A Day of Thanksgiving

I am in love with this little girl!

Leave it to Rachel Ray to make me think about how every day can be a day of Thanksgiving. And I'm very thankful to be Eliza's mommy. I love her smiles, her snuggles, her giggles and how squirmy with excitement she gets when she sees her dad. Every night we thank Heavenly Father for letting her come to our family and for being so healthy and happy and just bringing us so much joy. I don't think I really knew what joy was until she came.

And here's another story that just makes your heart swell with thankfulness. Read it, cry over it and then give a little early thanks of your own.

If you really want to shed some tears, read Mia's story as told by her mommy. It will make your heart swell with thankfulness. Well, at least it did mine.

Happy Fall Y'all

Our fall in St. George consists of hearing about the snow up north while we look out the window at our nice green leaves. Sad. Actually, the leaves around town are just now starting to turn yellow and we have had to wear jackets and hats the last few mornings. Anybody want to come visit? :)

We miss the changing colors, so we had to go find them. We went hiking in Zion National Park. We hiked up behind Weeping Rock to Observation Point and had a little picnic. We thought we would be home just after lunch, but the hike took a bit longer than we expected. It was well worth it and a great way to spend a nice fall day.

Happy Halloween

We were feeling that Halloween would not be too exciting this year - all dressed up with no place to go - but we lucked out. We were invited to a pumpkin carving party so our jack-o-lantern got carved. (Unfortunately, we had to miss the judging portion because someone just couldn't keep her eyes open - we heard it was pretty spook-tacular with 40 jack-o-lanterns all aglow.) Eliza's best buddies up the street requested that she wear their tiger costume, saved me the dilemma of "should we dress up" or "not." And then, we had some substitute grandparents to trick-or-treat to - my Aunt Joan and Uncle Arnold! We got a whole, wonderful dinner instead of just a candy bar! Now that's what I call a treat!



The candy bar was more of a hit than we thought it would be.

One holiday down, two to go. :)

Grand Canyon (Eliza's First Time)

This is a week late, but better later than never. We had wanted to go camping two weeks ago but it was very cold that weekend so I watched the weather all week to make sure it warmed up nice and warm. Well the weather said we would have a low of 38 out on the Kiabab (National Forest next to the Grand Canyon) so off we went. Friday night when Eliza was ready for bed we left. We got to our campsite a little after 10 and the moon was just coming up. From the pictures you can see that our campsite was right on the edge of the Grand Canyon and although it was cold it still warmed up quite nicely. Saturday morning we went to some viewpoints and then went on a hike along the Rainbow Rim, the only mountain biking trail along the Rim of the Grand Canyon. It was beautiful and we will have to go back when we can take our bikes. On the way we met a friend and went to Red Cave Narrows and then it was home through all of the Utah Deer Hunters. Good thing we went camping in Arizona!
This is the view from our tent. Eliza kept track of some of the sleeping bags while we packed up in the morning.
She loves her tent.
Yeah it was still a little cold in the morning.
Eliza loves her backpack too. It reminds me of her grandma and grandpa in Burma riding on the covered cabs atop an elephant.

The Trick of Tricks

I feel that a post is necessary. We've been busy, to say the least, and I'm sure it will stay that way. For instance - did you realize it is now less than 10 weeks until Christmas? Yeah, how 'bout that for an eye-opener.

But that's not the point of this little post. The point is to share a video with you. Eliza has been the proud master of this trick for some time, but she has recently added the sound effects, and I think you'll agree, it's just too cute not to share.

Aaron's sound effects aren't bad either. :)

What more could you ask for?

So, yesterday was my birthday. It's strange, some years I want everyone to remember and recognize it, and some years I don't. This year was an "I don't" year. Now, that doesn't mean I didn't want anybody to wish me happy birthday, I just don't mind if it's forgotten. But a lot of you did remember and so I wanted to say THANKS! I was delightfully surprised by some of the people who remembered and it was really fun to get messages all day. Thanks, friends and family! You made the big day be just a little more special!

Aaron was great - he gave me just what I wanted for my birthday (and mind you, it's not what's in the parentheses that counts): something I would never buy myself (dvds) and something he just made the decision and bought without any deliberation on my part (a family-size tent). Of course, we had to put the last one to the test right away and slept out in the backyard last night.

And Eliza gave me a gift too - loving to sleep outside just as much as I do!

Just some fun snapshots...