Dragonfly

This morning at the park Parker held a dragonfly in his hand and you would have thought it was Christmas by how excited these kids got:

Of course the moment it flew away, Parker turned to me and said, "Will you put this on your blog?!?"  How could I say no?  Another fun line from Parker a few minutes later: "I'm probably famous - I think I invented that very technique to hold a dragonfly."

Lincoln really wanted me to post a pic of him climbing the rope:

 And since we can't leave Anndra out:

She's been carrying this toy unicorn with her everywhere (including church).  It reminds me of the little girl in Despicable Me and her unicorn.

Kids Caught Reading

I was putting away some clothes this morning and when I came out of my room I found ALL three of my kids reading!  Well, the two little ones don't really read yet - but they were looking at picture books on the stairs.  This was a bit of a shock.  First of all, it is RARE that all three of them would want to do the same thing at the same time without prompting from me.  Secondly, the fact that Lincoln and Anndra weren't fighting over a book was a nice change.  Third, it was surprising that they chose to read instead of jumping on the trampoline or playing dress-up or some other more active game.  So of course I grabbed the camera and snapped these.

 

Sunday Afternoon

We went for a little drive after church and enjoyed nature for a couple of hours.  It was heavenly...

Anndra's First Bike (and other fun)

What a big girl!  She's still trying to figure out how to keep the pedals turning, but she's very excited to be just like her big brothers on their bikes.

Here are some pics from the park last week. 

The chain ladder was a challenge for Lincoln:

But Parker got right up with no trouble:

Anndra & I as we're about to go down the slide together (and L waiting for his turn behind us):

Our girl still loves to run through the house (like a pony!).  She has a 'race track' that goes from entry to living room and through the dining room & kitchen and back to the entry again.  Here she goes:

And there she goes again:

Boys pretending to have Angry Bird heads:

Our New Home

The weather is amazing.  The neighbors are friendly.  The house is nearly perfect.  The church group is welcoming.  The town is easy to navigate.  The pace is slower.  How could we be anything but blissfully happy to be here???  Seriously.  We feel like we've landed in paradise.

A rainbow appeared over our home 2 minutes after we arrived.  A good omen!

View of our home from down the hill by the river.

Evening sunlight on the river.

Lincoln picking up rocks in the tall grass between our lawn and the river.

Grandma helping Anndra find rocks to throw in the river too.

I have to conclude this post with a few big THANK YOU's.  First, to Aunt Vicki for all her help.  She traveled to Florida with Debbie to attend Todd's graduation and to lend a hand with the move.  She also hosted a lovely dinner our first night in Utah.  The kids grew very fond of her during her time with us:

Second, to Todd & Diane (and their son Carter) for being the nicest friends ever and driving 7 hours from their home in Idaho to help unload the truck here in Montana... and missing some of their July 4th festivities to do it... and then driving all the way back the next day.  Even though it was brief, it was so good to be with you three:

Third, and most of all, to Debbie - who sacrificed two weeks of her time to be with us through every step of our move and who never complained (despite the heat!).  I don't know what we would have done without her.  Her assistance was on so many levels that it is hard to describe how much she did for us and how much we appreciate it.  Thanks, Mom!

Stopover in Utah

In the middle of our move, we had two days in Utah while we loaded a U-haul truck with items we've been storing in my mother-in-law's basement.  While Todd and I were busy working, the kids were playing with their cousins who also recently moved (back to UT from AL).  Thanks, Jess, for supervising all this good fun and taking pictures for us.  You're the best!