Etta's fav new relative!

We had such an amazing time and are so grateful to Margaret for setting this whole thing up and making it such a special family memory.

There were a few more pics of Etta at the rodeo and of our family (with Liam included!) that were just darling that hopefully I can track down...but that's all for now!