Picture Overload

Since we've taken so long to update the blog, we have tons of pictures to share. First up is Travis's graduation. We drove down to Missoula (back in May) and spent the day with his family as he got his bachelor's degree from U of M. These pictures were all taken by Joseph.

Then we had a blast with Grandma Eris and Grandpa Mike staying at our house. Unfortunately, right after they arrived, Grandma started to get a sinus infection and had to get it taken care of before her hip replacement. Fortunately, it all worked out just fine. Before they left we had a nice photo shoot with them and the kids.

We had so much fun visiting with them (sinus infection and all) and can't wait to spend more time with them!

Next, Joseph was able to have an awesome experience fishing for the first time. He has his very own spiderman fishing pole!

He doesn't quite have the patience for it yet, but he did pretty well even though we didn't catch anything!

These are just some silly photos of the kids and the fun things we do. I don't know what it is with us and putting Emery in Joseph's underwear, but something about it's just so funny!

Our next adventure was at a really fun place here in Kalispell called the Little Bitty Ranch. They have pigs, horses, goats, a turkey, and maybe more that I'm forgetting. The kids were able to go and see all the animals and ride the horses. Joseph jumped right on and enjoyed his ride. Emery watched quietly the whole time, and then when it was her turn, she let me sit her on the horse, sat for a second, and then leaned back to me to come down. I was glad she let me put her on, even if she didn't want to ride, but she gave it a try!

Then we had a rained out Fathe'rs Son Campout. Joseph was pretty excited about it, so Aaron made their own tent in the living room and they slept out there. Maybe next year it won't be pouring rain!

Here are some silly shots of Joseph, doing what he does best. Being silly!

I'm cold!

Dressing up like Papa to go to work!

One morning when Julie came home from her run, she found Emery sitting at breakfast like this. Every morning when she gets dressed, she picks out the bows she wants to wear. Apparently that day she couldn't decide which one she wanted!

And whenever we take a picture of Emery, we have to take a picture of Joseph too!

One day as I was getting breakfast ready, I found this in the cereal box. Didn't know they were still putting prizes in there!

Nope! It was just one of our cars that mysteriously ended up in the cereal container.

More of Emery's silliness wearing Joseph's clothes.

And this lovely mark is where she decided to try sharpening her teeth on our table. That one's not coming out!

The next bunch are from our trip to the Hungry Horse Reservoir. Emery absoutely loved the water. Joseph was excited about finding pirate treasure. In the end it was a great time,  minus the 17 mosquito bites Julie ended up with and Joseph's horrible allergic reaction/infection.

This is his swollen knee. We were in the waiting room waiting to be seen. Turns out he had an allergic reaction to something that bit him and his bites were filling with hot fluid (which was apparently the infection ontop of the allergy). Made for a not so fun day, but all in all Joseph was a real trooper and didn't complain about the discomfort or pain.

And last are the kids with their wonderful creations from Grandma Eris. Emery is sporting her lovely new sundress, and Joseph (without his head in the pic) is holding his brand new car/book bag from her. It's so masculine isn't it? (His last bag was really a very femmy purse that used to be mine.) Oh, and there's another picture of Joseph which I had to take after taking a picture of Emery.

So that's the picture overload. Maybe I'll be good and keep up next time so I'm not blogging multiple months at the same time. :)

Emery and more!

Happy Birthday Emery! It's been an amazing year with you in our family!

Here are some photos from Emery's first Birthday party. She didn't really dig into her cake, although we gave her the chance. We think she was hoping for chocolate cake. We'll do better next year!

Next, it was time for presents. Like most one year olds, she wasn't too interested. But we were able to get her involved every now and then.

These are some pictures from our visit to the fire station. Joseph was slightly scared of the firefighter in his gear. They also hooked him up to a heart monitor. He didn't really like that either. But they both loved climbing in and out of the ambulance. Emery got angry more than once that I wouldn't let her climb back in.

This photo is especially for Patsy. She's pregnant with a little girl (YAY!) and gave Emery this sweet little bear that she absolutely loves. Maybe now we can find one for her little girl and just hope she likes it as much as Emery does.

This is just a silly picture of Emery. She was actually chowing down on peas at the time, but Joseph started making her laugh. Priceless.

I was talking to my sister Heidi when this happened. Out walked everyone from the bedroom and what did I find?

Emery wearing a strange assortment of Joseph's clothes.

Including his Wall*E underwear. I had to get off the phone I was laughing so hard. Aren't dads the best?

Spring Break and more...

So, here's what we've been up to the last month or more. Lots of not much, then one big spring break vacation/impromptu family reunion.


This is one of Joseph and Emery's favorite games. He sticks himself in there and she opens and shuts the cupboard doors. Oh, the simple entertainment! It's pretty sweet. Then Grandma Denney brought over two geckos from her third grade classroom. We babysat them for a night. Joseph was able to hold them, and Emery was pretty interested in them too. Not very squeamish about reptiles I guess!



This is just a random picture of Joseph. We had just folded some laundry and I turned around and saw him watching tv like this. He's now done it twice.   For Aaron's spring break, we took a few days and drove out to Conrad, MT where his dad grew up and Grandma Jean still lives. We were able to go out and see the ranch where Aaron's dad grew up. It was quite the adventure. Two of Aaron's brothers came on the trip with their families. Jared brought his, and Tim drove up with his family from Billings. We haven't seen them in quite a while, and were able to finally meet their sweet twin girls. (Pictures down below.) In the picture above, Joseph was trying to catch Grandma Jean's wind thing. (If it has a name, it's escaping me.) It shows the wind out there (which was pretty insane. I'm not a fan of wind.) and I thought it was just kinda cute.

There's a park right next to Grandma Jean's house, so of course we all took the kids out there for some playing time. Even Emery got in on the action! They had a good time.

This is Mariah.

This is Mollie.

This is Tim's older son Abram sitting with Joseph on an old snowmobile at the ranch. They were best buds. It was hard to tell which one was ours, because they really do look a lot alike. They enjoyed multiple snowmobiles, and being able to sit in huge tractors, and their wheels.

Abram really liked holding Joseph's hand, so for a while, we lent Joseph to their family. This is their temporary family photo.

 Here's another picture of Joseph's cities he builds. Aaron was so impressed with it, he took a picture. I think I've showed them before. He's still at it.

Joseph and Emery really enjoy bathtime together. Can you see how Emery's ears stick out? That's where her nickname Monkey came from.

I still need to upload the pictures from Emery's birthday, so expect another blog very shortly. It'll be full of goodness!

Closing out winter

Well, at least we hope winter's on its way out. Here's to hoping!  Here are some more pictures of what we've been up to lately, with a special section especially from Joseph.

We found out Emery's quite the artist and loves to play with this little magna doodle. It's pretty neat.

Here's Emery at Grandma Denney's birthday party. She was enjoying the company of a carrot that evening. At least it matched her dress, right?

Happy Birthday Diane! Julie had tons of fun making her angel food cake for the party. It sure was good!

We had cousin Cadence over for some V-day cookie fun. Unfortunately J's cookies all fell onto the oven door as we were putting them in. ( A little incident involving a nameless baby sister ;) He still got to make some, with other dough, so it all worked out. *click on the collage to see all the pics better*

This is for Grandma Eris. Thanks for the placemats! It's Joseph's job every  Wednesday to set the table. He really enjoys doing it!

The other day for "school" Joseph went on a picture scavenger hunt. We ended up walking around and he searched for 5 things to take a picture of. He ended up taking pictures of over 50 things (including the 5 required.) These are some of Julie's favorites.

His perspective is so different than an adults (mainly because he's shorter), so it's neat to see things through his eyes. A lot of his pictures were really close up,  but it adds a lot of dimension and emphasizes the texture of things. (Julie's recalling her photography class days...) Anyhow, he had a blast, and enjoyed the scavenger hunt.

As for the day to day goings, Aaron is still waiting around for a contract. We are very hopeful, as we know the principal likes him and wants to keep him on board, but until that comes around, we're cautiously hopeful. Julie and the kids are doing great. Emery is officially walking. It's not her only mode of transportation yet, but she practices more every day. Joseph is doing a daily "school" with Julie. They learn songs, scriptures, spanish, do crafts, plan meals, learn to write, and read. It's just a little bit everyday, but it helps to give Joseph some structured time so he's not spinning his wheels all day long. We're enjoying the sunshine, and waiting for the rest of the ice to melt and the mud to dry.

Oh yes, and Julie had her 26th birthday! Can't forget that. It was wonderful. Julie and Aaron enjoyed a nice dinner at Famous Dave's, and some ice cream and cake with family. And don't forget to look at the two new links listed at the top of the blog. They're Julie's projects. One has been going on for a while (and is about to be seriously updated) which is called Made With Love. It's filled with yummy and kid friendly recipes, with pictures for each one, and tested out by your favorite family, ours. The other is called A Real Day Job. It's a little personal project of Julie's all about the real life of parenting, it's joys and griefs, but still loving it all. So check them out!

Big Steps

So we've got some pictures leftover from Christmas break that weren't off the camera yet, as well as the latest and greatest. This is what we've been up to, and how we've been surviving the winter.

Joseph's absolute favorite thing to do is build caves.

Aaron had his 28th birthday. Happy Birthday! And no, we didn't make him blow out all the candles. Julie just thought it would be funny to stuff all 28 candles onto the tiny slice of carrot cake.

We took Joseph on his first real sledding trip. He had a blast! We ended finding a pretty good spot and spent a lot of time going up and down. Emery was a doll and sat bundled up in her stroller the whole time.

We made a point to prepare him for wiping out, worried it would make him sad or not like sledding. Thanks to our preparation, he loves wiping out! As long as it doesn't happen too fast. He now tells us when we go sledding, "It's okay to fall down."

We also had a great opportunity to drive down to Missoula and see Julie's Grandma Burnham. Travis and Heather flew her out to Missoula for a week and so we drove down the day she arrived to meet her at the airport. We had a really nice visit.

Emery starting standing while we were visiting with Grandma Burnham. She was so excited about what she was doing. It was really funny. Excuse my (Julie) loud voice during the video. She was right next to me and I was backed up to the couch, so I couldn't get good footage of her. But you can see how excited she was.

Just the other day Emery started taking steps. Right before the video she took one step, then Julie got her taking one small step in the video. After this, she took single steps a few more times, and once, took about 4 steps (although 3 were with the same foot, in a row.). We're still so proud of our little walking girl! We know it won't be long before she decides she wants to do this all the time too. We imagine she'll be prancing around by Julie's birthday.