Larry Melvin Nielsen

My Grandpa passed away this past a little over a week ago. I loved him so much and will miss him greatly. I am so grateful that I got to see him at least every other week at Sunday dinner. He was always a wonderful Grandpa to me.

Larry Melvin Nielsen 1936 ~ 2010 Larry Melvin Nielsen, age 74, passed away June 12, 2010 surrounded by his loving family. Larry was a long awaited and much loved baby born to Melvin and Lila Nielsen on January 14, 1936 in Logan, Utah. He grew up in College Ward and graduated from South Cache High School, where he played football and was a member of the band. After high school, he joined the Army Reserves. He married his eternal companion Donna Isaacson on July 26, 1957, solemnized in the Logan Temple. Together they raised seven children. He was a General Contractor and could build and fix anything. After retirement he was a shuttle bus operator at the SLC Airport. "Big Larr" was a gentle giant. Although people thought he was quiet, his family knew otherwise. He had a great sense of humor. He loved his family, his temple calling, playing on the computer, the Sizzler, Mountain Dew, BYU and his dog "Poops". He is survived by his cherished wife of 54 years, Donna; and his seven children, Shanna (John) Avila, Diane (Bart) Fitzgerald, Kellie (Tate) Jorgensen, Lynette (Mark) Higley, Lori (Mike) Brussock, Kimberly (Roger) Winder and Bret Nielsen. He was a loving grandfather to 21 grandchildren and 15 great-grandchildren. Preceded in death by his parents and sister Lois. Larry was an excellent example in how to live a good life. He will be greatly missed. Funeral services at the River Ridge 3rd Ward, 1244 West Chavez Dr. (9700 S.) on June 18, 2010 at 11:00 a.m., viewing Thursday from 6-8 p.m. at Jenkins-Soffe South Valley, 1007 South Jordan Parkway (10600 S.) and one hour prior to the services at the church. Interment Logan City Cemetery at 2:00 p.m.

Maci's Blessing Day

On June 6th, Maci was blessed. It was a wonderful blessing given by Dave and it focused on her being a good friend to others and choosing her friends wisely. There were so many members of our family there to support us. The priesthood holders who were in the circle were Grandpa Mark, Grandpa Lynn, Great Grandpa Nielsen, Uncle Brian, Uncle Jim, Uncle Brett, and Uncle Tate. A funny thing about the blessing which I want to record is an experience with my Grandpa Nielsen. I tried really hard to let everyone who we wanted to be in the circle know that they were invited. I didn't even think to tell my Grandpa because I thought that it was kind of a given. When it came time for everyone to go up to the front my Grandpa was kind of looking around like he didn't know if he should go. I motioned for him to go and he had to hoof it up to the front as the circle was slowly closing in without him. I remember thinking that it was funny that he barely made it. I am so happy that he did because he passed away the next Saturday, June 12th. I am so grateful that he was able to be a part of all three of my kids' blessings.




We had a great day filled with family and fun afterwards. My mom has a tradition that she buys her grandkids their blessing outfits. When we went to get Will's outfit, we saw the most beautiful "wedding dress" blessing dress. It was still there when we went to get a dress for Maci. She looked so beautiful! My brother even said that for a second, he thought he might be ready to have a baby of his own. He did say that it only lasted for a second though. We had a great day!

Maci Marie is 5 Weeks Old

We have sure loved the past 5 weeks in our house. Our little baby is such an angel. She really only gets fussy in the evenings. She sleeps a lot and does pretty well in the night. She has a little trouble burping and sometimes gets a little upset that I can't get those bubbles out, but that will hopefully get better soon. She is such a sweetheart and we all love her so much.

Big Brother loves to give Maci kisses. He says, "Hold it." and it very gentle with her.

Big Sister is a little obsessed with baby Maci. She does this thing called "cuddling" where she closes her eyes and rubs her face on Maci's face. It's pretty sweet except that's what she does to my parent's dog, Bubba, too.

While the Cat's Away...

My little mouse WILL play. Lately it seems like all that I do is feed Maci. Will has been taking full advantage of this time to cause a little mischief. When I first came home from the hospital I was in my room feeding the baby and I could hear this pinging noise. I kept calling for Will to come and see me and all he would say was, "Yeah?" whenever I would call him. When I was done feeding I went into the kitchen to find Will playing with an opened bottle of percoset. I was freaking out, not knowing if he had eaten any or not...when he saw me he tried to hand me one saying, "Candy." I called Dave at work and he told me to try and get him to eat another one to see if he would. He said that he didn't think he took any because they taste so nasty. I tried to give him one and he opened his mouth right up. I called poison control and they told me to watch him and if he started to act drunk then I needed to call 911. That kind of advice is definitely not very reassuring, but he never acted drunk so I assume he never ate any. Lately, he hasn't been doing anything as naughty, but he still is into trouble nonetheless.

My neighbor brought some dinner over the other day and with it came this giant cookie bar. I had it on the counter and Gus found it. I came out to find him lounging in Maci's bouncy seat eating away.

Will secretly got a hold of some of my mascara and proceeded to paint his face, tummy, hands, the couch, etc. with it. They then brought a bike inside and rode back and forth from the kitchen to my room.

Introducing...

MACI MARIE ALVORD

Born on April 2, 2010
Weighing 7 lbs 2 oz
19 1/2 inches long

Happy Easter

This Easter came and went and I thought I would at least post a picture of my cute kids. Maci and I came home from the hospital on Easter so I don't have any pictures of what the Easter Bunny brought, but he did come by. The kids were very excited about what he brought them and were extremely hopped up on sugar when I came home. We dyed eggs for family night a couple of weeks before Easter and we all had a lot of fun (Dave especially got really into it) until Will broke all of our eggs. Maybe we'll have better luck next year.

Hey Big Boy!

On March 27th, our little guy turned 2 years old. I can't believe how fast time has flown by. I was about to have baby #3 when his b-day came around so we didn't do anything too fancy. We went swimming at the SJ Rec Center with our family. It was a lot of fun! We had a lot of family come and quite a few swim too.



Will is such a joy to have in our family. Right now he loves trains and cars. He loves Cocoa Krispies and CANDY (he is crazy about it just like his dad). He seems to know if something is candy by its wrapper. He does get confused sometimes and brings me a tampon saying, "Candy mommy," begging me to open it for him. He can speak pretty well but sometimes it's only mom who understands him. His little skinny body has changed a lot just since he turned two. He looks a lot more like a boy now. We love him so much. Happy Birthday Gus!!!

Disney World is the Happiest place on Earth!

For Christmas, Dave surprised us with a family trip to Disney World. Will is still under two and gets to fly free and he had a lot of sky miles so we got to go to Florida for even less than it would have been to go to Disneyland. When we left I was 30 weeks so I was a little nervous that I would be so tired and wouldn't be able to walk around as much as everyone wanted to, but I actually felt really good and had a great time. Two nights before we left Will cried the entire night (in pain). I had just gotten over a terrible cold and Meg was getting over it too but Will had just become infected. I took both of the kids to the Dr the day before we left and they both had DOUBLE EAR INFECTIONS. The Dr thought that they would be feeling okay after taking a couple of doses of antibiotics so we left. Will was terribly sick and grouchy the entire time, all except the last day. He has never been that mean before. It was awful! Meg was a complete angel and had the greatest time. Dave and I had a lot of fun too, but wished that Will would have been feeling well because it could have been even more fun. When we came home we were all bummed to be home and can't stop talking about our trip. We can't wait to go back. Dave says in three years, but we'll see if he can wait that long.

The kids loved the tea cups...this was the last day when Will finally started to feel better.

We took Meg to the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique to get her hair fixed like Cinderella. She loved it. She got to pick her hairstyle, got her nails painted, her makeup done and left with a big bag of princess loot. Daddy bought her a magic wand and she was so happy.

The rest of the day she acted so weird. We couldn't figure out what was wrong with her. People would try to talk to her to tell her she looked pretty or would just say, "Hi, Princess!" and she acted so prim and proper. We finally figured out that she was trying to act like a real princess. It was hilarious. She finally got loud and crazy (her normal self) towards the end of the night.

Meg looked forward to meeting Cinderella the ENTIRE TIME we were in Florida. We finally were able to track her down the evening of our last night there (thank goodness). She was in heaven! Megan says that Cinderella is her favorite princess because "she has yellow hair just like me".

Our happy little guy finally joined us. He had a great time the last half of our last day. His favorite things to do was to ride the train that takes you all around the Magic Kingdom. It was fun to see him so excited.

This picture is one that we will be able to black mail Megan with one day. For some reason she started to do this really weird smile and did it almost the whole time we were on our trip. This pic is one of the worst. Pocahontas told her to "Smile big!" and this is what she got. I could barely stop laughing long enough to take the picture.

Meg was extremely afraid of these Incredibles characters. They tried for 10 minutes to get her to take a picture with them but she wouldn't. I kept telling them that it was okay, but they just kept trying and trying. It was really funny because she wasn't scared of anyone else really.

Luckily, the lines weren't very long and the kids were really good to wait.

We just happened to be standing right at this spot in Epcot when Sleeping Beauty emerged. She was the first princess that we saw and she was so nice to Meg.

We got to go to a water park one day and had a great time. It wasn't extremely warm, but we just kept telling ourselves that it was snowing back home and it made it that much warmer. The kids loved to dig in the sand as Dave body surfed in the humongous wave pool.

This picture was taken our first night in Florida. We landed, checked into our hotel and headed to Hollywood Studios for a couple of hours until it closed. On the bus to the park a family gave us some fast passes to the Toy Story video game ride. We really lucked out because we got to go twice that night and the other day that we played in that park the wait time was about an hour and a half. We all loved that ride. Will even kept his 3D glasses on.

Big Boy Bed

In preparations for our new baby to come we decided it was time to get Will a bed and get him used to sleeping in it. My parents gave us a mattress for him for Christmas so we went out and got him a bed and set it up. He was so excited to have it in his room so we thought it was going to be a piece of cake to transition him. It actually hasn't been too bad. We have it pushed up against the wall and his changing table pushed up on the other side so it is basically a crib but it keeps him from falling out...or at least we thought it would. The first night he rolled around so much that he rolled off the end. He hasn't fallen off since and doesn't really get down until I come and get him. My kids are weird that way. When she was younger, Meg would wake up in the morning or from a nap and would knock on the door until I went and got her...and she could open the door. Will's bed is pretty high but I have a stool by it so he can climb on and off. He climbs all over it during the day, but when I put him to bed or down for a nap he doesn't get down. He is getting to be such a big boy. It makes me a little sad, but I guess it has to happen since there is another baby on the way. We love our little Gus so much.

I had to include this picture because I thought it was so cute. When Meg's away at school or dance, Will gets to do all kinds of things that he normally would be in trouble (by Meg) for. This day he found her i-pod and was having the greatest time listening to her music. He is such a funny little guy.

My Christmas Project

About a year ago I bought a pattern for a card table fort and was meaning to make it for my kids. Then a few months ago I happened to find an awesome blog http://homemadebyjill.blogspot.com/2009/10/felt-playhouse.html and she made the most amazing playhouse. I talked to my friend Tara about it and we decided that we would both make one for our kids for Christmas. We gave ourselves about a month to do it so we thought that it would be no big deal. It took A TON of time but I think it turned out really well. I basically copied the playhouse from the blog that we found. Tara and I split a lot of things and it was really fun working on a common project together. Once it was all said and done I realized that I didn't measure correctly and it is a little too tall for my table. For Christmas and these pictures I had to put a bunch of boxes on the table to make it look decent. I am going to have to make a structure out of PVC pipe or something but I am really proud of it. I am using it as one of my Young Women projects because it definitely took me longer than 10 hours to finish it. I barely finished it for Christmas but my kids really seemed to like it...except the fact that Will kept standing up and hitting his head on the table. Making this helped me realize that I am really not that bad at sewing after all. Thanks Tara! These pictures are terrible, but they're better than nothing...

A dog house complete with doggy door and bones that come off to feed the cute little dog.

An apple tree with apples that can be picked.

A garden with...

Corn

Carrots

and lettuce that can all be picked.

Tara went above and beyond and made this cute mailbag and mail for the mailbox (The mailbox door opens).