28 for Thanksgiving Turkey

Our Thanksgiving was great...there were 28 of us, and, somehow or other, we were able to find a spot for everyone to light. I brined two turkeys, and they roasted up nice and moist. And I cooked up a huge pan of cornbread dressing...just like Mother's. Everyone else furnished the trimmings...we had Jeannine's yummy squash, Jackie's homemade rolls, Amber brought a green bean casserole, Mie Kyong contributed a fruit salad (and she also has a wonderful talent of knowing how to jump in and get the pots and pans and kitchen cleaned up afterward...I appreciate her so much), Bob and Eugenie furnished pies, and Jackie also did a delectable dessert...I think it's called "chocolate ice cream sundae dessert." It all tasted so good. And I was exhausted when the day was over, but it was a good tiredness.

These are the cute table decorations that I planned to put on the tables. Sad to say, I was in such a dither, besides being at least one or two hours behind my planned schedule (the food was ready on time, however), and I was only able to decorate the card tables in the living room before time to eat. Guenther helped me a lot, and he would have been happy to finish the table settings for me, but I didn't ask him because I figured I would do it. Oh well...they are darling aren't they? Maybe next year.
Guenther does a great job with the turkey carving..

Jim Brown holds Freddie ( his and Mie Kyung's youngest boy).


Some shots of the family dining. I got a few more, but they were out of focus...guess I was hurrying around too much to get good photos.

early thanksgiving feast at david and tami's

We had an early Thanksgiving dinner at David and Tami's on Sunday the 18th because they will be in St. George on Thursday.


The food was delicious.
Emalise looks darling in the dress that her grandpa Terry bought for her.
McCall is wearing the cute necklace that Tami brought home to her from Hawaii where Tami spent last week with her mom, aunts, and sisters. I am amazed that she flew home this weekend and put together a dinner for us today.
We enjoyed a game of Apples to Apples. Drew gets some cards ready.
Mike looks on as Tami organizes.
Katherine helps Summer play the game.

Tami, Drew, Jordan, Matt with Kaiyan, Jennifer and her friend, Jason.
Drew holds Ellyn Mae. Grandpa Terry bought her pretty dress also.

Isn't Ellyn's hair ornament darling?

our new stove and goodbye party for jed

I have a photo of Jed when he was in Jr. High School. He was eating his breakfast and reading, and I thought it would be fun to take this one to put beside it.
I can't get over what a good painter Guenther is. Here he is painting a portion of the kitchen wall which used to be covered by a section of cabinet. I get paint all over me and everything else when I paint, and he does it so neatly and makes it look effortless.

This is our old stove. We loved it, but with so many red-burn days now, we couldn't get as much heat out of it as we needed. So we had a new natural gas one installed this week.

Some shots of our new Tree of Life stove.

Lindsay and Matt brought the kids over to say goodbye to their uncle on Thursday evening. Jed flies out tomorrow. I hope that he gets a little break when he gets back home.. he has really put in a full schedule of work while he's been here.

Emalise enjoying pizza with her Uncle Jed.

Emalise didn't forget to ask if we had Creamies for dessert.

This is Kai at three and one-half weeks. Lindsay says he is really a good baby. Already sleeps seven hours some nights.


This is a video of Ellyn Mae and Emalise singing the abc song. Pretty good...Ellyn will be 2 in January.

Saturday and...another wonderful event

On Saturday morning Guenther headed over to Bob's house to help him with a shower-surround. Earlier in the week, on Thursday, Guenther worked with Richard to put down paver stones on his patio. These activities are wonderful for him...give him a chance to be with his sons as well as use his building talent.
These geraniums are also one of Guenther's hobbies. Aren't they beautiful?
On Saturday afternoon, Brad's daughter, Chantel, was baptized by her uncle Clint. Another wonderful occasion.
I snapped this shot of Jackie and Jeannine before the baptism.

Leaf raking and other photos

We started the week by raking the leaves from the apricot tree.
Guenther takes the cover off the altima. We get drops of white from paint off the carport whenever it rains or thaws, so we just keep the car covered.

I got to tend the girls again this week while Lindsay and Kai went to see the midwife. What a joy it is to be able to have them come see me . Isn't this a cute photo of Ellyn with her beautific smile and her saggy little diaper showing? She wanted me to know that she was wearing tights like Emalise's. She said, "tights...ema." (And Lindsay later explained to me what it was all about.)
Here's Ema with her colorful tights.
A pensive Emalise.
Doesn't Ellyn have the sweetest smile?
Kai slept while he went with his mom.
More cute shots of Ellyn.
I snapped this photo this morning (Friday) as Jed was heading out to the hospital for his assignment. Today was a short day..7:30 a.m. till around 3 p.m. Tomorrow he has to be there for 25-28 hours. (7:30 a.m. until 12:30 or 1:30 the following afternoon)

Summer had the day off from school today, so she went with us to West Point. Here she is in the walnut tree.
We were able to get all these leaves picked up today. There's still plenty more from the cherry and the crabapple trees, plus all the ones in the backyard. But the weather was gorgeous, so it was fun.

scenes for the Brits in our family (Doug's family) as well as all the other out-of-staters who we love and miss.

Here are a few scenes of the traffic and smog which greeted us as we returned to Salt Lake from Moab. These pics were taken around 4:30 in the afternoon.