Extended family

Yesterday we went to New Hampshire to visit my family. By "we", I mean my daughter, my son-in-law , all three kids and me. There wasn't room for the dogs, even if we wanted to take them!
Starting at about 3/4 of the way there, Ella began saying "Are we there yet?". I told her no, we were still in Massachusetts. I was surprized that she could even say it (although I shouldn't have been) when the next question was "Are we out of Massachusetts yet?". No, not yet. I told her I'd let her know the minute we got into New Hampshire. When we finally crossed the border and I let her know, now she asked "How long to Grammies'?". Travis realized where we were going and asked me if Grammie still had the trains. I'm so glad he is old enough to remember now. And yes, my mother still has the trains. She rarely throws anything out.

We arrived at my nephew's house first. The purpose of the trip was to meet his new daughter. She's their first child. She was only 11 days old that day. She's cute, and so far quite calm and quiet. It was fun to see my daughter and niece with both the babies in slings!
Ella and Travis had a very nice day outside. Josh has a flowering crabapple tree and it was in full bloom. Ella scooped up petals and put them in the fork of the tree to make a fairy bed. Then both kids scooped up handfulls and tossed the petals in the air like confetti. Their mother took a picture, and it shows the pure joy of the moment.

I was surprized at how quickly Travis warmed up to everyone this time. When Josh brought out a Slinky toy, Travis had a wonderful time sending it down the stairs. He called it a Spring-spring. My father has a cane with a gripper on the end for picking up dropped items. While Travis played with some toys on the floor near him, Dad started picking up some with the cane. Travis thought that was pretty neat, so they played pick-up for quite a while. When it was time to leave, Travis gave his great-grandpa such an enthusiastic hug, he nearly knocked him over!