Day in Alamogordo

On Saturday, we took a little day trip to Alamogordo, NM. Alamogordo is not the largest town, but it actually has some fun things to do. The NASA space museum is located there (since nearby White Sands is one of the alternate shuttle landing zones). We didn't do the museum this time, but we did go to the adjoining IMAX theatre for a cool T-Rex show. Then we went to the zoo, and also took a ride on a little choo choo train at the Toy Train Depot. Warning: picture overload ahead. (Who am I kidding, all of my posts seem to have picture overload!)

First and foremost, I had to take a picture of this because have never ever seen such expensive gas!! It was in a tiny little town out in the middle of nowhere, called Orogrande.

I googled Orogrande for you inquisitive readers out there:

Jarilla Junction, once a station on the El Paso and Northeastern Railroad, was renamed Orogrande when a gold nugget the size of a man's finger was discovered in 1905. Prospecting had started as early as 1879 in the Jarilla Mountains but the 1905 discovery started a gold rush and gave birth to the town of Orogrande. For several years thereafter, the town was the hub of intense mining activity and the population grew to several thousand people. A fifty-five mile long water pipe was laid from the Sacramento River to the townsite. Almost overnight, a hundred homes were built to house only a fraction of the influx of people. Some were forced to live in hastily erected shacks and tents. As happened so many times before, there was less gold than had been anticipated and mining activity began to wane. Today Orogrande is reduced to a post office, a few businesses and about fifteen families.

End of history lesson. The morale of the story is: Don't buy gas in Orogrande.

Question: Can Liam jump as far as a bull frog?

Answer: No, he cannot. As we learned at the zoo, a bullfrog can jump more than 6 feet. Liam can jump 2. But he had fun trying!

They don't even have a Mountain Lion at the El Paso Zoo...this place isn't half bad!

And since we didn't have a busy enough day yesterday, we decided to paint our living room today. Liam was really excited because we let him help. It's not done yet. I'm sure I'll be posting some before and after pictures soon.

Gunnar's 6th birthday

Liam's friend, Gunnar, had his 6th birthday party today. I would have said it was an "army" party, but I'm pretty sure when your dad is a retired U.S. Marine, you don't have "army" anythings! Let me just say there was camouflage everywhere - and on just about every face. Here is Liam getting dressed for battle by a real Marine! :)



Watch out, Uncle Tom, I'm comin' to get you.


Here is Liam's friend, Michaela getting into the spirit of things, too!


And this little sweetie is Emma's friend, Keira. They are about a month apart in age and are just starting to realize - "hey that other baby over there is trying to play with me!"


An intimidating bunch of party-goers. :) (Can you tell which one is Gunnar? Hint, hint, he's in uniform!)


And finally, my favorite picture of the day. Bill painting Hanne's face. (Gunnar's mom and dad)What a sport!

Party Girl

We're going to a birthday party today. Which is the perfect excuse to crack out another cute outfit from Emma's closet!






Last night was the first night that we found Emma flipped over in her crib. She didn't want to go to sleep and she was getting really mad. When we went in to check on her, she was on her tummy and looked like she was doing a push-up. I better start baby proofing my house! I think she's getting ready to take off.

What is beige?

Our house needs a lot of fresh painting. So I went and got just about every single paint chip at Lowe's. I thought I would do the dining room/living room area in a warm beige color. So after taping a small sampling of "beige's" to the wall, I have no idea how to tell the difference. How can there be so many different shades of the same color and how am I suppoed to pick one?



These are the colors I am considering for the kitchen. Our counter top is a kind of pumpkiny/ clay color:


And this would be the family room. It needs some brightness, so I though a shade of yellow.


Comments or suggestions welcome. :)

Domino Rally

Liam was so proud to get his Domino Rally all set up yesterday. It did take a few tries and some premature tumbles, but he did it. I think his goal now is to make it even bigger and longer. I know you'll all be waiting with baited breath for the updated pictures. ;)



And Miss Emma got to use her new bath toys from the Easter Bunny last night. As you can see, anything that she can put in her mouth these days is alright by her!

Go Spartans!

Hello, this is Emma. I am supposed to be taking my nap right now, but I wanted to post some pictures for my Uncle Frank and Aunt Heidi. Shhhh...don't tell my mom!



Thanks for the nice shirt you gave me for Christmas and -
GO SPARTANS!

Playgroup Egg Hunt

We hosted our playgroup's Easter Egg Hunt at our house this morning. Click below to see the action!

Happy Easter!

We've had a quiet, but nice Easter Weekend. Yesterday, we went to see the movie "Horton Hears a Who." I didn't have extremely high hopes about it, but I was pleasantly surprised. First of all, the Mayor of Whoville was played by Steve Carell, so that started things off on the right foot. We LOVE Steve Carell! (18 days and counting until "The Office" is back!) The movie really was very cute. Emma did well and managed to sleep though most of it (despite a very enthusiastic little boy sitting directly behind her who brought a whole new meaning to the phrase "laughing out loud.") Liam loved it for the sheer fact that Horton is an elephant. He loves elephants almost as much as he loves dinosaurs. I thought the best part about it was the message that Horton kept repeating throguhout the movie..."A person's a person, no matter how small." How true, Horton!

This is Emma on her way to the movie. Notice her 1st Army shirt AND her first mini-skirt. ;)

The Easter Bunny did manage to find our new house. Grandma & Grandpa McShea and Grandma Purdy had also sent some treats:

The Easter Bunny also hid some eggs in our backyard for Liam. Although Emma did help find a couple of them. It was an unusually cold morning and we had the worst wind we've had in probably a year. (Springtime in El Paso is notoriously very windy.) But we all bundled up and it was fun, anyway.

Liam is bugging me to get back on the computer so he can play his new game, "Diego's Safari Rescue." Wishing everyone a very blessed Easter!

Easter Eggs

Liam has been begging to dye Easter Eggs all week. And luckily Emma cooperated and took a pretty decent nap this afternoon. This is the first year that he could do the whole egg-dying thing on his own with me just helping to get him all set up.












His favorite color egg: blue

His least favorite: orange

Brendan and I plan to watch The Passion of the Christ tonight since it's Good Friday. Two more days until we can cut into the decadent chocolate cake from Brendan's parents that is sitting on our counter and is torturing us...it's calling out to us, "eat me, eat me!" Ahhh! Make it stop!

In unrelated news, Liam had a new expression slip out today. "Sweet Mamas!" I nearly crashed the car! He says he doesn't know where he heard it or what it means, but I'm pretty sure he was trying to convey how awesome something was. And he's not even in school yet. Oy. :)

Our little princess

So I must add a few pictures of our little princess, too. All those pictures I posted yesterday and not one of Emma! She is 7 1/2 months old and loves to be outside. This afternoon, she and Liam hung out on our hammock and took a ride on the swingset. It is getting to be beautiful weather in El Paso. We have a couple more months before the heat really sets in, so we are trying to enjoy it while we can.

The cutest little feet...ever. :)

Of course, Tinky still thinks she's the real princess of the house.

And last but not least, I just love this picture! Liam and Emma were watching tv together (maybe it's not such a good thing that my 7 month old baby was watching tv?! But I digress...) and Emma was holding on so tight to big brother's arm. It is such a sweet thing to watch your children love each other.