Halloween 2009

Happy Halloween from our little cheerleader!

Being her first year trick or treating, we deciding to go to the children's museum. Inside the Museum they have candy passed out at every "station". It went over pretty well, once she got passed the firefighters and decided the people weren't scary. We saw some friends from the ward and then all was happy!
The next night we went to the ward party. We were very excited that Mom Blomstedt was able to spend the day with us. Joe is very pleased that for the second year in a row we were able to win a prize with Calico Beans! Thanks for your help with them this year mom! We have had a fun Holiday and look forward to spending some time at home tonight passing out candy. Hope everyone has a Safe and Happy Halloween!

Family Fun...

At the Children's Museum! With the cold whether here, we have been trying to find a substitute for the park. I think we have success! Lindsay loves running around the museum and playing with all the fun toys and being creative. We enjoy going once every week or two to get out our wiggles. But, it is always the best when Dad can come!

All of our hands!

Just the right size

It seems that Lindsay is always wanting to try new things and grow up so fast. And, sadly, sometimes I have to say that she isn't big enough certain things. But, Lindsay is proud to announce that she is big enough to play on the toys at the mall! This is very exciting to her because everytime we walk the mall, she want's so badly to play!

Getting Caught!

This last month or so Lindsay has been very persistent that her milk comes from the fridge. Well, a couple of weeks ago she figured out how to get it open. This is her getting caught in the act, with yogurt on her face.

Snowman

This is Joe and Lindsay's first snowman of the year. They were so proud of it! It is really all of the snow off of the car because the ground was still pretty warm, But it was still lots of fun!

Vala's Pumpkin Patch In Pictures

This is Lindsay sitting in a really BIG rocking chair. She wasn't so sure what to think. But, she still wanted to climb it!

Last year Lindsay was scared of the baby goats. This year she loved to point and "talk" to the big goats.

This is Cinderella's Carriage in the story book area. She loved looking out of the window.

A really big slide. Since we know that Lindsay is scared of tube slides at the park, we thought that maybe if she went down with Joe holding her it would be better(this slide is bigger around than those at the park) and it was. She really enjoyed it!

Lindsay "driving" a tractor.

She wanted so bad to reach out and touch one of the bunnies. But, all she could do was reach as far as she could. And then she settled for just looking.

These are called "Jumping Pillows". Lindsay had a lot of FUN on them. She enjoyed laying on the side and being bounced around as the bigger kids jumped.

But, she wanted so badly to jump as well. She did pretty well on her hands and knees. Just not big enough to jump with her socks yet.

As much as Lindsay enjoyed the jumping, I think Joe enjoyed it even more!


Coming off the "pillow" all jumped out.



More to come...

15 Months

I can't believe my little baby is so BIG! She is continuing to learn and explore many new things. Everyday we have a new adventure before us. I love my little girl and her excitement about life!

Helping in the Garden

Lindsay is always very happy to help Mom and Dad in the garden. Her favorite part is picking the tomatoes. She has (over the course of the summer) pretty much chosen her favorite part of the garden: the cherry tomato plant. It is the first thing she zooms to and we usually have to take her away from it!

This is how the process goes.

First, look around and locate the best one.

Second, reach a little further to pick it off.

Third, enjoy the delightful taste of your harvest.And Lastly, leave feeling very happy (and full of tomatoes)!!

Lindsay's Leg Rings

When I was finishing up some canning, Lindsay got into a box of rings and seals. She neatly placed the rings on her leg and the seals back into the box. By the time she was done the rings covered from her knee to her ankle.
I think this picture shows a little of who Lindsay is; I love watching her creativity and preciseness shine through. She has an amazing personality and is fun to be around! I love her so much!

Peaches

I couldn't help but smile when I walked into the kitchen to find this:

She decided to help herself to a peach. She enjoyed it so much... that she went back for another one not many hours later! The only difference is that I caught her quicker and saved myself some mess with the high chair. (Oh, and the story with the fork, Lindsay refuses to eat in her highchair unless she has one!)

Lots and Lots of Playing

In August we visited Grandma and Grandpa Blomstedt in Hershey. We had a fun time doing many activities and seeing family and friends.

When we arrived Lindsay was ready to get out and play. She loved running in the yard. That is until... the kittens found her. She was not very interested in them and spent a lot of time being chased.

But, After a little while she was willing to try out the whole petting thing. It turns out that she likes the kittens. By the end of the weekend she was chasing them!

When she wasn't running with the kittens she found many things to do outside. One of which was to play football with Dad and Uncle Jordan. If I remember right, I think they said that she was on Jordan's team. It was suppose to make it "fair". :)

After all the running and playing Lindsay was more than willing to come inside!

As a family we love going to Cody Park. Lindsay has fun on the rides and we all enjoy some time together. At Lindsay's age (which means she really only has two choices) the Carousal is her favorite.

Before we went to Cody Park, we went swimming at Hershey Beach. I had never been there before and had wanted to see what it was like. We had lots of fun in the sand and water. Being Lindsay's first time in a lake I wasn't sure how well she would enjoy that much water at once. But, she loved it. She would kick and splash up a storm. Lindsay and I also enjoyed floating on the ring while the boys got crazy!

Vacation

In July we went to South Dakota for vacation. We had a wonderful time with Family and loved the time spent together. Unfortunately we lost our camera somewhere between chimney rock and rapid city :( So, we only have a few pics that we took with a disposable. But, we still remember the great times and exciting things we did and saw.

We went to an old gold mine that was really neat. It had a waterfall at the back of the mine where water was hit by the miners. We enjoyed seeing the waterfall 500 ft inside of a mountain! Lindsay enjoyed the mine as well. She was actually asleep when we entered but as soon as the water got loud she was awake and laughing and having a blast. Inside of the mine we say copper and silver deposits as well as quartz shafts. Or at least that is what we could recognize.

The view right outside of the mine was breathtaking. We absolutely loved being completely surrounded by this:

Joe thought this guy was pretty cool and wanted a picture by him. He is called the muffler man(don't ask me why, I thought he had a pick in his hands?!).

Chapel in the Hills is a beautiful solid wood chapel built after a church in Norway that is 800 years old. We liked the elaborate craving and detail on the inside and out. The house in the bottom pic was then designed after the care house of the chapel, complete with sod roofing. Looks like it could use a trim!

We also went to Story Book Island. We had fun trying to name all of the stories and I think that between, Mom, Jordan, Joe and myself, that we did pretty good! Lindsay enjoyed all the activities and playgrounds at this cute park(and so did we!).

This is a pic of Joe and Lindsay having fun at one of the museums we saw. Right behind Lindsay is the mouth of a really big fish of some kind(sorry don't remember what it was called).

One of the attractions which Joe got really excited about was the Crazy Horse mountain. He loved learning about the Indians and the dynamite used to sculpt the mountain. Below is a picture of Joe in front of a sculpture of what the finished mountain will look like. If I remember right, this sculpture is a 1/30 scale.

We also enjoyed many more attractions that we don't have pics of. Reptile Gardens was neat to see the turtle that was at least 120 years old (sorry i don't remember the exact age), the bald eagle, and the Komodo dragon (Joe's favorite). We also enjoyed the snake show. I still cannot believe someone would get that close to a snake on purpose!

One of my favorite sites was Mount Rushmore. I really enjoyed the museum that explained everything about the monument. It is amazing to me that people climb that high to sculpt stone!The trail around Rushmore was also very lovely.

Dinosaur park had huge concrete figures on top of what I think was the steepest hill in Rapid City. We also saw some glass blown. He made some swans and a glass bowl while we were there.

Black Hills Gold had a half hour tour which we were able to see how their Jewelry is made. It was very fascinating and neat to learn so much about how to identify a genuine black hills gold piece compared to a look a like.

Our Favorite part was being surrounded by family and nature!

Bye Bye Crib

Last week Lindsay got a little adventuress in her crib. She discovered that she could pull herself up until her knees where on top of the rail. To me, this was a little scary. I didn't want to see her climb that high again in fear of her landing on her head. So, Lindsay has now moved up to a toddler bed. I know that she is a little young but she has been doing very well. I still put pillows beside her bed at night, but she has surprised me so far and hasn't rolled off. Most nights this is what you see.
My biggest worry about Lindsay's new bed was her bedtime routine. But, after a couple of nights she seemed to have caught on pretty quick. I would say the biggest change for me is that she now climbs into bed by herself to lay down, and that she slides out of bed in the morning to find me. She is very happy with her new "big" bed!

Making Pies

This year for Father's Day I made Joe a banana cream pie. This year I also had my helper. She is now tall enough that she can reach the counter top when she stands on my little kitchen stool. She loves to watch everything that goes on. Well, while i was rolling out the dough she decided to carefully take some from the counter. I love the pictures of her being caught in the act!!