Thanksgiving

One of the more positive things about a death in the family is it gathers the entire family together. Our Thanksgiving this year was more of a family reunion. We spent 4 days in Utah with lots of family. Many stories and memories of Grandma Dee were shared. It was a fun time and great to see family we don't get to see enough.

Grandma Dee
We love you and miss you. You will never be forgotten.

For Thanksgiving dinner, we had between 50-60 people in one house. This picture is just the upstairs! It was fun :)

Celeste at the cemetery. All the great and great-great grandchildren that are about 12 and under sang "I Am a Child of God" at the graveside services. It was so neat and so touching. I cried my eyes out. I wish I would have gotten a picture of it but there were so many other things on my mind and a sleeping baby in my arms.

Grandma Dee's casket

Grandma Dee had two daughters, 10 grandchildren, 27 great grandchildren, and 6 great-great grandchildren. We had to take the opportunity to get a picture of everyone. I believe we were only missing one or two people.

It was a wonderful Thanksgiving with so much to be thankful for. Hope you all had a great holiday, too.

In Loving Memory

Grandma Dee

October 18, 1915 - November 20, 2011

Ryan's Grandmother passed away yesterday morning. Playing cards was one of her favorite things to do. We would often play "Oh Darn" together as a family. I love this picture of Grandma. She has two of her favorite things with her: a hand of cards and a Pepsi! If you've ever played games with me, you know I can get competitive. Grandma Dee used to always say I was an angel, until she played cards with me a time or two. Then it got to the point she wouldn't sit by be while playing cards anymore. I usually beat her. We loved to play cards together! Some things she said to me while playing were, "That's too bad honey." Or "I take that back...you aren't an angel!" I will miss Grandma Dee. I will miss the conversations about World War II, her childhoood memories, and Grandpa Don. Grandma Dee was a fiesty, but strong woman. She was 96 years old and still lived at home. She passed away in her blue chair; right where she wanted to be. About a month ago she said, "I want to go spend Thanksgiving with Grandpa." She got her wish and I'm sure it was a joyous reunion with Grandpa and all her siblings. Grandma Dee will be missed but never forgotten. We love you, Grandma.

Our Halloween

To me Halloween is a fun kids holiday. What do kids like more than dressing up and candy? This year we had Tinkerbell and Peter Pan. My amazing mom made Celeste's costume and I made Caleb's. I may have a biased opinion, but I think they were the cutest Tinkerbell and Peter Pan ever!

THANK YOU MOM for making Celeste's costume!

I made her wings and shoes. I was quite impressed with how they turned out!

So cute!

I can't believe I actually did this, but for our ward Halloween party, Ryan and I dressed up as plumbers. This isn't a very good picture, but the only one we got.

We had a parade and marched across the stage. A friend of mine took this picture of me. I decided to not just walk, but to dance across the stage. How embarrassing.

I didn't get a picture of the back side, but as you can probably tell, I did have a "plumbers butt." I don't think I've ever had so many people staring at my rear end before. In my whole life!

Here are the little ones playing the cookie walk. Well, Celeste is eating her cookies and Caleb is rolling around on the floor messing up their numbers!

We won a prize for our costumes! And yes, I realize they misspelled funniest!

Carving Pumpkins! It was fun to see Celeste so excited about it now that she's older.

Caleb sat and watched us carve pumpkins and ate crackers!

Finished pumpkins

We got a lot of compliments on our pumpkins from Trick-Or-Treaters. Speaking of Trick-Or-Treaters, we had a record high this year of 250!

We had a fun Halloween and hope you all did too! Let the Holiday's begin!!!