Happy Birthday Bethany!

There is nothing like a fun birthday surprise. Russ and I recently made a surprise visit to Wisconsin to help Bethany celebrate her birthday. She had no clue we were coming to see her. If you want a good laugh take a look at the video.

Melanie Teresa Richardson

On Tuesday August 23rd our family welcomed Melanie Teresa into our clan! What an adorable little bundle of joy Judd and Caitlin have presented us. She weighed in at 7 lbs. 10 oz.

Below you will see Melanie as she poses with her grandpa, mom & dad, and uncle Taylor. We all stand in line to hold her. Soon enough she will be joined by 2 cousins (Heather & Doug's daughter due in early Feb. and Jordan and Nichol's baby in early March).

There are not too many things in this life that are sweeter than a brand new baby!

Travis' Research

For the past several months Travis has had the opportunity to work on a research team for ASU. He has gone to Ft. Leavenworth twice to do the research and they are hoping to go to West Point. Here is an article that was published in the Ft. Leavenworth Lamp that explains what the research project is about.

Ouch! Now There's a Pain That Lingers!

Stay doggie, stay away from me!

That is probably what Brigham was thinking yesterday when the neighbors dog decided to take a bit out of his back. He was riding his bike past their house and the dog ran after him, jumped up and sunk his teeth into Brigham's back. Can you see the bruising around the wound? He probably could have used a couple of stitches to close it up but he opted out of that. Sure hope our next post isn't a picture of Brigham getting rabies shots. Don't worry the dog had it's shots (or so they tell me).

Look at our Nook

Okay, so while I was away playing in Wisconsin, Russ was at home building a little nook for our computer. For those of you that are familiar with our casa, it is located where the family bulletin board used to be.

I just love the little light he installed that shines down on the work area.

This is the view from the hallway by the bedrooms.
And here is our master builder. Nichol you are right, Richardson men can build anything!

Max the Cool Cat

Today Max got a cool treat! With the help of a special brush created for pets, he lost 10 pounds...of fur. Well, it looked like 10 pounds of fluffy fur.

Taylor was the guy that made it happen.

Ahhhh, that feels delicious!

...and here is the nasty results. The best part is that nasty fur

won't be on me or in my house.

Thanks Taylor!

Zippty "Zoo"dah

Here is a little peek at our trip to the zoo in Madison.

Below is a picture of my favorite sight at the zoo. It is a black swan. So many lessons could be learned from this swan. Maybe someday I will share one or two of those lessons. Such a cute pic of Drake and Ivy. The "rooster" and the "chick". What a great fit.
How about this one: Drake and Brigham.
Brigham's head seems a little big for the hole!

Who doesn't love the penguin exhibit?

These flamingos or mingos as Ivy called them were very beautiful.

So that was our day at the zoo. We took our animals (whoops I mean kids) and went back home.

Just Another Fun Day!

Three strikes, you win!

Another fun day in Janesville! Bowling for $1 a game is what I consider fun. Total we bowled 18 games. Now that was a blast. Drake put us all to shame with his great scores.

Who could resist this sweet little face?

Drake enjoying his lunch

Silly boys!
Lunch was greasy but we enjoyed it anyway.
Tomorrow will bring more fun and you can view us enjoying our trip and the cool(er) weather. Just stay tuned here.

Rock Aqua Jays

If you look up in the top left corner of this pic you will see 3 skiers who just flew off the ramp and did a flip. It was awesome. These and the other 50 skiers were members of the Rock Aqua Jays that perform in a river in Janesville. What a great way to spend the evening. We had a great time watching their performance. If you ever visit Janesville in the summer I recommend this event!
P.S. Now for the good part. One of the boats that pulled skiers had 3 engines each with 300 HP. That is a total of 900 Hp and it was FAST and LOUD. Just my style.

DINOsaurs

Tuesday we visited a dinosaur museum that has the largest collection of meat eating dinosaurs.

I wouldn't want to be attacked by this guy

or this guy

Trying to get everyone to pose for a picture can be a beast of a task!

Brig and I enjoying a moment.

Jelly Belly Fun

Welcome to the Jelly Belly Factory in Kanosha Wisconsin

Here is the little train we road in around the factory which was really a warehouse full of jelly beans.
Here is a picture of Elvis created from Jelly Beans.What would a trip to the facory be without visiting the candystore. We ate so many JB's we all felt gross!

When Grandma Comes to Visit

If you check the map just above Rockford you will see Janesville WI.

That is our destination! Brigham and I will be visiting Bethany and her clan for the next week. We are so excited!!

I promise to post pictures of our adventures.

So, stay tuned to this blog to follow our fun.

Welcome Home Annie

It seems like Annie has been gone more than she has been home this summer (lucky!). She returned last night from Snowflake (again)

where she was helping with her nieces while their parents were away.

It sure is quiet when she is not home. And who is going to keep Brigham

in his place while she is away? Good thing she is back!

We love you Annie.

Music to My Ears

I love beautiful music and today I heard some I couldn't resist.

We found this beauty at a garage sale! The price was right . . . $75! That was the steal of the day, maybe even the year. And to think I wasn't in the mood to go garage selling!

Is There a Doctor in the House?

Ben graduated June 3, 2011 from A.T. Still University with his MD. We are so proud of Ben and Briana for enduring this long journey...which isn't over yet. How many doctors do you know that have graduated from medical school with 7 children (2 born during school)? We love you and hope to visit you soon in your new residenc"y" in El Paso TX.

P.S. Ben, I really wanted to post a picture of you from Halloween but I love you too much to do that!

Am I Too Wordy?

Have I ever mentioned how much I despise blogging? Oh yeah, I love to read them but I don't enjoy creating them. They can be so time consuming. Well, I have had an epiphany (one of my favorite words) regarding blogging. I am just to dang wordy. As I blog I tend to put way to much into my posting. So, perhaps if I back off I will not hate it so much. I want to tell a story about being too wordy but it would be too wordy. Maybe some other time.

Although I hate myself in this "old" picture, I love the rest of the folks. So Enjoy...they are good people. Brigham and Annie are twice that size now.

Our Visitor

Never in my life did I think that I would be the hostess in my home to a General Authority from the First Quorum of the Seventy. Elder David F. Evans was our visiting authority for our stake conference this weekend. He asked if he could stay in our home and of course we were delighted. We had to do some rearranging to make a place for him to sleep but as always he was so gracious and grateful. It is so special to have such a humble servant of our Heavenly Father as a guest in our home.

Elder Evans has served as a Bishop, Stake President, Mission President in Japan and as an area authority also in Japan. He told many interesting stories from his life and shared with us details about his family. We had such a wonderful time visiting with him.

We have had a few other General Authorities stay in our home and each one brings a special spirit with them. My favorite thing is listening to them share stories from their church service or tell about their personal knowledge and relationship with the prophet. What a great privilege it is to have them in our home.

Finally...

Well Gram has lived in her house for 4 years and today the outside was finally painted! Hurray for Seville Park Ward High Priest Quorum. They wanted to do a service project and gram's house was the one they chose. I have posted some pictures. They were also kind enough to paint my school. I am so thrilled. I have before and after pic's of my school but only the gram's house after it was painted.

This last picture is our wonderful Bishop (on the ladder) and a member of the Quorum that came to help.

The Rug

The other day Russ found this rug in a vacant house that he was preparing to list for sale. It is in perfect condition. He brought it home and put it on the floor in the family room. I thought it looked great as it broke up all the blue in the room.


Later in the evening Annie came by and announced that she didn't like that rug one single bit. Russ and I responded by telling her we liked it and it was going to stay put. "Well", she said, "just wait until my sisters see it!"


Well I guess the statement about the "sisters" was supposed to make us want to jump up and drag that rug out to the nearest bonfire. Poor Annie, she really did get stuck with old fashioned parents. Maybe someday she will look past our lousy taste in rugs and love us inspite of our age. After all age is just a number!

The Coupon Escapade

Friday I bundled up my coupons and decided it was time to head to Fry's and see what this coupon frenzy was all about. I really didn't have a ton of coupons (I am a newbie to couponing). I tried to plan it out so I would be organized and not have to crisscross the store a dozen time. I swear I was in The Hotel California where "you can check out but you can never leave". It was making me so nervous carrying those coupons around and searching for just the right products. It is a really time consuming ordeal. As I finally headed toward the front of the store to check out I started sweating wondering if the moment I opened up my envelope to dump out the coupons, the floor would open up and swallow me! Everyone hates couponers...especially me. I held my breath as I waited for someone behind me in line to throw a rotten tomato at my head. Fortunately, the floor didn't open, no one threw a rotten tomato at me and I quit sweating when the cashier finally announced that I had saved $199.71 (I promise it sounded like she was shouting it over the intercom). I still spent more than most couponers do in a year but I had lots of items without coupons too. And, I lived to tell this story. I guess I might try it again next week, if I can get up the nerve!

Wake up All You Bloggers!

The following statement is not intented to focus on my own family but rather bloggers in general.

I know many of you will consider me a hypocrite and you would be right! I really love reading other peoples blogs but I seldom contribute to my own. What is up with that?

I get so out of sorts when I check someones blog and they haven't blogged in a month (and in some cases months). PLEASE...can you put something new so I can enjoy keeping up with you and your family. Thank goodness we have enough family members that someone generally contributes to this blog every week or 2.

So, why am I whining about such matters? I guess it is because I have been looking at some new blogs lately and I really enjoy the good things I have read. In some funny way I am inspired by the good I see in others through their blog. I get to take a peek at good families, loving mom's, families having fun together, trials that people cope with (especially those that make mine look like a walk through the park), fabulous food ideas, new babies arriving, weddings, well you get the idea. All kinds of things. I wanted to make a New Years resolution to blog at least once a week this year. Oops! Looks like I already failed since it is the 3rd week of January.

Thank goodness everyday is a new day and I get to start over. Forget the New Years resolution...I think I will just start today. Consider this my new beginning to blogging more often. Hope you find me here next week!

Love to All,
Mom

P.S. I almost deleted this post because I didn't have a picture to go with it. Just seems like a picture makes it more interesting. But I resisted and posted anyway. Maybe you will see a picture next week.

Look it has my eyes!!!

Well I know how excited women get about that first ultrasound picture so here it is.

I can't believe it!

That's right! Our baby boy is a sunbeam. Ok so he really isn't a baby but it is hard for me to believe! Today was a little weird for me but we got through it and Cooper L-O-V-E-D primary. Our Primary Presidency did a really good job of trying to prepare the kids that would be moving up into primary. They started taking them into singing/sharing time about the middle of November and they went each Sunday. The first Sunday Cooper had a hard time because he was sitting there being really reverent like they asked him too and when it was all said and done and his Aunt Nichole didn't pick him to help with the songs, he melted. But luckily that has been the only problem. Last Sunday we started helping him prepare also by telling him that he would have a new teacher and he would get to go to primary. We were always positive about it and he was getting really excited. So today I prepared him a little bit more by telling him that in his new class he wouldn't have playtime and snack time. At first he seemed a little leery but then when we got to church he was perfectly fine. At one point during Sacrament meeting he said,"Momma do I get to go to my classroom with the toy cupboard?" When I replied ,"No" he didn't even blink and he just smiled and said, "Oh yeah, I get my new teachers!". I was so thrilled that he was OK with that! Once we got to primary, I took him to sit by his teachers and then hurried out since I wasn't sure if he was going to take a cue from any of the other kids and start crying as their parents brought them in, so I just watched him from another door and he did great. He had no problems and I am ecstatic! He loved it and I hope he continues to love it. But for me it is still strange!