November mash up

We cheered on the Cougars...

... got cold...

...got warm again...

...got crazy for a fun movie with friends...

...got all lovey-dovey...

...got naked for dinner?

...got excited by physics down at BYU...

...got bored of trying to wake the sleeping tiger at the zoo...

...got to tour the new City Creek in Salt Lake.

Not a bad November!

Baptism day!

The first Saturday in November was a very special time that our family had been looking forward to.  Sunshine was old enough to be baptized and a lot of family was coming to visit!

Since a few plane schedules got delayed, we all ended up in Salt Lake City for a few hours.  We ate at the Roof restaurant near the temple.  They let Sunshine release a balloon out of a roof window into the sky.  It was pretty neat.

My brother Robert brought his girlfriend Marissa.  The kids loved wrestling with her!

We waited for a while at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, but they had lots of fun activities while we waited.

On Saturday morning, the big event arrived!  Sunshine was baptized by Thunder and I sang a song I had written for him called "Your Baptism."  Everyone wrote notes to Sunshine on small notecards.

Sunshine had several football buddies come to support him.  He loved seeing them!

We had so much family support, considering most of them live hundreds of miles away!  We loved it!!

After the baptism, we headed up to the cabin.  Marissa was an excellent shot with the AirSoft gun, and a great teacher!

We so enjoyed everyone's company.  We really miss living away from family and relish these times when everyone can get together.

Several of Sunshine's friends came up to the cabin for the day.  He loves those guys!

The cake tipped just a bit in the car...

I think we wore Papa out a bit!

We had such a wonderful time with family.

Thanks for making it such a special day for Sunshine!

October Mashup

October was a great month!  I was invited to record in a choir for Michael McLean's new album called "Threads."

We are planning a family reunion for my side of the family in March, so I got matching swim suits on sale!

Enjoying some good ol' BYU football.

We borrowed our neighbor's apple processor and made our own applesauce.  Just like when I was growing up!

I took part in my first ever photo shoot!  A friend is starting up her photography business and she was great. It included professional hair and make up.

Sunshine was initiated into scouts!

The Chic-fil-a cow came to visit the school!

Sunshine and Cloudburst had their piano recital, but Sunshine had to miss it for football.  Cloudburst did great!

We had quite an exciting final season game.  The opposing coach got mad at the ref, and shoved him after throwing a clip board at him.  The game ended in a forfeit right then (but we were ahead anyway) and with the cops coming to decide if assault charges were going to be pressed.  Crazy!

Harrowing Halloween

Thunder loves to freak out the kids in the neighborhood, and even a few adults.  This year he came up with a pretty good setup.  Everyone had to pass through a black-sheet doorway to find the candy.  We had a monster set up on a chair... then Kory was waiting behind them in the corner in a mask! Genius!  We got screams all night long, hahaha!  Now, what to do next year...

Pumpkin carving

The kids would not let us get out of carving pumpkins this year... You can see what Sunrise misses when you look at his pumpkin!

D-dogg's birthday

When I asked Tornado what he wanted for a birthday cake, all he wanted was spiders.  So I did my best!

Sunrise loved his birthday passport so much that Tornado requested one too.  He loved walking into the kitchen and seeing it just for him.

Even though his birthday was on a Thursday, we woke up early and opened presents before school.  He is on the gymnastics level 3 team, so we found a "mushroom" for him to practice on.  I'm glad he was excited about that one :-)

Dad took him to get a haircut to look nice on his special day.

At home, he got to try out his new and beloved motor scooter!  He zipped up and down the street and fell in love!  He got the hang of it quickly and always wants to be outside on it.

We finally had everyone come inside to eat cake.

We love you Tornado!  You are funny, smart, resilient and fearless!  These six years have been a fun ride!