All Together Again

 Can you tell it's been a bit of a whirlwind since Ellie got home in June?   I keep trying to get back into a good routine with blogging, but now the new school year has begun and our heads are spinning again!  Before I just throw in the towel on the neglected summer happenings, though,  I'm committed to do a little catch-up  before diving into the new life happenings.  After all, the main purpose of this blog is to capture the family memories.  

We had a very brief  window shortly after Ellie got home from her mission that all of our kiddos were able to gather here in Utah.   It wasn't long, but  it was magical.   

We went to the temple together...only missing Spence and the littles.  💕

We also got professional family photos taken (in the studio because the air quality was very poor at the time and we had a very short window everyone was in town).

In my happy place....

The professional photographer actually canceled our originally scheduled shoot for a ton of smoke in the air, after which we panicked that we wouldn't be able to find time to reschedule her in the brief window we were all together, so we had Heather do a quick photo shoot of us at a park near our home.  I actually really love both shoots for different reasons.... 

The girls (including Tia--Adam's girlfriend 💗)...

   

The boys...

Another shot with the kiddos...

A shot with Adam and Tia, whom we really like...

During this time, I also had all my sisters in town.  AnnaLisa lives in Virginia and Kristina lives in California, so it's not super often we all get to be together!   I loved having them all here, along with all of our kiddos, but it meant life was on turbocharge crazy for a while! 

We are really really happy to have our sweet girl back home again...

And I'm already looking forward to the next time we can all be together again.  

Stay tuned for more summer adventures coming soon (hopefully).

Eighteen Months Later!

 I won't lie...sending off each of my missionaries was a leap of faith.  We were so happy that a mission is what they chose and excited for the experience a mission would be, but not seeing your child for 18-24 months is HARD!   After doing it three times through before I thought it might be a little easier with Ellie, but that was not the case.   I think it was partially because she was my baby and partially because of all the health issues she's faced, but I was antsy as can be for the last few months of her mission.  It didn't help that about 15 months in she started having more seizures and  really didn't feel very well.  I honestly wondered if they would just send her home a little early, since it was so close to the end of her mission anyway.   But that's not what she wanted and after some telehealth appointments with her neurologist here and some medication adjustments, she started doing better.  

Then I fear I became a broken record for most of April and May.  If anyone asked me how I was doing, I would giddily say I was great because my missionary was coming home.   And then they would be surprised when I would tell them she wasn't returning until mid-June.  Those last few weeks felt like they took forever, but then one day I found my milk carton...

And then, after many distracting projects (one of the big reasons why this poor blog became neglected),  the day finally arrived.   Traffic was terrible and it was a mad dash into the airport with only a few of us actually making it in time, but she came home!   

It won't let me embed the video, but here is when I got my hug.   My sister was supposed to be the photographer for the moment, but she was caught in traffic, so it's a little chaotic.    

 https://youtube.com/shorts/9AzgDKP4BK4?si=uuDAxn8-4eb8gik7 

   

 

It definitely wasn't the big welcoming party we envisioned, but at least some of us were there...

The rest of the party was far enough away at that point that they just got out of the traffic and turned around.  We met them for dinner at Aubergine (Ellie's choice).   The big group included my Mom, sisters Heather and Kristina, brother Nate,  Kristina's boys, Adam, Spence, and Glen and I.   

Adam made a new Welcome Home sign for her to replace the one McKenzie made and we've had hanging up since he got home about 2 years ago.  

Denali was VERY excited to see her again...

A few days later, Cami and family, and Emma arrived...

And Heather took our photos after super smoky air and storms canceled our professional session...

Then Ellie had her homecoming talk and surprised us with this musical number.  

She had NEVER done a musical number or even sung in a choir before her mission, so the fact that she could/would sing a harmonic duet  shocked us in a happy kind of way!   I find myself listening to it a lot.   She also gave a beautiful talk and Bishop T. called Glen (calling him Bishop) up at the end to return her plaque to her.  I think it meant a lot to Glen to be a part of that, especially since many people in our home ward don't even know us since we've been serving down at BYU.  

Ellie had a cohort of mission friends there...

After the service we headed home for some snacks and socializing.   

We are so happy to have our girly home again and already sad that she'll be leaving us to head back to school again so soon!  

A Funeral, an Injury, and Another Unexpected Trip

A few weeks ago, my grandmother, Doris/Nana, passed away.   She was 96-years-old and had been super healthy and energetic up until just the last couple of years.  She lived in my parents' basement for about a decade and just moved to a care facility a few miles from our home after my Dad passed away in 2022.   Having her live with my parents meant I got to know her better than I ever could while she'd lived in Oklahoma City for all the years before.  

I got to know what an amazing cook she was...always offering to feed us...even in the last couple weeks of her life.   Her specialties were  hearty breakfasts, which usually consisted of bacon, eggs, homemade biscuits, and gravy.   Our family enjoyed many a delicious morning in Nana's lair while she spoiled us.   She is also very generous and always had a gift to offer to whomever came to visit her.  

My Dad was her oldest child (and I am the oldest child of my parents), so it was an amazing thing that we got a 5 generation shot before my Dad passed away.  It's not many people who get to meet their great-great grandchildren!   

She also got to meet Oliver...

   I felt blessed to be able to live close over the last few years, so I could drop by her care facility on a semi-regular basis.    I will never forget how she kept asking if we needed anything and wondering if she could make us some food up until the last week or two of her life.   

She had raised her family in Oklahoma City and lived there until about 2013 (?), when she came to live with my parents.    My granddad was buried there in OKC and it made sense to hold her funeral there in the city she called home for so many years. 

Four of my siblings and my mom were able to fly out to the funeral.  

  

It was amazing being able to see so many long lost cousins I hadn't seen in many years...  

And other extended family as well --aunts, uncles,  2nd cousins, and even Nana's 90-year-old sister {not shown}!

 I had arrived into town on Friday around  lunchtime and left just a few hours after the funeral was over on Saturday, so I could get back for my talk in sacrament meeting the next day.

We didn't have very long together, but I was grateful for the time we did have.   |

The day after the funeral, my Mom, sister, Heather, and brother, Matt, drove back to Dallas for their flights home.  Tickets in and out of Dallas were MUCH cheaper than from OKC, even with the car rental and hotel added in.  I almost certainly would have gone that route too, except I needed to get back for my talk.  It was there in Dallas my sister, Heather, had an epic fall on an uneven sidewalk at the hotel they were staying at.  It was a bad fall that involved a couple of broken bones, missing her flight home, and an emergency surgery the next day.  

Thus began a new crazy adventure that involved another surgery to remove all the crazy external hardware they placed to stabilize everything before the actual repair...

2+ weeks in the hospital and in-patient rehab center...

and some round robin trips to Dallas amongst us siblings to stay with her and help her out.    Matt took the first couple days, then AnnaLisa flew out, then I came for Monday to Friday....

And made sure to get myself and Heather some Torchy's a few times...

Then Kristina arrived later in the day I left to take the final shift and fly home with her (after a full two weeks of being stuck there)!   

IN amidst all this, we had to figure out how to get my Mom back home.  She was supposed to fly back with Heather, and since she gets easily disoriented, we knew there was no way she could navigate an airport by herself.   Eventually we arranged for to be accompanied straight to the gate in Dallas, then I met her in the airport in Provo, which thankfully is a very small airport.  

Mom was totally fine.   

Heather is now home.  

And life remains as off-beat as  a good plotline  for an  episode in Crazy Town!  

Another Thanksgiving in the Books!

I feel like I've been a little off my game with blogging lately and I'm here today to try to get caught up a bit by {finally} blogging about Thanksgiving.   What about the trip we took back in September, you ask?  Well, blogging about that, my friends, is going to have to wait for another day.  Maybe another year.  My bandwidth is not quite there for diving into trip photos yet.   

So, I'll start off the rundown on Thanksgiving with our Christmas decorations.      I've been feeling a lot more minimalistic this year and we didn't even put half of the ornaments on the tree this year.  I originally thought we might get a narrow tree for the dining room to display some of the other ornaments, but ultimately we left it more sparse.   Maybe we'll find a tree on clearance at the end of the season.    

I also tried to go a little lighter on decorating the display shelves.    It's probably still too much and it's definitely way too much brown on brown, but until I finally get around to painting these shelves, it is what it is.  It usually takes 5+ years of an item being on my home improvement to-do list before I even think about making it actually happen. Someday...perhaps!     

IN Virginia, we almost always hosted Thanksgiving at our house, but we haven't done it much since moving here to Utah, since my Mom was already filling that role when we arrived.  {Click here to see a glimpse of  past Thanksgivings}. It's been nice to just show up as a guest the past few years.   This year, however, my Mom and sister needed a break and we became the host house!   With all the hosting we've done with the YSAs the last few months, it didn't feel as stressful as it might have otherwise.   We had 2 of our 5 kids there {Spence and Adam}, my Mom, my sister, two aunts, one uncle, three cousins, the mother-in-law of my cousin, and four kids of my cousin.   We assumed we'd have some of our YSA ward members join the crew, but everyone we talked to already had plans, and the 1st counselor beat us to the punch with the two that didn't.    That was right about 20 people...just enough to keep things lively, but without it being that stressful.   

Glen  smoked the turkey, made mashed potatoes, and gravy.  Adam and I made the pies, which turned out dog ugly, but tasted pretty good anyway!    I need to keep working on my gluten free pie crusts!   

The rest of the Thanksgiving dinner was made by everyone else, which is an awesome way to do things. We played one round of Codenames and then I gave everyone a postcard challenge.   Everyone picked a random word and I went through my postcard stash after they left and sent them a postcard with that word on it.  No one stumped me, though a few people got close (all with food words).   

 In the end I actually found postcards with a pretzel....

pasta...

 and another with a taco on it...  

The words they gave me (besides taco, pasta, and pretzel) were iridescent, watermelon, tiger, purple, lake, candy, beach, pig, octopus, and heat.  And none of the rest of them were that hard.  

 Haha!   Yes, I'm aware that I'm quite a nerd when it comes to postcards.    Feel free to leave a comment and challenge me with your own word.  😆

Now, back to more Thanksgiving shenanigans. 

The boys also played a lot of Magic the Gathering...

And I was quite enraptured with the pics from Thanksgiving out East!   I really missed having any of our girls home and I am somewhat obsessed with Oliver and Lucie right now.  I really really need to see them again soon.   Isn't that flannel on Oliver the cutest?!   

 Adam gave a talk the Sunday after Thanksgiving, so I skipped out on part of 2nd hour and went to watch.   He spoke about becoming new creatures through Christ and did a great job! 

Last but not least, we did a peppermint ice cream taste test over Thanksgiving week.   

Last year, we did Tillamook vs. Umpqua and declared Umpqua the winner.   

This year we put BYU Creamery and Farr's peppermint up against Umpqua....

And Umpqua won the day again!  

 It's got a great creamy texture and by far the best peppermint flavor.    We'll look for more brands to test next year and see if any can unseat Umpqua!   

 

All in all, it was a great long weekend with my boys and it was nice not to have much on our schedule.  I've got a lot to be thankful for and you, my dear blog readers, are on that list!  Thanks for tuning in and have a beautiful holiday season filled with  peace and lots of love.