Around the beginning of March my maternal grandma passed away. She was the last of my grandparents to pass so me and Matt (Mark couldn't come because of school and work) went with the rest of the family back to Victor, ID for the funeral. Up until then I had not been to Idaho since we moved back in 1999. So it's been a good 13 years since I saw any family from Idaho.

This winter in Missouri had next to no snow so it was kind of fun to see all the snow in Idaho. When we were going through the mountain pass from Wyoming to Idaho I took some pictures of how high the snow was compared to the signs on the side of the road.

We pulled off the road at the Wyoming/Idaho border and I got this picture. This was in a stopping area though, so the snow had been plowed. That's still a lot of snow though.



Even though these pictures are of the same sign, they were taken at different times. I didn't know this before, but the orange stick things are attached to metal poles that mark the side of the road. They have to put the orange on them for winter otherwise the snow covers up the metal poles.

And of course there HAS to be a picture of the mountains.

We were gone for about almost a week. I'm glad we went and got to be there for the funeral and to see everyone. (Everyone in my family was able to come except Anita, who is currently serving a mission in Nevada.) But I was glad to come home when we did. Missouri feels like home now.


In other news, Matt is officially a toddler now...I guess. Is walking what turns them into a toddler? Either way, he can walk now and he sure is loving it.

He started walking about a week ago (on Monday, March 19) he walked across the living room all by himself. Up until that point he'd take a step or two and then hold onto something. That time he didn't hold on to anything. By Thursday he was kicking a ball around and chasing it.

He's almost 14 months old and it doesn't seem like he should be that old. He loves jabbering, looking at books, "playing" video games (holding a controller and pushing buttons while Mark is playing a game) and walking. He still crawls but he's starting to get more comfortable walking. He also thinks it's funny when I roar at him. If he's walking when I do that he'll usually lose his balance.

Mark is currently in his last quarter of school before he gets his Associate's degree in computer networking. His school does quarters instead of semesters. Also his school is year round with a week or two break between quarters. Mark is planning to keep going to school to get his Bachelor's degree. We're both pretty excited for him to be getting his degree. It's been a long time coming and hopefully soon he'll be able to get a job in the field.