Christmas 2009

We had a fun Christmas Eve with all of the family last Thursday evening. Jamie and Kelly came late because of other family parties and Melinda didn't get to come at all because she had bronchitis - we missed her. We tried our hand at fondue and decided we need a lot more practice - I over heated the chocolate and the cheese was stringy ... so they didn't look very pretty but they tasted good - and I MISSED the yummy artichoke dip that Da was going to bring. It was an interesting Christmas Eve - every year I work hard to find just the right story or program for our family Christmas Eve and then every year we have the Christmas Story done by the grandkids. Well this year I just plain couldn't think of anything to do program wise, so we decided that we would just get together and eat and visit and then do the reinactment of the nativity.

We waited for Jamie and Kelly to bring their babies so we would have a baby Jesus and then we decided not to do the nativity at all - we had a fun time visiting and eating and thought that would be sufficient. But we missed the nativity --- it isn't what you call spiritual because the kids don't practice it in advance or anything - but it is definitely one of our family traditions... and it was missed. It also is a break in the talking and eating and I missed the chance to stop and take a moment and appreciate the reason for the Season -- the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. The evening felt incomplete because we didn't 'do' the spiritual part of it!

Another reason that the evening was incomplete was because we were missing Makae. We did get to see her though - a bunch of the family all headed down to North Salt Lake for a 2 pm visit with her. It was a wonderful chance to hug her and talk to her and watch her get excited over seeing many of the family that she hadn't seen for two months.

We also got to see Makae on the Tuesday before Christmas - her whole group put on a very fun musical program for us - This is Makae singing with the girls at Lifeline. She seems to enjoy the staff and the students and has adjusted to their routine very well. She is learning to make some good decisions with her life right now and she is in our every prayer.

It was so fun watching Shawn and Kristanne's boys lovingly hold their new little cousins. All three of them were so excited to be holding a baby. Of course the babies were the hit of the party with everyone - here we have Ethan and Cade holding Taylie and Brayden. Taylie even looks a little bit like Ethan!
Here's Cade - in his fancy new jammies which he LOVED!! With a sweet Brayden
Taylie and Brayden were held and held and held that whole Christmas Eve and Christmas Day - they had to be exhausted after having to entertain all their aunts and uncles and cousins and gramma's and granpas!!
Jace was really excited to try and hold Brayden. At first I held Jace as he held Brayden but it didn't take me long to realize he did a good job holding the babies. So we sat him on the floor and let him go solo. We had a fun evening with everyone - there is nothing I love more than spending time with my family. It gets a bit BUSY in my little house when all of us are there but there is no cure for that problem - its only going to get worse as the families get bigger. I am still waiting for my kids to buy me a bigger house!! ;-D


But we had a lovely evening and then the next day Ed and I got up early and were on the road to Lehi by 6:45 am so we could be there when Ben and Simon came down the stairs to see what Santa had brought.

This picture of Benjamin is priceless - the look on his face is exactly what Christmas morning is all about. The excitement and thrill of a new train set! One that he could make go all by himself!

this is our own version of Godzilla - as soon as Simon realized he could make his train go foward and back, he had to get in the middle of things - literally!
Here's Ben watching Da as she sets the train back on the track again - I bet Dirk and Da wish they had a nickle for every time they have had to do that in the last week!
Benji got a normal looking train and Simon got the 'front-runner'....it didn't take him long to figure out how to get the little person in the train out and then he discovered he could make the train go on the carpet as well as the track...the rest of the time we were there he was driving his train all over the carpet. We tried to get Ben and Simon interested in their gifts but nothing doing...all they could see was TRAIN!!

After we had spent 45 minutes at Dirk and Da's house we got back in the car and headed to Provo where Kecia had been waiting patiently (???) for us to arrive. She woke up Glenn when we pulled up (he was glad to get to sleep in an extra hour!)
this picture should be very last --- I had been taking pictures of Emma and her trucks - there she was running back and forth in her jammies and her high heels and watching the trucks go = she was sooooo excited. Then I looked over at her mommie... sitting there with her hat and scarf on, her stack of presents in front of her and holding up her new saute pan in HER jammies and with her new high heels on too! Like mother , like daughter!
Note princess Emma's glass slippers - she didn't want to have anything to do with her new princess dresses and jewelry and crowns but she put on her new high heels as she chased back and forth watching the trucks going.
She didn't touch the trucks or the tracks - she just ran back and forth and back and forth saying truck truck truck
Like Ben and Simon - Emma was so excited about her tracks and trucks she was not the least bit interested in the presents we brought or any of the other presents under the tree - she would look for a second and then back to the 'truck, truck, truck'.
This was what was waiting for Emma when she first came into the living room - a whole box full of princess dresses and high heels and crowns and jewelry ... NO THANK YOU, NOT INTERESTED.....TRUCK ......TRUCK.....TRUCK!


Thank you Kecia and Glenn and Dirk and Da for sharing Christmas morning with us. Ed just decided on Christmas eve that he wanted to watch the little ones and see and feel the excitement of Christmas morning. I wasn't too sure about it (after all, I didn't get to open my presents until 11 am when we got back home!!)

Christmas Day was a fantastic day as we got to spend it with the people we love, watching the excitement on their faces as they opened the gifts that we had lovingly picked out to give them. Christmas is such a special time - as we drove down South that morning we saw a cross walk above the freeway where someone had taken cups and created the message in the fence that said "HAPPY BIRTHDAY JESUS"

Mauri and Ira and their sweet kids got to our house about 12:30. Grandpa was anxious to give them all rides on the RZR but it was sooooo cold and his hopes of pulling them on their sleighs over behind the church house on the lawn there were dashed because of the ice mountain between the lawn and the parking lot. After they left I got a half an hour nap (which is a good nap for me) and then Shawn and Kristanne came with the three boys. While they were still here Jamie and Kelly and the twinners showed up. We had lots of good food all day long and again, lots of love and laughter. About five pm we followed Shawn and Kris down to Kelly and Terrie's house to see grandpa Merritt - All of Kelly's family were there plus Jeff and Teresa and Skye and Katie Jo - so again, we enjoyed the love and laughter of our wonderful family. Teresa and Jeff added so much fun to the group.

Ed and I were getting ready to leave when the phone rang and it was Chase calling from North Carolina. Kelly put the phone on speaker mode and we all sat around the table for an hour chatting with Elder Nielson. It was great - and it was a marvelous ending to a marvelous day. As he bore his testimony of Jesus and all that Christ did for us I couldn't help but feel an even closer tie to my Savior.

People complain about how commercialized Christmas is but I love it because it gives me a reason to put smiles on the faces of the people I love the very most. Christ is the reason - we ARE celebrating his birth day - Thank you Jesus for inviting us to such a wonderful birthday party!

Cute grandbabies

Okay - my last two posts have been serious - this is a fun one!! I finally got to go visit my youngest grandkids on Thursday of last week. I am going again this week. The kids were happy to see me but not real sure they wanted me to hold them right off but they warmed up real fast. After all it had been weeks since they had seen me.
Once Emma decided that I was actually her FAVORITE grandma (grin) she warmed right up and started talking to me. She is a serious conversationalist. Even though you may NOT have the slightest idea what she is saying you can carry on a wonderful conversation. We talked and talked - she would jabber at me and I would jabber right back. I haven't the slightest idea what I was telling her but she loved it!! And so did I!!

She was on my lap most of the visit though she would get down and walk over to something else and then come back. One time I was talking to Kecia and she was standing like this wanting to be picked up and put back on my lap and I swear she said ga-MAA , very loudly, demanding that I look at her and not at her mama and put her on my lap like I should have done two minutes ago!!

Then, after a couple of hours at Kecia and Emma's house I headed back north to Melinda's house to see my boys. Ben grinned at me but wasn't too sure about letting me pick him up and give him a hug . But he was happy to let me sit at the table with him and play with his play dough cookie cutters. I have never seen such a huge bag of cookie cutters - I think it said there were 100 of them!!!

I thought this serious picture of Ben was really sweet. I gave him a candy heart and he licked it for 45 minutes!! Until it was finally down to nothing. It would take him weeks to eat a bag full! Simon woke up and mama went off to do some exercise and go to the library - just some 'me' time for Da. So grandma took the boys into the living room and got out her balls of yarn.

Up to this point they have been Ben's delight. I get a ball of yarn out of the bag and hand it to him. He identifies it - i.e., Big blue ball; little yellow ball. The medium sized balls he just tells me what color it is. Then he hands it back to me to toss it and I usually toss the ball of yarn so it bounces off his head. Well, Simon was sitting on the floor quietly playing while Ben and I tossed all the balls all over the floor . What a surprise when we finished tossing all the balls and looked down at Simon and there was Mr. Simon having a ball...with the balls!

Yes - it took me 15 minutes to untangle that mess. What fun!
Here is a cute video of Simon - he was really laughing and playing and tossing the balls and having so much fun until I got the camera out. It takes about 30 seconds before he starts getting excited again.

Finally - here is Benjamin again - showing us what he candy looks like - I put this one in for Dirk so he could see how cute both his boys are.


Melinda got back just in time for me to head out the door. I didn't tell her in advance that I really needed to leave at 6 instead of 7 - I didn't want her to worry about hurrying back. She had gone for a nice long walk and then went to the library where she was able to sit and relax and read and enjoy some quiet time of her own. It tickled me to know that I was able to give her a little bit of 'down' time.

I don't know why I hurried so fast - I should have called Amee - one of her clients showed up almost an hour late and she was running behind all evening. If I had called her then Melinda and could have visited more. Oh well - maybe this week. I won't set another appointment for Thursday night, I promise.

Thanks guys for making grandma susan feel so loved.

December Update

Last Sunday Dirk and Da invited Kecia and Glenn over for Sunday dinner (since they didn't get to see each other on Thanksgiving). They invited Ed and I too and we went down to Lehi for a delicious dinner (you should try her cinnamon lasagne!! DELICIOUS!!) Then we moved downstairs to visit. Pretty soon we found outselves in the playroom so the kids (??) could play.

Grandpa Ed is the designer and builder of the fancy towers seen in the foreground of this picture.


Here's Simon enjoying all the attention!!
Ben and Glenn were fascinated with the dinosaur puzzle - they played with it for a good 30 minutes!



Emma is enjoying the family party too - (take note of the cute outfit - how many babies do you know that wear satin onesies!!

I gave Kecia her birthday present that night since I had already given Kelly his and we wouldn't be having a birthday party per se for them until Christmas eve.

Now we are back in Layton - this is my tree this year... and who needs Santa to come with this load already under the tree!

We bought this cute display after Christmas in 2006 and then in 2007, since we were in New York for ten days from the 10th through the 20th of December we didn't set up our outside decorations. So this year we had a NEW decoration to our front yard !! And it is sooooo CUTE!! The picture doesn't really give you the full effect. They are much brighter and more sparkly in person.


Here is my cute snowball - sad to say it doesn't blow the snow too well anymore but its still cute.

Here is a full view of our yard this year.

And finally - last but not least - here is what it looks like all together.

Merry Christmas

Another visit to Provo and Lehi

I blogged about Wednesday - our Relief Society Visiting Teaching Conference (its two blogs down, just keep scrolling) and I blogged about Friday - going to see the movie Twilight, but I left off the most important day - Thursday. I drove down to Provo and then back to Lehi for my weekly playdates with my three youngest grandkids. I need to make playdates with my older grandkids too!


Anyway, here is Ben - and his new toy. I bought it for all the grandkids and accidently left it at Ben's house. I have now decided I want the green spiny ball back but I will find another worm to share with the rest of the grandkids. I am sure I can find one at Flying J. I bought it on the way to Beaver two weeks ago at a gas station. This spiny orange thing is about a foot long and has an lcd light inside of it that rolls from one end to the other. It turns on with action and if it sits more than a minute, then it turns itself off. When it is on, it flashes the light through the orange body and Ben loved it. He played with it for 20 minutes --- light on, light off, light on, he would say over and over again.


Here is Simon - he can sit up on his own very well. He is downstairs in the playroom - I sat behind him on the cushions for a half an hour until I realized he didn't need my protective arms close by ready to catch him. He is the sweetest little guy and his grin is just adorable - what is Dirk going to think when he sees and holds him ... don't forget the tissues on Tuesday!

We were down in the playroom so Ben could play with the play doh. Ben's idea of playing with play doh is to take it out of the can and put it back in and put the lid back on. He goes from one color to another to another. Of course he knows the colors of each - such a talented kid for only being 2 years old !!

I was playing with Ben and got out my camera and Simon grinned the cutest grin so I turned the camera on and started videoing Simon and Ben quickly brought my attention back to what he was doing. So here you have video of Ben and his play doh - you can hear him tell me the colors very quietly...and then I turn to Simon and got some really cute video of him. Now that he is sitting by himself he sees something he wants and stretches for it. I think he will be crawling in another month to six weeks. Lets hope for Melinda's sake he doesn't start crawling until after the Christmas tree is DOWN!


I have tried for six hours to download this video and its not working. I will try again another day.

O f course I got some cute pictures of Emma too - she was sleeping when I got there and I got to get her up from her nap. She was so excited to see grandma Susan. Her mama hadn't gotten her dressed yet and her hair wasn't in its normal cute bows but she was darling anyway.


I really liked this softness of this picture even though you don't have a good view of her face. Her hair is growing so long and is such a warm pretty color.


I also had a fun visit with Kecia and with Melinda that day. I hate the fact that Dirk is so far away but it is so nice to have a good excuse to drive down to Utah county and see the babies. They grow up so fast...I am thankful I have a chance to share in their lives.

Cute babies

I went south again yesterday to Lehi and Provo. Fun visit with Kecia and Da - and lots of play time with Emma and Simon and Ben.

Benji is growing up so fast. I love how green his eyes look in this picture. Must be the shirt. He was having a rough day today - he is trying to get three new teeth at the same time. OWWW! We got to watch the second DVD of Monsters Inc - it was fantastic. The outtakes were hilarious and all of the information on the story line and story board. It kept Simon and Benji and I entertained for the couple of hours that we watched. Melinda had a chance to go to the temple and I got to play with the boys.

Simon was sitting in his Bumbo just grinning at grandma. He is such a sweetie. While we were watching the movie he just got softer and softer as he lay his head on my shoulder and slept for about an hour. I don't think there is ANYTHING more precious than the feel of a sleeping baby in your arms.


I hit Provo first and spent a couple of hours with Kecia and Emma. Kecia and Glenn have been busy painting the lower cupboards and haven't replaced the magnetic closures on them yet. Emma has a favorite cupboard that she empties out for her mom on a regular basis. She was so excited to see Granma and was just full of her cute grins. Her mom and dad have just discovered how much fun playing with bubbles can be. Thus the video

Turn your head sideways!!

I was going through some older pictures and came upon this cute video of Ben and the yarn balls - he still gets excited when I show up at his house with the BALLS! I think I had problems downloading it before or maybe I didn't try because it was sideways. But since this is a blog just for family you all won't care.

A day with Da

I spent Thursday and Friday in Lehi visiting with Da and playing with the boys. We went to Thanksgiving Point where Ben got to ride on the ponies (new word) and laugh at the goats. He played with the goats for 30 minutes - running back and forth between the two cages and laughing at them . He was totally unimpressed with the fact that it was the "Halloween Boo" with fun clowns making balloons, ring tosses and free cookie decorating booths. The weather was great and Mr Simon really enjoyed his afternoon out in the sunshine. That night I got to watch the boys while Melinda got cleaned up cute and headed out to book club. She brought me home a delicious hot cinnemon roll which I gobbled up - half that night and half the next morning!


Friday morning the boys slept in. We sent Melinda off to get the oil changed and make a few other stops (it is SO much easier just getting one person in and out of the car, rather than trying to buckle and unbuckle two cars seats plus your own,,,right DA? ) I called her while she was out and sent her to a few more spots looking for surgical tubing. When I first told her what we needed she said "WHAT?" I thought - she's been married to Dirk for almost THREE years and she doesn't know what surgical tubing is??? WOW!! We needed it for the juicer but none of the three drugstores she went to had it. While she was gone, Kecia showed up with Emma to bring back the canner (Emma's drum!) and we proceeded to can 8 qts of tomatoes and 6 qts of grape juice.

Here you see Simon helping with the canning. Ben was taking a nap and Simon wanted to be a part of the fun. He is demonstrating the proper way to insert your foot into the rack for best tangling purposes. You will also note the firm hold he has on the rack and he wasn't really happy with grandma when she decided she needed to use the canner and didn't want to share her toy with Simon any more.


This week Melinda got to keep the tomatoes (last week they were Kecia's and the two of them each got 3 qts of grapes - thanks to Kristanne for her grapes. The juice ended up being a real pretty purplish pink because they were a combination of concord (purple) and red grapes. We were able to pick out the green grapes and eat them. I cut up a whole plate full of green and red grapes for Ben and then he decided he didn't want them. So I fed them to Emma. She liked em!



Finally - I took this video of my youngest three grandkids. Ben had been tossing Elmo around saying Melmo, Melmo so I got out my camera. Of course then he stopped and got really interested in the movie he had been watching. No grand pictures but cute kids anyway!!

Visiting the Grandkids

In the last couple of days I have gotten to see almost all of my grandkids and I have loved the hugs!! I missed Jerod when I stopped at Mauri and Ira's and poor Mickie was too sick when I stopped at Kristanne and Shawn's house. In fact, they say she is really contagious so I am extra glad I didn't go give her a hug.

Today I drove down to Provo and had lunch with Kecia and Emma at their house. Kec had leftover bacon carbonera and it was delicious. Of course Emma was full of smiles and laughs. She entertained grandma for a good hour and a half. This is a picture of the newest Mary Kay representative demonstrating how nice the skin creams are!! (Also great for chewing on!!)

Then I headed for Lehi where I got to play with Simon and Benji - Simon is so responsive and has the cutest grin and ...GREAT BIG BLUE EYES TOO!!!

What is it about this latest batch of babies and blue eyes??

I took my bag of yarn balls with me because Ben just loves to play with the BALLS - he spent a good hour taking the balls out of the bag one at a time and tossing them and then bringing then back and putting them back into the bag and then repeating it all over again. Also, every time he brought a ball back I would pick it up and rewind the hanging string ...after a while Ben starting 'rewinding' the balls of yarn himself - only he failed to realize that he was supposed to be winding the yarn AROUND the ball!! It was so cute watching him wind and wind and wind!!

Then he decided that the balls needed to bounce down the steps. But HE wouldn't toss them down the steps - that was grandma's job. So, he would bring the ball to me and then say 'stairs' and run over to the steps where I tossed the ball so it would bounce down the stairs.

Note all the balls of yarn all over the floor. While I was babysitting the boys a neighbor child brought over some zuchini and cucumbers for Da, and he asked me WHY there were balls of yarn all over the floor. :-)

I must apologize for the poor quality of the picture taking...I need to practice this art a lot more !!

Videos from the swim park

A day at the water park

I drove down to Lehi today to pick up Melinda and Simon and Benjamin so that we could head into Provo and meet Emma and Kecia at the Veteran's Park. Da wasn't feeling really well so Ben and I went by ourselves and Kecia and Emma met us there. It is a really really fun water park in the middle of Provo. Nice and clean and BIG. It had a beautiful swimming pool, water slides and a fantastic area for little ones to play in the water. Ben and I sat and splashed in the wading pool waiting for cousin Emma to show up and then all four of us had a great time.





Aunt Kecia took Ben over to the deeper water (all of five inches) and let a bucket of water spill over the top of both of them. Benji loved it.
meanwhile Emma is having a great time herself - look at those teeth!!
By the time they closed the pool at 4:45 Ben was soaked head to toe. He didn't give me a minutes trouble all afternoon - never once cried for mama, and just entertained himself either splashing in the water or running under one of the little fountains. It was a special day. Every so often he would run up to me and say "malmo" which is his name for grandma. I loved it.

We went back to Kecia's house for dinner and I returned him to his mom safe and sound about 7:30 that night, a teensy bit sunburned and one little scrape on his toe that I have no idea where it came from. We made some memories this day.

Benji watching Dirk on video

Last time I was in Lehi Melinda mentioned something about Daddy to Benji. He immediately insisted on going downstairs to the computer and watching the various video clips Melinda had taken of Dirk playing with Benji before he left for Ft Lewis. Benji was so cute to watch - he would get so excited watching his daddy - he would point and laugh and say daddy over and over again. I finally got my camera out to catch his actions but by then he had watched all six or seven of them and though he still enjoyed it he wasn't as excited. But I thought I would post this so you could see how a little boy is enjoying his daddy even though said daddy is far from home. I told Dirk he needed to have his fellow soldiers video him doing mundane things through out the day so he could send the video's to Benji...he does love watching you!

I am putting this second video clip so that Dirk can see how cute Melinda looks and how quietly Benji will sit and watch these clips of his daddy !! Dirk let me know if these are too difficult to watch or if you want me to take and blog more of them.

Rough Duty

Well I am about at the end of my second tour of duty here at Melinda's...its really a rough life. I have to play with Benji and tickle his belly and read him stories and help him stack blocks!! I also have to put up with cute grins and sudden hugs. I don't know if I can handle all this hard work. I have been working on my hats that I make to give away and Benji loves playing with the balls of yarn. He has discovered which of them are especially soft and he will stop and rub it across his cheek before he tosses it. He decided it was great fun to try on the hats after grandma finished making them. Right now Benji is over at aunt michelles playing with Erin. FUN!! Since Benji has had a cold and cough since Sunday, it was decided to keep the boys apart as much as possible so he goes and plays with his cousins and has a great time. Then comes home for lunch and play time with mom and then a nap and more play time with mom and then back over to Chelle's house.



When Melinda is playing with Benji then I have to hold the new baby and watch him look at the world with those great big dark eyes... or watch him sleep so very peacefully. He is such a good baby - he is eating every 2-3 hours and then he lays and looks for a while (unless of course he simply goes to sleep while nursing, since that is such hard hard work). One thing he doesn't like is for mommy to unwrap him and change his diaper...that is sooo cold! We have gotten to see his smile a few times (mommy calls it gas, Grandma calls it talking to the angels!) and it is a beautiful smile. His lips remind me of Mauri's perfect lips. Beautifully shaped. Did you know that a dentist told me once that Mauri had a perfect smile! She was 3 years old then!

So I'll head home today and find out what they are doing with the property behind our house and where the hospital is going to be built. Thursday is Jill's play, Friday Ed and I are heading to St George to go to the temple with some other ward members and then Sunday I will come back to Lehi and work sooo hard.

Our Soldier is now at Ft Lewis Washington

Well - he has gone - on a big plane in the sky. Actually we left as he was still walking up to the plane with about 150 soldiers ahead of him as they slowly loaded for the flight since Boo needed a diaper change and had been as patient as an 18 month old could be. He was ready to be out of there. Dirk had thought they would be traveling in one of the big green C140's but they had a commercial plane parked out in front of the hanger that we didn't see until they opened the huge doors of the hanger.

Dirk and Da did really well - I think they both have primed themselves for this day and stayed in good spirits knowing that breaking down would only hurt each other. They have so much love for each other and I started to cry a little when Dirk was giving Benji this huge hug before he headed out the to tarmac. Of course Benji didn't have any idea as to why he was being squoze (is that a word?) to death but his daddy is going to miss him so very much.




They had all 319 soldiers plus their families in a huge hanger - thank heavens they had the doors closed and it was actually warm! Da said that when they got there at 7:30 the place was still cold but when we got there about 8:15 it was warm enough to take off the coats. Benji had a great time running around in a corner of the hanger where there weren't many people. He had found some moveable steps when Grandma Porter was chasing him and when he headed back 15 minutes later a couple were sitting on them...he gave them the strangest look - like "what are you doing sitting on my toy?"
There was a little girl about 3 years old all dressed in desert cammo's like her daddy, right down to the boots!! She had a cuddly teddy bear that Boo thought should be his...finally he decided he would be happy with his fish. As you can see in this picture there were lots and lots of people there.

Dirk and Da and Benji were there of course. I rode down with Da's parents, Marilyn and Orson. We stopped at the Fairgrounds on 10th West and picked up Da's brother Mike. Kelly was going to come but couldn't make it. I felt bad later when I realized we went to Denny's after we left the airport and I bet Kelly could have met us by then. Of course, Dirk was not with us by then. Da's sister Michelle and her husband Mike came with their three kids to be family for Mike's cousin Kidsy who has been living with them for several months. She was flying out with the 3pm group so they all came to lunch with us and her mom and two sisters joined us at Denny's.

There was a huge gorgeous flag hanging in the hanger - with a podium in front for several speakers - they all kept their remarks short. The Commander of the 319th was there and talked about how thankful he was for our MI Battalion when his soldiers were sent to Iraq and Bosnia. It was the MI battalions job to make life safer for his soldiers and he just wanted to say thanks. The governor even showed up and talked about how special these soldiers were and what a great job thing they were doing. He said that he had been in Washington DC yesterday and had talked to the Admiral in charge of all our troops over there and told him what a special bunch we were sending to them and that he wanted to make sure that their leaders would be watchful of them and make sure they appreciated the caliber of men and women we were sending. The dignitaries all went out to the plane so that they could shake hands with each soldier as he departed. That makes two governors that Dirk has shook hands with as a soldier.

Marilyn called me abut 6:15 and said that they had just seen Dirk on channel two. I guess they were interviewing the chaplain and his family and then scanned the group and got a good pic of Dirk. I am anxious to see if it is on the ten o'clock news.

To end on a happy note - while the dignitaries were talking they called a female soldier up out of the crowd and had her stand next to her CO. Then they called another soldier up and after he saluted the CO he knelt down in front of the female soldier and proposed - ring and all - let me tell you, the TV cameras came running fast and so they will probably highlight that bit of happiness on each of the channels tonight. It was fun and it gave us a chance to have a giggle when we most needed it. She said YES!

To Dirk I want to say I LOVE YOU. I will miss you and I am so very proud of you. I know that grandma Nielson is the one that taught you to love the flag, and your dad is the one that set the example for military service, but hopefully there is a little bit of me in there saying Do your best, do your duty (maybe that is the scoutmaster speaking there!) and COME HOME SAFE AND SOUND TO US ALL! You are a special man, with a special spirit. Be proud of who you are. You have a terrific little family that loves you very much - we will help make the year go by more easily for them.

I'm Back!!

Don't you just love the pout on this girls face?

It seems like it has been forever since I have had a computer to blog with...so its great to be back. Saturday we had a farewell party for Dirk at Jamie and Kelly's and I got some cute pictures. I am also posting the ones from Imperial Valley on the gallery at Willden.org if you want to see them. I haven't gotten Eds from his camera yet - we both took a bunch of pictures, with him walking down Shank Road and taking pictures from that view and I walked up Hwy 115 taking pictures from that view. But here are some fun pictures from Saturday.









First off is this darling one of Benji boo - He was in fine form that night and was so fun to watch.




Emma had lots to say that night...isn't she adorable?






Kelly










Dirk and Da










Kristanne




Edward (I really like this picture - Jace asked me to take the picture of him as he rolled down the stairs, but I really think its a great picture of Ed)
















Cute picture of Jerod






















Here are a couple of cute pictures of Adrie holding Emma - looks like she likes getting kisses from Cousin Adrie!!