A tiny miracle named Charlotte!

 One of the Tender Mercies of the Lord 

was shown to our family when Richard's sister and brother-in-law traveled to a city 2 hours away from us (which is MUCH closer than 20 hours away) to adopt their sweet daughter Charlotte.

It was wonderful to be able to visit with them and to spend time with our niece Julianne and our new niece Charlotte.

 Emma holding sweet Charlotte with Uncle Ethan and Aunt Melissa.

It was wonderful to be able to visit with them and to spend time with our niece Julianne and our new niece Charlotte.

 Beautiful family!!

 Welcome to our family Charlotte.

You are truly loved!

Oklahoma City Temple Trip!!!

Driving down the Original Route 66 

Moving to a new state has some fun perks!
Fun Family Visits~
Richard's sister came into town and surprised the girls with a visit.  They could not believe that Aunt Michelle was here to play with them
New Temple to Visit~
We visited our new temple, the Oklahoma City Temple and it was beautiful!

We love Aunt Michelle!

Eternal Families ROCK!!!

And Ms Rachel, our future photographer!!!

Spring Break Road Trip Adventures!!!

We are so grateful for Richard's job at our apartment complex, but it does limit our travels because he is on call every night and weekend.

So, we decided to take a few days (READ: 2 days) off and do a fun family road trip around Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, and up into Minnesota. It was just great to get away and be together and just play and laugh together!

2-Headed Duckie in Dubuque on the banks of the Mississippi River

In Dubuque we stayed in a hotel that was attached to an indoor waterpark. One of the slides even went outside the hotel!

The girls liked the gears and pipes outside the hotel.

Funny frog statue outside the waterpark

We had to get a picture of part of the waterpark. That bucket at the top holds 350 gallons of water that dumped down on us every 8 mins! It was so fun!

Richard playing a basketball game

My little skeeball girls!

*I have never been to Wisconsin, so we crossed the Mississippi River into Illinois and up into Wisconsin, and drove around for a few minutes. Now I can say I have been to Wisconsin! Sweet!!!

*Then we headed up to Dyersville, IA to "The Field of Dreams". The house looks just like it did in the movie. Exactly!!!! Right now there isn't any corn in the outfield, but we want to head back later this summer when the field will be tall and green! More pictures, I promise!!!

The 3 girls on the bleachers watching the game

Rachel running the bases

Great hit Sarah!!

*Enjoying the drive up through Eastern Iowa was wonderful and beautiful! It was so fun to hear Richard and his mission stories! It was green and hilly and rustic and beautiful!

*Then we headed up to Rochester, Minn. to visit Richard's Uncle Paul and Aunt Janice. We drove through the city and saw the Mayo Clinic, stayed the night and visited, ate some great food, and played! I had to take a bunch of pictures of the family running around their amazing and fun backyard!

Little lumberjack Emma

Sarah on the rope swing!

Rachel says "thanks Uncle Paul"

Richard and Uncle Paul helping Sarah get ready for a big swing!

And one last swing by Richard! What a fun time!

*One of the best things that we were able to do on our trip was to actually find a woman, Deb, that Richard met and taught on his mission and had been looking for her for almost 10 years! We stopped by her old house and found out from a neighbor her new married name and that she had moved to a town just south of there. So we looked her up and stopped by.

She opened the door and when she realized who Richard was, she started to cry! She was so happy to see him!!!!!!!!! You could just feel the love she had for this missionary that she met more than 10 years ago. It was a wonderful visit!!!!!! So glad we found you, DEB!!!!!!!!!!

Deb and Richard, great friends!

*On the way home we stopped by and visited some Amish people and bought Richard's mom some of her favorite potato peelers!

So, a crazy and fun trip that took only 2 days and we forgot to pack a few things (pjs for me and Rachel, my pillow, and jackets for us), but it was such a fun family time!!!!

HOPE YOU ENJOYED OUR CRAZY FAMILY ROADTRIP!!!!!!

Changes!!!!

Life at our house the last 2 weeks has been FULL of changes!!! Actually the whole last month has been so different!!!
The big thing that happened 2 weeks ago was that Richard's sister, Michelle, flew to visit us at the end of her mission. She was serving in the Cleveland Ohio mission and she spent some of her mission at Kirtland and some other Church History sights.

Sister and mom and dad

Welcome!!! Emma and Richard welcome Michelle
The girls welcome Michelle to our new home!

Come play with us at the John Deere Headquarters!

Sarah, Emma and Rachel with Michelle

While the family was here, we took a trip down to Nauvoo and did a session at the temple. It was so wonderful to be together as a family! We also did a quick drive down to Carthage a spent a few minutes in Carthage Jail. We are so blessed to live near these Church History Sites.

Having Grandpa and Grandma and Michelle was so fun! It was great to see them again and show them around our new city! We miss them all so much and it was a blast to see them! We know that Michelle is going on to new changes and adventures in her life and we are happy for her! She is an awesome woman who has an awesome future!

The MAJOR thing that went on with our family this last week is that Richard started graduate school. We have been waiting for this for a long time and it almost doesn't seem real. Richard says that it will feel more real after his first test and labs. He is taking classes like Embryology, Neuroanatomy, Spinal Anatomy, Gross Anatomy, Biochemistry, Fundamentals of Neurophysiology, and Philosophy. Lots of crazy classes!!!

We love Richard so much and I know that he will do great in school. This is going to be a great (read:hard and long) 3 years! Thanks for all your love and support getting us here! Keep us (especially Richard) in your prayers.

Oh, and here is one of the random things that Richard had to buy at the bookstore for his first trimester at school:

"Bag of Bones" for Richard to study the Spinal Column

(we had to reassure the girls that they were just plastic!)