Sadi's Blessing

This weekend (I know, off on another weekend trip) we went to Logan to see Austin's family. Andy & Jaylyn were having their baby girl Sadi blessed in Preston, ID. It was so good to see everyone! Taylor had a good time at our picnic working on some home"work" (more like fun art projects for kids).

Shane was literally rocking out on the horse they had at Andy's parents house!

Here it is - THE BIG ONE - a 5 generations of Smith's picture. I was so happy Cadence got to meet his great-great grandmother - NANAN!

Here are Cade & Sadi with Nanan again. What a sweet lady! We love her!

The boys had a fun time at the picnic playing football. It was Austin and all the younger boys (big surprise?) vs. the older boys with dad. I think the older ended up winning, though the younger really gave them a run for their money (and they weren't the sore ones afterwards)!

Here is John holding Cadence (Austin's cousin-in-law)

Shane knew who Cade was right away. He was fighting for the chance to hold him with all the other kids! We are glad Cadence is so loved by all his aunts and uncles.

Just precious!

Mission Reunion

Before going to see our family in Logan, Austin's mission had a reunion. President & Sister Barreto were able to make it from Brazil, so we had to go! President especially liked Cadence's onsie (future president).

Some mission buddies.

Trip to Idaho

What a fun trip this was! We decided to head up to Idaho after the Hot Pots hike, to spend some time with our family. We got to see lots of them and especially enjoy the time with Cristina, Ian, & Atley.
Ian even cooked us dinner on Sunday night and we had a fun time playing Last Word & Skip Bo.

We even got to see a gorgeous Idaho sunset!
Here are some more family members Cadence met:
His Great-Uncle EdRoy Baron (my father's brother)

His Great-Grandma Baron (my father's mother)And he got to see Uncle Blair, Aunt Philine, & Jake again.
(We found out they are moving to Montana)

Lately, we have been letting Cadence lick our food (he is so interested in us eating). On the ride home, I let him lick some of my fruit snacks he was eying. It went okay until he got a couple of licks of the blue one! I had to take a picture! HOW FUNNY!

Hot Pots Hike

For fun this Memorial Day weekend, a bunch of our friend hiked up to the hot springs in Spanish Fork Canyon. Just Austin went up (Cadence just is not big enough, & I did not want to miss nursing 2 times), and had a great time.
The Thompsons, Dopps, some of Matt Thompson's siblings, and the Rosenbaums went (friends from the ward mostly).
They actually found a campfire still burning. Being the good eagle scout he is, Austin and our friends helped to put it out!

Master Gardener - and good friend

Our neighbor, Justin Lowder, is a master gardener. In fact, his whole yard is a garden, that many passerbys mistake for weeds. They seem sad for us we have live next to him (he has only one small strip of grass the city made him put back in, in front of the sidewalk). If they only knew!
We get DELICIOUS fruit from him, BEAUTIFUL flowers, & WISDOM that beats reading scores of gardening books! It is because of Justin that we have a beautiful garden, and a beautiful view. Austin also home-teaches him and when he came over tonight, he brought this beautiful bouquet!
Every time I look at it I think of what a wonderful friend he is. Austin and I always tell him he's our "Wilson" (from Home Improvement). What would we do without him?

FHE in the Park

We went to the park for dinner and family night. We didn't get there too late, but Cadence was almost ready for bed!
He went on the slide first with me and cried 'cause it scared him (he did later when Austin ran through the sprinkler with him too). But on the slide with daddy (who went much slower) he seemed to be content.

Still no happy smiles! Guess we'll have to go when he's a little more awake!

Planting the Garden

It took awhile for us to decide what we wanted, but we finally planted our garden. See if you can guess what each picture is (don't look to hard at the labels). Check for your answers at the end of the post! Lots of yummy food!




(1)








(2)







(3)








(4)









(5)

Also, we finally planted some bushes in the front yard. I had a serious blonde moment when we were shopping and read all of the feet as inches! So we get home to plant (we did it for FHE and it was pretty late by the time we were planting - dark and Cadence was sleeping), and I realized what had happened. They look tiny and innocent, but in just a little while you'll be thinking "Where did their house go?". The bushes we got, thankfully, all suggest that you prune them to control growth. Despite my blonde moment, I think they will turn out looking really nice in our home. The bush on the corner is a flowering lilac bush.

We got some perennial bulbs that we still need to plant in front of the bushes - some flower in mid summer, some late summer. We are planning to also transplant the tulips from the side (the south side gets way too much sun anyway) and mix them into the front flower bed - creating a colorful display all season long!

Don't worry! There will be more pictures to come once they all start filling in! We love having a garden (I think Austin just loves an excuse to get dirty)!

(Answers: 1. Strawberry 2. Cucumber 3. Cherry Tomatoes 4. Big Beef Tomatoes 5. Pea)
How many did you get right?!

Austin's Detroit Trip & Spontaneous Vacation

Yet another post that my husband could probably do justice to much better than I. One of the flaws of the blog is that it is done mostly from my (Amy's) perspective. I guess everything on it is pretty biased (which is why maybe there are so many pictures of our adorable little distraction).
In short, Austin got word that the house we (along with the Dopp's) own in Detroit was broken into. At first we were very worried because it sounded like it had really been stripped. A nice neighbor helped us by checking out the house and boarding up the broken door until Austin could get there. He ended up going to visit from Tuesday until Friday. Cadence and I really missed him! It turns out the house was not as bad as we had thought. He spent some time with some friends of ours who just moved there, and some of my family (thanks Mosley's, Welch's, & Hornung's for taking care of him). Best of all, he had a great time fixing up the damage with my Uncle Wade!
We had planned the night Austin was coming home to go see his cousin Julia and her husband John in their production of Savior of the World. Not wanting to drive all the way to Provo, then back up to Bountiful, I was equally dreading staying in Salt Lake with a nursing infant. We were on our way to find the regional center and I said to Austin something to the effect of wanting someday to go on a trip like this and just get a hotel to stay the night. I also mentioned something about buying bathing suits...
After about another hour, he was convinced! Our spontaneous little vacation was great! We ended up in a Best Western just a "stone's throw" away from the regional center. We all got cute new bathing suits (I love mine and we found one for Cadence!). It was a blast, especially after having been apart that week. We had a great time at the show (If you haven't seen Savior of the World, make plans too. It is a wonderful testimony of the Savior's birth and resurrection - very moving)! Cadence slept perfectly in the pull out couch bed in the room (a full size bed to himself) and he LOVED swimming in the pool. He is a natural floater.
We had a great time! It was a refreshing little break for us! Maybe we need to be spontaneous a little more often... :)

Discovery!

He finally did it! This week, Cadence has discovered his hands and feet are his own. He has started grabbing toys, pulling off his socks, and even on occasion just staring at his hand. It's been so much fun to watch him. From his bouncer to his new car seat toy (which we snagged for free at our ward swap) he has had those hands going constantly. We pulled out the Baby Einstein Activity Center he got for his baby shower (from the Gardner ladies - thanks!) and he loves it!! When he was first in it, he was so happy he could stand my himself, then he realized there were more toys than the toy in front of him and he could MOVE to get it! It was fun watching him discover.

Bath Time!

Cadence has had a lot of fun at bath time, especially since he figured out how to kick his legs! It's cute now, but you know in just a short time I'm going to have to be careful what I wear to his bath (a bathing suit maybe?) We are gearing up for summer swimming! He is so much fun!