Xela came to visit

About a month after we went to visit Xela she came down to visit us! While she was here we went to see some more sites downtown! We loved having Xela, Chris and River here!

Jessy Girl Turns 2

While we were up in New York Jessalyn had a birthday! It is so hard to believe that this little girl turned two!!!

It seems like just yesterday that she came to our family!

The day started out making a great birthday pancakes with the fresh blueberries we picked the day before!

Then that night we had cupcakes to celebrate!

We sure love this little one! She is such a joy in our lives and we can't imagine life without her! She is learning and growing up so fast! She wants to be just like her sister.  Jessalyn is a happy little one most of the time.  Her personality is really coming out and she is hilarious! She is constantly making faces and doing little dances.  She loves music and will open up the hymn books at church and sing as loud as she can!

And just because I love this girls so much here are some of my favorite pictures of her!

Yep she is potty trained! Now that she is 2 she thinks that she is a big girl! :)

Thank you Jessalyn for picking our family! We sure love you and can't wait to see what other adventures you will bring to our family!

Lake Placid

Before Jorgen's school started again we decided to go and visit his sister Xela up in Lake Placid.  We had so much fun with Xela.

We got to go Blueberry picking and the girls loved it! They loved being able to eat something that they picked off a bush!

We also were able to go to a really cool farmers market.  The weather up there was a little bit of a shock to our system! We went from 117 degree weather to the 50's but we loved it!

They had so many good fruits and veggies! It made us really want to start a garden.  Maybe not now in our little apartment, but hopefully one day we will be in a house and we can have a large garden!

One of our favorite things to do is hiking! Hiking in the adirondacks did not disappoint! It was beautiful.

These girls sure had so much fun with their aunt Xela! She moved to Costa Rica today and we are going to miss her! Except we can't wait to go and visit her, hopefully soon! :) 

Washington DC

We have had some fun visiting some cool places since we have been here.  We took the girls to go and see the Temple and they have a recent redone visitor center which was fun.  

Our first trip into DC involved eating lunch at the Jefferson Memorial.

We can't wait to explore more of the city!

Final Journey

The last part of the trip was by far the longest! After we left Iowa we were planning on making it a quick drive to Ohio to stay with some friends.  But the girls got sick, were throwing up and we were all starting to get cranky and ready to be out of the car.  So we decided to bite the bullet and finish off the 16 hour drive in one day.

The poor little girl fell asleep like this.  She must have been praying really hard that we would get there soon.....

Keira couldn't even stand to look out the window any longer.....If she couldn't see that she was in the car, maybe she could convince herself of that fact.

We FINALLY made it to our new home! Now we just have to get everything up to the 9th floor....good thing we didn't bring much! :) 

Home sweet home! Keira is obviously tired of me taking pictures of her.....

Church History Sites

After leaving Utah we decided that we were going to drive to Omaha Nebraska that night.  It was a very long day, but worth it.  Jorgen served his mission in Nebraska and we wanted to be able to look around at the sites and places there!  On our way there we found a Cabela's and decided to stop and let the girls get some energy out.  They really enjoyed the animals.

Back in the car for some more driving....and sleeping...

We stopped and went to the Visitor's Center at the Winter Quarters Temple.  It was fun for Jorgen since he spent a lot of time there as a missionary to go back.

They had a little area for kids to dress up like pioneers and the girls loved it!

The Temple!

The next place we visited was Carthage.  Neither one of us had been there and so we were really excited to go.  It was a very cool experience and made it so much more real to see where the saints were and to be where the Prophet Joseph was killed.

I hope that these girls will be great friends just like Joseph and Hyrum!

And a little side note to self....don't plan on taking the girls on tours of places after they have been sitting in a car all day long.  There were lots of tears, running away, and relief once it was over.  Jess couldn't have been more excited to be outside to roam free! Too bad we weren't done yet....It was onto Nauvoo!

The girls had a blast playing with some pioneer toys and games! 

We even got to see the Nauvoo Pageant! What a great Pageant.  We stayed with my cousin Mike and his wife Rocio and their family.  They came and met up with us at the Pageant and I am so mad that we didn't get a picture with them! 

 Onto the next adventure!