Flying

Well, I found out that I guy I went to school with at the U (Wayne Crowther) has his pilot's license and so I thought it would be fun to take the older girls out for a spin in a plane and Wayne didn't mind playing along. Here are the girls in front of the plane that we went flying in.We started out at the Ogden Hinckley Airport and Wayne showed us how to do all the pre-flight checks on the plane and the gas and the weather. Then off we went. I decided to just have him give us a short flight because it is kind of pricey, so Wayne thought it would be good to fly up to Brigham City and back. That sounded great to me. So we got in and the girls were really excited, but they were being shy and quiet. It is kind of noisy in the plane and we all had headphones or earplugs in so we didn't talk much up there, but they seemed to like it. I was worried that Zoe would get sick because she gets motion sickness pretty easily, but she did just fine. Take-offs are pretty fun, but in such a small plane, I barely even felt it. We flew over Ogden and then over to the edge of the mountains. We stayed along the mountains looking at the pretty fall colors until we got to Brigham City. Wayne did a touch-and-go at the Brigham City airport where we came into the airport and touched down but then after going along on the runway for a few hundred feet, he just lifted off again and we turned around and went back to Ogden. On the way back we stayed west and flew over Willard Bay.It was a great flight and the girls really liked it. Wayne was a great pilot and the take-offs and landings seemed really smooth. Zoe has been asking me for years when I thought she would be able to go somewhere in a plane so I am glad we got the chance. And I am glad Wayne was happy to take us. Here is a picture with the girls and our pilot Wayne.
After the flight Wayne showed the girls his flight log and gave them their own mini-logs to write out the details of their flight. It was a good day. And when I think that Lila almost didn't come at the last minute because there was some thing in town were they had free hot dogs and she didn't think she would want to miss that. She was glad I convinced her otherwise. We stopped at the Burger Bar on our way home and that was way better than hot dogs.

Baby Girl

I love Ethnie. I mean, not a little bit, but a whole lot. I go away in the morning to work and school and I actually think of her several times during the day and coming home I can't wait to get back home to see her. Maybe this is how I should have felt about all my kids, but for whatever reason I never really did. I love them all and I think I love them more and more as time goes on, but I never really felt this way about any of them when they were small. I am not exactly sure what is going on, but I think I must have been asleep or something when the last four kids were little. It is so fun to see her smile and cry and crawl and eat and drool and fall and play and stand and everything else she does (which isn't a whole lot more than that). I can just sit and watch her do things and not get bored. I am pretty sure Molly could do that with all of them when they were small. But I couldn't. Molly would say, "oh Shanie just look at her (or him) doing this (or that)" and I would have a look and say, "yeah, that is pretty cute" and then go back to what I was doing. It was never fascinating to me the way it is with Ethnie. It's like I am watching a kid grow up for the first time. I could always see in Molly's eyes the fascination with them and kind of thought it was cute how infatuated with them she was, but I never really got it. But now for some reason I get it. It is so fun. And she is so great. I am glad she came along.