Did you celebrate?

We did! We celebrated Earth Day by:

Planting flowers

Sewing seeds with friends
Making the Earth

Eating dirt (here's the dirt pie recipe)

Playing at the beach.

We are truly grateful for this beautiful place to live.

calling me home

{Warning this is really long, and I probably didn't even remember everything, so don't feel bad if I forgot you. Don't forget to click on the collages to enlarge them for a better look.}

We've been back in Delaware for a week (and Ben too!), so it's about time I write about our trip to Idaho. I wasn't planning on going since my mom just came to visit, but I couldn't turn down the help on one leg of the trip, so off to Idaho we went. There's an Eric Church song about going to his home, Carolina, but I feel the same way about Idaho- it just calls me home. We had a great time. It always goes by so fast, and we always take TONS of pictures.

Rhone playing at the Philadelphia airport. This was a life saver!

The first big event was meeting Olin, my brother's little boy. They were nice enough to come to the airport with my dad to pick us up. Rhone loved him right from the beginning. Their carseats were next to each other on the 2 hour drive to Idaho. Rhone kept talking to Olin and tried to share his drink. Rhone got so excited when Olin showed up. He loved to hug, rock, feed, swing, and even burp Olin. Thank goodness Brock and Morgan (and Olin) put up with all of Rhone's antics.

It's pretty fun to be an aunt, especially Olin's aunt.

See how excited Rhone is in the bottom left picture. Olin didn't even make it outta the carseat before the lovin' began.

We got to see lots of family since we were home for Easter. My grandparents and aunts were nice enough to meet up with us for lunch at Maddox and drive to Idaho for a visit too.

Rhone and Olin with their great-aunties and great-granny.

My mom, my granny, and me after lunch.

Anthony, Kaleigh, and Rhone are cute 2nd cousins.

Rhone and his uncle Brock. Nana and her 2 boys.

We always spend lots time outside. It was time to start farming when we were home. Rhone absolutely LOVED the tractor. He would point to it for hours, just hoping someone would be nice enough to let him drive. Notice how small he is compared to the tractor and harrows. Rhone also loves riding the 4-wheelers. One morning we took a little drive up a nearby canyon. We couldn't get too far up because of snow, but it was still a beautiful trip and fun to do with the family. He helped catch birds (see picture of him throwing it down) and even had a chance to go sledding.

Rhone in pure delight from the front.

Rhone from the side. Pretty funny huh.

Flying a kite in the Idaho wind.

Sledding on our property in North Canyon. Rhone slid down the hill and then Papa pulled him back up. What a life.

No trip home would be complete without an outing with Ace. We sure do miss him. You can't tell but it was snowing on us!

My mom and I took Rhone to the Treehouse Children's museum in Ogden, UT. We had a great time and it was a great price. It was hard to keep him moving through the exhibit, because he loved playing with everything. He made music, sat in the Oval Office, dressed like a chef, had a Peter Rabit Tea Party, and explored houses from other countries. His absolute favorite was milking the cow. There was a life size cow that had rubber udders that sprayed water into the pail when milked. Rhone LOVED it and managed to find his way back to the exhibit multiple times.

I couldn't pass up this shot in the Oval Office. Too bad I'm not this friendly with his politics.

Thanks to my parents for having us! We miss all of our family and friends already!

make love, not war

My mom has this picture framed at her house on a little side table. I never really liked it and wondered why she had it framed. It is so casual, and we aren't really looking at the camera. When I was home I saw it this time and looked closer. Now I love this picture. It was taken right after we graduated from college (Ben in outdoor recreation and me in soil and land resources). We had been married for 2 years. Don't we just look like 2 hippies in love. I miss those simple days. If I thought chanting "make love, not war" would really keep Ben home, I might start.

Nana came and we took LOTs of pictures

My mom came to visit over her spring break. My sophomore year of college my mom and I came to the east coast together. So it was fun being here together 5 years later. We absolutely LOVED having her. We had a few days of bad weather, but we were still able to get out and enjoy some of the east coast. I guess she will just have to come back to enjoy the rest of it.

PHILADELPHIA

After we picked my mom up from the airport, we drove into downtown Philly to try and avoid rush hour traffic. We had dinner at Jones and saw some of the historical sites like Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell.

Dinner at Jones in downtown Philadelphia.

In front of Independence Hall.

WASHINGTON, DC

Since we only had 1 day to spend in the city, my mom picked a few things she hadn't seen before. We visited Mount Vernon, Arlington National Cemetery, and the Cherry Blossoms (which took us right past most of the monumonts).

Waiting in line to see the inside of Mount Vernon.

In the gardens at Mount Vernon.

Arlington National Cemetery. It is a beautiful place, but but thinking of all those who lost their lives fighting and the love ones they left behind, makes me feel sick.

The Cherry Tree Blossoms were beautiful and smelled nice too.

DELAWARE

My mom's brother, Cole, was nice enough to drive down from New Jersey to spend some time with us. After dinner and visiting we meet Ben at work (on a Saturday) where he showed us around a C-5. On a rainy day we did some shopping at the Rehoboth Beach Outlets. We toured historic Dover, visited the Agricultural museum, walked through the Biggs Art Museum. We worked on our garden box, visited the beach, celebrated Easter, and wished Ben safe flying as he left on a mission. All in less than a week- we were busy.

Yep, he found the steering wheel that runs the nose gear.

This silver is from the USS Delaware and dates back before WWI. It was gorgeous. Notice how Rhone does museums? Just about as good as his dad did the art museum. :)

Nana and Rhone at the Ag Museum.

Shoveling the soil into our garden box.

There's nothing like toes in the sand.

Dear...

Dear Idaho, Your beauty never disappoints.

Dear Better Homes and Gardens, My fresh coconut cake will never grace the cover of your magazine. All the beating, boiling, and grating was not worth it.


Dear Dad/Ben, We love and miss you.

Easter double take

We celebrated Easter twice- once in DE before Ben left to the middle east and once in Idaho with our family here. That's lots of egg dying, egg finding, and ham eating. Lucky us for double the fun and double the thoughts about the blessing of our Savior.

Rhone was quite the egg dyer. I don't know why but, I some how I envisioned it going better (well less messy) than it did. Almost all our eggs ended up cracked and we had one green hand, but boy was it fun.

Rhone is loving all the spoons. Notice the green hand.

Rhone and Ben with finished eggs.

It took a little bit for Rhone to catch on, but once he did, he loved egg finding.

Our little family after the egg hunt. Am I so glad Rhone got to celebrate with his dad.

Rhone and I flew to Idaho with my mom the Friday before Easter so we were able to visit with lots of extended family during the weekend.

We learned our lesson and only used 2 colors to dye eggs with the 2nd time. We had much, much better results. I love Rhone's expression here.

Excited about his Easter basket finds.

Getting tips from Papa on using the REAL shovel he got for Easter. Yes, that is snow!

Olin and Rhone bundled up for the Easter egg hunt with their great grandma and grandpa.