Emery's 1st camping trip!

We took the little rugrat camping and climbing in Mount Charleston (beautiful alpine scenery unexpectedly just 45 minutes from the greater Las Vegas area and 20 degree cooler too. ahhh.). It was great to escape the heat and enjoy the wonderful mountains with our little girl. She was a good camper too - though it took her a while to fall asleep. She wasn't fussy - I think she just thought it was weird to sleep in a tent outside. :) She'll get the hang of it!

Thank you, thank you to my sweet hubby who rearranged his day off at work to spend a Tuesday with his girls! Thank you for being so good to us! We love you!

My two favorite camping buddies!

For those of you who doubted that Emery would love rock climbing like her parents, examine this picture carefully. Is that a smile I see? We think it's growing on her.

The Annual WWW Family Reunion - Kansas City Style

My wonderful Wimmer Grandparents fund an annual reunion every year for their 6 kids (my dad being the oldest) and their families. It rotates between the home cities of their kids every year. The rotation this year hit the Alan and Heather Wimmers who recently moved to Prairie Village, Kansas where they live and my uncle rides his bike across the state line into Kansas City, Missouri every day to practice one of the many things he does best - electrocardiology. We went 2 days early to tour the LDS church sites at Adam-ondi-Ahman, Liberty Jail, Indepedence and Far West with some of the family until the rest of the bunch showed up for the big party... which included lots of good food, good company, catching up with family and a family talent show - which may have to be a yearly event because, man, was it fun!!! :) Thanks to Uncle Al, Aunt Heather, Mariah, Eliza, Willa and Wyatt for being wonderful hosts. Especially to Willa for letting us steal her room for a few nights. We love you guys and can't wait until next year!

Side note about Kansas City, KS vs. Kansas City, MO - they are very different, we came to find out. There is a road called "State Line Road" - a 2 lane road that literally divides the two - and KS maintains their side of the street while MO maintains their side. The KS side is very clean, green grass, they plow their snow in the winter, etc. The MO side, however, the grass is dead, the street is dirty and they apparently don't plow their snow in the winter. Interesting.

At Adam-ondi-Ahman... hopefully not the last time we'll be there! :)

Aaron and "Emery Teresa" during the talent show. Man, that girl loves her daddy!

Mariah, Eliza and I doing a dance to "Thriller" during the talent show. I wish I would have been more fun when I was their age so I guess you could say that now I'm making up for lost fun!

Uncle Bry (a.k.a. my little brother) with Emery and Miles squished into our rental van

A Tribute to My Sweet Grandma

My sweet grandma, Ila Mae Britt, died a few weeks ago at the ripe old age of 86. You may recognize a few parts of her name because she is both Emery Mae's namesake and my own - something I am very proud of and wanted to pass on to my daughter. She was very special to me and we were very close and to celebrate her life and her passing on to the next I want to share a few special memories - mostly recent ones - of my Gramma.

• Though Gramma and I didn't share a common religion, we shared a common faith. Much of my testimony or faith, the power of prayer and the goodness of God came from watching her and her relationship with God. She was and angel of prayer to me and to many others, as it was easy to see how her relationship with God blessed those around her. Her prayers for her family and others were answered. One of my most cherished memories of my Gramma will always be a conversation we had a few months ago on the phone about the world's declining morals and the things families need to do to stay strong in this scary world. She will be much of my inspiration in that quest to protect my family.
  
• Gramma and Emery had a very special relationship. Because we were close, she always wanted to be alive to see my babies. When Emery was 2 months old we took a trip to Vegas just to make sure Gramma got to meet her (since her health had been declining for quite some time) and we got to spend much more special time with her in her last month as we were living near her assisted living home. One thing I will never forget is the way Emery studied Gramma. For those of you who have been around Emery at all, she doesn't study anyone. She's too "busy" to make eye contact for more than a second, except for with Gramma. She studied Gramma and looked at her like she was telling her something and would always just lay calm and still by her side whenever we visited her. Gramma was in the hospital for a few days up until she went home the day she passed. Even though she was no longer responsive, my mom had been telling her that Emery was coming to visit her once she left the hospital and got back to her room. When we visited her that day, Emery put her hands on Gramma's face, held her hand and laid next to her. Just 20 minutes after we left, Gramma died. I think she was waiting to say goodbye to Emery.


• Gramma was spunky. I happened to be there on her last coherent night, just a few days before she died. My mom, aunt, sister-in-law and I surrounded her bed and were giggling and telling her that she was spunky and though her eyes were closed, she started chuckling. A few minutes later she opened her eyes for the last time, smiled at the 4 of us, glowed for a short minute at having some of her girls surrounding her and then closed her eyes again. On the spunky note, another fun memory is a game of Scrabble I played with Gramma and my Aunt Sheri a few weeks before she died. Even in her dwindling physical and mental health, she came alive when she played Scrabble. She was unbeatable. This game was a relaxed one though and Gramma made up rules, played funny words, had us hysterically laughing and STILL beat us.

I miss my Gramma so much that it still hurts, but in this 1st experience of losing a family member, I'm thankful for our Heavenly Father's plan of salvation and that I know I will be with her again. Because of her I'm also sure there will be Scrabbe and chocolate in heaven. :) I'm also thankful for the cherished memories we made together and that I will be able to pass her memory, her testimony and her spunk to my children to keep her alive always.

Emery and Gramma sharing a special moment

The 4 generation photo we took about a week before she died

Emery Mae's 5 month birthday!!

In an attempt to redeem ourselves as parents, we remembered to take the traditional monthly picture of Em for her 5 month birthday a few days ago. (We forgot at 4 months.... whoops!) All we have to say is man, she is one cute girl. Being her parents is our favorite job, hobby, past time and what we look forward to most, all at once. We love you, little whale! Happy 5 month birthday!

girls trip to the beach

We started a new tradition with my best girl friends this year - girl's weekend! This year we spent it at the beautiful Imperial Beach (compliments of my bro and sis-in-law and their beautiful condo - thanks guys!). Bekah and Russ, Lacee and her mom Laurie, and me, my mom and Emery were all in attendance, though we missed our Maggi... the glue that holds the rest of us together. We love our "Mama Maggi"! The trip featured yummy food, a beautiful view, talking, movies, no makeup or flat irons, boogie boarding and the best part - just being together! That's one thing that makes growing up stink - we don't all live around the corner anymore. I'm really so blessed to have such amazing girl friends. All 4 of us - Maggi, Bekah, Lacee and I - feel so lucky to have childhood friends that we're still so close with. I don't know what I'd do without my girls!

Russ-Russ and Em - love at first drool

Sand-eater (mom's fault)

Me and Lace-face

Em loves the brown zebra swim suit. Thanks grandpa!

The three boogie boarding babes catching a sweet wave (thanks moms for watching the babies so we could!)

Bek and I boogie boarding at dusk - SOOO fun!

my first day at the crag

Yesterday was my first day rock climbing outside at the crag! For those of you babies who aren't rock climbers like me, "the crag" is the place where you go climbing. I went to Red Rock with mom and dad now that we're moved to Las Vegas for the summer and we had all sorts of adventures... including a peculiar bug bite in my diaper area that mom and dad aren't sure where it came from. I did all sorts of fun things like sleep, eat, get naked because it was really hot (something I've done a lot since I've been here - I don't like the heat much), meet an old German climbing bum who lives in his van and get a flower from my daddy. It was a great day. I'm not sure what mom and dad did, but maybe the pictures below will explain. :)

Hanging out in my dad-made shade

Food and mommy make me happy

Do you like my adventure hat?

Sleeping with daddy

Naked... ahhh... :)

Mommy climbing

Daddy climbing

Thanks for the flowers, daddy!

One happy climbing family... and one exhausted climbing baby. Climbing is hard work.

Life is good!

P.S. For those of you keeping tabs on my fat stats, at my 4 month appointment last week I was 13 lbs 14 oz, 24.5 inches and my big head was 42 centimeters. :)

3 months of Emery and more

Emery hit her 3 month mark last week and for some reason I don't seem to care how long she is or how big her head is, but I did weigh her and she weighed in at 12 lbs 11 oz. Cute little fatling! Inspired by her friend Felicity she took a diaper-only pic in celebration of being alive for 3 months (in the exact same booties - don't you guys love those Kelli and Kurt?). There is one with clothes too for those of you offended by baby nudity.

We took another quick trip to Vegas for my friend Bekah's baby shower and for Aaron to interview with Nevada Power for a summer internship (which he got! yeah!). It was a fun trip and of course we got cute pics.

Bek and I, our babies and the glowing Grandmas

Emery and Baby Russ putting the moves on each other

Sweet moments with Great-mama

Okay... random cute pics as usual. I know... there are lots of them. I can't help it if she's cute a lot!

Emery and buddy Jacob... they kind of look like they're afraid of each other here though

Helping dad study (aka eating his highlighter)

Emery and her spiritual mentor, Bishop Dicou

Stylin' girl

All smiles