Emmaline's Blessing

March 5-6, 2016

We had a fun weekend for Emmaline's baby blessing. We were able to have Ryan's parents and sister's family come out to support us. The weekend prior to her blessing, Ryan sewed Emmaline a beautiful blessing dress. We went to the craft store and he let me pick out the fabric and lace. I picked both the lace and clothe to be sparkly white. He made most the dress in one day and then finished it off during a week night.

I thought it turned out soo pretty!! Ryan used a doll dress pattern we'd borrowed from Alisha, so he had to take a few measurements on Emmaline and let it out a little from the pattern.

Ryan's parents came on Friday night and we were able to have a relaxing night with them. We decided to have a little birthday night for Mark since we had only just missed his birthday.

On Saturday afternoon, Alisha, Chris, Katie, Elena, Eliza, and Ben came to spend the night. We had a pizza dinner. Elena also made a delicious chop salad! It was so good! The kids then all helped me with a little project. They each painted an 8x10 canvas so I could decorate our play area with them. They turned out so bright and colorful. We have some very creative nieces and nephew; and I think Jared and Karl had a great time getting to play with paint with their cousins. :)

Sunday morning we got to try Emmaline's dress on her. It fit beautifully! She looked like the precious little angel that she is!

At church we got to see the Edmunds, Ryan's old friends from his home town, who drove across Michigan that morning to be here for Emmaline's blessing. We so greatful for their support and sacrifice in being there!

Emmaline was a good girl for her blessing, and didn't cry. After sacrament meeting she took a nap, most of it in Aunt Alisha' arms. Meanwhile I got to go to my CTR 7 class with Eliza, and Jared got to take Ben to his CTR 4 class. That was a special treat for us!

After church, at home, we had our celebratory meal. Mark and Kris had made some nice appetizers. I had lots of help with making the different things for dinner.

For the afternoon activities we went on a walk, took naps, and even cleaned up a major toilet overflow. Luckily many hands make light -and fast- work. We are grateful to have family there to help whenever we seem to have plumbing issues. ;)

Later in the afternoon we got to have these pies that Eliza came up with, called "Cutie Pie"s that I then helped her make. They turned out really good! Saturday night we made the crusts, partially backed them, put some canned mandarin oranges in the bottom, whipped up a filling with sweetened condensed milk and cutie orange juice, baked them, and let them chill over night. On Sunday, we put one slice of fresh cutie orange on top of each filling. Papa Mark helped her whisk up a meringue and then we baked them one last time. They turned out to be really good, especially for a spare of the moment idea. Eliza was pretty clever for coming up with the idea for these Cutie Pies and she put a lot of love and work into them! This will definitely be a special memory for me getting to make them with her! :)