Portland Weekend

Darren's cousin got married in Portland in early April and we had a great time partying with lots of family we don't get to see often enough. Of course, the trip started off with a dip in the hotel pool. We invited Kellen and Caleb to join us. Look at this bathing beauty!First time in the pool with Daddy.Swimming boys! Joseph and KellenJustin and CalebAll the boys together at the wedding. It was an adventure to keep the kids occupied with all the waiting that goes along with a wedding. But they made it through! We had time for quite the photo shoot.Grandma and Erica.Maygan and Matthew. Congrats to the bride and groom!Uncle Val, Uncle Dean (father of the bride), Bruce and Carol.

Erica, 5 months

Look at these beautiful pictures my Dad took while we were in Utah!

Anderson/Jolley Reunion (Tour of Erica)

Wow, we had a fun and family-filled trip to Utah! It was actually a recruiting trip that I was invited to, so Darren and Erica and I flew to Utah while Grandma and Grandpa Jolley were kind enough to take Joseph and Justin to their house to play. We started by driving to Portland and meeting up with Carol and Bruce. Then Erica and I flew out of Portland. Erica was happy to see her grandparents again. And the boys were so excited to have sleepovers at Grandma's house!This was Erica's first airplane ride and she was kind of naughty. She did quite a lot of fussing, both times making me stand up in the aisle and bounce her to sleep after screaming her head off. I was glad to not have the boys with me during all of that!Erica missed her Grandma and Grandpa Anderson! Darren is such a sweet Bishop. Everytime he's at BYU on business, he takes the youth from our ward who are now at BYU out to lunch. We enjoyed each other's company and some yummy food.Erica met her Great Grandparents! Great Grandma MangumGreat Grandpa MangumGreat Grandma AndersonJordan, Melissa and TaylorErica got some good girl time with her cousins. They are so sweet with her. AlexisElleHere's all the Jensens.Along with all the Anderson love, lots of Jolleys ended up in town to meet Erica. Here's Michael, Jenni and Megan.The Rogers came from Las Vegas to play.Carly and EricaJason, Megan and Kevin came all the way from Missouri for Spring Break and our vacations were lucky enough to match up!My parents were so awesome to host a huge dinner, accommodating all the Andersons and Jolleys on Sunday afternoon. It was wonderful.I just can't thank all of our family enough for hanging out with us, taking care of us, feeding us, traveling to visit us, watching our boys. We love you all so much!

Kiddos update

Joseph
calls Erica his "cute berry" and loves to see her smile wide at him when he gets home from school.

His credit card obsession has officially ended. It has been replaced by an obsession with technology, specifically everything surrounding the Wii. Joseph reads the owners manual religiously. A little while ago, the Wii wasn't turning on and we couldn't figure it out. Joseph shouts, "I know what to do! It's in the troubleshooting section of the manual!" We followed the steps, problem solved.

When he and Justin aren't playing the Wii, they're re-enacting the games. They have their own version of Super Mario Bros where they jump around the house passing levels. Joseph filled an empty tissue box with items like the question mark boxes in the video game. They pull out of the box a mushroom for bigness, a flower for fire power, or a star for invincibility. It's adorable.

Justin
likes to use the silverware holder from the dishwasher as a car garage.

He used to be too shy or scared or something to say a prayer on his own, but suddenly he fights to be the one to say the prayer. And his prayers are both hilarious and heartfelt. Lately he's blessed Santa, thanked Heavenly Father for his new favorite TV show, and asked for help to not get lost at swimming lessons. We got separated last week for a few minutes and he's been really concerned about it ever since. Poor thing.

He also really loves books. I love to hear him when we get home from the library as he pulls each book out of the bag saying, "I love this book!" or "This one is so awesome!" It's been the perfect thing for us to do during so many baby feedings.

Erica
at 5 months has started eating baby food! She is sitting up with help and loves playing with her toys. She hates being on her tummy and immediately rolls to her back. Her favorite song is "Twinkle twinkle little star." I kid you not, she stops fussing when she hears it. It's the best to see it happen when Justin sings it to her. I've been singing it to her when I lay her down and she's been going to sleep on her own.

She just got to hang with a lot of family during a quick trip to Utah. I'll post soon.

One more for you: Bedtime stories courtesy of Joseph

Erica Giggles

I have to admit I'm a little jealous that Justin is the best at making Erica laugh. But I shouldn't be surprised. He's the silliest one in our house. And it makes it easy for me to capture on camera. Enjoy! (Sorry it's in pieces.)

Our Month of Love

Just wanted to say how much I love my man. For V-day he sent me these roses and then took me out to dinner and jean shopping. What a catch! Darren really does so much for me even after doing so much at work, so much at church, and giving so much to our three little rugrats. He just keeps getting better and I'm more in love with him every day.Here's Joseph showing the love for his little sis by changing her diaper. I love watching him do this all by himself. Justin also loves all over Erica. He just gets in her face and gets a little carried away. I go back and forth between feeling sorry for Erica for the loudness of her brothers and feeling like she's lucky to be so well entertained. She does cry when they leave her alone so she must prefer their boisterousness.Erica's new trick is grabbing at toys (or Mommy's watch).
Just a few of my fave 4 month old pics:Loves bathtime! She always flashes a huge smile when she gets into that warm water and Justin caught the tail end of it. But here's a big one! This girl's hair is out of control.Every Sunday when I get to put Erica in one of her gorgeous dresses I just want to do a huge photo shoot. But she doesn't always comply. My boys are pretty handsome too. Love these kids.

January's over already?

It was a great January! I think I'm gonna like 2011. Typically I despise January. The holiday partying is over, Darren gets busy with work again, and the weather is just blah. But look what we've been up to. First, we kept the partying going with the big Duck game which, as you know, didn't exactly go as we hoped. But boy did we throw a good party for the Young Men. Cool Bishop, right? This picture was taken after the game ended, hence Darren's thumbs down. He was a good loser, though.Darren did get busy with a project and worked his way through a weekend so we left him to go to a party! (Sorry, honey) Happy birthday to Caleb and Kellen! We had a great time in Portland with these cuties. Marc and Connie just treated us to non-stop fun.Not to mention hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa Jolley again. Erica missed them.January had a lot of blah weather, but we had some fun stuff too. We had the perfect snow day. It snowed all night and school was delayed 2 hours so we could play in it! It was great packing snow and it melted the same day. Just the way I like my Seattle snow.Then we've had some gorgeous, clear days to get outside in. One Saturday we spent outside at Lincoln Park.Another day we walked to the park for a picnic.And this baby just keeps getting cuter. Hope you had a good January too!