Thanksgiving family reunion!

This is our baby floating down from heaven... what an angel! (I told Rob I never want to see Jeremiah flying this high again, even if he is loving it)

Spent this last weekend over in Long Beach (CA) with Ryan after dropping the kids with Rob's parents in Yuma. We had such a fun time and finally got to see Ryan's boat, the Enchantress. Ryan and sea mate, Shawn took us out past the breakwater to the real ocean to sail for a few hours. It was great to see them in action since they'll be leaving for their 10 month trip to Audtralia this week with one other friend. I felt pretty good about not hurling over the edge in my delicate condition - that's not to say that I didn't feel like it.

Here's Ryan while he was here for Thanksgiving. The protective eye wear was for target shooting - more pics of that to follow. I don't get to see Ryan that often, but I'm always inspired when I do. He's constantly following through with one dream or another and living life to the fullest. My prayers will be with him on this journey.

Ryan with his girlfriend, Melissa who was brave enough to spend her Thanksgiving here with all of us. She was delightful and got us all (Mom and Dad included) to stand in front of a leave blower while Ryan took pictures of our contorted faces. Those pics will not follow.

Jeremiah sharing one of his favorite hang out places with his cousin, Ivan (Aaron and Krystal's 2nd).

All the grandkids in attendance (we missed you Syd!): back row Spencer, Aneya, and Audrey, seated are Jordan, Jeremiah and Carter, on laps are Ivan and Bennett and then there's lincoln hanging on the end.

We hiked up in South Mountain park to a natural rock slide (no water like "Slide Rock). Lots of rocks and skinned knees along the way, but no injuries on the actually slide surprisingly.

Lisa and her kids in a pile at the bottom of the slide. I think they decided to go train style.

My Dad and Jeremiah, who was the only one not to slide but preferred to roll around in the dirt while he waited.

The promised shooting pics. This was mostly a boys outing, but Melissa stuck by her man and proved to be a good shot.

Love this one of everyone looking so tough. Nice minivans.

One holiday to the next

Here's our anxious trick or treaters. Audrey's friend Nicole joined us for our very short and sweet trip around the block. We had already collected quite a stash at the ward trunk or treat the night before. Jeremiah was a ferocious lion, Audrey, Sleeping Beauty and Bennett, Peter Pan... it's not my fault he still fits in the costume he wore last year, and he makes such a cute Peter!

Jeremiah understood fully about the chocolate if not about taking wrappers off

Audrey and Bennett at the chili cookoff part of our ward "fall festival". Just thought their expressions were priceless. No, neither of them would touch the chili and got away with eating only candy and cookies the whole night.

Giddy with their loot from the neighborhood

picture time, picture time, lots of fun with picture time...

Okay, here are the rest from our photo shoot a couple weeks ago. It's kind of a lot of pictures, so if you get tired of looking at my kids half way through and need to click on someone elses blog to look at that for a while, I understand. If you can endure the whole thing (and I've really narrowed it down), please vote for your favorites of the kids - trying to decide which to print for the wall).

Happy Birthday to my baby

What a wonderful year with this sweet boy! He's happy, bright and oh so snuggly; I get a little teary thinking of the joy he has brought into our home (as everyone pulls together to meet his every whim). Yes, this is my second posting about Jeremiah in the last couple weeks, but I wanted to share him a little more on his birthday since so many family and friends are too far away to celebrate with us. These photos and those to follow of the rest of us were taken by a friend of mine, Bedie Price. This first one is my favorite.

"you go that way and take a right at the stop sign, it'll be on your left..." Did I mention the pointing skills?

Jeremiah has a great laugh to go with his sense of humor.