May Happenings

 We had a lot going on in May - of course, when do we not have a lot going on?! We played a lot with Grandma and Grandpa Walker, Aunt Kimber, Vance, Carter, Kade, Aunt Shauntelle, Mary, Evyn, and Isla. It's nice when you have a lot of people to play with - we definitely did not get bored.

This is basically the first half of May - I will call the pre-Hawaii part of May.

Reed was able to track some of Aria's climbing moves when he was doing a what-seems-like-routine photo shoot. I guess I still feel like Aria is super young because she is still such a skinny little thing. But, she is definitely growing up and hitting all the gross motor and fine motor skills milestones - despite being in the 5% for weight. She eats like no body's business on most days and I think she might actually have a hollow leg when she hides all her food. Here is Aria showing us her skills on pulling herself up (photos courtesy of Reed - May 7, 2012):

Hey, what's on top of that stool?

Yep, that wasn't too bad at all. 

Look at me! I am so big!

I love these stools. 

May 8, 2012 was a fun day for us for a couple of reasons: we got to go to the park at Mountain's Edge and I got to see some of my very favorite people in the world - Pat and Jen plus their 2 adorable children! Besides a brief sighting at Cafe Rio on our way back from graduation, I had not seen them since Reed was 6 months old - too long for my taste. It was awesome to be able to catch up with them, play a little bit, and catch up some more. They are still some of my favorite people - it's one of those friendship's that lasts forever - even if you go for a long time not talking. I love it!

Oh yeah, Reed and Eve had a great time as well. I think the favorite thing was the teeter totter - always a good time.

Reed with Jen hiding in the background. 

Eve sitting so nicely. 

Oh yes, and Reed took some more pictures of himself. This one was my favorite:

Silly Boy 

May 11, 2012 was a big step for Reed, he actually helped Grandma mow the lawn! He was definitely nervous when they started and didn't want to mow. But, as he saw his cousins do it, he wanted to try. Well, he did great and loved it! Now he goes every Friday to mow lawns. He would do it every day if he could. I love that he loves to work. So proud of my little super man!

Mowing Grandma's front lawn

Yes, he had to wear his Superman cape. 

May 14, 2012 - Reed found the camera yet again and took some self portraits. He is becoming quite the ham in front of the camera. Here are my 2 favorites:

Watermelon and My Doll

 Apparently, Aria LOVES watermelon. April 30, 2012 we just happened to have watermelon as part of our lunch. I had given her some pieces on her tray. She quickly sucked out the juice and spit out some of the watermelon (once all the yummy watermelon flavor was gone). After a while, she decided that it would be fine to chew it instead of just sucking our the juices.

So, I thought she was done and went to go and get a cloth to clean her up (there is no keeping her clean at meal times). When I got back to the table to clean her up, this is what I saw:

Does she look happy or what?!

"Look at what I did!"

She had used one leg and one arm to push her way over to the watermelon bowl and pulled it up on her tray. She proceeded to eat every single piece of watermelon in the bowl - sometimes sucking out the juice and spitting out the rest and sometimes just eating the whole piece. There was really no keeping her clean after that. She had watermelon juice everywhere! At least she enjoys her food! You would think she was starving looking at her thin little body, but she eats more than her siblings for almost every meal!

After that, Reed and Eve wanted me to take pictures of them. They never miss an opportunity to be in a picture. They turned out pretty dang cute - I just have the cutest kids :)

So, I used to want a huge porcelain doll collection. I thought it would be a fun thing to have. I thought it seemed like a very grown-up collection to have when I was a little girl. I did end up getting 3 different porcelain dolls, but that it where the collection stopped. (I guess I technically had 4 porcelain dolls, but one was a baby that was not on a stand, the other 3 were on stands). I guess I had kind of settled with that and moved on to other things, but still wanted to keep my dolls around to give to my girls that would have someday. I loved all 3, but I definitely had a favorite doll. I loved her crinkly hair (looks like it just came out of a braid crinkly) and her piercing blue eyes. I loved her dress and just thought she was gorgeous.

Well, the 3 dolls made the trip across the country, packed nicely and I was so excited. I put them up on a shelf and after a little bit I heard a crash in my room. No one was back there, so I wondered what it was. Sadly, it was my favorite porcelain doll. Ugh, she made it all the way across the country in a box and lasted 10 minutes on the shelf!

Most of her face was in once piece, but there were some shatters. Sadly, I got the vacuum and cleaned up the mess. I took 2 pictures of her and then threw her in the trash. Good-bye my favorite doll. I know you are not that important, but I certainly liked you. I guess now I don't have to choose who to give you to. Plus, maybe I will only have 2 daughters, so they can each have one of my remaining porcelain dolls.

Graduation

 April 19th and 20th were BYU's graduation days. We had a full house of graduates from our family: my sister, Kristy, her husband, James, and Tyson's brother, Jared. So, we headed on up to Provo, UT on Thursday night after Tyson got off work.

We were able to attend the college graduation on Friday and luckily, they all graduated from the Marriott school, so we hit all 3 graduations at one time! Phew! Actually, all 3 of them walked within almost a minute of each other because of last names - Walker and Wilcox (my sister's new last name) - too bad we had to wait until the end of the whole things because W is at the end of the alphabet. Ah well - the kids got restless by the end, but that was expected. They did a pretty good job.

After some pictures with Tyson's family and my family (of course, I didn't actually take any with my camera - need to get some of those), we headed off to the Brick Oven for lunch with James, Kristy, my parents, and James' family. It was delicious and I just had to get some homemade root beer (it's so good - maybe it's the frosty mug that it comes in). It was nice to be able to chat with Kristy and James since I literally only met him in the sealing room when they got married and that was pretty much the last time we talked. I just can't believe that little Kristy is all grown up, married, and has a Bachelor's degree! Crazy how the time flies. I guess other people can grow up, too - it's just weird because she will always be my little sister and maybe around 18 years old. But, alas, she is almost 26, so I guess she is allowed to be doing grown-up stuff. :)

We dropped off some boxes that we brought up for a different Christy and then headed to Kristy and James' house to play some games and relax until dinner at the park.

My parents got some sandwiches from Costco and we headed there to play and eat. I got to see some cousins that I had not seen in a while and the kids loved being at the park.

Saturday we spent with Tyson's family and we went to the Hogle Zoo! The kids were so excited to go and see all the animals. It was definitely a hit - the zoo always is. The kids loved looking at the animals!

Reed's favorite thing, however, was riding the train through the zoo (I'm not at all surprised that that was his favorite thing). He got so giddy and excited and followed directions to the 'T' and made sure that everyone else knew that they were supposed to wait and stand in a certain place. Oh man, it was just so cute and funny to see how excited he was.

Eve's favorite animals were definitely the monkeys/gorillas. She kept going back to look at them. She would just stare and stare - just trying to take it all in. She also loved the giraffe. I am pretty sure that's the first giraffe she's ever seen (the National Zoo doesn't have giraffes - I know, weird!).

We went out to Red Lobster where Aria showed us what her favorite animal was - a lobster. The waiter brought around a live lobster and talked about it. The kids were allowed to touch him, but most of them were pretty scared. Aria was the first one brave enough to touch it and she even smiled when she did it. She went back for more touches and loved it!

After that we dropped by Adam's brother's house for a quick hello and then went to our hotel, exhausted. What a fun, crazy, and fast trip it was - we came back home on Sunday.

I didn't take many pictures on the trip, but managed to remember the camera at the zoo - so here are some of the adventures at the zoo:

Elephants

Always a favorite

Reed watching the train pull up

He almost couldn't contain his excitement

Posing nice for the picture

This is who was sitting behind us

Reed somehow managed to switch spots and get in both pictures. Notice Aria staring at Jared and Beckie - I think she loves them. 

Eve was a Grandpa's girl this whole day

Kade and Kimber

Eve and Grandpa by the giraffe

Grandma wanted pictures of all the grand kids by the elephant that made funny noises. I was included because Aria would only let me hold her at the time. Here are the ones we got:

Kimber wanted her boys on the elephant:

Aria wouldn't let me put her on the elephant, so I ended up with Reed and Eve:

As we were leaving the kids loved touching and trying to spin the spinning globe (It's on water):