Basket Sleepers

The girls came up with a fabulous idea last night to not sleep in their beds and sleep in laundry baskets instead. I told them that I didn't really care if they did or not, but it was quite funny to see them actually do it. It really made Jon crack up when he came and saw them. Seriously, he had to walk away so he didn't wake anyone up.It reminded me of when Savannah was a brand new baby. She was born here in Arizona, but we flew back to Ohio for school when she was just 2 weeks old. Unfortunately, we were given a used crib which was missing a few parts. We had ordered the parts before we left Ohio (when the semester had ended) and had them overnighted, but they didn't get there overnight. So we couldn't assemble her crib before we left for the summer. Our flight back to Ohio was 4 hours and the drive to our little town was another 2 hours after that. So we didn't get back to our apartment until late at night and we were too tired to try and assemble a crib. So our first night back in Ohio, poor baby Savannah had to sleep in a laundry basket, because we didn't have any where else to put her. Luckily, the next day, a bassinet that my mom had ordered for us was delivered. At least then we had somewhere to put Savannah. But I wouldn't recommend sleeping in a basket, unless you really have to.

Grandpa Bloomfield

My grandfather passed away back in January, about a week after Jon and I moved. My grandparents lived in New Mexico for all of my life and so I was thrilled when they moved down here a little over 2 years ago for my Grandfather's health. Grandpa was such a hard worker and insisted on helping move their stuff in. It was so wonderful to have them live just around the corner so I could go and visit them when ever I wanted. Melanie quickly became Grandpa's best buddy. Here he is trying to teach her to walk, insistent that she should be able to walk by 9 months. Grandpa was the only one that Melanie would just sit with. Here they are at a birthday party, just after we went swimming. Grandpa always shared whatever he had with Melanie, whether it was his ice cream or his glass of water. When he was in the hospital I told him that he had spoiled her and his response was: Nope, you did that yourself! Grandpa always wore suspenders - or spenders as we called them, and his flag ones were his favorite. And he always wore a Bolo tie to church. I don't think that I ever saw him in a regular tie, even at our wedding. All of the grandsons (even Jon) wore bolo ties at Grandpa's funeral to honor him. Here's the last picture that I got of him, enjoying Thanksgiving Dinner, sitting between his two girls. So it's been a little hard since he passed away; probably harder for me because I know how much the girls loved him and how much they have grown and changed since he's been gone. So, we drove up to New Mexico for the funeral when it was so cold and snowy everywhere. And I just couldn't believe that I forgot my camera. But now it has been 6 months and we took another quick trip back to New Mexico to set his headstone. It was a hot and sunny day and the kids all enjoyed running around and playing. Spencer really loved wandering around the cemetery. Grandpa really loved Spencer too. Even when Grandpa was in the hospital, all Grandpa had to do was look at Spencer and he would start laughing. Grandpa loved making him laugh!Here is a picture of my Mom, Aunt Raette (my mom's younger sister), Grandma, and Aunt Mae (my Grandpa's sister). It took forever (about 2 hours) to get the headstone in place, but it looked great when it was all finished. Grandma and Grandpa were sealed in the Mesa Temple when Grandma was 16 and Grandpa was 18. They rode in the back of a pick-up truck for 6-8 hours to get to the temple. They had just celebrated their 62nd anniversary right before Grandpa took a turn for the worse. Melanie was so glad to get to go and see where Grandpa Bloomfield was buried. I also got to find the headstones for both of my Mom's Grandparents while we were there. Here is Nina Maleta Bond & Alexander Finley Bloomfield. And here is Byron Nephi & Maud Cluff Farnsworth. The only one of my Great-Grandparents that I can remember was my Great-Grandma Farnsworth. She lived right next to the temple and my mom came down to live with her after high school. That is when she met my dad. I was 3 when Great-Grandma Farnsworth died and I can remember only a few things about her, so it makes me wonder what memories the girls will have of Grandpa Bloomfield. After setting the headstone we went over to my Grandparents' old home, the one that I remember them living in when I was little. My uncle and aunt live in it now, so we went there and had a BBQ for lunch. Savannah and Spencer both had a blast swinging in the tire swing out back. Grandpa made that swing a long time ago and we used to swing in it all the time when we visited them. Grandpa would push us so high in it! So that was really great to see Savannah having so much fun with something that I remember enjoying too. We headed out after lunch and we got an okay picture of Shiprock. This is the "rock" that we would always look for when we drove up to Grandma's house, then we knew that we were almost there. Seeing it always brings back memories of very long road trips! Grandpa, we miss you and can't wait to be with you again.

One more quick story: This past Easter I was trying to explain to the girls that we celebrate Easter to remember that Jesus died for us and was then resurrected. And because he was resurrected, we will be too. I told the girls that we would be resurrected when Jesus comes to the Earth again. Savannah then got really excited about Easter because she thought that Grandpa Bloomfield would be resurrected on Easter. It was so sweet of her to think that and a little difficult to try and explain that that was not quite what I meant.

Picture Tag

Thanks for the tag Heather. I'm not sure that any of my pictures could top your stellar perm! But here is what I came up with when searching through the pictures files: The 4th picture in the 4th file!Definite bonus points if any of you can guess where this picture was taken.

This was about 4 1/2 years ago. We were living in Ohio. It was Jon's 3rd (and last) year of law school. This is Savannah, climbing on the little fence that went around our front patio. She has always been a climber and has an excellent sense of balance. She was about 21 months at the time. We were just so happy that there was no snow outside and that you could actually feel the sun when it was shining! So her and I spent a lot of time outside those last 2 months before we moved back home.

Unfortunately, now that I started looking at some of these old pictures, I want to post a few more of them. So, sorry for the long history, but here are a few more picts from when we were in Ohio!

Ada may have been small, but it did have a nice park. Savannah loved going there and so I would take her whenever I could (when I had a car and the weather was nice). She loved the swings and the slide - definitely her favorites!Here are a few other pictures of her out in front of our apartment. We had a large field that she loved to just run in. She was also completely fascinated with the drain that was in the parking lot. It was always funny to me, but she loved to run over to it and look down in it.And I love this picture. It's Savannah bird watching! She would see a bird and try to get as close to it as possible. I was surprised at how close she actually got. And I love how she's all crouched down like she's hunting it!I love this next picture because of a number of reasons. First of all, Savannah is wearing her favorite shirt - her "Sunshine" shirt. She loved to wear that shirt (and it's probably the reason that her favorite color is lime green). And she's playing with her bubble blower. Grandma sent her that for Easter and she loved it (still does). We played with it a lot outside. And I don't know if you can tell, but there was a fairly decent breeze outside that day, yet it was still warm enough to wear shorts and short sleeves! And last of all, this picture was taken at the Moot Court vs. Law Review annual softball game.

All of the law students loved Savannah (because she was so cute and none of them had any kids)! Notice that she's not even standing close to Jon! We were just happy that Moot Court won the softball game! Nice job Daddy!Hopefully I didn't bore you with all of this. And let me know if you liked all of the old pictures, maybe I'll post some more and tell you about all of the adventures that we had during those crazy years!

Memory - Ada Fire

I have a little bit of extra time and so I thought that it would be a perfect time to share a memory. I'm hoping to do this on a regular basis.

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The Ada Fire

I was looking through some old pictures and came across these. During Jon's second year of law school one of the buildings in Ada caught fire. It was a very large fire and at first I thought that it was one of the old church buildings in Ada that was on fire. But it was 3 stories tall. The top 2 stories were apartments. I think the fire started in one of the apartments or attic. There were a few businesses on the bottom floor. We often went to the Movie Rental place that was on the ground floor, even though you could only rent the movie for 1 night. In the picture below, it was where all the windows are busted out and all you can see is bricks and debris. There was also a tattoo parlor right next to that, but they were lucky enough to have moved to a newer location about a month before the fire. If you look closely, you can see a For Rent sign in their window.

I remember that the entire town was filled with smoke that night. Also, because there was such a large demand on the water and water pressure that it did something funky to the tap water. The water was all cloudy for a couple of months. Main Street had to be closed off for a few weeks and then the building just sat there like this for a while. When Jon and I came back for our 3rd year, the building had been demolished and there was only a vacant lot there.