Places To Go...

This is just a quick list of places I want to visit here in the United States. I have been rewatching Ken Burns' National Parks documentary. It has made me think about the importance of taking our children to the places we loved as children. Some of these places I have already visited but need more time. Here it goes, in no particular order:

1. Yosemite National Park
2. Boston, MA
3. Glacier National Park
4. New Orleans, LA
5. Redwoods National Park
6. Providence, RI
7. Ashland, OR
8. Florida Keys
9. Santa Fe, NM
10. Black Hills of South Dakota (Deadwood)
11. Gettysburg, PA
12. Palmyra, NY
13. Nauvoo, IL
14. St. Louis, MO
15. Washington DC
16. Salem, MA
17. Atlanta, GA
18. Savannah, GA
19. More later....

Samantha and Santa Claus

We had our Ward Party tonight and a special visitor came to dinner! Samantha really liked visiting with Santa. Turns out Santa has a granddaughter the exact same age as Samantha so he wanted to take her home to the North Pole. He held her several times throughout the night and she really liked him. White beards and furry hats are lots of fun. Here's the pics!

 It's a real beard! Samantha pulled it pretty hard!

 

 

 

 Merry Christmas!

Growing and growing!

The last month flew by for our little family. Samantha keeps learning new tricks. Her latest skills include peek-a-boo, elephant noises and spraying slobber in a misty spray. So charming!

Samantha has really started liking my cell phone. Smiles are harder to capture when incredulity abounds.

Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate!

A couple of weeks ago Sam got her first run in her "pantyhose." Welcome to the world of women little chubby toed girl!

 Hanging out under a chair in Sunday School. This girl knows how to relax and kick back!

Visiting with Great Grandpa! Samantha loves sitting on his lap.

 Gnawing on Great Grandma's cookies! Too bad I didn't get an "after" picture. Sam made a fantastic mess with this cookie.

Chewing on Sophie the giraffe, our new favorite toy.

Conked out in the carseat...with Sophie again.

Cute piggies!

Playing with Uncle Jeff! Samantha loves walking with Jeff and watching him play video games. She doesn't really care about what's on the TV, she just likes watching Uncle Jeff.

Playing on the floor in Mommy's room while she does her chores!

 

A little Black Friday shopping! (Isn't sitting up great!)

Yummy cereal! 

Five Months Old!

Samantha turned five months old yesterday! Here are some fun pictures from the last few days. This one below was taken today on our walk to the park. The firemen were playing soccer so Mommy was smiling too (you just can't see!)

 

 Here's Daddy and Sammy getting ready for another walk!

 

 Here's Samantha the day after she found her feet. She really loves being in the buff. Here's Mommy and Sammy the Kewpie! Samantha is actually looking at herself in the hallway mirror, that's why she won't look at the camera.

  Another walk!

  Someone fell asleep during playtime!

Witches' Night Out!

Saturday when all of our husbands went to the Priesthood Session of General Conference, Samantha, my mom, Hailey and Wendy (two of my sister-in-laws) and my niece Lilly took off for an outing to Gardner Village. In honor of the occasion we wore witchy hats and t-shirts. I couldn't find one small enough to fit Samantha so I ended up making one. As you can tell by the picture Samantha really loved hers:

I went for a modified witch hat this year. My old bedazzling witch had didn't seem to fit very well...maybe my head grew?!? Who knows...here is Samantha and I at one of the cute vignettes around the village.

Grandma Maloney holding a little pumpkin.

Aunty Hailey (aka Aunt Heehee) holding Lilly-bean.

Here are some of the yummy treats we split four ways at the bakery. The white frosting one was a pumpkin cookie....mmmm.....yummy!

Poor Samantha was not a very happy witch. She spent quite a bit of the night looking like this:

I had taken more pictures but they didn't turn out so well. More pictures from my mom's camera are coming soon!

Samantha's latest adventures...

September has been a very busy month for our family! On August 30th Samantha had her blessing. It was a great time to see family and to celebrate Samantha's arrival. Her uncle Andrew documented the event beautifully. Click here to see his blog post. Below are just a few pictures from some of the fun things we've done this month. Chris had a "stay-cation" this past week so we were able to squeeze in some extra fun before the snow flies. Enjoy!
Here is Samantha in the beautiful dress that Uncle Eric and Aunt Maria gave her. She loved putting her hands in the crochet holes!

This is Sam in her new baby saucer. She LOVES it. It helps her to get strong and keeps her from getting bored.
Here's Sam right after a bath. Bathtime is by far the best part of Samantha's day. She likes them morning and night and won't let you forget!
This month we've learned to hold a rattle all by ourselves! Sunday School is super fun now that Samantha rocks the house with her beats.
Here's Daddy and Sammy playing at the ward party.
Sam chillin' in her stroller at the Hogle Zoo!
Waiting for the Baby Elephant to wake up with Mom at the Hogle Zoo!
Pretending not to be tired so she can stay up and play with Daddy in his game room.
Waiting for the Draft Horse Pull at the Utah State Fair.
This is pretty dark but it was taken early in the morning after our first "camp-out" with Samantha in our back yard. It was basically a test run to see if we are ready to go camping for real. Samantha passed the test and slept like a log but Mommy woke up every 15 minutes to make sure that Sammy was okay. No camping trips for us for a while!



This is my first try at posting a video on my blog. It's not the best, since it is from my cell phone, but there is a pretty cute baby smile in the middle.

What a year!

My last post was over a year ago! Now that my sweet baby girl is here I thought I'd better bring the blog up to speed. Here's Samantha at one day old:



She's now 9 weeks old now and has become even more cute (if that's even possible!) These pictures were taken last night at bath time.



Here's Sam (and her Mom and Dad) a few weeks ago at her first baseball game:

Samantha LOVES having her diaper changed. Some of her happiest moments are on her changing table. Here's some of her smiley moments, post diaper:



I'd better post this before I get too distracted. Hopefully I won't wait another year to post again!

Being Lilly's Aunt Jenny....

Last October a little angel named Lilly came to the family! If anything can get me blogging again it is the cutest baby in the world. Below are some of my favorite pictures of "the bean."


This was our first time babysitting Lilly at our house. Back when rolling wasn't a problem!

Even this little Lilly already liked tummy tickles!

Why is Lilly cutest when she's angry?

Uncle Chris likes it when Lilly's pouty!

Yawning? Laughing? Crying? or just drooling? Who knows...it's sure cute though!




Lilly works the crowd at her first BBQ at Uncle Chris and Aunt Jenny's house. What a little hammie!