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About a week after her birthday, Millie decided to join the walking club.

Now's she's officially allowed to become a big sister.

Is This a Surprise to Anyone?

I'm pregnant.

Due January 4th.

That makes me 21 weeks along (if you like it in weeks) or 5 months pregnant (if you like it in months).

We have decided to keep the gender of this baby a surprise until birth, but we are predicting another girl.

(I know, old news to plenty of you, but I figure that there are some people who read my blog, but haven't found out about this news by word of mouth or Facebook, so I thought I'd post it officially here too.)

Camping Trip

At the end of July, we went on a camping trip with Derek's parents, Rachelle and her family, his Grandma Bayles, and Uncle Wes. We drove up to Great Basin National Park in eastern Nevada and enjoyed the great outdoors!

After two days at Great Basin going on hikes, visiting Lehman Caves, exploring the creek, watching the deer (who were incredibly close to the camp site), and driving to the top of Mt. Wheeler, we headed over to Timber Creek which was closer to our final destination of Ely, Nevada.

Lehman Caves

In the Great Basin N.P. we took a tour of Lehman Caves - well known for it's rare formations, especially these shield ones below.

Back in the 1920s they would hold wedding receptions and parties in some of the rooms in the caves. Someone wrote their name on one of the formations and it's still there like it was written yesterday.

For obvious reasons, these ones are called cave bacon.

These formations that go from the ceiling and touch formations rising from the floor are called columns. Here's a pretty cool view of the inside.

Train Museum

One of our first activities in Ely, NV (which was where Derek's parents grew up and went to high school) was visiting the railroad museum.

This is an old steam engine that was nicknamed "the ghost train." During WWII they wanted to scrap all the old steam engines so they could use the metal for the war effort. The engineers liked her so much, they kept hiding her in different places so she couldn't be used for scrap metal - hence the name. She still runs today, in fact, we got to see them dumping all her soot and filling her tender up with new coal.

We went on a train ride and got a tour of the town and then toured the machine shed. The ghost train was parked there in the shed at the time so we got to take a picture with her.

Visiting the Ranch

Another highlight was visiting the ranch where Derek's mother grew up. Her father raised sheep and they lived about 50 miles outside of town. She told us that all the buildings were the same ones that they had when SHE lived there. When we saw them, everything was pretty run down and in disrepair, but it was still neat to get a picture of how she lived.

This red building was the old Pony Express Station. It is right next to the blue house that was their family's primary residence. They used the Pony Express building mostly for storage and from time to time had people living on the top floor (you can see a staircase on the left side of the house).

To the left of Grandma (with that huge bush covering the front) is the home where she lived.

While we were there looking around, it started to rain on us. Here we are trying to get a little cover from rain.

Ryan and Katie and Grandma went ahead and posed in the rain anyhow.

You've Had a Birthday, Shout Hooray!

Millie had her first birthday while we were camping. Her cousin, Laney, had a birthday 6 days earlier, so we celebrated for both. Grandpa made a cherry/apple cobbler which the girls enjoyed, and Grandma brought balloons for the kids to squeeze and pop and gnaw on and chase. She also chewed that #1 candle to shreds.

We didn't get to do any of our normal birthday traditions, but she had a nice day anyway.

Happy Birthday Emmi.

Cathedral Gorge

On our drive back to California, we stopped at Cathedral Gorge for a few hours. None of us had any idea what a big hit it would be for our kids. This place was awesome - basically huge walls of dried mud with mazes all throughout. We'd find an opening and walk through until we got to the very end.

We all had SO much fun.

This should give you an idea of how narrow they were.


Here's a view looking up.

Millie LOVED crawling through the tunnels. At one point she tried to squeeze in a tiny little hole, but I knew I'd never be able to get her out if she got stuck. She didn't appreciate me stopping her from trying it out.

Ryan and Katie found this tunnel that only THEY could explore. Derek and I were too big to fit, but Ryan took his flashlight and crawled all around in that dark little cave, and then took Katie once she was sure it was safe. They said it went back pretty far and opened out into another place, but we never got to see it. ;) They spent a LOT of time exploring it.

We definitely got in our fair share of climbing and searching.

This is definitely a place that we'd enjoy visiting again.

I Still Have Hobbies - Even Without Free Time

I've recently learned how to knit. My first project was a wool "soaker" like is pictured above. (Basically a diaper cover.) Unfortunately, I did not check my gauge so the end project ended up being *almost* big enough for ME to wear. This red and white one was my second project, and I would call it a success.

I am currently working on my third - a doll. It will probably take me months to complete. Whenever I am knitting around Millie, she takes to the ball of yarn like a kitten. It ends up getting all tangled - so I have to knit while she's asleep. Makes for slow project completion. When I finish, I'll be sure to post a picture.

Um, I Thought We Were Past This Behavior

I just didn't expect that when Ryan came in to "tell me something important," after lights-out time, that it would be THIS.
"I wanted to make Katie look beautiful so I drew with a marker to make her a clown."

What the? I just did NOT expect that these shenanigans were going on at 9:30 when these kids were supposed to be dead asleep. After further investigation, I found out that they had also decided to make a mural on the wall in their bedroom. Traced their hands and such.

Thankfully, the owners of this property had the good sense to paint the walls with glossy paint. And thankfully for Katie's face, Ryan chose to use a washable marker. Isn't he FIVE now? I wonder what that clown was thinking at the time.