My little girl is growing up way to fast!

So apparently I keep leaving my camera in my husbands car and I haven't uploaded birthday pictures yet so I'll post them later.

Elysa Officially turned 1 August 18! We had a fun birthday party for her. We went to Willow Park, because she loves monkeys so much, with the whole family. After we went through the zoo we went and had Elysa's Curious George monkey party. We had banana splits and I made 2 monkey cakes... yeah you'll have to see them I surprised myself .. I had gone everywhere and all the bakers in town must have been in either a bad mood or at a cake cooking convention cause they were either really rude ( one just walked right past me and disappeared when I said "excuse me" ) and the others were just missing in action and no one knew where they were sooooo I had to resort to making my own cakes.

After cake and banana splits we knocked down the pinata.. we spray painted a sombrero yellow so that it would be a yellow hat for "the man in the yellow hat" haha.. it turned out cute.

Then we opened presents. Elysa got a little tykes laptop ( cause she always wants mommy's) some cute curious george books, clothes, a toy box ( which I painted myself ) and a little walk and roll bike/stroller. She has been using the walker side and after the first day she is now officially a walker! She walks everywhere now and can carry things around and walk at the same time too. Of course at times when she just can't get there fast enough she'll use her "monkey crawl" but for the most part it is all walking now.. what a big girl!

It was a fun day that brought a tear to my eye.... my little girl is growing up way to fast!

My Birthday already?

I've heard that as you get older you forget about your birthday more. I didn't think that could be possible but.. I totally forgot my birthday.. I'm guessing it's because I was so consumed in planning Elysa's birthday party that I totally forgot mine. Devin surprised me tho with a spongebob cake that I have always wanted. It was so cute and so sweet.

My whole family took me out to Olive Garden. It was so fun to be with everyone. Overall.. it was a fantastic birthday!

Alturas Lake, Fishing, and Challis.... I miss it already

Every summer my dad's side of the family goes to Alturas lake for a camping trip. When I was younger we used to stay a week but now that everyones got busy schedules we stay for about 4 days which now is PLENTY of time especially with a baby that gets homesick.

My grandparents, on my biological dad's side, live in Challis Idaho and we decided to take our own little trip and went the Preston Idaho way to Alturas rather than the Tremonton way. It was a really nice drive and I enjoyed it alot better.. more check points along the way instead of a bland 175 mile drive to Twin Falls. When we got to Challis we decided to stay the night with my grandparents since my dad was up visiting. It was so nice to see them since it had been.. oh... 3-4 years since we saw them last.. We stayed up all night talking about the days when we kids were younger. They just fell in love with Elysa, who couldn't tho, it sure eased the nervousness about seeing them again, I need to get better at the whole writing/visiting thing.. I just hate when life gets so overwhelmed that it just passes you by and you don't even realize how much you missed out on especially when it's to late.

Anywho.. the next day my dad took us to the Challis hot springs.. MAN I love that hot springs. It's a giant pool that has soft river rocks at the bottom, it's perfect temperature like a giant bath tub. They empty the water out everynight so its fresh and clean.. man it's nice :) Here's some pics:

My dad, me, dev & Elysa

Devin, Elysa, my Grams, dad, gramps

After visiting we headed to Alturas. We heard there was a storm rolling in and along the way to Alturas there were a few showers here and there so we figured that it wouldn't be to bad. As soon as we got to the Alturas turnoff it just started pouring rain which turned into large marble sized hail.. it scared me so bad because it really sounded like and felt like it was going to break right through the windshield. When we got to the campsite it finally cleared up so we set up our tent and and hurried and huddled around fire and for the next 2 days hot chocolate was my best friend :).

The next day we started our big horse shoe tournament. This is the part of the trip everyone looks forward too.. it has gotten so big that we even have a trophie now called "The Buck Cup" and whichever team wins gets their names printed on a plaque that ends up on the trophie.. mines on there and so is Devins :).

This year I was partnered with a new guy, a friend of the fam. named Joel.. we did really good.. we won one game lost the 2nd.. but we lost the 2nd match by inches! The game ends when someone reaches 15.. we were both at 14-14 and Nicole, who was tossing against me, as you can see from the pic below, got a ringer and a leaner which is almost impossible to get beat..

her shoes are the red ones.. mine is that one that by INCHES missed wrapping the pole. If that shoe would have wrapped I would have canceled all 5 of her points and we could have had a shot at winning.. dang it all huh but we all were amazed how good of shoes we threw that match. Devin's team made it all the way to semi-finals and ended up losing so we had a lot of fun despite how incredible cold it was. We ended up bring the fire over by the pits so we could warm our hands after every time we threw.

This little guy crawled into the food tent.. he brought a ton of friends later and we lost all our hamburger buns.
Elysa with "Gee Gee", that's how she says grandpa. He now has her doing "cheese grin" and "scrunch face" on command.

All bundled up.. it was cold!

Go freakin figure.. the day we had to leave was the most beautiful day there.. it got up to 80 while the last 2 days we were there the highest was 60.. but still beautiful.. this is a picture of the beautiful meadow on the other side of our camp.

The whole fam.

On the way home me and devin decided to take a little fishing road trip. We saw Deadmans Hole on the way to Alturas and remembered that that was where my grandpa used to go fishing when he was younger so we just had to fish there.
Devin was so mad that I caught a fish because he and my grams were talking about how I always seem to catch all the fish and I said I do not.. but.. I guess I do. The night we got to Alturas we had a day left of fishing and we were a little frustrated from not catching anything earlier plus it was freazing so we just put some bait on our hooks and cast out into the lake and just left them knowing we wouldn't catch a thing and lo' and behold the next morning we reel in and guess who has a fish on the end of their line.. yep me haha.. so when I caught this 2nd fish Devin said he was done fishing lol, not really I know he would never give it up ;).

This fish we figured out was a small mouthed bass, it weighed .5lbs and was 13 inches long.. so a pretty good sized fish.

Elysa wanted to fish so bad so we put her stroller on the sand bank, she loves the water too, and gave her the pole she freaked out with excitement.. it was funny too cause when we reeled the line in and just let her hold the pole she knew that it wasn't cast out and she would start fussing until we cast it out again.

Playing in the water.

This was such a fun trip and I look forward to it every year. Plus, thanks Dev for the great idea of a road trip for the 3 of us.. we had so much fun and vowed to make it a tradition every year!

Memories

*Click on picture to Enlarge*

Thanks For The Memories

My grandpa passed away Saturday August 1st, 2009 from a long battle of cancer. As hard as it is to see someone we love so much gone the pain is somewhat subdued due to the fact that we know he isn't in pain any longer and that we will see him again!

Memories of my grandpa:

• Waking up in the morning to the smell of my gramps pancakes.

• Seeing him out in the Garden, My grandpa loved his garden and whenever I went over to visit he would always be out in the garden in one of his straw hats

• I'll never forget my grandpas quirky smile when i'd sit next to him and say "Hey Gramps"

• My grandpa lost half of his middle finger when he was younger and he ALWAYS liked to pull jokes with it like the time someone cut him off and he pulled that middle stubby finger out, it always got us laughing because you could hardly tell he was

flipping anyone off haha

• My gramps was always so nicely dressed and he was notorious for his golf print shirts

• My grandpa also loved to golf and I always remember when I was younger calling for my grandparents and they would always be out golfing

• My grandparents are famous for their delicious applesauce and raspberry jam from their garden

• I'll always remember watching the Price Is Right every morning in the summer with my grandparents while eating breakfast. That is something Elysa and I have now made part of our morning routine is watching Price Is Right while eating breakfast.

• My grandpa also loved Matlock, when I worked at the Elementary school in Hyrum I always went over for lunch and while we ate we'd watch Matlock

Gramps is going to be missed so much, he is such a sweet, funny, tender hearted guy and there wont be a day that'll go by that I wont be able to think of him because anytime I eat applesauce, see a flower or watch Price Is Right i'll remember those are the things my grandpa loved.

Blaine H. Willmore