Amy and Liam Come to Texas

A few days after we got back from Tennessee, Aunt Amy and cousin Liam came to visit. We hadn't met Liam yet, so we were all very excited about their visit. Landon, Ian, and Liam were all born within 6 months of each other. Amy and Liam were here for a week and we had a really good time. Despite having to consider nap times of three babies and then keeping three older children entertained, we were able to do quite a bit. We hung out, we completed some projects together, we went to different pools, we went to the beach, we went out to dinner one night, and just enjoyed! Here are a few pictures of their vist.

Audrey thrilled to meet Liam:

Here are the three boys playing on the ground together for the first time. I love how you can see the different stages they're each in. Landon is mobile, Ian's sitting up, and Liam's trying to figure out how to sit up. So much fun!

On Saturday when the menfolk didn't have to work, we all braved the beach. We went early, since it gets mighty hot and it's not like the water is all that refreshing... We enjoyed quite a few hours at the beach. All the cousins together:

Here's picture overload of Ian, but it was his first time at the beach, so we took a ton of pictures. And there's so many cute ones... 

What's coming at me!

 Another wave and lots of mud:

Ian loved playing in the sand! He's never played in sand before and he was all about exploring it. And I think we only had to stop him once or twice from sticking it in his mouth.

 

We loved Liam and his shades:

Audrey playing in the sand:

She was freaking out about all this mud on her face. Before I helped clean her up though, I had to grab a picture.... And she doesn't look that upset.

 

Rachel out enjoying the waves with Andy. When Rachel found out we were going to the beach she declared she wouldn't go into the water. The last time we went, she got stung by a jellyfish. Anyhow, that didn't last long. Soon enough she was playing away in the water and luckily no one came across a jellyfish this time.

The big cousins playing:

Landon and Ian playing with their buckets:

Our family of 5:

We so enjoyed our beach day! After a few hours, the babies were worn out and ready to go, so we packed up. The big kids didn't want to go though. I would really like to take a beach vacation next year as a family. I know the girls will love it and Ian will be old enough to play longer by then. Plus, when you stay at a beach house it's easy to take one back for a nap. As soon as we strapped Ian into his car seat, he was asleep. The girls of course didn't sleep a wink the whole way home, but they were happy.

On Saturday evening we grabbed some pictures of the siblings and their babies and kids:

We're so glad that Amy and Liam were able to come down and visit us. We love visitors!!! I really enjoyed watching Amy as a mom. She's a wonderful mom to Liam and has stepped into motherhood beautifully. Amy has now moved back to Utah, so we are excited that we will for sure get to see them whenever we make it up to Utah.  I am looking forward to seeing these three little boy cousins spend time together throughout the years. Ian has really lucked out in the cousin department. Out of all our kids, he's the only one who has three cousins (2 on the Smith side, 1 on the Michaelson side) his same age. There's lots of fun memories to be had!

7 months

Ian is 7 months old today and we are all loving the stage he's in right now! You know, the I'm happy and content but not mobile yet... It's a very nice stage! We have started solid foods with him and are still going through introducing the different types of food. He LOVES rice cereal mixed with formula. I actually bought formula for the first time in order to mix his rice cereal - I'm being very lazy about pumping. Anyhow, he likes it and so it works. He'll do sweet potatoes, peaches, and applesauce with some enthusiasm. The others he just seems to tolerate. I'm anxious to see what he thinks of pears and squash - we haven't gotten to them yet. Overall he's enjoying solids and is still very interested in what we are eating. He'll be one happy camper once we can move to table foods. One thing Ian currently does not like is his vitamins. The doctor had me switch from just giving him vitamin D to a multivitamin with iron. He's not a fan and he can tell when I mix it with his food, so we are just torturing him each day. I'd rather have him eat and enjoy his food and just not like his vitamins. 

Our little guy still loves to talk. He was babbling quite a bit at church today and is pretty good at the "d" sound, which makes his daddy happy. Ian has pretty much mastered sitting up. We've gotten to the point where he sits in highchairs at restaurants and in the shopping cart. Which I'm very happy about, because when shopping with 3 children (2 of which can't/won't walk) it leaves very little space for groceries when a car seat is involved. And it's just too hot to drag out the baby carrier. Last night, we ate at a restaurant and Ian was so thrilled with himself that he could sit in the high chair. Ian has also started growling, which we laugh at every time. Audrey was a growler as well. 

Ian has pretty much grown out of all his 6 month clothes, so he's now wearing 9 and 12-month sizes. Craziness! If we have a prefect day where Ian wakes up at a reasonable hour (meaning some time after 7:30 am) and we are actually home most of the day, he's able to get 2 good naps in and be happy. However, most days he still takes 3 naps due to activities and waking up too early. I'm hoping once Rachel starts school and we are on more of a regular schedule he'll be able to fully convert to 2 naps. I feel like our house looks like a daycare right now. Ian's still content with his bouncy chair, play mat, and swing. We've also pulled out an exersaucer and lots of other hands-on baby toys. So, we're just full of baby stuff. But we love how he loves to play and it such a smiley, happy baby. Happy 7 months, Ian! 

Tennessee

We had the opportunity to get together with all of the Michaelson family this summer. It was such a treat to see everyone. We had never met Camdyn (18 months) and Jacob (4 months); and we had to introduce Ian to everyone (except Papa and Grandma). It had been almost 2 years since we had all been together. As my family is spread out from California to Texas to Ohio to Pennsylvania, it gets a bit trickier for everyone's schedules to mesh. We have decided that every couple of years we'll pick somewhere to meet and all make the effort go. For our first go at this tradition we all met in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee from July 29th to August 4th. It was kind of a random place, but it turned out great. Andy and I had never been to Tennessee, so we were excited to explore a new place and spend time with family as well. 

We were a bit nervous about the drive, but it went really well. All three of our little ones were fabulous in the car. We had a few hiccups, but nothing that we couldn't handle. We actually only drove 5 hours the first day and stopped at my parents'. On Saturday we drove to Nashville, which was our LONGEST day. Unfortunately Rachel got car sick, but she was a trooper and we made it there. We then only had about 4 hours to drive to Gatlinburg on Sunday. So before meeting everyone in Gatlinburg we stopped off at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. We walked around, took some pictures, and had some yummy lunch at Chuy's across the street...

 

We were actually the last ones to arrive at the cabins. We rented out 2 cabins to fit all of us. There was an "adult cabin" that housed Papa, Grandma, Jeff, Amy, Steve, and Rachel. And then there was the "kid cabin" where all the fun was had! We had our family, Ken, Jenny, Camdyn, Paul, Cristy, Aaron, Ashlyn, and Jacob. The first night there was quite interesting. Where Andy and I ended up sleeping we could heard various babies getting up at various times of the night... And Audrey even fell down the stairs in the middle of the night. Never a dull moment when you have 7 kids, 7 and under, under one roof! Monday was a catch-up day for all of us. We tried to get little ones naps and just hung out. There was a hot tub and pool table in each cabin. We had tons of TVs and a park right down the street. We were able to keep the little ones plenty busy. Here's Aaron, Rachel, and Ashlyn hanging out on the deck Monday morning:

The girls were excited about their gifts from Papa and Grandma:

Aaron, Uncle Jeff, Aunt Amy, and Audrey:

Ian loving all the chaos:

On Tuesday morning we all got coordinated and had family pictures taken. We took pictures of the whole group, pictures of individual families, pictures of couples, pictures of the original 7, etc... We had 19 people to keep happy and I think we did a pretty good job. Here's our little family picture:

After Ian got a much needed morning nap, we headed out to take a few more pictures of our three little ones:

My boy and I:

Audrey having fun on the swing:

Rachel doing the monkey bars:

Our cabin is up there in the woods (you see the decks). Each cabin was 3 stories, but they were built on very high bases. Not sure how to describe them... Anyhow, it was a beautiful area. And we had 2 wraparound decks on each cabin.

We then went to a hands-on museum called Wonder Works in a nearby town called Pigeon Forge. Our kids as astronauts:

Ian just discovered something quite concerning on the moon:

Making a massive bubble:

Rachel was brave and tried out a new bed:

Here we are back at the cabin that evening. I think Steve was trying to play a game on his phone and obviously others were interested...

On Wednesday Ken, Jeff, Amy, and Andy headed out to go river rafting. They had a blast and I'll have to insert some pictures later that are on Andy's computer. While they were rafting, we did some indoor mini golfing:

I believe we also went to a nearby indoor pool later that afternoon. The kids had fun swimming. For some reason, I don't have any pictures of us swimming...

On Thursday we headed into the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. We had 2 hikes planned for our day. The first hike ended up being more difficult than we thought, but the view was pretty awesome once we made it to the top. The kids were troopers and Papa and Grandma even made it to the top. Here are some pictures along the way:

Ian all smiles because he had the best deal in the stroller!

Our family at the lookout point:

Beautiful!

Rachel checking it all out:

Ian loving it!

Rachel with Papa and Grandma:

Andy and the girls back down at the bottom of the hike:

Unfortunately everyone else pooped out on us for the next hike. So, we went on by ourselves. This time we hiked to Laurel Falls. We had an extra stroller now, which made Audrey happy. The hike wasn't too bad, but it was just getting hot since it was after lunchtime. Here are some pictures of our hike:

The Falls:

Audrey was soaking wet shortly after getting there, but they were both very excited to cool down.

As we headed down we passed a family hiking up who said a bear had just crossed the trail about 200 yards back. Unfortunately we didn't see the bear, even though we looked. I think I would have been a bit nervous if it had crossed right in front of us, but if we had seen it off in the distance, that would have been cool!

As we hiked down (on a very nice paved walkway) Audrey snoozed:

And Ian stayed awake the whole time and happy:

At the end of our hike I had Rachel stand by the trail head. I wanted to record that this little girl hiked 2.6 miles, with the help of her walking stick.

Thursday night Aaron and Rachel enjoyed using their binoculars out on the deck:

Playing around on Friday:

Ian and Jacob (2 1/2 months apart):

Uncle Jeff chilling with Ian:

On Friday various activities were to be had. Andy, Jeff, and Ken went golfing. Grandma, Amy, myself, and the kiddos walked around downtown Gatlinburg. I let the girls pick out one souvenir each and guess what they picked out? They each got a very cheap dollar store quality set with a bow, arrows, a knife, and a gun. Go figure! I think they really wanted the bow and arrows and the other stuff was just bonus. I blame it on the movie Brave... :) 

Saturday morning came all too quickly and we were all off in our various directions to our homes. We are grateful for the memories we were able to make. We had fun playing games, Grandma cooking us breakfast, eating dinner together each night while various individual families took turns cooking, watching the Olympics, and just being together. There are things that will forever make me laugh... Hey, there are things that will forever make me laugh so hard that I will cry... Good times! So now we just have to figure out where the next gathering will be. Hopefully between then and now we can squeeze in seeing each other a bit more often. We shall see... Thanks for the memories!