Father's Day!

We celebrated Father's Day with my Dad the Friday before. We took a picnic dinner over to the pond at Weber State to feed the ducks. We had a great time, good food and lots of ducks and geese. Emma had so much fun in fact she wanted to dive right and go swimming with them but we were able to catch her in time. Then we headed back to Mom and Dad's and enjoyed their back yard. We hope you had a great time Dad - WE LOVE YOU!!

With Uncle Taylor and Aunt Annie!

With Grandma and Aunt Annie!

With Grandpa!

Quinn succeeded in getting a goose to eat right out of his hand.

Our little climber!

Kisses from Sophie!

Emma loved her tent!

Swinging with Dad!

Quinn enjoyed his Father's Day I think. He received the third season of the Cosby Show, a PlayStation game, and a U of U shirt. We love our Dad and Emma was very excited to help out with the gifts. Happy Father's Day Quinn. YOU ARE THE BEST DAD! Later that day we celebrated with Quinn's family but we forgot to take pictures.

Snowbird

Last Wednesday Emma and I headed up the canyon to Snow Bird for the day along with my Mom and brother Taylor. Grandma and Grandpa Zundel were already there along with Aunt Shelly and some of her kids, Heidi, Quinn and Josh. Aunt Liz also came with all four of her kids, Ryan, Eric, Kaylee and Alley. We had a great time even though the weather was a little on the cold side.

First we headed to the park. Emma loves to swing but only for about a minute then it's all about the slides. She will go down all by herself but always wants help getting back up. Cousin Heidi was great for Emma. She took her around to everything and made her laugh. The was also great for Heidi. She is the youngest in her family and never had anyone to be a big sister too. Thanks Heidi!

Here is Emma asking for "more" using sign language. She knows several words and she definitely knows what they mean. Of course she wouldn't eat anything I gave her until Grandma pulled out the olives, which she loves.

After a short nap, we headed out into the cold to the warm pool. Emma had a great time with all her cousins. She so wanted to be big and be able to swim about like them. She even dived off my lap twice to give is a try. She most enjoyed jumping (more like leaning until she fell) off the side into my arms in the water. She did this over and over. If I stopped she would sign "more". I did get a little rest by putting her in an inflatable boat which she hated last year but now loves. She has no fear.

Most of the cousins!

Splashing Mom!

Signing for more.

All the cousins wanted a turn pushing Emma around.

Watch out Emma, I think Grandma is going in for that booger!

We had a great time and we sure tired Emma out for the ride home! Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for letting us come up and enjoy the day with you. We love you!!

Letterboxing -- Just another nerdy hobby enjoyed by Quinn

Last weekend, rather than poring through Native American artifacts at Hovenweep and Mesa Verde (as we had planned) we spent the weekend as shut-ins while Lauralee and Emma got better. By the time Monday rolled around, they were feeling better, and I still had the day off, so we decided to actually step foot outside and feel the warmth of the Earth's sun.



It was a perfect premise to indulge me in my latest nerdy hobby: letterboxing. We wanted to get outside, and Lauralee was too sick to argue with me. Letterboxing is essentially treasure hunting for adults. Somebody hides a small container in a public place and leaves clues for how to find it. The containers have a small book where you leave a stamp indicating that you found the letterbox. There's also a stamp for you to apply in your own book. For details, go to http://www.letterboxing.org/.



There are unfortunately no letterboxes in Woods Cross, and only 3 in Bountiful. We set out to find all the Bountiful letterboxes on Monday. Our first stop was at Rocket Park. Unfortunately, we couldn't find the letterbox, but Emma had a great time playing on the playground. She is getting quite brave. She will go down all the slides by herself and usually signs "more" when she gets to the bottom. She also enjoys jumping off of things (playground equipment, stairs, coffee tables, beds) into our arms.















Our next stop was Mueller Park canyon. The letterbox was hidden about a mile up the first trail, so we ended up with a nice little hike. Emma enjoyed the rocky terrain in her stroller, but I felt bad making Lauralee hike so far while she was just getting over her cold.






Looking at my clues. The letterbox is hidden in this rock wall. How many times have I hiked past this wall without knowing there was something hidden there?

Success.

Emma enjoying the view.

Our last stop was at the Bountiful City Cemetery. This letterbox was hidden by a family who had lost a child, and all of the clues involved finding the grave markers of other children who had passed away. It was actually quite touching to see all of these families who had lost children -- many families had lost multiple children. It was really driven home to have Emma there with us, running around happy as can be. What a blessing she is to us.

The final letterbox was hidden by a family in the flower pot of the their child's grave marker. The stamp they had made was a little child with a halo. It was a really neat experience.

All in all it was a fun day, and I'm looking forward to more letterboxing. They are hidden throughout the state (throughout the country, in fact). We've decided to try to do this on Saturdays during the summer when we don't have anything else going on. It will get us outside and hopefully we'll get to see some neat places in the state as well. Our next adventures will take us to Farmington, and to Wheeler Farm.

Quinn

What a Weekend!

I was hoping to have some really great pictures to post of the Indian ruins at Hovenweep and Mesa Verde that we had planned to explore this weekend but....

instead we decided to just stay home and be sick. Earlier in the week I started to feel sick but thought it was just a cold and would go away. I even felt well enough to work on Thursday and then we planned to leave on Friday. Emma started getting sick on Wednesday with a minor runny nose nothing else. However this all changed Thursday night. Emma and I both got worse and we spent the whole night up with Emma. She would not sleep, her nose would not stop running. I started with more body aches and a fever and congestion, I was not sleeping either. Because we were all exhausted we decided we had better cancel and just stay home. No one wanted to deal with another sleepless night in a hotel room. I was a good thing we did because we were all up again Friday night. Quinn was such a trooper taking care of his sick girls. I don't know how he managed to not get sick himself, there were tissues everywhere. Thanks again honey, we love you.

We did get out for a few hours on yesterday, but I'll let Quinn blog about that because it's about another one of his hobbies.

But here are Emma's 18 Month photos finally:

Playdate and an Afternoon out with Mom and Dad!

I'm still trying to get caught up. Emma and I have both been sick with colds this week but hopefully things are on the mend. Emma's last two canine teeth are almost in. Hooray! Life (and sleep) had better get back to normal soon. I don't function well on 5 hours of sleep a night. I feel like I have an infant again.

Oh, well we still manage to have some fun. Emma and I drove down to Alpine a few days after Monica's wedding to spend some time with my cousin Beth and her twins before they headed back to California. If was so nice to visit with her and swap "mom" stories. The girls also had fun exploring the yard and the next door neighbor's horse.

On the swing set.

Walking through the tall weeds and grass to go see the horse.

Beth is due the end of July with a boy!

Our little explorer, she didn't even mind that the grass was a tall as she was.

Trying to get all three girls to hold still the hammock, we were not that successful.

Then last week Quinn and I decided to hit the zoo one afternoon before the crowds of summer and the heat. Quinn can't even remember the last time he had been. We had a great time and Emma was much more observant of the animals than she was last September when we went.

Emma would not walk through this tunnel by her self.

One of the elephants is expecting a baby in July or August!

She was really nervous about this rhino!

This was one of my favorite things about the zoo as a kid and after a little help from me to know that it wasn't scary it became a favorite of Emma's too. She had to have a drink out of everyone we saw.

Studying the rams.

Still not old enough to realize this gorilla is not real.

Checking out the exotic birds.

She loved these because she could get really close and they were on her level.

She didn't really get it that I was allowing her to go play and get wet. I'm sure she'll pick up on it next time and I won't be able to drag her away.