Life with the Conleys

To our mamas, grandmas, and great grandmas. Here are a few pictures of Eli after painting your Mother's Day cards.  He loves you. We love you. We feel so blessed and grateful to have such wonderful women as our mothers and grandmothers. Each of you has been an influence for good and an example of love. We miss you and wish you the happiest of  Mother's Days!

We have been hoping to take a trip to LA to visit Josh's family for a while. We weren't trying to be in LA for Easter but that's how it worked out and we had a grand time. We always enjoy our trips down to see Josh's family, but this one seemed especially nice. We spent time with his parents, grandparents, and sister, ate delicious food, and enjoyed the sunshine.  Josh and his dad went halibut fishing one day. Josh caught two but neither was big enough to keep. He wanted to meet up with some old friends from high school but got sick just before we left on the trip and couldn't shake it. Sorry to anyone reading this who feels slighted. It really was unfortunate timing, and he didn't want to spread the sickness around. I got a sunburn and it was fantastic. My skin hasn't seen sun potent enough to get a sunburn in so long that it felt really wonderful. Between that and being able to spread a blanket on the lawn and read, it was nearly heaven.   Eli...

Somehow our little baby is all grown up. Or at least, well on his way to being a boy rather than baby. To celebrate, we had all his local cousins and aunts and uncles come for a party. It makes for a full house, but Eli loved having everyone come over. He really loves all his family. We have large photos of our families in the entry and he will stand in front of the pictures (standing on a table that he is technically not supposed to stand on) and point to and name everyone in the pictures. Sweet, sweet boy of mine. We were hoping to have some outside playtime but it was raining, so instead we played Twister, Headbands, and had a scavenger hunt for Eli's presents. The pictures of Twister were a little... twisty?It's tricky to get a photo that's more than knees and elbows and other assorted body parts. So we will skip the Twister photos. I hadn't seen this game before but all the kids seemed to enjoy it.  Presents! More presents! It's a cake! ...

Last Saturday we went down to the river to enjoy the nice weather and throw some rocks. Eli really likes throwing rocks into the river and Luna quite enjoyed herself as well. He could have stayed all day Luna seems to really like the water Sometimes throwing rocks is a little dirty Josh had Monday off for President's day. We decided to check out a local ghost town called Franklin. We didn't realize until we got there that you can't actually see the town. It is on private land and they have "No Trespassing" signs posted. What you can see is the old mine and the cemetery. It would have been nice to see the town but what we could see was pretty cool.   Coal cart marking the trail The mine shaft is over 1,300 feet deep My two fellas The views of Mt Rainier were pretty great The tombstones were scattered about the hillside. We thought this was an old mine cart rail but afterward Josh read that it actually held the pip...

Before we get to Christmas, we need to talk about December 21st. To most of the world it is only Christmas eve's, eve's, eve's, eve; but around here, it's Josh's birthday. We had some family over for a nice birthday dinner and some cake. Singing to the birthday boy Happy Birthday, Josh! After celebrating Josh's birthday, Eli got to have a little pre-Christmas. The Masons brought a present for Eli and he got to open it while they were here.  Superman book! Hannah reading the book to Eli. Thanks for the book, cousins!  Christmas morning was pretty exciting. Eli got a ball shoot (basketball hoop) of his very own. Josh and Eli hadn't even made it downstairs before Eli started shouting "ball shoot! ball shoot!". Getting him to open any presents after seeing the basketball hoop was nearly impossible. Luna got to open her present first because we couldn't get Eli to stop playing long enough to open a present. Notice th...

Not too many pictures have been taken around here lately. It's regrettable considering the lapse in picture taking came during Halloween and Thanksgiving. We took just a few pictures of Eli in his Halloween costume but it was at the end of the night and he was tired and not particularly cooperative by then. Halloween was a lot of fun though. Some friends invited us over for dinner and then the children went trick-or-treating around the neighborhood. This was our first Halloween in our house and it was really fun to see all the kids going around. Eli the Dragon or Dinosaur. You can pick.  Resting after pillaging the village. The week before Thanksgiving my family came to visit. It was great to have everyone together again. We didn't take any pictures though, we were too busy having fun, eating food, and playing volleyball. Also, my dad was able to fix our freezer, which has leaked since we moved in. Yay!  The following week was actual Thanksgiving. After the hu...