Learn A Snowsport Month

We went with Laura to Solitude. She works for the Salt Lake Visitor's Bureau. She needed to film someone learning to ski and she picked Alex. We had a lot of fun skiing with her, and as it turns out Solitude was a pretty cool place. She made this video for the Salt Lake Visitors Bureau Blog.

Snowman Cookie

Grandma Nana gave snowman cookies to all the children on Christmas Eve. They were really cool. They had half melted snowmen on top of them.

Happy Birthday Grandma Nana

Coconut Cake with seven minute frosting and baked pineapple chips... Anne you really out did yourself!

Playing in Park City

Barneseve 2009

Alex bonds with certain people very quickly. He really liked Jeff.



Linda got Elizabeth and Alex on her lap. The kids were both a bit subdued because they weren't feeling very well. It was fun to see Elizabth share Grandma with Alex.



It puts a bit of a damper on the holidays when you have the flu on Christmas Eve. Alex still had a good time he was just very mellow... and not as busy as he normally is.

Linda and Laura in Boston

This past weekend Laura and Linda came to visit us. We had such a fun time! We took a lot of pictures so I made a slide show. Here is what we did: ate crab cakes and clam chowder at Legal's, saw the "ducks" at the public garden, Visited the New England Aquarium, ate Mike's cannoli, ate in the North End at Limoncello (and watched Alex down all my ravioli), went to church, enjoyed an Ole brunch on Mother's day and wandered in the Mount Auburn Cemetery.

Grandma and Grandpa Barnes

When we were visiting the Barnes; Ted watched the Allstar Basketball Game. Near the end of the game we took Alex down to watch it with him. Alex loved to sit and watch basketball with Grandpa. Alex gets so much attention when we go to Utah. I bet he loves Utah. Grandma Linda took a turn to show Alex some fun with the blocks.

Elizabeth Rose

We spent Sunday with Patrick's family. Sadly Laura was out of town and Richard didn't see us while we were in town. But happily we did see Anne and ELizabeth and Patrick's parents. It was so much fun to have Alex and Elizabeth play with eachother.

two baby cousins
Uploaded by patriciabarnes

I love how innocent and sweet kids are. It was so cute when Elizabeth tried to share her toys with Alex. She wasn't so sure at first and would take things that he would play with. Anne was worried about it. (But, I thought was really funny especially because Alex didn't care.)Alex thought it was a fun game so he would take toys that Elizabeth was not playing with and then she would get confused at take them from him. He thought it was great. he just kept grabbing more and more toys that were abandoned. After a few minutes she had a realization and started giving him toys. Our collective sigh in the video is kind of embarrasing but it was so cute we couldn't help it.

ERH and APB
Uploaded by patriciabarnes

Elizabeth was really funny with Alex she poked him and climbed on him. Alex loved it. (As you can see from the video.) He loved the attention. He didn't care if she poked him in the eye. At one moment he got brave and poked her back. She didn't think it was as fun to be poked as it was to poke so she cried. We all laughed. I hope I never forget watching the two babies discover their friendship. It was awesome.

Barneseve

Every Christmaseve the Barnes family draws names and we give another relative a gift. Ted then puts on a santa hat and passes the gifts around the room. John gave alex a monkey... alex likes it.



I gave a gift to Stacy and Mike gave me a gift.



Ted Had fun playing with his grandbabies. Here is Anne holding Elizabeth playing with Ted and Alex.

New Camera

Ted and Linda gave us a new camera. They gave it to us a few days before christmas so that we could use it on Christmas morning. This is the very first picture that we ever took with it.

Don't worry Harvey we ate some other turkey!

On the nineteenth, I got to Utah at four in the morning Boston time and slept in... so did Alex. Patrick came the night before Thanksgiving. We celebrated Patrick's upcoming birthday with Catherine, Mike, my parents, awesome gifts and a birthday pie. The next day we had so much fun feasting on the food that Steve, Catherine, mom and I had spent several days making.




Catherine made many wonderful pies. Steven's turkey was a fabulous brine cured turkey with a mustard and pomegranate molasses glaze. I made the place cards and a cranberry tart. Mom made cranberry jalapeno relish, sweet potatoes and thai chili seasoned beans which complimented the turkey. The food was fabulous. There were hardly any leftovers as we all stuffed ourselves to the point of ridiculousness.



The best part of the trip was hanging with family. On Thanksgiving night Alex was tired and he started to cry. Carsen has this idea that everytime Alex cries that we should sing to him. The cool thing about Carsen's idea is that it works really well. Carsen got Melissa, Dad and I to join in on the singing.

P1050883
Uploaded by patriciabarnes

The Friday after Thanksgiving was spent with the Barnes. We went to Redrock Brewing Company for lunch as a family and celebrated Patrick's birthday. It was especially fun to see Laura. It feels like it has been ages since we have seen her. She looked great by the way. (and she had an awesome new ski parka.) By the way Laura we have already seen Ratatouille three times and Alex loves it.


Saturday morning as we were leaving Patrick's cousins came by and we saw Bill and Ali.


We then watched Utah lose the Byu/Utah game. But on a happier note Alex and Kathy and Riverett Knutsen came up from provo to see us!!!!!!!!! Kathy looks great. I can't believe she is having a baby this spring. We are so excited for them. They call the baby Riverett. (I am not sure if that it how you spell it.) They find out if they are having a boy or a girl just before we come back into town at Christmas time. What an awesome Christmas they will have full of anticipation and excitement.

Weekend Visitors from a Land Far Away

Linda emailed me some cool pictures that she had coverted to look like pop art. I asked her to make some this style so I could see what they looked like. I would love to have a giant picture like this on stretched canvas. I wanted to test out the style on some photos that they took while they were here.



Patrick's parents Ted and Linda came to visit us this weekend. They arrived Friday and we brought them home to eat lobsters with us. (Melissa if you come to visit I promise I won't make you eat lobster... I won't even have it in the house when you come.) The lobster was wonderful. On Saturday we walked around campus and over to Harvard square. I saw the law school campus for the first time. It was freezing cold so we stopped at aldo and Patrick bought me warm boots and a hat in the middle of our walk.


Also we stopped at dunkin donuts ate yet more pumpkin spice donuts... our favorite and drank hot chocolate. We took a picture of Alex and Grandma Linda in ffront of the famous John Harvard statute on the undergraduate campus.



On sunday we took the barnes to church with us and we played with Alex in his room and Grandpa Ted took this fun picture.



Monday was just a fun hangout day. We relaxed in the morning and then took Grandpa Ted and Grandma Linda to the airport and hugged them goodbye.

Saying Goodbye

Well it has been a while since we last posted to our blog. It has taken us a while to get settled and unpacked. Now that we are finally getting pulled together I can start posting to our blog again. We have taken a lot of pictures since August.

On August 11 Patrick rode the 111 mile Utah Lake Century something ride (ULCER) bike race. Patrick was on team road killers along with Catherine, Mike, Dad, Blake Rigby and Alex Knudsen.


He rode the whole race with Catherine. Mom Alex and I gave everybody moral support.

Patrick and I had a few friends over at grandma and grandpa Barnes house to say goodbye before we left for Boston. We said goodbye to friends in the ward, Patrick's missions companion, and friends from Patrick's fraternity.
Here Laura Vernon snuggled with Alex for a little while and shared all her mommy secrets with me.

Cyd Vernon chatted about recovering from pregnancy and was very encouraging. I got great advice from our last third Sunday family gathering before the move.

P1050058
Video sent by patriciabarnes

Here Grandma Kohler let me record her singing to ALex. This is a song that she sang to Linda and Linda sang to Patrick. Linda and Grandma taught it to me so that I can sing it to Alex.




Here we had family night at Grandma Pats house. Adi cam up from the Y and the whole family was there. Grandma made family style tacos and we had ice cream for desert. During the meal Carsen killed a bee with a salad fork.


Check out these two babes. We took this gorgeous picture of Adi and Raegan while we were there.

The night before we left we had dinner with Steve Melissa and the kids, Catherine and Mike and Mom and dad. Melissa made the coolest cake with a lobster on it as a symbol of Boston.The cake was incredible it was made with rolled fondant and rice crispy treats. I thought it was awesome. She even made little sea creatures to go with it. There were snails and clams made out of fondant on the cake.

During the party Patrick gave Carsen a book about bugs as a goodbye. It was a very tearful night as I kissed Melissa, Steve Carsen and Raegan goodbye. (I miss them soooo much!)
On Wednesday the 21 of August we pulled out of the driveway and said out goodbyes to our parents. It was really cool that mom made us a yummy breakfast before we hit the road and Catherine and mike came up to join us to eat it. It was really cool that they were there at 5:30 in the morning. We love you guys so much and we miss you alot!

Still two... not yet three

What a fun week! This week was a busy one! Tuesday night Jeremy Hadden came down from Sun Valley Idaho and we went to dinner with him and Peter and Samantha. It had been a while since we saw Jeremy. We ate at hoppers grill.

Later this week Melissa threw a Potty Party for Carsen! We are all excited that he is finally starting to show interest in potty training. We don't even care that he is only interested in using the potty in the backyard. So, Melissa made Carsen a blue lightning Mcqueen cake with wing bammers. We had Mac and cheese and popcorn and cake. Grandpa came during his lunch break from work. I learned that Potty Parties are fun.

Thursday night we went on another bike ride. Mom and Dad took Patrick and I to big Cottonwood Canyon and we rode around the Brighton Loop. We found some wonderful cabins up there for sale. Maybe one day when Patrick and I win the lottery we will get one.

On Friday we went to the Transformers movie with Catherine, Mike, Steve, Melissa and Mom and Dad. I liked the movie so much that I thought about it all night and into the next day. I enjoyed the character of Sam Whitwicky and the detail of the autobots. I especially liked the yellow Camaro (Is this how you spell camero, or is this how you spell camaro?). I have never been into Cameroes but I might be willing to change my mind after the movie.
On Saturday morning Patrick went on a fifty mile bike ride. he rode with my dad and Dave Arrington up to Farmington and back to the house. Afterwards we went to lunch at Ruth's Diner its up immigration canyon, with Linda. While eating we discovered that she and Laura had never been to IKEA! So we picked up Laura and went to Ikea that afternoon. We visited the furniture that we will be getting once we move to Boston. Man were we exhausted Saturday.

Yesterday after watching the tour we went up big cottonwood canyon in our car. We went for a walk and enjoyed the view. We sat on our crash pad and looked out across the mountains to Heber valley and midway. The air was wonderful up there. We accidentally disturbed some wild mint. The air was filled with an overwhelming aroma of fresh mint and wild flowers. It is nice to enjoy a few more quiet evening before the baby comes... nope he is still not here, and our due date is tomorrow. So, we are using this time to enjoy some wonderful moments of life just the two of us.

We've Moved!

Last week Patrick started his training for the 111 mile "Ulcer" bike race. On Monday
Mom and Dad took us to Pearl Izumi in Park City and helped Patrick get bibs, a jersey and shoes for the bike race. Dad is lending him a custom built titanium Schwinn road bike. It is beautiful and it was built for Greg Florez who has a similar build as Patrick.

On Tuesday, Patrick and I went on a family bike ride. It was only ten miles, but it was pretty fun. We went with Catherine, Mike, Mom and Dad and Jacob Francis. We rode out by the airport. Everyone biked so fast and looked so cool on their rode bikes. I wore flip flops and kept up pretty well with my beach bike.

On the fourth of July we decided to help Laura move. She had been in a house which turned out to be a bad situation. The landlord really tried to rip her off. So, Laura found another house to move into, owned by a friend from work, Steve. (NO NOT STEVE EROR) Any way he had been trying to sell his house for a year and it just wasn't happening so he decided that he would take it off the market and let Laura and her roommate Tara rent the place. We moved all her things into a moving van and we got in our car... and we got a phone call. It was Steve. Coincidentally Steve had just sold the house. Laura was welcome to move in for a few weeks but that was all. She had no where to go and it was the fourth of July.

Patrick and I looked at each other and thought... well our lease has technically started in Boston and we currently have two apartments. We were only staying in our current apartment so that we can have the baby here in Salt Lake and then move to Boston in August. Well, we decided that we might as well let Laura live in it now. That way she has a place to live and we will only be renting one apartment at a time. So we moved all of Laura and Tara's things into our apartment and Patrick's cousin Linda let the girls stay with her while we took the rest of the week packing. Laura is letting us put our boxes going to Boston in the corner. Otherwise all of our stuff will be at mom and dad's house.

After a long exciting day we went to watch fireworks with Patrick's parents and aunt and uncle at the Hotel Park City. (see pictures)

We finally packed our last Boston box at 2:00 am on Saturday night with Sterling. Laura has been wonderful. She helped us pack our kitchen for Boston and she has given us time to move. Mom has helped with everything from shampooing carpets to chocolate donut deliveries for me. Dad helped us move our mattress to their house in his brand new pick up truck. (I have to say it is a gorgeous truck.) Anne Linda and my mom helped me with DI runs and helped me move all of our things into mom and dad's basement on Friday. Sterling is a good friend who helped us decided that their is no way the ply wood cabinet is making it to Boston at two o'clock in the morning. Catherine and Mike made the basement ready to live in. They got the nursery, bathroom, bedroom and kitchen ready. Thank you thank you thank you everyone!!!!!
Well, we had a crazy week last week. I really appreciate all the help that we got from everyone.

By the way it is week 39 of the pregnancy and the baby is still not here... and with the move it turned out to be a good thing because we were able to get everything we needed to finished!