Skousen Reunion Continued

This one turned out to not be in focus, but Ellie is still so adorable! She is the older of Kayla's kids
Sammy's wrestling Daddy to the ground and giving us his best mean wrestler face! :)
One of Sammy's new favorite things to do is to stick one or two fingers in the corner of his mouth and gag himself, as if he needs any more help barfing!!
This is the house we stayed at. It is Robert's dad's cousin's house and he lets friends and family use it for reunions and vacations for almost free. They just ask you to make a donation to the Perpetual Education Fund or a scholarship they have set up. This way it can't be considered a business and they get to avoid all the restrictions and guidelines.

Skousen Reunion Continued

Sammy enjoying some Cheerios in his booster seat.
The Mark Skousen family + in-laws + grandkids
The Skousen kids. Some are bigger than others :)
And here is Grandma and Grandpa with the grandkids.

Skousen Family Reunion 2008

Sorry it has been a while since my last post. Life has been crazy with work and all our trips sqeezed into the last month and a half of summer. This last week we went down to Manti to stay at a vacation home with Robert's family for a reunion before his little brother, Jake, leaves on his mission to Seoul, Korea in September. Sammy really enjoyed the beach in his pack-n-play.
Enjoying the coolness of the lake. Yes, that is Robert doing the monkey jump off the dock! They had a blast with canoes, a football and a floating dock. It's amazing what fun such simple items can bring when you combine them with five men!!
Yes, we actually went real golfing for the first time ever! Isn't this view gorgeous?! But the little splotch of green in the left corner is where the hole was and a canyon was in between, not many made the stretch!
Here's Kayla's sweetheart Emma on the swings outside the house.

Eating Food

Sammy playing peek-a-boo from inside the laundry bucket!
Yeah, he really likes the rice cereal
Sammy in his new booster seat/high chair we bought so we can feed him easier
Sammy loves being able to sit up to the table with Mommy and Daddy now. This booster seat is great because it travels well and it saves a ton of space in the kitchen. We put it on our third chair and it folds down so you can slide chair in. And the best part, it was only about $25 - awesome!!

Party On, Dude!

We had soo much fun on this trip and we got to do many things while we were there. We went on hikes, saw Rushmore, Reptile Gardens, Storybook Island, Cosmos Mystery Forrest and got to go down the Alpine Slide. It was an awesome trip!
Many times during our week-long trip the babies would be so worn out, they'd fall asleep right in our arms!
Oma is grandma in Dutch, so my mom had to get her photo by the shop named after her and so many other wonderful women!!

Random Pictures from Rushmore

So this is what Sammy would look like if he had hair! Believe it or not, but this is my grandpa's toupee'! We were being silly for family pictures and someone grabbed it and popped it on Sammy's head, the poor kid didn't have a clue as to what was going on!
The group in front of the great Mt. Rushmore
A close-up view of the presidents. There is a trail you can hike that goes around underneath the monument and gets you closer than you would think!
This is the model the sculptor made for the monument. Some interesting facts; Roosevelt was included in the original plans, but they put him in the back because he was still considered a modern president and they were unsure what history would think of his presidency. Also, if Roosevelt really were to stand behind these men, you wouldn't be able to see him because he was so short! And as you can see, the monument was never completed according to the model because of money shortages and also due to the sculptor's death.

Family Pictures

Here is my family that came to the reunion.
The girls at the reunion
Four generations!!
Grandpa and the Sammies!!!

Reptile Gardens

Ok, so this is the day we left for South Dakota, but I wanted to show everyone how big Sammy's getting! He has begun to sit up, with help getting there, and he has been rolling over tons. We think it was the influence of his first(?) cousin, Samantha who is a few months older and can already crawl all over the place.
Here are the kids at the family reunion inside a coiled-up snake. On the left is Julianna, middle is Matt, on the end is Jake and behind Jake is Daniel and way in the back is my Uncle Gerrit helping his son Jackson get in for the picture.
We got to watch an alligator show while we were visiting and this guy wrestled the alligator and showed us how to grab it's mouth, etc. One of the interesting things about alligators is that they can sink their eyes down into their skull. He kindly demonstrated this by pushing down on the alligator's eyes, it looked kinda gross. After the show, they let us pet a baby alligator, it was pretty cool!
This is my Aunt Stephanie and her little sweetie, Samantha I was talking about earlier. It got a little confusing because we both call our babies Sammy, so we had to call hers Sammy Jo to distinguish the two, but they both still looked when you called!

Preview of South Dakota

Sammy fell asleep during our hike in my arms, which made him heavier, but soo adorable!! He was so asleep that he didn't let go of his ears, which he grabs when he gets tired. Here Sammy is before he fell asleep, but you can tell that he's losing the fight. We had a great time on the hike while Daddy went biking with Uncle Reeve.
Sammy with Auntie Candace in the motorhome traveling somewhere, we went so many places I don't remember which place we were headed, but he loved getting to spend lots of time with his aunties, grandma/grandpa, cousins and great-grandpa!

Mohawk Time!

Look! Sammy now has enough hair on top to create a small, but present, mohawk!! :) Our cute little guy!