Vacation to Montana Aug. 18-25, 2010

We had the opportunity to go back to the state where we honeymooned a couple of weeks ago, but this time with more family members.  We had a short flight from Ohio to Chicago, IL, and then came the 3 hr. flight from Chicago, IL to Spokane, WA.  We had a short visit with my Aunt, Uncle and Cousins in Spokane and then off on our 3 hr. drive to Missoula.  Here's Emily enjoying a nice whale ride at my Aunt and Uncle's house before we got in the 2011 Toyota Sienna which was our rental van for the trip. 

We arrived in Missoula on Wednesday night and got settled into our hotel (Wingate by Wyndham) which was the highlight of Emily's trip because it had a very nice water park along with a regular size swimming pool. Thursday morning Charlie and his Dad took off for a fishing trip while my Sister-In-Law, Mother-In-Law and kiddos went to Jackson Hole, WY and Yellowstone National Park for a girls only trip (minus Ben, but since he's not even one year old, he doesn't count). Since traveling with two little ones our trip took a little time, but we finally made it to Jackson later that evening & checked into our motel.

After a good night sleep, it was time to get out on the town as we only had 1 full day to spend in Jackson. After breakfast we toured the town for a little shopping and siteseeing.

There are a few intersections in Jackson Hole that still utilize a flag system to stop traffic instead of street lights.  You just pick up a flag on one side, proceed across the street and place it in the holder on the other side.  Emily of course wanted to hold the flag.

Next we took Emily to the Elk Conservatory Visitor Center to earn her Junior Blue Goose Ranger Badge where her Aunt earned her badge back in November.   She passed with flying colors and we were down the trail to play around in the Grand Teton National Park.

I had never been there so we spent the better part of our day walking and driving around to see the sights. For those of you that have never been there, you should definitely add Jackson & the Tetons to your to do list.

Emily was more than excited to see our first animal, a barely visible moose playing in the brush of the river. She exclaimed, "I saw it's belly Aunt Holly!" She then proceeded to say we needed to find at least 10 animals before we left the park to go back to our motel for the night.

After driving around for half the day we had only seen what counted up to be about 8 animals, elk, deer, birds, horses, cows, moose, squirrels, and even some barely visible bison. Our stomachs were grumbling so we decided to call it a day and head back towards town (and food!). In a distant field Holly could see what looked like a herd of something so she decided it was only a short trip down a road to see what they were. We were all glad she did.

The herd of Bison completely surrounded our car.  Holly & I were snapping pictures as the bison stared us down & tried to figure out what we were doing there. Emily was most concerned for their safety, as they didn't look both ways before crossing the road (cars were starting to pile up all around us at this point).  We stayed as long as we had to since they had our car surrounded and then took off for dinner.

We wrapped up the night after a good meal.  Holly & I did a little touring around town while Ginny gave the kiddos a bath & then everyone was off to bed.

When morning came we packed up the car & said our goodbyes to Jackson & the Tetons. It was time to tour Yellowstone. Having two tiny travelers we had only time to stop at Old Faithful, the Middle Geysers, & the Painted Pots. If you have time to go to Yellowstone, these places are worth the stop.

 

Finally we headed back to Missoula for the rest of our vacation.

Here are some shots of the boys during their fishing/hiking trip.

Emily - 4 years - Aug. 16

We love you Emily!

One Month Old at her first church picnic

  One year old - showing us how she can wink

Two years old - being a diva at the zoo

Three years old - first driving lesson at Idlewild

Birthday Party 2 of 3

We had the opportunity to spend Emily's birthday with friends at Recreation Outlet.

"Please no pictures."

This place wanted $150 just for a room to eat so we chose to eat outside.

Birthday Party 1 of 3

Camping with the Schmidjell's

We had a great time camping with the Schmidjell's a couple of weekends ago.  We went swimming, played on the playground, ahhhhhed and ohhhhhed over a turtle Charlie found and just enjoyed being outdooors. The guys slept in the tent, while Patty, Me and the kiddos were spoiled with air conditioning.  Charlie was able to do some geocaching on our trip home and you will have to ask about the amazing story of the return of his GPS.  God is so good!

Surprisingly our little woodsy girl would barely go near the turtle until after she saw that Kara was ok with it.

Benjamin at 9 months

I totally forgot how much can change in one month. Ben went from crawling slowly on one leg, to off and running - not literally, but he is a boy on the move.  He has so much fun chasing after his big Sister which usually ends with them in the bathroom pulling all the towels out of the cabinet.  The funniest thing to watch is when Ben is using his legs and turning circles on his behind.  We guess that he's either looking for something or that he's pointing himself in the direction he's getting ready to go. 

I call Ben my Water Boy.  He absolutely loves the water.  So far I have not ventured beyond the bathtub and our backyard pool with him, but I can tell he enjoys it much more than his big Sister. 

Ben's first tooth decided to pop out this month and you can tell that it feels like a foreign object to him because he sticks his tongue out a lot.

Here is a picture taken by our good friend Shelli.

Happy Birthday to my Best Friend

C - Caring

  H - Humble

         A - Adventurous

  R - Reliable

L - Loving

     I - Intelligent 

     E - Easygoing

(just in case some missed this picture posted last year)

Happy Birthday Charlie!  We love you!!!

Successful Surprise Party

I'm sure all have heard by now that we actually pulled off a true surprise for THE Charlie Groff who turned 30 this year.  My Sister-in-Law and I worked together to see if we could surprise Charlie.  Who knew that we would actually make it happen especially with a toddler in our house who can let things slip every now and then (and Mommy can too).  We were able to keep it a secret even up to the last second when we drove in Kristen and Jose's driveway because there were no cars in sight.  Charlie's first comment after everyone yelled SURPRISE was "where did you all park?".  It was priceless.  Thank you Kristen and Jose for planning and hosting the surprise and thank you to all those who joined in the fun.

 Wow, Daddy, you look so much taller now that you're 30.

What's a good caption to go along with this picture?

2nd Annual Idlewild Trip with the Groff's

For those that haven't had a chance, you must check out the coolest amusement park ever.  It's called Idlewild.  I've also posted information about this park on our Fun Place Database site.  I don't have any pictures this year.  I used the "Mary photography" from Luke 2:19 - But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.  It was a blast and we can't wait to go next year.

Emily - 3 years, 11 mo. - July 16

Here's our growin' little girl.  One minute she's talkin' baby talk to Ben and the next minute she's acting like a 4 year old going on 13.  Her recent nickname is Cat Lady.  She had seen these Beenie Baby cats over at my Mom and Dad's house and asked if she could take one home with her.  Well now she has quite the collection, 7 in total and I believe she's named 5 of them so far.  We mentioned Stripy back in May, and we've added Lilly, Bucket, Brown and Bubble. 

Emily loves to have sleep-overs at my parents house.  This last sleep-over gave us another Emily-ism.  She and my Mom were in their basement and Emily had been sitting on the floor playing on the computer for quite a while.  When she stood up she said "Mommo, my leg is sparkling.  Do you see the sparkles?"   Yes, her leg had fallen asleep and that's how she put things together.  She was convinced you could see the sparkles.  

Emily's recent food combination was blueberries dipped in ranch dressing.  I have to write this for the blog because when she's older she probably won't believe it.

Emily is enjoying having Ben around a lot more now.  It's neat to watch them play together.

Sunday School fellowship

We hosted our Sunday School fellowship a while back.  We had hamburgers, hotdogs and other fixins'.  After stuffing our faces we had a friendly cornhole tournament to which Mr. H and Charlie won. 

Here's Ben's reaction once he found out his Dad won.

Here was Emily's fun with her friend sending bubble bottles down the slide. 

Family Reunion

I love family reunions.  I have fond memories of sitting around with the older folks and hearing stories of what times were like "back then".  I haven't had an opportunity to go to my family's reunion, but I did get the chance to go to Charlie's.  There was great food, great fellowship, and tons of fun.  Emily swam and played on the playground and also had her first dog bite - actually it was just a nip and she was the one that provoked the dog even after Charlie told her the dog was already upset.  Ben enjoyed the scenery, napped, ate and attempted to crawl around, but I'm sure he mostly enjoyed being passed around from one family member to another.  The adults enjoyed catching up with everyone, the games and the auction.  They are already planning where next year's reunion will be. 

I have more pictures, but I seemed to have misplaced our camera so thanks to one of Charlie's family members we have this picture.

Benjamin at 8 months

Ben has a lot to say these days. His most recent sounds are da-da, ba-ba and just yesterday ma-ma.  He loves to make his presence known by slapping his hands on his legs and this usually occurs when he's left in the room alone for a brief time.

Crawling I believe is on the horizon.  Ben now can scooch himself around on his behind and is actually moving some when he ends up on all fours.

Ben loves pretty much all the food he's given, but does seem to really enjoy the flavored puffs and strangely enough, veggie chips.  They actually dissolve pretty quickly.

Summer fun

We found a great deal last Fall on a small pool and finally had a chance to get it set up. Emily loves it and this past weekend was Ben's first pool experience. Unfortunately for Ben the only flotation device I had was quite girly looking. These pictures will be enjoyed by his future wife.

Happy 6 year Anniversary

A couple years later and many fun adventures together.  Thank you Lord for bringing us together.  We are truly blessed.

Emily - 3 years, 10 mo. - June 16

Almost 4 years old - I can't believe it.  This picture cracks me up - skinned up knees and a frilly pony tail which you can't see very well.  Emily is quite the little tom-boy with a little bit of girly in her.  She is a ball of energy, but is and always has been my good sleeper both for nap time and night time.

The recent Emily-ism happened when she and Charlie were watching tv together.  The show was about characters trying to catch shapes.  One character was trying to catch a triangle on a fish's tale.  Charlie teased Emily saying "what if the fish swam away and they couldn't get the triangle?".  Emily gave Charlie a serious look and said "Dad, it's pretend, drawn on a storyboard".  Charlie looked at her in disbelief and asked "What?".  Emily proceeded to repeat herself word for word. Then Charlie asked Emily where she heard that and misunderstanding his question proceeded to explain to Charlie what a storyboard was.  Quite interesting the things that stick in a child's brain.

Emily thoroughly enjoyed Vacation Bible School recently at our church.  I had the privilege of being one of her teachers again this year.  It was a joy to hear her singing the songs and saying the Bible verses.

What a difference soil makes

Here are some updated flowerbed pictures. I know we've received a LOT of rain, but I truly believe the difference is based on the soil.