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!!!

Pumpkin Patch

For Family Home Evening Monday night, we went to the pumpkin patch! We weren't out there for long because it was getting dark, but we did manage to find two pumpkins perfect for us!

Caleb loved riding in the cart!

with our pumpkins
Celeste enjoyed running around trying to find the perfect pumpkin!

Starting our search...

I love when we get to do fun things as a family like this! :)

Extended Family

Last weekend all of Ryan's siblings came into town to celebrate Grandma Dee, Amy, Lori, and Mya's birthdays! We took advantage of having everyone together to get a picture of everyone with Grandma Dee.

On the couch in the middle is Grandma Dee. It's Ryan's Grandma who just turned 96 years old. She still lives at home by herself. However, we don't know how much longer she'll be with us on this earth. We are grateful for Grandma Dee and the many years we've had with her!

Back Left to Right: Dana (Ryan's mom), Lori, Amy (yes, they're twins), Ryan, Caleb (who was not happy), Damon
Front Left to Right: Mya, Dylan, Jaden, Grandma Dee, Brody, Celeste, Kyler

Here are all the Great Grandchildren of Grandma Dee's from our family
(She has many more from Ryan's Aunts family)
I had to take advantage of the beautiful fall leaves in Ryan's moms backyard. It was a perfect photo shoot opportunity for me! :)
These are Ryan's sisters triplets. From left to right is Brody, Dylan, Kyler

All the cousins from Ryan's family

Caleb didn't want his picture taken. Here's Daddy and Caleb

And Celeste who has a hair cut scheduled!

We Love Family! It was a fun weekend with everyone here!

Newborn Photo Shoot

Monday night I got to take pictures of my sisters newborn. Isn't she adorable? She was born on October 5th.

Kara made this diaper cover and bow earlier in the day. She's super woman!

My sister is amazing. She made this outfit for her to come home from the hospital in. So cute!


And of course, big sister had to pose for me too!

Dad is a big Chicago Bears fan. I think this is a pretty cute picture, even if you don't like the bears!

Thanks for letting me pull out my studio lights and backdrops Kara! I had a blast!

Update!

I am so sorry it's been so long since I've posted on our blog! I have no excuse except for there's nothing to post about! Do you ever feel like your stuck in a rut and nothing changes? That's how I've felt lately. The only thing that changes is our children are growing fast!

Celeste

She is once again attending her Grandma's preschool this year and loves it! She's so smart and is about to start reading! Her scores qualified her for the accelerated preschool so that's what she's attending, even though she's 1-2 years younger than the rest of the students in her class. She loves to learn and we love her! This picture shows her....hair usually a mess and all! I do it every morning but it's so fine it doesn't stay in...

Caleb

Although he was a bit slow, Caleb is finally walking! He had been taking steps for a while but just started walking everywhere about a month ago (when he was close to 15 months). And what comes with learning to walk? Bumps and bruises! If you look closely, you can see his bruise/scrape on his forehead and nose. That was from a face plant onto the cement. He's got such a cute personality and is so much fun. We love him!

On September 17th, Ryans little brother got married. This is the wedding I had the wonderful opportunity to photograph. I learned so much doing it and was glad I got the experience. Here are a few of the pictures from the wedding.

I thought Celeste made a pretty cute flower girl! :)

Celeste is a Daddy's Girl for sure!

Other thoughts: Why doesn't anyone comment on blogs anymore? Are blogs going out of style?! I've been trying to comment on other peoples blogs because I know how much I like comments. I'd blog more if I knew people even read it or cared!

Also...I got a new computer a while ago and I can't blog from it. For some reason blogger isn't compatible with Windows 7 or whatever it is I have on it. Anyone else have this problem?