Stella's #2 Birthday!

Happy Birthday Princess Stella!

Happy #2 Birthday to my little Princess Stella Rose! In reviewing all of the things that Stella’s done in the last year and looking at all of her pictures, I sure laugh a lot, but it’s also so sad because she’s grown up so much! Her stringy hair is getting longer and she is talking all the time and that little personality could just bring a smile and usually a laugh to anyone.


In this last year, she’s learned how to climb on everything, she loves to help me clean, she loves babies, she went into Nursery, she learned to say, “I Love You!”, she learned how to climb out of her crib (or fall out), she’s learned all of the good hiding places in our house, she finally learned how to play with her toys, she’s learned how to make a lot of animal sounds and identify them, and she’s learned how to include other kids in what she’s doing (she’s a great sharer). She broke her collar bone, and became a fearless swimmer, and she’s peed and pooped in the potty. She’s learned how to sit through a 2-minute time-out and is learning how to know why she was in time-out in the first place. She knows how to put things away (or “put it back” as she would say), she’s learned how to sit and read books during quiet time, she loves her friends, and especially loves to play with her cousin Anabelle . . . and, with Anabelle’s help, she’s become a self-proclaimed Princess (I already knew she was, but she knows it now).

She’s just been really busy this year and keeps us busy too! She is an absolute joy to us! Happy Birthday my sweet Princess Stella!

Until We Meet Again

07/29/06 – This morning was a little more relaxing because breakfast wasn’t until 9:00. We had pancakes and eggs (and all the other breakfast stuff left over). We sat around and visited and waited for Rachelle to finally show up. She had been in Arizona all week taking care of Aunt Sandra and was supposed to show up in time for Savanna’s baby shower.

Lindsay’s flight was at 12:30, so we had to leave to the airport by 11:30. We said goodbye to everyone twice as well as my cousin Shana Clanton who lives 2 or 3 doors down and showed up at the last minute, and headed to the airport. We dropped Lindsay off and returned the rental van and headed back to the airport on the shuttle. It was fairly uneventful again. We saw Lindsay board her plane, and then went to Wendy’s for some lunch and watched the airplanes take off from the window. Stella loved that.

We boarded the plane and I think that Stella and I were asleep before the plane even left the ground! It was a straight flight and Stella slept for more than an hour. I used to love having her sleep on me, but she’s getting so long now it’s kind of uncomfortable, especially in such a tight space. She was a good little girl the rest of the flight and spent most of it playing on the floor at my feet.

We had 17 messages when we got home. I hurried to unpack (which is always a good feeling) and started some laundry. It was an exhausting trip, but also very fast. I just wish that all of my cousins could have been there. I kept expecting Natalie to walk through the door each day to surprise all of us, but it never happened.

I’m really happy that we went and I’m glad I got to see most of my family again, although I don’t feel like I spent much time with anyone and definitely failed in the picture-taking department . . . I didn't even get a picture of Grandmother!

John and I have talked about the next reunion and how much fun it's going to be. I honestly think that we'll all be perfectly happy with playing games at the park and we won't have to spend a dime! It’s tough to get such a huge family all together at the same time, but I’m hoping that the next one will be more heavily populated. It’ll be fun.

Park & Zoo

07/28/06 – Upon waking up this morning, Elliot’s first sentence was, “This isn’t relaxing AT ALL!” We were so tired and didn’t want to wake up. Stella had a hard time too. We had a French toast breakfast at Unka and Auntie’s again (made by Mom, Unka, and Todd), and then headed to Washington Park where we were planning on taking the train to the Oregon Zoo. We missed the train, and they supposedly only ran every 45 minutes, so we decided to do games and lunch first.



So we found a picnic area to play some games and set up the lunch. Julie and Todd were in charge of the games and they did a great job. We had a lot of fun. To get us into our groups, they had us draw a piece of paper from a hat that had an animal name on it. At their start, we were to make the animal sound and find everyone else making our same sound. I was a frog. Lindsay, Stella, Mom, UD, Aunt Lora, Unka, Alecia, Marci, and Alex were in my group. The other groups were the pigs, ducks, and dogs.

We played a game where there are several rolled up newspapers and each group has the same amount. We weren’t allowed to guard our papers on the ground, but were supposed to run back and forth trying to steal the newspapers from everyone else. We could only carry one at a time. I had Stella in my arms, so I gave one to her and held one myself. After the time was up, we had to open the papers and there was a number written on them. We added the points up and the ducks won that one. This was the beginning of duck domination.

In the next game, we had to have 5 people sit on the picnic table and the rest of us had to race through, one at a time, and paint 2 toenails on each person and run around the table. This was funny because Unka, Alex, UD, Stella, and Alecia were the lucky people to get their toes painted. The ducks also won this game.

The next game was putting our heads on the baseball bat and spinning around 3 times and then running to a piece of paper across the lawn and back. This was funny because everyone was dizzy, but it was also funny to see the oldies try to spin around! The ducks also won this one.

Elliot during the donut eating game

The last game was a donut eating contest. They were hanging from a string and we had to go one by one and lay on the ground and eat the whole thing off of the string and run back. The ducks, of course, won this one as well. Every time they would win, they would clap their hands together and chant, “Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack!”

JuJu Bear





My team, just standing around watching the duck team win





Ashlyn and Zach Butterfield





Marci and Bill, displaying Bill's femininely tied bow at his neck and painted toenails

We ate our sandwich lunch (provided by John and Savanna) and sat around talking for quite a while. Then I heard the train come and go again and wondered why no one was gathering us together to get on the train. Finally it was about one o’clock and we still hadn’t started heading towards the zoo. The older adults didn’t feel like going anymore, but the kids still wanted to, so we all got back in our cars to drive to the zoo. This was frustrating because parking was the pits! Elliot dropped us off at the zoo (for which I’m grateful) and then had to actually park far enough away that he had to take the shuttle back! He wasn’t very happy.



Lindsay rented a stroller for me to put Stella in and she loved it because it was a Safari Stroller that had a steering wheel on it. We stayed at the zoo for 1 1/2 hours and then headed home to freshen up and go to the church for family pictures and dinner.

Someone from Unka’s single’s ward took our pictures and then we ate a yummy taco salad dinner, provided by Scott and Stacy. After dinner we went into the Relief Society room and watched the video that John made for Grandmother. It was really emotional, but I was busy with Stella and didn’t have a chance to be touched as much as I would have otherwise. I did get teary when, during one part, John quoted Grandmother’s life story about the last night she spent with Grandfather. Lindsay was bawling and she attributed part of that to missing Keith. Another funny quote is by Lindsay when she was commenting on me not bawling like she was . . . "Are you made of stone?!"

John did a fantastic job on the video and I can't wait to see it again!

Oregon Coast

07/27/06 – Elliot and I made breakfast this morning. The plan for the day was to go to the Oregon Coast which was 2½ hours away from Vancouver, Washington.

When Grandmother arrived to the house for breakfast, everyone was making such a huge deal about her wearing tennis shoes instead of the dress shoes that she wears and has worn every day of her life. She stood there and said, “I feel like a cow!” She wasn’t used to clomping around in regular shoes. We all got a good laugh out of that.

We finally got our start to the beach and enjoyed the 3-way radios with Jeff’s car and Bill’s car. I’m sure we ALL would have fallen asleep if it hadn’t been for those radios. We took my nieces, Alecia and Megan, in our car and they finished watching the DVD Princess sing along that Stella fell asleep during.

Stella, Megan (she's hiding), Alecia, and Lindsay on the drive to the beach . . . I should have gotten an "after" picture because we were all in great need of a comb!

When we arrived at the beach, I was shocked that I didn’t remember how cold and windy it was! I remember going to the beach when we I was younger, but I didn’t remember this cold! Unka (Uncle Steve) had reserved a room at a beach hotel for changing and bathroom breaks and at first I was sure that all 49 of us were going to just stay in the room the whole time. The kids wanted to run around though. Stella hated the wind and she was just cranky from not being able to sleep on her normal schedule.

Marci, trying to call someone?

Auntie Liz . . . I bet she wishes she had her hot cocoa right now!

Todd and Julie Hillyard (Ju-Ju Bear is 3 months pregnant!)

It was lunch time when we arrived, so Stephanie and Scott set that up and we ate. Elliot was determined that if he didn’t just go and get in the water that he’d never do it. So we watched him and crazy Uncle Bill run into the ocean. It’s too bad that we’re now done having children due to Elliot’s decision to place himself in the FREEZING water. They frolicked in the water for a while until they could no longer feel their appendages and then came back up. We headed down to the beach to sit around and watch everyone else play in the sand and fly kites. Stella really hated the wind.

OK, so this is one of the funniest pictures I'll ever have in my life. I handed Mom the camera to get a tender picture of my family standing on the beach . . . and this is what we ended up with!

Mom and Whitney laughing at the picture that Mom just took of herself

Kayla and Rachel thinking that it might be a good idea to get into the ocean . . .

Rachel and Kayla thinking that maybe getting into the ocean wasn't such a great idea!

Scott and Stacy McAllister

Alecia, trying to avoid getting her picture taken

John and Savanna . . . this is the kind of picture I wanted to get of my family . . . maybe next time

Scott and Stephanie Dunkley enjoying the below freezing weather

Kyra Dunkley trying to one-hand it (she was about to float away, so someone had to catch her seconds later)

Nate . . . the kite must be going down!

Scott McAllister . . . I don't think anyone loves kite-flying quite like Scott does

Elliot enjoyed flying the kite more than he had anticipated. He also tried to kill the on-lookers several times by flying it right at us!

Tyler right before I distracted him and the kite crashed!


Alex in the giant hole!

Lauren McAllister, just as cute as can be!

Tyler Anderson in the giant hole him and Nate (his dad) started digging

Lauren and Nate

Elliot taking a jog on the beach

Jayden and Stella

Jayden, Grandma Anderson, and Stella

Jayden, Grandma, and Stella

Lindsay and Teener (Christine)

On our way home, our little caravan stopped in McMinnville for some ice cream. As Elliot and I were about to pull out from a stop sign, a little boy waved us down and started to cross the street, but he came to my window and said that I needed to let him in the van so that we could take him home because someone was trying to steal him. WHAT?!

I got out of the van and took him to the side of the road and asked him some questions. He said that he ran away from daycare and that “Dave” kept trying to steal him and that he hated daycare when his mom dropped him off. Elliot got out and talked to him for a minute and asked where his daycare was, to which he responded that it was just down the road at the ice cream place. It sounded shady to me. We wanted to walk down there just see if it was really a daycare, which it wasn’t. When we started crossing the road to the ice cream place, this big guy came out and across the street to get the kid, said “thank you” gruffly and said that he did that all the time. The little boy just started crying and the guy started to take him. Elliot asked who he was and he said that he was his babysitter. Still a little shady to me.

By the time we got back to our van, Bill and Jeff were walking down the street to come and check it out because Jeff is little more savvy in the legal department and Bill is knowledgeable in the crazy department. Jeff, Elliot, and Bill went to question the guy and little boy before we made a decision whether or not to call the police. They all decided that it sounded like a legitimate story they were telling, so we left to join the rest of the family eating ice cream.

On our way out of town, Bill noticed some crazy person walking down the road and through the radio asked if we should help to which Jeff replied, “I think we’ve meddled in the affairs of this town enough for one day.” And that happens to be my favorite quote of the week.

We ate dinner at Nate and Meredith’s house in Sherwood, Oregon and had another family history moment from Uncle Reed about Lorin Farr who was a body guard to Joseph Smith. Elliot and I really enjoyed these family history moments and can’t wait to get our hands on their information.

Some of the kids and big kids played football in the backyard until it was time to leave.

I was just wondering if Corbin was really planning on tackling Bill . . . anyone else wondering too?

Elliot, tackled by a 10-year old!

When we returned to the hotel in Vancouver, we went swimming in the FREEZING cold pool. Poor Stella’s lips still haven’t returned to their normal color.

McAllister Family Reunion 2006

07/26/06 – After a fairly easy flight from Phoenix with a stop in Reno, we arrived in Portland, Oregon for our McAllister Family Reunion which has been in the works for over a year now. I must admit that when I gradually found out that only half of the family was going to be there, I threw several tantrums and even threatened not to go myself. But then I remembered that I was an adult and Elliot reminded me that we already purchased our tickets. So we strapped on our happy faces and headed to Portland.

We rented a van with Lindsay and checked into our hotel (Phoenix Inn) where Bill and Marci and the kids showed up minutes later. We rested for a while and headed to Unka and Auntie’s (Uncle Steve and Aunt Liz) for dinner where my parents and my brother Jeffrey and his family had arrived and were making a yummy dinner that we got to see a few times. Several uncles and aunts and cousins were also present at the dinner, including Grandmother McAllister, and it was a great night to get to know each other again.



Karl, this one may have been a home run!

Elliot and some of the kids started tossing a ball around, which turned into a wiffle ball game of homeruns! My cousin Rachelle’s kids (Brayden and Zachary) were missing their mommy who was in Arizona taking care of Aunt Sandra, but as soon as I started talking to them about baseball they piped right up and told me how awesome they were and that they could hit homeruns. John finally got them to go play so that they could show me that they were TOTALLY serious! It was totally cute!

Brayden, home run hitter

John (aka Maeser) was totally being heckled by my nephew Cordell!

We played some volleyball and the kids jumped on the trampoline and played in the neighbor’s swings and then we sat on the side of the house for our little FHE. My mom had a family history presentation on Diantha Farr Clayton who was the sister of Lorin Farr who was a body guard to the prophet Joseph Smith. I sort of felt guilty because it was almost like I was watching a soap opera while hearing these stories of Diantha. She had a rough life and my mom made sure she squeezed the history of all its juicy details.

Jayden, trying to play with the big boys

Stella on a huge slide with bark on the ground . . . not so nice on the bare feet

Then we got to take another jaunt back in time to the Dr. Galackawitz movie that my cousins made 13 years ago. I think they started out making these movies when my Uncle David bought a new Lexus and they all dressed up like security guards and video taped themselves running alongside it like they were guarding something important (not that UD isn’t important). Anyway, they continued their video-making by creating Dr. Galackawitz (Uncle David, aka UD) and they had to safely transfer him from his home to his office and then on a quest to find a potion similar to the fountain of youth. My cousins are so funny and it was fun to see the awkward fight scenes with my aunts and the even more awkward scenes in which I was present.

The night was seriously lacking in desserts, which upset more than a few of us, and then we headed back to the hotel to sleep. Elliot and I had to prepare breakfast the next morning, so we were trying to arrange our schedules to make sure we had enough time to prepare it before everyone showed up the next morning.

Happy Engagement Anniversary Sweetie!

Elliot and I got engaged 7 years ago today! The week before Elliot proposed I was probably asking him again about when we were going to get married and he made me feel like it was going to be another few months when in fact he had already purchased my ring. The little trickster!


I was fully prepared to wait until the end of the year to get engaged, which is why it was a total surprise when he really proposed the next week! I was totally calm the whole evening, while Elliot was a wreck! He told me to dress up because he was taking me to a nice dinner. I hadn’t seen him all day because I was working and he was at a Single’s Ward activity. He picked me up and looked totally HOT (as always . . . I looked cute too) and took me to The Landmark where we also had our luncheon after the wedding. He was so nervous. It’s a good thing I’m not a snoop because he had the ring in the glove box.


He took me back to his house and we sat in some lawn chairs in the back yard to look at the stars and talk. I seriously don’t remember exactly what he said because by the time he was on his knee I figured out what he was doing and I just couldn’t wait to say YES! Today marks the day I made the best decision of my whole life!