Maddox at 6 Months

In March Maddox turned 6 months. He is such a happy baby and is right on track with all his milestones. He is sitting up, eating baby food, rolling around on his play mat and just being an overall, happy boy. The only thing he is a little behind in is his height and weight. Mama affectionately calls him her little runt. We love the addition he is to our family.

Losing A Great Lady

In January of this year we lost our sweet G.G. Scott's grandmother, Nancy Philp Allen passed away in her home surrounded by most of her family all around her. She was a wonderful example to us all on how to be a GREAT great-grandma. All the kids adored her. We all adored her. She made Thanksgiving and Christmas so memorable. We love gathering at their house each year.

I had the privilege of being her visiting teaching companion for the past 7 years. It was quite an adjustment when she got too sick to go with me. It was a blessing to be able to go with her and spend that little bit of time with her each month. She taught me how important visiting teaching is and made sure I went when I was supposed to.

We will always miss you, G.G. The holidays will never be the same.

Some of the great grandkids at the viewing

Scott and the other grandsons and sons-in-law were all the pall bearers

The great grandchildren

The grandchildren all but Wayne who was serving his mission and JR

Her children and husband (Grumpy)

Disneyland

Well, I put this post off long enough. I just knew how photo intensive it was going to be so It has stalled my blog for almost a year now. So here goes.

We had a Disneyland jar to save our pennies for about 2 years. In November before Christmas I realized we probably had enough so we got the bright idea to surprise the kids for Christmas with a trip to Disneyland.

I wrapped up a box with the tickets inside and on Christmas morning they opened it. They weren't even sure what to think but eventually they acted excited. We left the next day and spent 3 days there. Not our best idea ever.

Apparently, the week between Christmas and New Years is the busiest time of the year. They actually CLOSED Disneyland for the first time in 30 years because they were at capacity. By the third day Mom and Dad were so ready to leave. We spent most of the time standing in lines and freezing. We did manage to have some memorable times in there and it was really neat to see it all decorated for Christmas. Let's just say we will NEVER go at Christmas time again.

It's a Small World was probably my favorite. It was lit up so neat and inside they had each country decorated for their Christmas in their own Christmas traditions.

The Castle was beautiful.

Santa's reindeer were taking a break at Disneyland after their long trip around the world.

The Parade was really neat.

Gracie was afraid to meet any of the characters. We didn't get a chance

to meet anyone but Pluto and Minnie anyway because of the crowds.

House Addition!

This past summer we were blessed with the opportunity to enclose our porch and add on to our house. We were busting at the seams and I was getting really tired of having to do laundry outside. We couldn't even all fit at the kitchen table together. We added a large family room, a dining room, 2 bedrooms and a large pantry. We added around 900 square feet. It is like a different house and we love it so much and feel so blessed to have been able to do it.

View from the kitchen looking into the dining room and family room. The edge of the wall at the right of the picture is where the house ended before.

This is looking into the new family room from the office. Where the arch is used to be the side door to the outside.

This used to be the family room/living room and now it's just a formal living room better known as the home teaching/visiting teaching room.

Looking at the dining room from the new side door. You can see into Gracie's room there in the back.

I think this room speaks for itself. There's only one person this could belong to. ; )

I need to take a better picture of her cute quilt her Nana made her. It has owls all over it. It's beautiful and she loves it.

This is the room that when I open the door to go in I actually hear angels singing hallelujah!

This is Jake and Joey's new room. It is just to the right of Gracie's room. It still needs a little decorating but I love the colors in it and they love the space.

Maddox is now in Jake and Joey's old room which is next to mine and Gracie's old room is now the laundry room which it was always intended for in the first place.

Next project is to redo the kitchen. It's going to take some doing because I plan to repaint all the cabinets black and put up a backsplash and some new countertops. I see lots of sanding and painting in my future.