our trip out west: irvine

after aspen grove, we went to irvine with my family for a week and a half to pass the time between our two reunions--and MOST importantly, to hang out with dallin before he left on his mission to the dominican republic. it was extremely relaxed--we hardly did anything other than go on lots of walks with dane and murphy and go swimming at our neighborhood pool. and it was great! i think dane especially really enjoyed having not much going on after the craziness of aspen grove.

i looked through our pictures of this week and i thought, "how the heck do we have 338 pictures from a week where we did almost nothing!?" and then i remembered that we were in a house full of people obsessed with dane (tommy and i included). so every activity dane participated in was document several times over. 

grandpa murphy reading dane some bedtime stories:

in each of the bedrooms at my house, there are these sliding mirrors that cover the closet. dane saw them and just went crazy head-bumping the baby in the mirror. 

one of the days, we did venture out and went to balboa to get balboa bars and then briefly to the beach. 

dane was first transfixed by the pigeons crowded around the balboa bar stand . . .

and then totally THRILLED by the tastes of ice cream that we gave him.

i really cannot get enough of these two together. and neither can dane, really. all he wants in life is to have tommy be with him 24/7. maybe tommy and i should switch jobs.

dane loved the water--every time a wave would come, he'd giggle and scream and tommy would pull him up so just his feet would get wet. he thought it was hilarious.

but seriously. how cute are they?

look at that happy face!

cole sometimes took dane on walks in the morning. look at them both in their pajamas. 

dane also learned how to clap while we were there. he could not have been prouder of himself.

oh my gosh! i can do it!

he was also obsessed with piano--when i'd try to walk past it upstairs to put him down for a nap without letting him play on it, he'd burst into tears. he got kind of possessive of it though--he'd grab your hands and throw them off so that he could play by himself.

dane also would be very happy if we would bring murphy home with us. he loved sitting there talking to murphy through the glass. murphy, however, paid him no attention at all. look at him looking straight at me taking the picture--he knows that little person who's his size isn't going to be taking him on a walk.

 per usual, we had a family picnic one night. i think we murphys just like eating outside.

 wow, my cute baby is gnawing on a rib bone. 

oh, these two are so cute. dane is totally going to miss his uncle dallin.

last family picture before dallin left. we took one just like this when austin left a little over a year ago. 

our trip out west: aspen grove

oh, aspen grove, how i love thee. 

this is the third year out of four that i've been to aspen grove for a whole week. and i think it was the most fun i've had there so far, because we knew SO MANY PEOPLE there. we were basically a part of two different reunions, with the myres and the leiningers there, which eventually melded into one group by the end of the week because everyone got to know each other.

the myres family reunion--missing a good chunk of the cousins who have graduated high school because of jobs and missions, but still a very respectable group!

 the murphy family--note dane eating my cheek.

the leininger family--missing several siblings but most of them!

we tried to take full advantage of all the cool opportunities aspen grove has to offer. we did the ropes course, i made a wood pen, we played basketball and volleyball and wallyball and raquetball and tennis and played games in the evenings with cousins and siblings. and oh, dane got so much attention--he was the STAR of the whole week. we noted that dane was related to more people in the camp than anyone else, with the whole myres family and all of his grandparents and aunts and uncles there to dote on him the whole time. it was unfortunate that it was our first week on our trip because he was coming out from our quiet little life of just the three of us at home all the time, so he was rather overwhelmed by all his new friends. but he did warm up to everyone over time.

so here are some more pictures, just not in any particular order. it's really hard to depict exactly what we did the whole time, and i have so many pictures to sort through from both of our families, but here are some good ones.

oh yeah! check me out on that ropes course!

the kind of non-aerobic water aerobics

now, i feel kind of bad saying this, because dane has eight other very attentive and loving uncles (EIGHT! seriously! and there will be more once a few more weddings happen... he is a spoiled baby with so much love), but cole has to win the award for Most Dedicated Uncle. he was 100% focused on Dane Dane Dane the entire time we were at AG and visiting irvine--he took dane on walks, he brought him toys, he played peekaboo with him, and he made dane fall in love with him. he was such a good sport.

more dane loving from all the cousins.

and, dane loving from his grandpa murphy.

and, dane loving from his mama.

and, from his grandma and grandpa leininger.

tommy's brother shane has a new baby too, so we got a cute picture of the brothers and their boys.

we went all-out patriotic on the fourth of july--all matching and american!

dane loves cougars already!

as do grant and ninna.

i am sad that dane is making a grumpy crying face in this picture--he's wearing dallin's first-ever family reunion shirt from when he was a baby. it's very tender because now dallin is on a mission and won't get to see dane again until he's running around and talking up a storm. say it isn't so! these two are twins though. so cute.

after AG, we stopped by grandma and grandpa murphy's house to see them. while we were there, dane finally learned how to crawl! and considering how long it took him to crawl, after that clicked, he has figured out everything else so fast. within just a few weeks he was pulling up to standing on things and is now just figuring how to walk along things. ahhhh! his whole world has exploded with excitement.

dane! be nice to your great-grandpa! haha, i think this picture is pretty funny though, grandpa.

and then we drove down with my family to california. dane actually did pretty well on the 10-hour drive, because we broke it up into two days. he just was really cute thinking he would get to drive the car.

oh, it's sad, but it seems so long ago already! maybe having a baby does that to you. they change so fast and make things seem like they happened so long ago. we LOVED aspen grove this year and had such a good time with everyone who was there.

four generations pictures

I'm going to do a whole separate post on Aspen Grove in its own right, but I wanted to share these four generations pictures that we were able to take while we were there. We hadn't seen my grandparents and my parents at the same time with Dane since he was born yet, so we took full advantage of that while we were there. And we were extremely lucky because we were able to be at Aspen Grove with BOTH sides of our family at the same time! We originally planned to go with the Myres family (my mom's side) for a family reunion, and then Tommy's family decided to spend the week there as well once they heard we would be there. It was such a fun week to have both of our families there together. Dane had all four of his grandparents there all week long wanting to hold him and play with him--which should have been like heaven for him, except that he was going through stranger danger and was completely overwhelmed by all these crazy people, haha.

And then one of the days, Dallin was ordained as an elder, so my Murphy grandparents came up to Aspen Grove for that--so Dane had eight grandparents there. I'm so glad my dad organized this super extreme four generations picture, because it really makes me happy. From left to right, it's Dane's Myres great-grandparents, Murphy great-grandparents, Murphy grandparents, and Leininger grandparents. So great.

And then we took a bunch of the traditional four generations pictures with each grandparent. Here's Grandpa Murphy:

Grandma and Grandpa Murphy:

Grandma Murphy:

Grandma Myres:

Grandpa Myres:

And we also got a good one with Dane's great-grandma Merrill while she was visiting Utah in the middle of our trip. 

So Dane got to see all of his great-grandparents and grandparents this trip--but I don't know if he appreciated enough how lucky he is. We really are so lucky! I love all of these pictures and I'm so glad we got the chance to take them.