Benny, Eliza and I went to the park for a pony ride a few days ago. Last summer when Benjamin went on a pony ride it was extremely exciting for him. His pony was named Peanut and it became his favorite character in bedtime stories, and his favorite name for every horse. So this year I thought I had better take him for a pony ride before they stopped giving them at the park. He got to choose which pony to ride, so he decided on the brown and white pony named PJ. He had so much fun riding on him. He told me a few times that he loved PJ. Isn't that cute? And he also pointed out all the piles of "pony poo" along the trail. Ahhh, nothing like good conversation. :)

five years

Jed and I celebrated our five year anniversary on Saturday.

Wow. Talk about a wonderful five years. This

definitely was cause for a celebration. Five years and loving each other more every day. Seriously, I am so blessed to have such a perfect husband. He's considerate, sweet, and loving. He's so fun to be around, and has the funniest sense of humor. He often has me rolling with laughter from his impersonations. Mostly impersonations of me, I'm afraid. But he's hilarious! He loves our children and looks forward to seeing them and playing with them. He loves the Lord and shows his commitment to Him in the way he lives. He inspires me in every way.

I could go on and on, but I know he is not going to like how I'm publicly praising him. I'll spare him any further embarrassment. But anyway, I feel so thankful for him and what a blessing he is to me.

We celebrated our anniversary by going to the temple and then going out to eat afterward at PF Chang's. It was such a great day. We decided that we need to spend more one-on-one time together - go on real dates more often. We love each others company. That's a really good sign after five years, huh? I guess it'll mean even more at our 10, 20, 30... year anniversaries. :)

I love you, Jed!

Toledo Zoo with Mindy

We went to the Toledo Zoo with Mindy when she came to visit last week. This zoo is AWESOME. It seemed like all the animals were super interactive and energetic. The living spaces for the animals were neat, and seemed stimulating for them. There were lots of signs about how the zoo aids in the animals' development. They move animals around to different areas, have 'enrichment time' with them, provide different toys, etc. I was very impressed.

The polar bears exhibit was the highlight of the day. There were three cubs that were SO energetic. One would dive into the water after a toy ring, and then another one would dive in right on top of the first cub. They would wrestle and swim around, get out, dive back in, and the whole time we were watching from a huge window underneath the water. It was so cool! Benjamin absolutely loved it, and we were all laughing out loud too. It was awesome.

(Look at the picture above - Benjamin isn't too sure about being fed to the scary bear! The other picture above is us in front of the meerkat standing sentinal.)

The hippos were my second favorite. Again, we got to watch them from a huge window under the water. This enormous hippo was swimming under the water, and then suddenly turned and came right to us. It was such a fun surprise - it came right up to Benjamin!

These exhibits were very well done. I just loved this zoo. There were many times when Benjamin was so excited he couldn't contain himself. In the picture below, Mindy is holding him as they watched the monkeys. Benny was laughing so hard at the monkeys and squealing with delight. It was so fun to be there with him.

The aquariums were wonderful too. They had some really neat fish and sea animals on display. Below are some pictures of Jed and Benjamin at the shark tank. Benny loved the sharks! Look - he's covering his mouth and laughing - he does that when he is super-duper excited. :) Isn't Jed a great Dad - his face is right up to the pane next to Benjamin's, and he's getting really into it too, which makes it even more fun for Benny.

Mindy's visit

My sister, Mindy, came to visit us this last weekend. It was SO FUN! I just loved having her over. Hanging out and chatting together was so enjoyable. It only gets THAT fun when it's a SISTER. :) It was so sweet of her to use her vacation days at work to fly out and visit us. She is expecting her first baby and it was really fun for me to see her pregnant. She is the most adorable pregnant lady I've ever seen.

Mindy slept in the front room every night. The first morning after she arrived I was up feeding Eliza and heard Benny's feet scamper out of his room and down the hall. Then I heard them stop when he reached the front room. There was a very long pause. Then he came to Eliza's room and slowly opened the door. He stood there and said to me, in a very serious tone, "Mom, come with me." I asked him why, but he kept saying, "Mom, come with me." Finally I said, "What do you want to show me?" and he said, "There's a lady sleeping in our front room." Isn't that funny?! As if some strange woman had come and camped out in our living room during the night! I told him it was Aunt Mindy and he was like, "Ohhhhh..." and then he asked if he could go lay down by her. :) Luckily he wasn't too worried about the new lady sleeping in the house.

The first day she came, we went blueberry picking at a U-pick farm nearby. It was super fun. We only picked for maybe 45 minutes, and we couldhave kept going and going, but we weren't sure what we would do with any more berries! :)
Mindy brought a book for Eliza (her first My Little Pony book), and Lady & the Tramp pop-up book for Benjamin. She read them both to Benny about 25 times, and many other books too. Benjamin was constantly asking her to come into his room with him to play or read him some books. Boy, he enjoyed his weekend with his Aunt Mindy!






Mindy hadn't seen High School Musical yet, and since it is Benjamin's and my favorite, we had her watch it with us one evening. Here's Benny dancing along to the music... in his underwear. :)

On Friday we took Mindy to the park nearby where there is a big water fountain for kids to play in. It was a little windy that day, so we headed to the playscape at the park later on, where Mindy and I both made ourselves sick by spinning around on the tire swing with Benjamin. (Honestly, I thought I would be sick all day after that.)

Benjamin and Eliza both really enjoyed their Aunt Mindy. Aren't these pictures cute that Mindy took of them? Eliza is wearing the little dress that Mindy gave her when she was born. :)

Portraits - Eliza 6 months and Benjamin 3 years

Look at what my friend, Christina, did to the picture I posted. Wow - what a difference!

Who would have thought?

Well, it's official - I've been called and set apart as the Young Women President in my ward. I'll tell you, it was quite a shocker to receive this calling. I felt totally overwhelmed and inadequate to say the very least. But I've been feeling a bit more comfortable with it now that I have a great presidency called. Having counselors and a secretary to discuss stuff with and feel camaraderie with is a big lifesaver. We had a really good presidency meeting last night, and I'm starting to feel excited about getting to know our darling girls and helping them make right choices. One thing the bishop told me when he extended me this calling is that Jesus Christ loves these girls more than anyone, and has so much invested in them. I realized that if I turn to Him in this calling and seek for His guidance, He will help me because He wants this to be a success for them too - infinitely more than even I do!
I'm glad I've been working with these young women as their 2nd counselor for the past 6 months. So I already know them and have a great relationship with them.
I just have to include this clip - it's of me and a few of our young women doing a dance skit to the "Fabulous" song from High School Musical 2. Everyone was laughing about how I looked like just another young woman up there on the stage. It just cracks me up that I'm their YW President now! (I'm third from the left)

Stake Pioneer Campout

We went to the stake pioneer day family campout last weekend. It was the first camping trip I've been on with kids. It was surprisingly easy and enjoyable. Of course they both went to bed late, but for the vast majority of the time they were happy all evening, and once they were asleep (about 11:30pm) they slept all night. In fact, Benny slept in until 8am. (Granted, he woke up and snuggled beside Jed at about 6am. Sounds sweet, but it's rather uncomfortable in a sleeping bag. He's a good dad. I pretended to be asleep still. I'm a bad mom.)

Benjamin also got to shoot a bow and arrow. Just like Nephi, except Ben's bow didn't break. Atleast that's what he tells us.

We had delicious hotdogs for dinner, and lots of roasted marshmallows and smores at the campfire that night. Benny just loved running around with the other kids, playing in the tents and shooting off the little rocket launcher we brought. We also got to do the popbottle rocket in the morning, which was fun.

Here are a bunch of pictures from the big bonfire we went to that night.

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Our friends....
The Davises and us

The Golds and the Aanderuds

Mornings around here...

Eliza is proficiently rolling around now. She is starting to explore the sounds she can make - "oooh-oooh." She is grabbing at everything, loves to eat paper, and gets stuck sometimes as she tries to roll into the furniture legs. She's on a great schedule. She takes 3 naps a day. She has her 'dinner' sometime between 7pm - 7:45pm, and then goes to bed about 1 hour later. She sleeps until about 7am - 7:30am in the morning. I love it.

Jed had to change the breakpads on the car the other morning, and of course he had his devoted helper out there with him. He is Jed's official sidekick. Benjamin is becoming more and more self sufficient. For instance, he just noticed a magazine on the table and declared, "I need some scissors so I can open this, Mom." Then he got out the big pair of scissors himself. Hmmmmm.... I traded him for some kid-scissors. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.

He can dress himself (underwear put on backwards still counts), get out of the house himself if it's not locked, strap himself into his carseat, help himself to food from the fridge, 'read' to himself... He's actually really good at entertaining himself in general. His favorite is when Jed and I both hang out in his room. He loves having us in his room - he shows us his toys and how he can run fast from here to there... It's cute.

Our two morning cuties. Don't you love that strangled look on Eliza's face? haha! She's used to the uncomfortable hugs from her big brother. :)

Roar on the River

We went to a city event two weekends ago called Roar On The River, at a nice big park nearby. It's a big jet ski/water ski/hydroplane competition. It was really fun to watch the races on the river. This is what they looked like (see photo). On the first loop of the race two of them crashed, so they started the race over after they took care of it. When it began again, on that same first loop, there was an even bigger crash, where one of them actually flew up in the air and flipped over. It was crazy. The competitions were held on Sat and Sun but we only saw one of them on Saturday. We went with our good friends and after the race was over we were just hanging out together. Well, we felt a few splattering of raindrops, so we thought we better call in the kids and pack up. No sooner than we had the thought, the clouds just emptied on us. It was a very intense rain storm! We were running through sheets of water, pushing the double stroller. Benjamin was soaked in the front seat, but Eliza stayed comparatively dry in the back seat. Talk about an adventure!

Some of my great friends, Christina, Chantel, and Anona.

Here's Ben and Garret playing in the construction fencing. All the kids enjoyed throwing pebbles into the water. I swear that activity could entertain children for hours on end.

Guess Who's POTTY TRAINED?!

Need I say more? haha! This kid is so goofy - I love it. He thought the idea of sporting underwear on the head was entirely his own. His creative little mind just loves coming up with silly things to do, to get a laugh out of us.
Honestly, his potty training went SO WELL. He was perfectly ready to make the transition, which made it a million times easier for us all. He still has a few accidents here and there, but he has the desire to go in the potty. So when he has an accident, it truly is an accident. He's getting to be such a big boy.
Way to go, Benjamin!

Big Day for Little Girl

Eliza's first taste of solid food! The momentous day was on July 11, at 6 months old. :) I had forgotten how messy spoon feeding can be, so I didn't have a bib ready. Hence the burp cloth.

Aren't her little feet with her curled up toes cute?