Catching up!

Just catching up on some May happenings...

Delaney finished her first competitive season for gymnastics. She actually did take 1st place overall in a meet, but Jeff thought I had the camera and I thought he did, etc....you know what happened. We are incredibly proud of how hard she's worked and she really, really loves it. She bugs me every day about getting her into gymnastics here.

This is Delaney at the state meet with the other two from her team in her age bracket. Her coach, Eugene was amazing to these girls. When it came time to move, he wrote her a very sweet note and cried when we left. He really does love his job and I'm so grateful for the time Delaney spent with him!


This year Jackson's class did a play for the whole school. He had a part on the "Jury" and he was also the announcer/"welcomer" at the beginning of the play. The whole class did a fantastic job, and they were incredibly proud.

And, in keeping with the "where's my camera" theme of my life, I didn't get a picture of Jackson as the announcer. I do have it on video, so hopefully that counts for something!

Here's the whole class in action, but you can't see Jackson behind the other jury members.


Here they are afterward. Well done 4S!


Also in May, over Memorial Day, we traveled down to Nauvoo. Jeff's parents were already coming out after Memorial Day to stay with the kids while we went house hunting, so we talked them into coming down early and coming with us to Nauvoo. We were long overdue for a trip down, especially since Jackson's Illinois State Project had peaked such an interest in our kids.

We drove down on Saturday morning and arrived by lunch time. We shopped for souvenirs and then Jackson and Delaney went on a horse-drawn tour of Nauvoo with Grandma and Grandpa. Later that evening, Grandma and Grandpa offered to watch the kiddos while Jeff and I went to the temple - what a treat for us!

The next morning we woke up to dark, dark clouds. The number one thing on the kids' list was to see the temple. So, we headed right over. These pictures were taken at 10 in the morning, even though it looks like dusk. The clouds were dark and threatening for sure!


Of course, before we left, the weather said it would be warm, in the upper 80s on Sunday. However, by Saturday it was clear that would not happen. So, I ran to ShopKo to get the cheapest clearance sweatshirts I could find. I came up with Chicago Bears sweatshirts for everyone. Jerry aptly named this picture in front of the temple, "The Three Bears".


This is the view of the Mississippi River from the temple. On a side note, every river we now see Addie calls the Mississippi River. Including the big river we can see from our house.


The Joseph and Hyrum statue across the street from the temple.


After our morning stop by the temple, we headed down to old Nauvoo and the heavens opened! It started POURING! However, the nice thing for us was that it kept away any tourists, so we had many of the tours all to ourselves. We went to the Wheelwright, the printer, the brick mason, the family living center, the bakery, and the Browning home. We wish we'd gotten to more, however with Addie being her 2 year old self, she could have cared less about how they printed a newspaper or made rope in 1845. All she cared about was getting back to the swings we'd passed earlier.

This is Jackson at the Browning home. He's really into marksmanship, thanks to a History Channel show, Top Shot.


Jackson and Delaney at the printing press.


After a stop at the swings, we went to the Visitor's Center and walked around the statue garden.


Sharing secrets...


Playing "Ring Around the Rosies"


After dinner that evening, we asked the kids what was the one last thing they wanted to do, and they wanted to go back to the temple. The weather had cleared and we went back for one last look of that beautiful building.




Delaney was fascinated with being able to touch the building. She stood with her hand on it for the longest time.


Knowing that this would be our last road trip through IL, I had Jeff take these pictures of the kids. My parent's moved to IL when I was in college. Never, before then, had I ever seen corn fields in real life (I know, I'm so sheltered). I was completely fascinated by them! In fact, I have a picture of one of my favorite friends from college and I standing in a corn field, because I'd never seen anything like it before!


I am mesmerized by the incredibly neat rows of corn, all well over 8 feet tall when fully grown. Little did I know that just a few short years later, I would be married to Jeff and living in the land of cornfields! Unfortunately, we had to leave IL before they were full grown this year, but I wanted my kids to remember that they have, in fact, seen corn fields. Lots of them.