Emily's Home!!

Finally updating the blog with Emily's Homecoming. This post took a lot of work and I'm thinking it's because of all the pictures I took from my phone and putting it on the computer than uploading them individually, and finally organizing them. Phew!

*WARNING*WARNING* TONZ OF PICTURES!! *WARNING*WARNING*

What can I say, I love my nieces and nephews! Most of them really are of the twins cause I saw them the most and could never say no when they asked me to play with them. :)

So I'll try to be brief in general, than write about some of the pictures.

So first off, my work was fabulous with letting me work certain days and giving me the days I wanted off. I couldn't be more happier with my boss!

So Mel and the girls left Troy to fly into Utah 3 days before Emily came home. I picked them up from the airport and drove them to Idaho. I stayed in Idaho to be there for when Emily came home, Jackson came up the day before her arrival so he could be there as well.

After Emily came home, Jackson and I drove back to Utah until 4 days before her homecoming talk, so that way we could both work and get our hours in for the week. I love working 12 hour shifts just to only get more days off.

So we we went back to Idaho and did lots of stuff! It was a blast! My grandparent's (Hawkins) came up with cousin Brooke Hawkins the Tuesday before Emily's talk, so we were able to hang out with them as well. Troy was also able to get time off to head to Idaho as well that week before.

So Sunday arrived and Emily gave her talk in church! It was great and even put me into tears several moments in her talk. So many people were able to come and support Emily at her homecoming talk. I know she appreciated the love and support.

Thats about it, I'll leave little bits of notes sometimes above the pictures but overall the trip was great! So grateful for all the blessings my family and I received while Emily was out serving the lord but very grateful to have her back home!

At McDonalds after picking up Melanie and the girls at the airport.

At my moms house with my fish lamp.

Out in the snow! Yes, even I went out to help build a snowman, which the snow wouldn't cooperate, I wanted to make a huge snowman and ended up making a tiny snow puppy. And since Emily likes Dalmatians, we figured we'd put spots on it and have it be a Dalmatian in honor of Emily's arrival. This was like the morning before Emily came home.

Making "welcome home" signs with the girls! Even Rylee had to be involved with the fun!

The late night at the airport! She didn't arrive until like 10ish. My mom made that "Welcome home sign!" Doesn't it look fabulous!! :) These are also some pictures of her friends that were able to come.

The next day or sometime after she came home, we went to the museum to see "Sue" the dinosaur. At least I think that's what they called the T-Rex. The museum had a fun children's play center/discovery room that we hung out in for quite a while with the girls, while they dressed up in pioneer clothes.

For another day of fun, we decided to go to "Blast off" a real super cheap place for kids to go in and play in tonz of balls/toys and even dress up.

Just a few pictures now of us hanging out around the house. It is so weird yet fun to see the twins play with my "Polly pockets" that I collected as a kid growing up. I have lots of them! It is one of the girls favorite toys to play with every time they come, so I decided to snap a picture. Lately I have even joined in on the fun and started to play "Polly Pockets" with them as well now. :)

I just love spoiling them rotten, so when I saw some kites at the store, I couldn't resist on getting the girls some since I figured we'd have time to fly em'. So we went out one mild windy day and flew kites. It was a lot of fun! Jackson was even a great sport on helping us get the kites in the air. Jackson and I offered to give the girls our sunglasses to wear because they couldn't see the kites with the sun, they ended up keeping them on the rest of the day, until we went inside that is. :)

It's now recently become a tradition that I paint the girls toenails/nails every time they come down to visit. Not only that, but the last time they came we did it on the trampoline outside. So even though it was freezing outside the girls were persistent on having us paint the nails on the tramp. I can't ever say no to them. So we bundled up and kept our socks and gloves on as long as we could to keep warm. It was so cold! I was freezing, so I'm sure they were too! Just one hand and foot at a time ;)

Now the day of Emily's homecoming talk and luncheon. I just snapped random pictures occasionally at the luncheon. The one picture of Emily sitting down with others is the one with all her previous mission companions/people from her mission. It was again, a great turnout and a fun get together.

Just a couple random pictures of me and the girls the last night before heading back to Utah to catch the plane. And than a picture of Jackson and I with the grandparents right before we all departed and went our ways.

So now it was just Jackson and I with Emily, Melanie, Troy and the girls in Utah. We drove up the day before there flight back to Washington to walk around Temple square. Melanie heard of a free LDS children's museum so it was fun to take the girls to that as well. So the next few pictures are at the museum.

There are a bunch of playgrounds around our home. So I took the girls out there to play the morning of there flight and snapped a couple pictures. It was another windy/cold day.