Brooklyn's Trip to Conference

Brooklyn recently had an experience of a lifetime.

Her grandparents acquired sweet tickets to general conference.

And (because they are awesome) they decided that since Brooklyn is now old enough to go into the Conference Center, that it would be a wonderful experience for her.

Lucky for us, she had her own camera, so we get to see her experience through her eyes.

Brace yourself.

There were many "selfies" to choose from.

I thought this one was particularly charming.

You'll have to excuse her, she was a teeny weeny bit excited.

Also understand that I only had about 5 zillion pictures from this trip to choose from.

Sheesh, I really wish she would have given me a bit more selection.

 In my in-laws true fashion, they nearly saw the entire state of Utah in 2 days.

This Is The Place Monument

 Pioneer Village

(And further proof that she was there with her grandparents...pony rides?  Yep, definitely with her grandparents.)

 She was super pleased with her stilt-walking abilities.

There never was a happier girl than the one petting stinky goats.

 Do you think they would have let me stay for free?

One of Brooklyn's favorite things is to have her Grammy tell her all about the day she was born.

About how we were all waiting, (and waiting and waiting) for her to come out.

She (along with who knows how many concourses of children) was born in

As part of this trip, her grandparents took her on a little personal history tour.

This is the  hospital where she was born.

The stadium where I may or may not have roasted a few times.

And here was our humble abode.

Apartment #6

She was probably frightening some poor young mother.

Like there was some private investigator taking pictures of her apartment or something.

 And of course, no trip to Provo would be complete without a trip to the Creamery.

The little punk called me while she was eating this...just to rub it in.

I told her to eat some extra for me, but I never quite got the satisfaction I was looking for.

 She also got to visit her Great-Grandfather & Grandmother's grave.

She was sad that she didn't have any flowers to leave so she found a feather to lay by their grave. 

 After all of this activity, it was time for General Conference!

She loved being able to go inside the Conference Center.  

Aaaannnddd...she loved the cake that she said was as big as her head.

Wait!  Was she with her grandparents?

Oh yes, yes she was.

Spoiled rotten, she is.

That looks like what I would like to eat for lunch everyday.

I am so grateful that Brooklyn got to have this experience.

I truly believe that it was life changing for her.

When I picked her up, she was telling me all about the trip (for the whole 1.5 hours home.)

At one point she started tearing up and told me that she had no idea that Conference would be so amazing.

 (That giant dude is totally photo bombing my picture)

And it looks like Brooklyn is floating...

I was happy to have my girly back, 

but I am very thankful for these two for making that experience possible.

It takes an entire village to raise a child - 

and I'm really, really happy to be in the same village as these two.  :)

Future Engineer

I've mentioned before what a quiet and somewhat mischievous boy Bradley is.

The thing is, is that he really isn't mischievous for the sake of causing trouble as much as he is a curious little fellow and wants to discover things about the world on his own terms.

When he is curious about something, he quietly 

plays/experiments/watches/blows things up.

A trait that I do believe will come in handy later in life,

but one that can cause a few concerns for a busy mother.

Last Saturday we decided that we had to reclaim our garage.

It had been discombobulated for way too long.

I was going nuts.

So, we opened up the doors, 

pulled out all the junk 

and then did our best to get everything back in it's place.

The kids were in and out of the house, 

but mostly they were riding up and down the sidewalk on their bikes and scooters.

After about 2 hours of this I paused to count heads (for the 50th time).

1...2...3...

Uh, where's Bradley?

Do you have any idea how many times that question has been asked?

Yeesh.

So I walked into the house, and to my alarm smelled something cooking.

Not good.

I rounded the corner into the kitchen to see Bradley's little face beaming.

"Mom, check this out!  It's amazing!"

I cautiously came around the island to find him with the toaster.

Which he had gotten out of the cupboard and plugged in.

He carefully placed 2 pieces of bread.

 Pushed down the lever.

 And then popped it back up.

Sending that bread flying.

He was positively thrilled to discover the amazing abilities of our toaster.

My favorite part though was how he would then take the bread out and peer inside of the toaster.

Dying to know how such awesomeness was achieved.

I'm starting to think that I should be thankful I didn't come in to find my toaster completely dismantled.

I seem to remember a story about my grandfather doing just that.

I imagine it won't be long.

I just hope that he sticks to toasters and toys - 

and stays away from computers and minivans.

Only 2 slices of bread were burned to an absolute crisp in the making of this post.