I got to go to Texas recently to see my new grandson, play with my granddaughter and help out my son and daughter-in-law. After the first day which involved sitting in the airport for 9 hours because of flight delays, it was a good trip! The first day, we visited the park and did some swings, held the baby, and visited Target to buy some pajamas that I had forgotten and check out the toys: The next day, we went out to eat at Gringo's which has a really good tomatillo sauce (and soft-serve ice cream), and visited the park again. Here's a copycat recipe for the green sauce:  https://www.tfrecipes.com/gringos-green-sauce-recipe-copycat/ The green sticker on her shirt is supposed to help keep the bugs away: I saw some cool birds--egrets maybe?: The third day I got up with Lincoln to go watch him teach early-morning seminary. The kids are pretty amazing, getting there before 5:50am to have a religion class. They have to start that early because school starts at 7:15am. Lincoln did...

 Our 8th child is turning 18! In no particular order, here are some pictures and memories from Mindy's early years.  Mindy was a pretty happy little girl. The main challenge I remember from those years was trying to get her to eat and sleep. She had a very small appetite and grew very slowly. This was probably related to being born very small and with a tumor on her tailbone. At age 5, she weighed 29 lbs and was 38" tall. Believe me, I was trying to get her to eat high calorie foods constantly. This caused me a lot of stress--I am so relieved that eventually she made it to 4'10" and a reasonable weight and I no longer have to work on this.  We moved to Germany when Mindy was 9 months. Probably because of her low birth weight (4.5 lbs.) and her time in the hospital, she was a little delayed with her gross motor skills. She didn't learn how to walk until the week before she turned 18 months. She loved to chew on toothbrushes. Here's Frau Czadek following Mindy a...