Grandma Bonnie's Visit

October 14 - 20

Despite the face above, we LOVE it when Grandma Bon comes to visit. It is always packed with lots of fun.

These two are quite the buddies. And we couldn't help but do a little photo shoot this day when their outfits coordinated so well.

Zoo Boo

At zoo boo they had two haunted houses that in fact were a little too scary and quite smokey. And though Carter's face looked pretty spooked, he handled it pretty well.

This was the "Not too Scary Train Ride." This was our first time riding our zoo train and it was "interesting." It is the only zoo train I have ever been on where you don't see any animals, well I guess we did see a handful of sculptured animals but they don't really count.


They had a number of these large macrame animals that were quite cool.

Matt and the Dragon are climbing through the sea ray tunnels in the aquarium.

This video is of Daddy chasing the dragon. Listen for the Dragon's great roars at the top of the stairs. Before we went to the zoo, Carter said he was going to roar at all the animals and scare them all. The tigers are one of the first animals and all of a sudden he decided he didn't really want to scare the animals. Good decision my boy. Also, I am sure you have noticed he only had the top half of his costume on. It was a rainy, icky day and I didn't want him getting his bottoms dirty.

Feeding the Ducks

We wanted to bring Grandma Bon along for one of our favorite Sunday afternoon activities, feeding the ducks at the Allegheny County Cemetery. I know it may sound creepy that we like to spend our Sundays at a cemetery, but this is one of the most beautiful cemeteries Matt and I have every been to. I think I read somewhere that it is the 7th largest urban cemetery in the country. There are HUGE, OLD trees everywhere which makes it gorgeous in the fall and lots of deer and critters all around. But what we do every time we go is stop at the duck/ goose pond and feed the ducks.

Highland Park Fountain

This is another favorite family spot. Carter loves to ride his scooter around this fountain or grab a stick and poke it in the water.

The Latest Hang Out Spot

We have this tree that is pretty low to the ground in our backyard and it has become the favorite hangout spot for Carter. He climbs up there on his own and literally hangs around on the branches. It is just so funny how kids are kids. If it was 100 or 200 years earlier you better believe that another kid would want to be doing the same thing. Kids just love to climb trees it is as natural as eating sweets.

The Big Project

Bonnie is such a great sport. When we first found out we were having a girl, she offered to buy the bedding for her. I don't think she quite had this in mind:

While, at Swiss Days I found this adorable rag quilt pattern with all the material included. The catch was, you had to cut it all out and put it together. That is where my fantastic mother-in-law comes in. I called her up and informed her that we now had a great project to do together which also involved her flying out to my house in Pittsburgh. And she took the bait...though I didn't have to beg much (not at all).

She did a phenomenal job. I helped a bit with the cutting and ironing, but she did all the hard and tricky stuff. It took us the entire week that she was here to put this all together. We did play in all our in between time though.

We also went on the hunt for a bumper pad and crib skirt that would match our quilt and my tastes. We found a bumper but no luck on the skirt. So back to my trusty mother-in-law, I had the audacity after all that quilt making to ask her to make me a bed skirt. The day before she left we went to JoAnns and after about an hour or so ended up with this material. She took it home along with Carter's store bought crib skirt for a pattern and to no surprise it turned out looking better than Carter's store bought one. Even my little brother who is in town for Thanksgiving couldn't believe the difference and what an incredible job she did. I tell you this lady is amazing and I am not just talking about her sewing skills.

Thanks for being so willing and helpful Bon!!! This little girl has quite a gift on her hands and we have lots of fun memories to cherish!!

My Latest Endeavor/ Obsession

Last Friday afternoon, a friend of mine taught me how to digital scrapbook. I have thought about little else since. I tried for a while to get into regular scrapbooking, but I never felt like I could do all that I wanted to make a page cute because I was too cheap to pay for all those embellishments. With digital scrapbooking, problem solved. I still don't have super talent of how to design a good page, but I am enjoying working on it. So I thought I would throw a page on here.

First Day of Pre-School

September 10, 2009

Gearing up for this day I thought I would cry or get teary-eyed. In fact as I was driving him to pre-school I about started to cry. But no, there were no tears spilled and the pictures below kind of tell why.

As soon as I get him out of the car he starts throwing a big fit about not letting me hold his hand to cross the road and is crying and screaming as I then pick him up to carry him across the parking lot. Then I try to take a picture of him on his first day and he refuses. We finally got him to his classroom, I dropped him off, and then took a breather.
Now pre-school is a great thing. He is excited every Tuesday and Thursday to go. Loves his teachers and classmates. And these little tantrums aren't happening anymore, at least when it comes to pre-school. :)

Utah Summer Trip 2009 Part 4

August 31 - September 8

Seven Rivers, Liberty Park

Liberty Park has the coolest little "water park" that represents the seven rivers going down seven different canyons along the Wasatch Front. It is such a fun place for kids to run around and climb and splash. Carter had such a great time we had to go twice. The first time was with his cousins. In the picture above he is with adorable Kaylee or "KK" as we usually refer to her. Her smile always melts my heart and makes me smile no matter what mood I am in.

These are my sister's twins, #4 and 5, Ashlyn and Kyle.





The second time around Carter brought this little boat and let me tell you sending that boat down the river became SERIOUS BUSINESS!! You just have to look at his face on the video I post of him. He was running up and down for at least an hour. It was hilarious to watch the focus he had.






Grandpa's Big Helper

Carter was all about helping my Dad while out in Utah. Whether it was fixing the sprinklers, scooping up dog poop ("That's so Yucky!!") or mowing the lawn. Grandpa was great at letting his little shadow help every step of the way. At one point, when the boys were fixing the sprinklers there were three heads in the sprinkler box: Dad, Carter and Sadie the dog who wanted to play catch.




Nothing like a cutie mowing the lawn in his diaper:



Swiss Days

Growing up every year over Labor Day Weekend, we would go up to Midway where my parents have a cabin and go to Swiss Days. Swiss Days is a boutique extravaganza, pretty much every girl's dream. They do have some pretty awesome wooden toys that boys young and old enjoy checking out.

Here's some of the cousins at the cabin after their early morning wake up call.

Swiss Days always means the Swiss Days' Parade. This is one of those great small town parades where they throw candy out like it is Halloween so needless to say the kids loved it. I took some pictures of my favorite items in the parade, most of them being for sentimental reasons since they have been in the parade since I was little. By the way, I haven't been to Swiss Days since I moved away from Utah 6.5 years ago so I was feeling all sorts of sentimental that weekend.

This incredible horn was part of the Post Office Band which has been there since I can remember.

I can't remember the name of the family who owns this train, but it is another sentimental item. It used to be filled with their children and now they fill it with grand children and great-grandchildren.

This was just plain adorable.

This tractor and trailer are from my cousin's farm. The driver is my Uncle Charles and some of my cousins are on the tractor.

I just thought this plumber float was hilarious, notice the "flowers."

While at Swiss Days I got an adorable rag blanket quilt for my little baby girl. When my mother-in-law came out a couple weeks ago she made it, I helped a little bit. It turned out SOOO CUTE!! Pictures to come. I also bought baby girl headbands and flowers. It is so weird to be buying these little girl things but fun too. Carter got some super cute wooden toys. I hope to make it back to Swiss Days soon!

And that wraps up my Utah 2009 Summer Vacation. Now on to catching up on other things on my blog. Can you tell I am "blog nesting" before the baby comes? I have got to get caught up!!

Utah Summer Trip 2009 part 3

Jackson Hole

August 26 - 30, 2009

After Nielsen family pictures were over everyone hopped in cars (except Whitney sadly! She had World of Dance practices going on down at BYU that she couldn't miss) and we headed up to beautiful Jackson Hole, WY. JH holds a special place in this family's heart. For Matt and I it is where we went for our Honeymoon, but more than that it is where my father-in-law Jay and mother-in-law Bonnie met. One summer they both went up there to work and just happened to work for the same place and many years later they were married. Now 5 kids, 3 in-laws, and 2 grandchildren later we all went back to celebrate our growing family.

Jay rented a beautiful "cabin" for us to stay at and we all enjoyed just hanging around and being together.

Carter and his cousin Dade. You would never guess there was any relation at all between these two boys they are so different looking.
A proud Grandma with her two JOYS!! Carter hardly wanted to do anything else all trip long except play with Grandma.


Sarah, who married Matt's brother Todd, was so good to read to Carter in their own special cubby hole. As you can see Carter LOVED it!! It didn't hurt that he developed a little bit of a crush on his Aunt Sarah. But who can blame the kid?

The Tram

A few of us decided to ride the Tram up to the top of the Tetons. Here we are going up...



Though it was a somewhat bumpy road to the top, we all made it in one piece, some of us a little more jumpy than others (Meagan). :) Speaking of Meagan, here she is with her gorgeous son Dade.

Carter very much enjoyed his ride to the top and the magnificent view once we got there.

It's been so fun to see Kurt become a Dad not just technically but emotionally as well.

I love this boy of mine!!

Carter enjoyed exploring the mountaintop.

Great-Grandpa and Grandma Bauman with their two great-grandchildren.

Jenny Lake, Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point (all in random order)

After we made it to Hidden Falls Jay, Matt and I decided to go on to Inspiration Point for a lovely view of the area.

Hidden Falls

Jenny Lake in the background.

After hiking around Jenny Lake, admiring Hidden Falls and trekking up to Inspiration Point we headed back to take the ferry boat back across the lake. Here is Carter hiking his way to the boat:

Then after all that hard work, Carter needed a little cool down:

Yellowstone

We made a "quick" trip up to Yellowstone to see Old Faithful explode. The plan was to spend the day up there, but after being stuck in construction the drive took way longer than planned so we pretty much got up to Yellowstone saw Old Faithful and left. That trip will always be memorable for all the wrong reasons I think. :)

Uncle Cory, Matt and Carter

Carter was totally intrigued.

We also were able to enjoy a little bit of wildlife.

The beautiful and majestic Grand Tetons.