Goodbye Ohio!

Packing...

Moving again...

Random Sampler

Sweet little sleeper

Hanging out with daddy

Elsie has almost out grown her big fluffy pink dress, so we took some pictures of her in it

Big fluffy pink behind

We finally were able to take a decent video of Elsie laughing. Enjoy!

Visit from Virginia

Andrew, Michelle, Sophie, and Elanor made the drive from Virginia to visit us before we head back to school. It's a long drive to make with two little girls, but we're glad they came!

Elanor and Sophie meeting Elsie

All three girls

Tickle tickle! Elanor tickles her Uncle Alan's feet.

Elanor likes to play with Elsie's toys

Alan reads a story before bedtime. Both girls are enthralled... Elsie with her binky and Elanor with her swim diaper.

Elsie meeting her Uncle Andrew

"Here's your rattle, Baby Elsie!"

It was a short visit, but it was good to see them. Thanks for making the trip!

Standing!

The Picture

Whats really happening

Weekend in Palmyra, part two

The next place we visited after the print shop was the Hill Cumorah. We had already been to the visitors center the day before, so we drove straight up to the top to see the monument. This side was the three witnesses.

Joseph Smith receiving the plates from Moroni
Moroni's exhortation

The eight witnesses

And here is the full statue

You can't really tell from this picture, but we were on the top of a really steep hill.

"Goodbye Hill Cumorah!"

Ooh la la

In front of the visitors center they had a giant Book of Mormon statue.

After the Hill Cumorah we hit up the Joseph Smith farmstead. This is us in the log home.

As we walked to the frame house, we got a great view of the temple.

Inside the frame house, Alan checking out one of the places the gold plates were hid.

Outside of the frame house

We took a nice walk through the Sacred Grove next. We split up with Trent and Jenny, so this was the only picture we got of us in the grove. We tried to set the self timer and prop the camera up on Elsie's lap, but as you can see it turned out really flashy. Oh well.

Before we left Palmyra, we stopped at the temple to get one more picture.

On the way home, we went the extra hour and a half out of the way to stop at Niagara Falls.

Elsie was so happy to be out of the car, the whole time she was in her stroller or in our arms she would babble, talk, laugh, and squeal. People would stop to watch her and comment on what a happy baby she was.

Every so often the breeze would blow the mist up at us. Elsie would be so surprised every time she got misted. She would open her eyes wide and sputter in shock.

Ready for the long drive home!

It was a very nice weekend trip. It was extremely hot and humid and muggy, but we had a good time. I'm glad Trent and Jenny were able to come with us, we all had some good laughs together.

Weekend in Palmyra, part one

Alan took the day off this last Saturday and we drove up to Palmyra for the weekend. Our friends Trent and Jenny came with us, so our little car was very cozy. It took us about 4 1/2 hours to get there, and the first thing we did was go to the temple. Alan and I were able to go in while Trent and Jenny watched Elsie, then we switched. It's a small temple, but very pretty!

Trent and Jenny were already inside, so we tried to use the self timer... It didn't work so well.

We went down the road to the Hill Cumorah visitors center to wait for Trent and Jenny. It was very hot and humid; we were happy to wait in an air conditioned building! Alan is giving Elsie her very first bottle. I got one ready for her incase she needed it while we were in the temple, but she was fine. When she did get hungry, we decided to give it a try. It was strange to have someone else feeding her...
Our next stop was the Peter Whitmer Farm. It was getting later in the day, and all of the sites close at 7pm. The Whitmer farm was the furthest away, so we toured there then called it a day.

Mmm, dinner. We stayed the night in a hotel in Rochester.

The next morning we hung around the hotel until check out time. The sites didn't open until 12:30, so we drove around and found the Martin Harris farm property and the grave site of Alvin Smith. When the buildings finally opened, we went to the Grandin Printing building first. The senior couple giving us the tour asked us to pick a number, and that number would correspond with a Book of Mormon language, which would predict where we would go if we served a senior couple mission. Our number was 42, and it told us we would go to Bolivia.

Trent and Jenny

Elsie reading a replica of the first edition of the Book of Mormon

One of the original copies of the first 5,000 Book of Mormons printed

Poor Elsie. She was such a trooper during this trip. We had to blow through all her nap times, so she just had to fall asleep on the go.

Alan in front of two original paintings

Elsie woke up at the end of the tour and is ready for the next site!

I originally tried to make this whole trip on big blog post, but it was very long, and blogger kept messing up the photos. So check back tomorrow for the rest of the story!