Six Glorious Months

Evelyn Murdock Miller is six months old now. And oh what months they have been. I have never worked so hard in my life, and I have never been so richly rewarded. Evie is such a joy to our family. I love her smile. I love watching her learn and grow. I even love it when she cries because I'm able to make it stop. Not that she cries that often. She never cries unless there's something wrong.

To commemorate the occasion we had some family photos taken, just at kiddie kandids. I think they turned out ok. I never like pictures of me but Evelyn looked stunning, of course. She's such a beautiful child, inside and out. I am so blessed to be her mother. She truly is a gift from God.

She loves us so much and she's so expressive. She loves to play and she especially loves playing with her daddy. He brings her so much joy. And she laughs at the funniest things. The other day he was trying to swat a fly and she just started cracking up, so I hurried to grab my camera and he just kept swatting. The closer he got to her, the more she laughed. I guess she likes violence. Go figure.

No Funerals and A Wedding

Yesterday Spencer and I went to his Cousin's Wedding up near Morgan, Utah. It stopped raining and the sun came out so that they could have a lovely outdoor ceremony and reception. The reason I say "no funerals" is because the groom's father was given two days to live-ten days ago. Everyone was just praising God that he could hold on long enough to see his son get married. Of course he had the will to live and that's probably why he stuck around, but it was just such a miracle. He just bounced back and really had the energy; he was even able to get out of his wheelchair and walk down some stairs to where the ceremony was being held. It was really amazing.

The reception immediately followed the ceremony. There was good music, good wine, hawaiian food, and lots of fun people. Probably the funniest thing that happened was when they cut the cake. After the groom had a bite he said, "I don't like this at all. What IS this?" and the bride said, "Then you should have been there when we picked it out!" It was absolutely hilarious! It was a beautiful drive up and back and the weather wasn't too bad so even though the roads were wet they weren't dangerous, thank God.

All in all we had a lovely time and we wish Cathy and Craig the best in their new adventure together.

Baby Food

Even though organic baby food is easy to come by, I decided to make my own, and since a little bit goes a long way, it's very easy to make a big batch of baby food to freeze for later. It only takes an hour to make several dozen meals. I bought a couple dozen jars of baby food and then saved the jars to store my food in, along with using ice cube trays and small tupperware. I suppose it's not entirely necessary to go organic, but when the meals are this small the cost difference is negligible and I want my child to have the best. Plus I love shopping at whole foods. :) Today I made carrots, green beans, peas, sweet potatoes, pumpkin, carrots, pears, avocado, squash, bananas and beets. I LOVE making baby food. And luckily for me, Evie loves eating it.

July Fourth and Other Stuff

As the fourth of July grew closer, I insisted to Spencer that we have our own celebration at our house (and not go to his parents'). He didn't have any problem with that, so I got to plan a whole day with just my family! A bit of a wrench was thrown in things Saturday night cause Bowser disappeared, but long story short, praise God we got him back on Tuesday. We were feeling much more up to celebrating since he came home! The morning of the fourth was nice and quiet and a pretty normal morning. Around 1 in the afternoon we had a BBQ with steaks and hot dogs. I had marinaded the steaks overnight and they grilled up beautifully.

I went all out for today. We had potato salad, grilled corn, grilled pineapple, baked beans, and veggies with ranch to go with the steaks and hot dogs. After we ate we played a game of Dominion, which was a lot of fun. Then we had dessert: pound cake with strawberries, blueberries and whipped cream (red, white and blue!).

Evie was quite festive today. She wore one of my favorite outfits for her. It happens to be red, white and blue but it has a crab on the butt. I absolutely love it.

Of course being a baby she decided to spit up on that outfit so we had to change her into another one, which was a little more appropriate I guess cause it had a flag on it. She looked so precious.

After Evie had her dinner and went to bed, Spence and I went out on the deck to enjoy the evening and make smores. They're so rich we can't eat more than a couple at a time, but that's ok cause they're delicious.

When it got dark Spence and I cuddled up to watch the Sugarhouse fireworks, which we can see pretty clearly from our back deck. It was a nice, long, slow day and I loved it.