Top Chef Tour

We love the show Top Chef, and Ben found out that they were coming here on tour. All the reservation seats were filled months before, so we braved the heat and headed up to Phoenix to try to get in. The one we were hoping to get into was full, but we were able to get onto the wait list for the next one. We had to hang around for a while. We wandered through the farmer's market it was at, and then walked around downtown to try to keep the kids entertained. Eventually we ended up sitting in the car with the air on trying not too cook ourselves too much more. We still had a lot of fun, even if we were roasting. So here's the pictures from the Top Chef Tour:

The tent it was in. We had to wait for them to call our name to make sure we would actually get in.

Baylee acting goofy at our table, waiting for the demonstration show to start.

Payton and me waiting for it to start, we were sweaty and hot and Payton was starting to be done with being there.

Phoenix's Top Chefs were CJ and Ryan. They were pretty funny and entertaining to watch.

CJ made a really good salad, some of the ingredients being from the farmer's market. Baylee got to this one, that's why it doesn't look as appetizing as it was. It had a mole sauce, fried cheese curds, lemon cucumber, and candied ginger. It was so good!

It was fun to go see the Top Chefs, but I don't think we will go again unless we get a reservation or they do it during the winter.

A Trip Down Memory Lane

Now that we've moved to Arizona, whenever we go to Carlsbad we always pass a sign for Julian, and I always mention to Ben how much I'd love to stop there one of these times. On our way back from Ben's sister's house we finally made a stop. Julian is a little apple town that we would visit when I was growing up in San Diego. I remember going there for a couple of field trips too, and somewhere I know my parents have a picture of me in the old jail from one of those field trips. It was fun to stop there with my own little family, although we came during the off-season so it didn't seem as hopping as it was when I was growing up. We only stopped for a quick trip and didn't get many pictures, but here's a couple:

We stopped at the cider mill (the last two pictures are outside of it). Of course they weren't making any for us to watch, but we got to try some and ended up buying a little to take home. It was as good as I remember. We also ate at one of the little cafes and loved the apple pie we had for dessert (I think it was caramel pecan apple but I don't remember it being very caramel-ish). It was fun to stop and take a little trip down memory lane, and I hope we can stop again sometime during apple season.

The Party Don't Stop

Ok, this is the big one! We went on vacation for the first time since Thanksgiving (if you know us well you know that's really an odd thing for us). We went down to Southern California to celebrate the addition of two of our nieces into Ben's sister's family, and while there Payton turned one and another one of Ben's sisters also had a baby shower. It was quite the party vacation! So, here's way too many pictures of what we were up to (and I didn't get the greatest pictures of all the things going on and didn't pack very well-so if you see us in the same clothes on different days, I promise the clothes are clean):

We left Wednesday afternoon to drive up to Ben's sister's in Ladera Ranch. The plan was to stay there that night. We stopped and grabbed a bite to eat before getting to her house. When we stepped out of the car, the air was so moist and cool and I felt such a difference than the hot dry air we've been in here. Why did we move away from that again? It felt so nice, and a little chilly. We had some not so great Panda Express at Irvine Spectrum mall (we were trying to be cheap), and in an effort to let the kids have a little break from the car, we let Baylee ride the carousel.

I don't know what that expression is all about, but I love that she's pretending to be a cowgirl in her daddy's fedora hat.

Ok, my sister-in-law Missy is so great (so are all of my other sister-in-laws)! She knew from a phone conversation we had that I was really struggling with Payton's birthday and not being able to do much (I know, the kid's only one, he doesn't know the difference). I had to hold back the tears when I brought Payton downstairs on his birthday Thursday morning.

Missy had the table set with birthday plates, and her and her boys had decorated the sliding glass door for Payton's birthday. Being less than a month away from her due date, she even had a breakfast of raisin bread french toast with berries and fresh made whip cream. I am so blessed to have such a great sister-in-laws. Her and my mother-in-law had a couple of errands and lots of airport trips to make, but Missy was so nice to pay for us to go to Zoomars, a cute little petting zoo place, for Payton's birthday present. So, that's where we headed next:

Zoomars has a bunch of different animals to pet and feed. There's a big area where you can go in to pet and feed bunnies and guinea pigs, and then more farm animals in pens around the area. There's also an area you can go in that has a whole lotta goats that will actually jump up on you to try to get you to feed them, and there were a couple little lambs hiding in a playhouse. It was a fun activity and I really appreciate Missy for sending us!

In between Missy's and Zoomar's, we saw a big field where they we practicing for a horse event/show. So, on the way back, we pulled in and parked the car so we could watch the riders and their horses jumping the fences. It was pretty fun to watch.

Ben's mom bought us lunch for Payton's birthday. It was fun, and a little wild, to go to a little diner/bakery with her, Missy and her boys, and our sister-in-law Laura and niece Abby. The best part was when the waiter brought Payton a piece of banana cream pie for his birthday.

We took off his shirt and let him go at it. It was so fun to watch!

The kids all had fun playing at Missy's while we waited for more to show up since Missy's baby shower was that night.

Baylee loved Missy's hammock. She later flipped over and had a little freak out, but she still had fun. She loved playing "babies" with Grandma Hall all weekend, especially since her mean mommy won't let her be a baby at home.

The good part about Missy making another airport run was that I was able to finish this little tutu I made as part of her baby shower present. I was a few strips short in the car and didn't have any scissors to cut more so sometime at her house was the only way to finish it in time. I loved how little this tutu was. I made Baylee the same one for Easter, but it wasn't nearly as tiny as this one. I hope it fits little Amelia, who was just born on Monday (congrats Missy and Brant!)!!!

This is the only picture I have from Missy's baby shower, and you can't even tell that Wendy and I were there from this picture. But, it's still a cute picture if you don't look at my face or weird hair. :)

Thursday night we headed to Jenny's down in Carlsbad (it took longer than it should have since Payton threw up 5 minutes after we left Missy's). Friday Ben spent a lot of time making Payton a birthday cake, and in the afternoon the family headed to the beach.

The beach was so nice and Baylee was in heaven! Payton slept the whole time, so he missed out.

Check out the cake Ben made for Payton:

For Ben and Mike's first birthday, they had baseball hat cakes. Ben was so excited to make one for Payton. It turned out really well! Jenny and Andre had homemade Cafe Rio for everyone for dinner, and sometime around then we sang Payton Happy Birthday. He had the hugest grin on his face whenever anyone sang him Happy Birthday.

Payton passed out from all the partying from the past few days.

Saturday was the big day! In our church, we believe that families can be forever. The adoption of Jenny and Andre's two older girls went through at the end of May, so Saturday their family went to our church's San Diego temple to have their family what we called sealed to them (meaning they will be a family forever, even after they die). It was beautiful, and we were so lucky to be apart of it.

All of the Hall cousins (minus Mea and Cambri who weren't there). This is the only picture I have, but Wendy took a lot of pictures that she will hopefully send everyone.

Jenny and Andre threw a HUGE party that night to celebrate. They live at the end of a court, and there are only houses on one side of it, so they blocked off the end of the court and had food and rented a big inflatable slide and bounce house.

The Hall grandkids got to test everything out before the party, which was fun! So Payton and Baylee had the bounce house all to themselves at one point before the big party started. Jenny and Andre also had a dance party inside their family room, complete with a dj who had lights and a fog machine.
Baylee had so much fun (along with the rest of us), and somewhere during the night acquired a random stuffed animal and purse as her dance partners or wardrobe maybe? Then her daddy came along to dance with her too. The dancing went on for awhile, and since we were sleeping in the room right next to it, my kids got to stay up pretty late enjoying the fun.

Even when the party was dying down, Baylee was out there having a blast in her p.j.s.

Everyone else left Sunday. We decided to be the annoying relatives that never leave and stayed until Monday. At least we got to enjoy one more beach trip from that, even if it was freezing.

Baylee loved having Maddy play with her in the sand.

Ben struck a nice little pose.

Jenny and Andre loved having me kick their trash in Scrabble on our phones.

Even though it was freezing, Ben and Baylee still got their feet wet in the ocean. We don't get to do that out here in the desert.
Payton even stayed awake this time and got to see the water.

Mostly he just crawled around on the blanket and ate crackers though.

We had such a good vacation! It was so fun to celebrate family and we are so happy for everyone and the places life is taking their little families. We loved seeing all of Ben's family (minus Mea, Cambri, and Austin-we missed you!). Thank you to all of them for all that they did for us, and thank you to whoever is responsible for the surprise someone left in our car- we appreciate it so much. We can't wait for the next family get together (or vacation).

Pre-Birthday Celebration

My little man is now 1! Can you believe it? The year went by way too fast for me, and I'm a little sad that Payton isn't a little baby anymore. The weekend of his birthday we were going to Carlsbad. I was actually having a little emotional battle inside myself over his birthday (him turning 1 and the whole party thing, and also spending his birthday in the car), but a couple days before we decided to just leave the day before his birthday. With Ben being home for now it didn't really make a difference. Wednesday morning Baylee and I went to our weekly summer kids movie that we've been doing, and then we came home and I packed, fed us all lunch and then we let Payton open his presents from us a day early before we headed out. Here's just a few present pictures:

Kid's Fitness Challenge

Baylee's gym had a free kid's fitness challenge thing that they did at the beginning of the month. It sounded like a fun, so we took Baylee. She had a blast!

Baylee waiting for her group's rotation to start.

Payton was pretty chill for a little bit, but recognized where he was before too long and wanted to play.

One of the activities was an obstacle course. Baylee got a little lost on the turn around spot. She stopped and joined another group shooting hoops. She eventually made it back before her group headed for their turn at basketball.

Another station was dodgeball. Baylee loved throwing the balls at people.

She wasn't too excited at first when she was the one getting balls thrown at. She eventually caught on and had fun though.

We played a little more and even ran into a guy I cheered with at BYU-H. We had a lot of fun and were happy to have somewhere cool (and free) for Baylee to run around at in this heat.

Our Little Gymnast

Somewhere in the middle to end of May, Baylee participated in her first Preschool Gymnastics Show. It was the cutest thing to watch, and Baylee had so much fun showing off her skills to us and Grandma and Grandpa Higgins (although I think Grandpa spent the whole time watching Payton and didn't see much of Baylee-thanks Dad!). We got a bunch of pictures, and it was hard to narrow down which ones to show, so here's more than enough of our little gymnast:

Baylee warming up with some stretches.

We didn't get any pictures of her on the tumble track, but we got a cute one of her sitting patiently waiting for her turn. Of course when we got to her gym, I noticed she must have leaned against our car bumper in her nice clean leotard and turned one side a little black. We did our best to get it a little cleaned off, but this shot shows it more than I'd like.

Here's a few from the bars. Baylee had never been on these bigger bars, but did really well for not having done some of the things:

Sitting patiently again to wait to show some of her circuit skills:

Splits- she can get almost all the way down.

Baylee doing her ta-dah finish they want them to do.

Receiving her medal for participating.

Classic Baylee pose on the stand.

Baylee's coaches weren't there, but she loves this coach that teaches the next class up on the same nights (and I think she's in charge of the pre-school program?). She loves Baylee, and told Baylee she'd take a picture with her if Baylee did one of her famous poses with her.

We love gymnastics and are so proud of our little gymnast!