Ellingford Family Get-Together

My parents, my brothers and sisters, our families, and Grandpa and Grandma Ellingford got together for a little family reunion. We had a fun couple of days! The guys went golfing, the girls did pedicures and cooked meals and treats, we all went flying, played lots of board and card games, went geocaching, and played an entire afternoon in the water...lots of fun!
Mom made arrangements for us to go flying with a gentleman with a 4 seater plane. Bracken was able to go flying with Brian, Seth and I. Seth (13) got to fly most of the time while we were in the air, and he loved to dive the plane so that we'd lose our stomachs and go in tight, steep circles. I finally had to tell Seth to stop diving because it was making me sick, but Bracken just held onto my hand tighter and never made a sound. A week or so later I overheard him telling Chandra, "I went flying in an airplane with Mommy and Daddy. Seth made it dive and Mom got a little scared, but I was brave Chandra. When you are big, you can fly in an airplane too."
We rented a 18 foot inflatable water slide one afternoon. It was a blast! It was actually pretty hard to climb up, and so us older kids played on it the most. We had relay races where the people who were watching laughed so hard their stomachs hurt, and I think we all got injuries of some sort from falling down the stairs. But the laughs were worth the pain!

Grandma Ginger and Grandpa Rudy. Love you guys!

The whole crew.

Kylie and Bracken...they loved the sandbox.

It was nice having organized activities for our reunion, because it kept everyone together. Normally when we go home it seems like everyone is running in ten different directions. Thanks for putting it all together Mom and Dad!

Our Little Girl

I am enjoying Chandra so much lately. She is so interactive and lively. I love having “conversations” with her. I’ll hold her up so we’re looking eye to eye. She’ll look right in my eyes, very contemplative and serious as if she’s trying to figure out what I’m thinking, and then all of a sudden burst into a big, beautiful smile that lights up her eyes and makes me feel like sunshine just filled the room. She coos, “talks” and mostly squeals at us. She sounds so girly. Then I just want to snuggle her close and love her, but she’s too wiggly and doesn’t like to be snuggled.

Chandra is always moving. She’s always looking around, kicking her feet, or waving her arms. Even when she’s sleeping she’ll often flip her head from side to side for minutes at a time. She loves it when we hold her up and let her jump on our laps or stomachs…our arms get tired before her legs do.

She’s decided she doesn’t like laying on her back anymore. Now anytime we lay her on her back she rolls over to her front, and then wiggles around on the floor. She tries so hard to move, pulling the carpet and wiggling her body so that she never stays in the same place long. The first time Bracken saw Chandra roll over he said excitedly, “Look Mom! I taught Chandra to roll over all by myself! She’s getting bigger! Good job Chandra.” I’m guessing she’ll be a much earlier crawler than Bracken, since she’s got an older brother to look up to and keep up with!

She’s such a sport with Bracken’s loving and mauling. Usually when I’ve left them alone for a minute I come back and find Chandra surrounded by stuffed animals and covered with blankets, with Bracken reading or singing to her. She just loves movement and activity, and is happiest when we’re busy and moving—when I’m running around with her in my arms playing tag or baseball with Bracken, playing in Bracken’s forts, or tagging along on any of his other adventures.

Whenever Chandra hears Brian talking she’ll stop crying, look around, and then watch him carefully until he comes to talk to her. It’s pretty cute. I love every time she giggles and don’t mind making a fool of myself to get her to laugh. I love her big, beautiful, soul piercing eyes. We all love our little girl!

Building Forts

Bracken asks me multiple times a day if he can build a fort. Whenever I say yes he pulls every cushion off each couch, gets all the pillows from our beds, and every blanket he can find and piles them into a heap in the middle of the living room floor. Then he burrows inside any hole he can find with his lion, bear, and blankets and plays all sorts of imaginary games. He often wants me to let Chandra play too. That means I move Chandra from place to place around his fort as he commands and save her from falling cushions and getting tripped over. He is always so proud of every fort he makes.

Camping at the Lake

We went on camping at the lake while in AZ! Brian has been telling me about these camping trips since before his mission. Lake trips are some of his favorite family memories growing up. I was worried about how camping would work with Chandra (3 months old now), but she was a dream. She just slept snuggled up on a camp chair beside my cot. She hardly ever cried. She loved riding on the boat, and we even took her swimming in the water with us. She seemed to like cooling off. Bracken loved every minute of our three days there. He played in the sand, in the water, with his cousins, rode the bumper tubes and on the boat, and even went water skiing with Brian! Brian was so proud of Bracken for water skiing. Brian asked Bracken if he’d like to water ski with him. Then he had Bracken hold onto his life jacket tight while Brian was pulled out of the water, then Brian held onto Bracken with one arm and just skied one handed. Bracken was grinning ear to ear he was so proud of himself. They skied 3-4 times. I'll try to get a video of them on here later. What an adventurous little boy we have!

Left: Bracken and Grandpa Rob

The grandkids had so much fun swimming with Grandma...unfortunately Grandma forgot sunscreen the last day and got burnt like a lobster! Bracken still tells me, "Mom, I am big like Ethan and can go under water!"
Brian
Playing in the sand...for hours.
Bumper Tubing!

Chandra in her camping chair bed. She slept here for naps and nighttime for all three days!
We had uninvited guests in our camp at night: skunks! They were only about 10 feet away from us the first night, eating and fighting over the hotdog pieces the kids had dropped on the ground. After we went to bed we could hear them wandering around our camp (We’d put away our food and garbage) and Rob even heard them under his cot. Yikes! Thankfully they didn’t spray and we hardly even smelled them.

Thanks for an awesome lake trip family!

"I see Heavenly Father!"

Bracken was laying on the grass beside me when he said excitedly, "Mom, I see Heavenly Father!" I was confused for a second, and then he said again, pointing above him, "I see Heavenly Father like when He came down to see Joseph Smith!" Following the direction of his pointing finger I saw the sun and its rays shining through the tree branches above us. I said something like, "that does look like when Heavenly Father came down to Joseph Smith" and then Bracken said, "I'm going to talk to Heavenly Father." And he sat looking up at the sun and started telling Heavenly Father about how he raked the grass in Parawan by himself and liked milking the goat with his Uncle Dallin. Just a normal little conversation. What a sweet little man!

Pioneer Day

Bracken and I have been reading pioneer stories out of the "Friend" magazine and singing pioneer songs the last few days. We wanted to be ready for Pioneer Day! Here's what we did:

We went to the Pioneer Parade in the morning. Bracken got to see the handcarts and wagons, and people dressed up as pioneers, but mostly he ran after salt water taffy and tootsie rolls and shared them with us and our neighbors. Our friend Andrea took him to pet a miniature horse and he hasn't stopped telling me about it since.

We had a Pioneer FHE. Bracken and I made gingerbread cookie "pioneers" and a wagon with an ox. Brian helped Bracken make a little handcart out of a box and a rope. We had a little lesson, and then Bracken loaded his handcart up with the things he thought he'd need most for a trek. He took his blankets, his tools, his piano, and a box of cookies. Then we walked around our apartment complex and he stopped at some of our neighbors doors to share his (now broken and mostly headless) cookies. Then he played with his left over snaps and sparklers from July 4th. We had a fun day together.
Bracken is wearing his favorite pajamas (he wouldn't change after his nap) and blue rain boots. He loves the boots because he can put them on himself, I don't care if he stomps in mud or puddles with them, and hey, they're bright blue!