Thanksgiving

As usual Thanksgiving was a busy one.  Baking pies, cheesecake and frog eye salad the day before.  Then up at 5 am to get the turkey and ham in the oven.  Then on to the side dishes.  I was so tired - too tired to eat in fact.  I was also dealing with many emotions that day but I did okay at keeping them to myself.  I was so thankful to have all of my children there with the exception of Royal.  He and Charlee spent the weekend with her family and had a nice time.

I did have a special treat in the morning.  When I worked at Southwest College of Naturopathic Medicine & Health Sciences I became very close friends with Shannon.  She always made me laugh, was so smart and good at her job, and I could tell her anything.  We became the best of friends.  She took me to California one year for my birthday to meet her family, spend time on her parents yacht and then took me to Sea World.  She moved back to California after her husband graduated and shortly after I resigned at the College and moved to Queen Creek.  I was so happy to have her stop by in the morning and spend a couple of hours.  She is the type of friend that even when you haven't seen her in 5 years you pick up where you left off. 

Shannon with her twin sons, Ronan and Mateo.  She is also expecting a baby girl in May!

Shannon and RaLee

After Shannon left we got busy in the kitchen again and the two John's tended the babies.  I LOVE this picture... so precious!

Caden, Ellie, Nolan and Izzy

Payten was so hungry.  She picked out her spot and sat there until dinner was ready.

RaLee, Crystal and Spencer

A sweet couple! 

Kids table

And the adults tables

Baby Ellie

Tiny little Nolan

And finally Jayden at the end of the day.  We sent the kids upstairs to get ready for bed and this is as far as our little curly locks made it.

We had a wonderful meal and shared the day with family and friends.  It doesn't get much better than that.  I can't help but wonder if somebody will be missing from our table next year?  Two years in a row with one empty place is almost more than I can bare. 

But we are looking forward with hope and faith and hanging on to family and friends.  We are ever thankful for a loving Heavenly Father and we know that he is mindful of us and our needs.  What a comfort that knowledge is to me. 

Holiday Birthdays, Dances, Hair Cuts and Boy Scouts

The Holidays are a big deal to our family and this year was no exception.  I would have to say that this year was especially important to us in light of our recent struggles.  We wanted to make sure everybody enjoyed the season. 

I am going to post about our Holidays in  three parts.  The first will be everthing that happened in between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Our Holiday season begins every year just a week after Halloween on November 7th which is Williams birthday.  I can not believe he turned 10 this year!

"Good Morning Buddy Your 10!"

Crystal and Spencer always decorate the stairs for the kids birthdays.  They LOVE running through the balloons and streamers in the morning.  Williams cat Fuzz beat him down.

10 Candles

Boy Scout Pack Meeting - William gets his Bear!

Flag Lowering Ceremony

I LOVE flag ceremonies.  I feel such love and patriotism for my country and it was especially sweet to see my Grandson salute the flag and take part in the ceremony. 

RaLee goes to the Winter Formal 

She is so beautiful!

She doesn't like going to dances with a date as much as she likes going with a group of girls and dancing with everybody.  She runs through boyfriends as fast as she changes clothes and that makes me happy.  She has taken my advice to heart.  "Don't get too serious in High School with one boy.  Date them all, learn what you like and don't like in a boy, and have FUN!" 

Spencer buckling her bracelet pretending to be her date and putting her corasge on.  He cracks me up and is always so kind and sweet.

Caden gets his first hair cut!  Aunt Crystal cut his hair.

Dad had to hold him still.  Cutting his hair was like trying to paint a car that's driving down the freeway!  He is such a wriggle worm!

All done and so happy!

Wayne turns 8!  And Arizona legalizes fireworks!  So mommy and daddy bought him a huge package of fireworks and he loved it.

8 candles

Outside for fireworks

DJ turns 24!  I sure do love my son.  I even love his thick, curly, crazy hair!

Crystal and DJ pose for the annual birthday picture under the Christmas tree.

Royal came over for DJ's birthday party and tried very hard to convince Caden that he is a nice guy.  Caden has never liked Royal.  We can't figure out why.  Is it his size, voice, or the hair on his face?  So Royal try's to gently hold him.  You can't see his face but Caden puckers up and immediately starts screaming.

Royal quickly puts him down on the floor and Caden just sits there staring at Royal and screams!  It's really kind of funny but it hurts Royals feelings.  All of the nieces and nephews love uncle Royal with the exception of Caden.

Even Nolan doesn't seem to mind him.

RaLee and Royal I really like this picture.

Wayne turned 8 and is so excited to be a boy scout.  William and Wayne got to go Christmas caroling with the scouts and they had so much fun.  William is in the red shirt holding the sheet music and Wayne is sitting behind him to the right in the plaid coat.

We didn't know what we were going to do with all of the chidren once school got out.  So we decided to do a Christmas craft everyday until Christmas Day.  They loved it! And it exhausted us!

Payten took her projects very seriously.

Crystal turned 31.  She doesn't like cake so she requested peanut butter cheese cake instead.

John Griggs turned 31 just 3 days after Crystal.  He loves teasing her during those couple of days that she is older than him.

That's it for all the birthdays.  Wow I'm exhausted just looking at all of it again.  It's a lot of work and definitely keeps us busy during the Holiday season but we LOVE it!  I'm so thankful for my family and my love for them grows daily.  My children are wonderful and are there for me supporting, comforting and loving me everyday. 

Nolan's Blessing

Would you believe that I have TOO many photos in my computer and that I ran out of space?  NOT me!  I guess 49,000 picture folders will do that!  So I couldn't blog because I couldn't post any photos my entire computer went nuts on me.  Luckily my sweet son in law, Spencer, knows computers and was able to fix it.  Now I have some additional space and two new hard drives I should be good for a while.  Alot has happened in the past couple of months and it was hard not getting to BLOG about it. 
Anyway I'm back and the first post will be about my sweet grandsons blessing.

We went to Coolidge on the 19th of December for Nolan's blessing.  He looked so handsome in his white suit.  He is such a good baby and I am so thankful for him.  I crocheted his blessing blanket and "OH MY GOSH" I had no idea that the pattern I chose was going to be so time consuming.  My heart would literally pound at times because I was afraid I wouldn't have it done in time.  BUT miracle of miracles I managed to pull it off and have it done 24 hours before he needed it! 
John was released as the Ward Clerk that day because they are moving to San Tan Valley!  I'm so happy that they are going to be closer to us and that we will get to see those sweet babies more often. Sometimes that hour long drive too Coolidge was just too far and I didn't get to see them as much as I would have liked.

John's parent's, Vaughn and Linda Griggs, flew in from Logan, Utah to be at the blessing and spend a few days with the family.  I seriously love and respect John's parents.  They are so kind and sweet and have raised an amazing family of 7.

Our Family- We missed the boys.  I can't remember if Royal was working or visiting family in Northern Arizona and DJ had to work.  They were sure missed.

Sweet baby Nolan with all of his beautiful hair.

Notice all of those little "puff balls" in his blanket? Those were tons of fun to make using fine baby yarn.  But so worth it!  I think the blanket turned out beautiful if I say so myself.

Isabelle was not about to look at Grandma and smile for the camera 

But she was more than willing to shower kisses upon her baby brother

A proud father

And a proud momma.  Notice her finger in Nolan's mouth?  He was hungry and didn't understand the fuss he just wanted to eat! 

Amanda looks so much like my mom.  Her blonde hair is exactly like hers.

Beautiful Family

Okay I detest pictures of myself BUT I was a trooper and let Amanda take a picture of me and for some crazy reason I'm posting it.....enjoy...haha

We had a wonderful day.  It's always nice to get together with family on such a joyous occasion.  The weather was beautiful, the kids had fun, the company was awesome and we topped it all off with a family dinner of creamy home made soups, bread, cheese cakes, cookies and fudge.  It was a perfect day for a perfect little boy.