Life Keeps Happening!

Rides with Grandma Paula and Grandpa Mark.  We love our City Park and its reasonable prices for fun carnival rides!

Ellie excavates for amethysts for her birthday present picked by Daddy:

Meg reads while walking to school.  She has not been as obsessed with reading as Ellie so it is fun when she finds a book she doesn't want to put down (usually fairies and princesses).

Grant and Spencer tied a ribbon to a toy dog and "walked" it to school:

Meg cooks with Dad.  These are our two real cooks.  The rest of us could probably do without....

Meg gets to go on a date with Mom:

Haircut time!  Spencer's curls flattened out when summer ended and he just looked like a scraggly orphan child.  

Can I bring something in the car?

Grant picks FHE activity: Wii Mario Kart.

Dad's Birthday:

Hayride with friends while Dad is at a conference in Utah.  (One-handed photos are always great on bumpy hayrides where you're trying to keep your one year old from falling under the wheels.)

Visiting the Temple with friends while Dad is out of town (we must keep busy to avoid pushing each other off cliffs!).

Ellie's Birthday Morning

Ellie had a great birthday year with all her grandparents in town for her baptism.  Her siblings were very excited to give her gifts.  They gave her big hugs and loved her lots.  We love our eight year old!  She is a busy reader, loves to make up stories, draw artwork, and do science experiments.  She is good at saving money, she likes to plan things for our entire family (FHE, activities, meals, anything that could possibly be planned!) and is always ready to share and make her brothers and sister happy.  She has been reading her scriptures, writing in her journal, and doing extra work at school for fun.  She has good friends at school this year that she plays fairies with at recess.  She tells me all about the weather and about how air works when she gets home.  She gets to go to ELP this year which means lots of extra projects that get her thinking about all sorts of things that I can barely keep up with.  She does math problems with Justin in the car, and plans on being an author one day.  She also has had her temper calm down this year, and is much happier to deal patiently with crazy siblings... unless she is reading a book, and then she doesn't hear them at all.  She continues to take piano and is passing me up pretty quickly... I won't be able to help her soon!  She likes rhyming, riddles, and jokes, and has inherited her Grandpa Wood/Grandpa Mark/Daddy's humor for saying strange word plays.  She is a treasure and we love her soooooo much!

Ellie's Baptism

Ellie turned 8 this September!  Which meant it was also her year to get baptized.  Ellie wanted to be baptized on her official birthday, luckily it fell on a Friday so we could make it happen.

Invitations (Ellie loves trees right now, so they became our unofficial theme):

Waiting for the big moment:

Guests:

Spencer's favorite friend from Church: Evangelina:

The Bulman Family:

The Steurers (one of Ellie's primary teachers), The Carlsons:

Meg stealing strawberries, one of her favorite things to do!

The Sheffields:

The Mergenthalers:

Ellie's teacher from last year, Mrs. Gorsh.  Ellie really wanted to invite her and was so happy that she could come.  Afterward Ellie invited Mrs. Gorsh to Church on Sunday.  She is quite a little missionary, and much braver than me.

Anna Sheffield:  Anna sang a song at Ellie's baptism that Ellie had written the words to herself.  She wrote them late one night while trying to fall asleep.  She came upstairs to tell me, and first I gave her the angry "get back to bed" speech.  Once she read me the words, I remembered what a special girl she is.

"That God"

by Ellie Wood

I know a God that you might know.

I really hope you do.

And if I tell you about Him,

I think you'll love him too.

That God who is my Father.

That God who had a Son.

That God who loves me just as much as He loves everyone.

I love that God, of course.

I know he loves me too.

He sent the Holy Ghost to help us know what we should do.

Shauntel Anderson wrote music for Ellie's song that her daughter Camille (Ellie's piano teacher) played.

Visit to Salt Lake to Meet Baby Eli

Spencer and I spent a quick Labor Day weekend visiting his new cousin Eli in Salt Lake.  The first two days he ignored the baby (Eli is a very good baby that rarely cries).  Then, when he noticed the baby cried and that it was real, he became very excited.  From then on he would hold out his little hands saying "Peas, peas."

Playing with cousin Olivia and the phone camera (Spencer was very shy on this trip and cried when I went anywhere... unless Olivia produced the phone):

Falling asleep at night on the couch (Spencer is not used to sleeping without Grant):

With cousin Cody: