Our First Visitors!

So this last weekend we had our first visitors at our new residence.  My mom and dad came to visit over the weekend.  It was a whirlwind visit but so much fun.  It took my parents coming for us to find decent cheesecake and amazing pizza in our new town.  Well actually the pizza wasn't in Laramie, we went to a little cafe at the base of the snowy range mountains in a town called Centennial.  We also had our first trip to a western wear store.  Emma has been adamant since we moved here that she would never wear cowboy boots, but once she saw they make them sparkly and green she changed her mind pretty quick!  We even had another chip and lipstick party with a bit more varity of lip colors and chip choices. We are so glad to be closer and to have visitors.  After going a year in between the last 2 visits we feel spoiled we have seen family every month since October!

Everything else is going pretty good for our family.  We can't seem to stay healthy though and have had another round of sickness, this time with fevers.  Poor Leah even ended up with an ear infection, but is feeling much better and quite distressed at still having to choke down her amoxicillin!
Grant's work has approved him purchasing a new microscope so he is traveling alot in the next couple weeks trying them out and deciding which to he likes best.  He just got back from San Francisco and is headed to San Jose next week and then Chicago probably by the end of the month.  Luckily he only goes for a day so we barely have time to realize he is gone!

Emma is doing well and continues to read Harry Potter at lightning speed.  She just started book number 6.  She loves school and even wrote me love note in spanish and loves playing the piano.  Leah somehow talked us into getting her another betta fish and she has decided to call him Ralph.  She likes school but is still trying to adjust to being gone all day, and insists she is just too exhausted after school to do her chores. Becca is as chatty as ever.  She and I have become best buds, I think. She told me the other day "I love you so much mommy, because I always have to be with you." Apparently it may be just because we are always together though!  She loves to do her homework- aka preschool work book- and is really into practicing cutting paper into tiny peices with the scissors.
Alicia in all honesty has been kind of irritable due to sickness and molars coming.  But she is still super cute.  She continues to say E-I-E-I-O all the time but has also added dough (which really means go) and up to her word list.  She has also come up with her own baby sign that we have absolutely no idea what it means!
Last but no least here are some pictures-

Emma made a harry potter out of floam!

Girls playing outside on a warmish day!

Side view of our new house

Front view of the house

Wyoming sunsets are amazing.  This is our nightly view from the kitchen window

Alicia is 1!

Last weekend we made the trek to Utah to visit and celebrate Alicia's 1st birthday.  We almost didn't go due to sickness but Emma was a trooper and suffered through the car ride even though she didn't feel well and we made it.  It was kind of a whirlwind trip but we had a great time and are so grateful we can visit more than once a year now!  Alicia was spoiled and loved her own tiny cake! We are so glad she is in our family!  The last year has gone so quickly, it seems like yesterday we brought her home for the first time and sat up all night cuddling her!  She is a super happy baby that really loves and adores her older sisters.  She is especially talented imitating sounds and noises.  Her favorite foods are avocados, bean dip, bananas and roast beef.  We love our Alicia!
P.S. Becca had thought Grandma Claudia would be at our New Years Party and planned to wear redlipstick and eat cheetos with her. Not really sure where that came from, but Grandma made her dream come true while we were visitng!

Who knew bean dip could be so exciting!

Had to add a picture of Grandma and Becca at their red lipstick and cheeto party!

Holiday 2014

So we finally moved into our new house 6 days before Christmas.  As you can imagine unpacking decorations was right up there on the list with unpacking the kitchen!  The girls had been waiting and waiting to put up a tree and all our other decorations.  So we had a great Christmas amid lots of still unpacked boxes! This was Alicia's first Christmas and she loved it.  It was fun to have an older baby at Christmas trying to take all the bows off the packges and rip the paper. We have broken the long standing tradition of ableskivers on Christmas and have our own tradition of cinnamon rolls.  We had a nice relaxing day and even stayed in our jammies all day long playing with all our new things.  Thanks to everyone for the gifts, we were spoiled as usual! Grant had a wonderful birthday too! He continued our non tradition theme and had applebars for his birthday instead of cake!
On New Year's Even we watched movies and made 2015 sugar cookies. Alicia loved her cookie, especially the frosting.

Emma's Baptism

So we are a little behind in our blogging!  I guess that is bound to happen when you decided to move across the country and are homeless for 4 weeks!
 So we decided to move to Laramie the week after Emma was baptized and my family came to visit us in Maryland.  So here are some pictures of her special day.  The program was wonderful!. Grandpa John and Spencer gave wonderful talks and the spirit was so strong when Emma was baptized.  We are so proud of her for making this wonderful choice!