It's after Dad's birthday...

...SO we can decorate for Christmas!!! Summer and I had fun getting out all the Christmas stuff and deciding where to put it in our new house. It was easy to figure out which kid got to put the star on the tree...

We might have got a little carried away though, just ask Doug.

He was a good sport though. Hope you guys are having fun getting ready for Christmas too!

Giving Thanks

We found many reasons to give thanks this year. It started out with a great Schnike by Krista on Summer. Krista surprised her by showing up Monday night instead of Wednesday morning. It was a grand reunion.






NOT a picture of the Summer/Krista reunion. Just a random picture that we have...oh...300 just like it.


We headed to LA Tuesday night (only Krista and Summer actually got there, Bill and I made it early the next morning though.) We had lots of fun hanging out with Jamie and LaDon and Ally. This is how we spent Thanksgiving...yeah, it was rough, but someone had to do it.


(That's Kris and LaDon in the surf)


Ally is half mermaid, she LOVES the ocean.




Summer had a great victory on the climbing rope. If you look close at the rope on the right, it's Summer on her way down. LaDon and Krista had both struggled to TRY and reach the top. Summer walked over and swoped up that rope like it was an elevator! All our jaws were on the ground, especially Krista and LaDon.





Summer and Krista were looking forward to the great dinner.



Ally was thinking, "Man, I have some weird Aunts."





Bill and I left for Virginia late that night. Sadly, Jamie and LaDon had to leave for the funeral of their friend who died so tragically in Utah. Kris and Sum returned to Colorado. They did get to go see all the lights at the LA temple. We are grateful for temples and knowing that families are forever.




We met up with Charina (who was in Virginia for Thanksgiving) and Jimmy and his parents in Washington DC at the temple. It was just the sweet and peaceful experience that we needed. It reminded us of what's important in life and how extremely blessed we are at this Thanksgiving and always.

Prediction Race 09

This is our third year in a row to go to the prediction race. The point of the 5K is to predict how long it will take you to run the race, leave when there is that much time on the clock and then in theory everyone in the race finishes when the clock hits zero. It's really fun. The winner is whoever is the closest to their predicted time. This was Summer and my first time running in this event, we usually just watch. Here we are before the race. Summer's prediction, 27:22. Mine (I just walk) 40:50.

And the winner was, not us. But of all the people we knew who entered the race the winner was...Vickie Roy! I came in with 4 seconds to go so my time was 40:46. Summer came in at 27:37. So we were both very close to our predictions. It was a fun way to spend a Saturday morning.

A Trip to LA

Well, this week I took a trip to Los Angeles. I met up with Charina for a celebration cause it was JAMIE'S BIRTHDAY!!! We spent most of it in the car cause that's what you do in LA. But, we did get to go shopping and eat some great food. The greek food was amazing! Jamie and LaDon have a wonderful apartment. And best of all we got to see ALLY.

Her morning hair is the best, but is followed closely by her, "I'm pooping face."

Her little brother is growing along and Jamie looks pretty amazing for 6 months pregnant.

One of our intended jobs while in LA was to take some bridal pictures of Charina at the LA temple (just a couple miles from Jamie's house) but when we got there, there was a whole army of volunteers putting up Christmas lights EVERYWHERE!!! We managed to get a few pictures without light hangers in them but we'll have to try again in Washington DC. Here's a sneak peak of Charina as a bride.

Made ya look!!!! Of course I can't show you that, but rest assured she is gor-ge-ous!!!!

So, I went to Virginia last week. It was so beautiful with all the leaves changing colors and everything. I ran across these two kids and thought, maybe I'll take their picture...not that there was a lot to work with...


Plus the photo shoot "ended" before it began as Charina got stuck in a tree.

But as we pressed on, the pictures were a little stiff and stuffy.

But then we discovered the magic ingredient to make great pictures!

Jimmy tells me, it was their first time kissing, ever! Imagine that and I caught it on film!

With enough incentive we had no problem taking some really great pictures.

So, I would consider it a great success! Thanks for the great time Willis family!

Homecoming from the Summer Perspective!

So i finally got around to making a blog about HOMECOMING! here it is!
(this pictures are in backwards order but its the best i can do!)


We had a mormon dance at the Kerr's house and they have this half window kind of thing in thier kitchen that looks into the living room. That's Korey and i dancing in the living room!


The Kerr's have this freaky looking guy for Halloween, that everyone was taking picture with!


This balcony looked out over the living room


After we ate dinner we went to the Miller's house and made dessert. Korey and I made a ice cream dog with an orange as the head.

The weather was SO cold and SOOO icy that Korey got his tounge stuck to the car antena! haha!.....well not really stuck...just pretending to!

This was at the begining of the date, after korey and I had taken a nice slide/waltz down the drive way!

Homecoming was SOOO fun1 I had a blast. I am really grateful I got to go plus nothing can be better when you have spartan shoes, home made, like these:

A favorite Past time

Since we don't have a very exciting life I thought I'd just throw in a blog about one of our fun things we do after dinner every night. Dad and I play a game of ping pong. We are getting kind of good at it and welcome all challengers. Summer is too good and so when we get to her level we'll start a tournament. There is one thing that is true in ping pong and in all things...Greed will get you every time.

Summer fun in the fall

Summer had her Young Women in Excellence this past week. It was a safari and Summer (she's in the presidency) was a guide. That's her on the left.

She shared a display of her great decorating. She did her room and bathroom. They are the only cute rooms in our house.

It was homecoming week this past week too. Summer created a great shirt for blue and green day and I made her a cool skirt. She was awesome and had these amazing blue and green shoes she made. I'm sure she'll add more to the blog later.

She went to the dance (Mormon style) with Kory MacGill. They made a cute pair of...

ICESKATERS!!!! The weather was like this--

And so when Kory came to pick up Summer. I had made a "red carpet" out of some moving blankets we had in the garage but they weren't quite long enough and just putting one toe on our very steep and very slick driveway and away they went, twirling, whirling, spinning and sliding till they landed still on their feet at the bottom in the street. I wished I would have been videoing it. I would have won America's funniest videos for sure. It was great.


Just before the fall.