Broken Arm

Owen fell off the couch and broken his arm on Tuesday afternoon. First he went to urgent care to get a splint put on:

This morning we went to the orthopedic specialist's office to get a cast put on:

The ortho said it was a supracondylar distal humerus fracture. He will get the cast off in about a month.

Hutto

Today we went on an outing to Hutto (about 15 minutes northeast of us). They are big hippo fans there. We walked around their historic downtown district, and in just a few blocks Lizzie counted 19 hippos. (There are supposedly more than 300 scattered all over town.) Here were some of our favorites in the downtown area:

This is Henrietta Hippo. She is the main Hutto hippo.

These next two were outside the beauty shop:

Outside the candy shop.

Farmer hippo

At Hutto Public Library. We took a bathroom stop here.

Outside the Mexican food restaurant.

We finished our outing with a visit to the Texan Cafe, well known for their pies. We split an Oreo pie, and it was yummy!

(Owen had a meltdown as we were leaving, otherwise it was a pretty good outing.)

Solar Eclipse

The solar eclipse glasses were a hot item, so we weren't able to get any and had to make our own viewer. It was "underwhelming," but supposedly Austin is in the path of totality for the solar eclipse on April 8, 2024. Ya'll can make your reservations to stay with us now!

At the Beach

Ward activity at Lake Pflugerville last week:

Photo Shoot

We had some pictures taken for Lizzie's baptism:

Round Rock Bats

While the Bakers were in town, we decided to go check out the Mexican free-tailed bat colony in Round Rock. There are half a million bats that nest under this overpass, just 5 miles north of our house. It was really cool to watch the bats fly off in big groups to go hunting for the night. We sat there watching them for 15 minutes or more, and they just kept coming in huge clouds and flew off in formation. It was so neat that we went again the following night with Grandma and Grandpa Ellsworth for FHE.

They just kept coming, wave after wave, for more than 15 minutes straight. It was pretty incredible.

On top of watching the bats, the kids had a lot of fun rough housing with Grandpa Baker.

Olive Garden

Back in January, Lizzie set the goal to read the Book of Mormon before her baptism in August. Liz and Mom read a few pages every night (okay, almost every night) for about six months, and we finished the Book of Mormon the night before Lizzie's baptism. As a reward, we went out to eat at the restaurant of Lizzie's choice. We were lucky enough that Grandpa Ellsworth got to come along too.

Awesome that she ordered a burger and fries at an Italian restaurant, right? I think the big draw was the breadsticks. ;)

Cuties

15 More Months!

Heidi is next!

Lizzie's Baptism

Grandma Hadley made this baptism dress

This dress was trimmed with pearls from Grandma Heidi's wedding dress.

This is Lizzie's friend from school, Angelie.

Liz got baptized with two boys from her Primary class: Eli Solorzano and Eli Farley. (Notice that all their names start with "Eli." They call it the "Eli Club.")