Howell Grandparents Visit Pt. 1

On August 20th my parents visited us from Utah. We were so excited to have them come and play in our neck of the woods. They arrived very late in the evening so I had time to do stupid stuff like make cruise ship animals to welcome them. Here is an "elephant". Looks a little like a long nosed dog, but whatever. They got the idea.

How cute are they?

We didn't waste a minute of our time together. We started out the next day by visiting Potter Park Zoo. Eleanor hasn't been back since her birthday in March. It was a much more fun activity for her now that she is six months older.

The gang looking at the barnyard animals.

This might be one of my all time favorite pictures ever. The lion was in high form too, roaring up a storm for everyone to hear. It made Eleanor flinch each time. Cutie.

My dad and Eleanor with the giant giraffe sculpture.

Up close.

Eleanor loved spending time with my folks. She isn't used to that much attention at home, poor thing. My parents really dote on her. Here she is getting her nails done.

Nail polish doesn't taste so good.

Until you let it dry, then it's good eats.Grandpa and E had a special routine where she would run into their room and jump on the bed (a souped up air mattress). My dad would then "chase" her down and throw her on the pillows over and over. Sadly, once they left, she found we weren't exactly Johnny-on-the-spot with her game. Poor E.

One day when Clayton was in school, we drove up to Holland to visit Lake Michigan at Tunnel Beach. It has the most spectacular overlook, as seen here.

Eleanor has always loved the water. The Howells are a water bunch, so it was fun for my parents to enjoy this with her.

I think she loved playing in the sand with Grandpa almost as much as splashing in the waves.

He even built her a hot tub to enjoy. It was the best of both worlds. She spent the better part of our day in there.

Hi sparkles.

She also really, really liked the gulls that wander around. If only we had brought our french fries.

Walking back through the tunnel.

Capping off a great day by having your personal slave spoon feed you Haagen dazs.

My dad was enjoying his ice cream and Eleanor just went and got her
little chair and set up camp next to him.

Man, she has his number.

Note the backwards pajamas? We have a little undressing problem at night, so everything goes on backwards. Otherwise she wakes us up around 3 am because she is shivering in a corner of her crib after she's thrown all her blankets out. It's the most adorable and pathetic scene. A naked, shivering baby all tucked into the corner with her bum in the air. It broke our hearts, so obviously we needed to take steps to prevent it. Isn't it funny the things that become routines once you have a kid?
Part Two of Howell week will be coming up soon. I thought my computer had broken, it was broken for a few days, but I think I have it fixed. (Your welcome Adam! One phone call you don't have to man.) So I slowed down in my blogging goal, but I will try to keep going.

Cleveland/Kirtland Trip- Days 2 & 3. Oh, and my overzealous opinions. Enjoy!

After leaving Cleveland and getting some french fries into Eleanor, we drove the short 10 miles or so to Kirtland. We stopped first at the temple. The next tour was an hour off, so we walked around the grounds. Here are Clayton and Eleanor. She was still a happy camper at this point.

We walked through the cemetery right across the street. There are a lot of really old headstones there. Including this pretty, albeit slightly macabre one.

Hey, we know that name.

We toured the John Johnson farm the next day.

Eleanor was wearing thin after all the walking around near nap time. By the time the tour was about to start we decided to bail. Someday we will have to go back to see the inside of the temple, but without a wiggly one year old who is discovering her powers of negotiations.

We went back the next day after lunch and took a few more pictures.

Eleanor became excited by a flock of geese. She followed them for a good twenty minutes.

Our best self-timed effort.

We then headed down the street to see the town of Kirtland. The LDS church owns the town property while the Church of Christ owns the temple. I've heard people say it before, but there really is a difference in the feeling of the two. While the temple holds a lot of significance for our early church history, at the end of the day it is just a building. We went through a tour of the town. Well, most of it. Clayton had to take Eleanor out after a bit. It was impressive to walk the floors that Joseph Smith walked. To see the buildings where he taught and received inspiration and revelation from God. It really makes me appreciate the histories so much more.

Eleanor enjoying restored historical sites. It's totally one of her favorite things.

Us.

Them.

Next we drove to the John Johnson farm, where Joseph and Emma lived for over a year. It was another amazing place. I was impressed with how many original "parts" are still in these old buildings. Floor boards and mantels and so forth. The church has done an impressive job in restoring so much. Side note, the Church of Christ (that runs the temple) charge a fee for their tours to help with ongoing restoration. I have no problem with that, it's only about $3, but then my friend who knows all this stuff (Hi Julie!) told me that our church actually paid for the major restoration for them. Kinda funny. I'm glad we take that approach and don't strong-arm them into selling to us. Where the LDS church now has over 130 temples with about 20 more under construction, their church only has one operating temple and the original Kirtland temple. The one room "museum" they have is full of replicas and not much else. I'm not saying that we're God's true church and he favors us, but, oh wait, yes I am.
Suck it other churches!
Kidding! Geesh!

But really, the LDS church is God's true church. Don't just take my word* for it, I know two nice young men who can tell you all about it.

Back at the farm, we toured the inside. Eleanor was adorable, as proven here. Me? This is the picture that made me repluck my eyebrows for thirty minutes this week. Well, not this exact shot, it's actually the one after it that is in NO WAY ever being shown on this blog. Upside? My eyebrows are now looking goo-ood. Sorta.

At the end of the tour you end up outside on the front porch. We both took turns shouting REPENT to a few squirrels and birds. This is the porch where Joseph preached from one morning when he had been tarred the night before. Take that stupid mobs.

After the tour we then made our way back to East Lansing.
It was a good trip.
Up next, my parents visit Michigan and home projects!!!
Get excited folks!

*P.S. I think only I have 2 readers who are not LDS, and I am pretty sure they know when I am kidding and when I am not. And to anyone reading my blog: I hope you know I do take things seriously some times. I'm not knocking other religions. It just seems I never really get to say how awesome being a Mormon is on here without offending someone. Visiting church sites makes me incredibly proud to be a Mormon and part of such an amazing heritage. The Gospel of Jesus Christ really is the best thing in my life. It just makes everything easier and better. Any good I have is from trying to emulate Christ and any bad I have is from my less than stellar obedience to His ways. If you've known a lame Mormon sometime in your life, (I really hope it wasn't me) all I can say is that it is a perfect church filled with normal everyday people who make mistakes.

I highly recommend it.

Cleveland/Kirtland Trip- Days 1 & 2

Towards the end of the August we finally took a long weekend to go see Kirtland and Cleveland. Kirtland is a historic site for our church. It is roughly a 5 hour drive. Eleanor started off awesome. Lots of treats and toys, I think I packed two solid bags worth to help her along the way. We were really counting on her taking a nap.

Which she did. 10 minutes from the hotel.
But come on. Can you even stand those cheeks? Those lips?
Those eyelashes?
Her sweet hold of her lamb? She's killing me. This, sadly, would be our most successful
family portrait in about a year.
Go us.

We stayed at a sweet Radisson right across the street from Progressive Park, where the Cleveland, um... Browns? Orioles? Hold on (googling) INDIANS. I remember now, where the Cleveland Indians play. We had tickets to a game that night. At least I remember that they were playing the Mariners, like a good Washington girl would know.
Eleanor LOVED the hotel room. She thought it was all kinds of fun.

Elmo has insomnia.

This little dude in the lobby was soooo interesting.

Eleanor had a lot to tell him.

E learned a new trick.

But soon became discouraged when the door latch above kept
her from getting out.

And by "discouraged", I mean threw a tantrum. Oh, she throws those now. Throws them like a pro. Arched back, crocodile tears and everything.

We enjoyed a nice afternoon at our hotel, then walked to the game.

Eehhh, why do I look like a jack-o-lantern here? We'll blame bad makeup day.

Eleanor loved the game. Or should I say, had no interest whatsoever in staying in her seat. We took turns keeping her amused. Here she is on Clayton's shoulders at the top of the world.

After the 7th inning stretch I walked her back to the hotel. We had to cross this giant pavilion to get to there and she stopped to talk about these balloons for quite a while. I finally asked a nearby cop if we could steal one. He said he was just seconds away from getting her one himself, so together we stole that red star balloon. She was in heaven. I love cops.

The next day our plan was to hit the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Museum. We woke up and decided "eh." It wasn't worth the $50 it would've cost. We would rather go to a real concert with that money instead. So we drove by on our way out of Cleveland and took a picture. Who knew there was NASA right next store?
Aside from the Boardmans.
(Their boy is obsessed with all things space. Hi Bauer!)We crossed a cool bridge.Very LOTR's, yeah?Saw Cleveland from the other side of the river. This is near the restaurant "Lolita's". It's Iron Chef Michael Symon's second restaurant in Cleveland. We had plans to eat there but it doesn't open until 5 on Saturday. Oh well. We decided to head off earlier to Kirtland instead.Stay tuned for the exciting follow up to our awesome three day tour!

Sometime in July?

Just trying to catch up. There is a ton, and I mean a ton of pictures and videos. In order to not leave stuff out that I love, I am going to try a bunch of mini posts, and maybe a goal of posting one a day or something, don't hold me to that. Soooo....




P.S. I try to fight the love of obnoxious character stuff like Elmo or Bratz dolls (shudder) but what are you going to do? Out of nowhere she has this sudden interest and abiding love for Elmo. It's adorable and we can't help but indulge her. No Elmo shirts please, we have limits. Pretentious limits, but limits none the less.