Two Birthdays in One

January 10th is a pretty special day for me. Twenty Five years ago today my first little girl, ShelleyAnne was born. (She was my first girl, but she had two older brothers.) What a joy she has been to me all these years. I love it that she is not only my daughter, but one of my very best friends. It is fun to be able to have someone you can talk to almost every day, and never run out of anything to say. So I say Happy Birthday to Shelley!

And....two years ago today, my first grandchild was born. . . my sweet Ellee Kate. How I love this little girl! I didn't know that grandparents loved their grandchildren as much as their own children, but I know that now! Elle has been so much fun for me. I do miss her terribly now that she and her mommy (Kara) and daddy (James) are living in Memphis while her daddy is going to dental school. I love you Elle! Happy Birthday!

Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving we stayed home. But it certainly wasn't empty. We enjoyed having Justin, Tessa, Shelley, Brad, Noah and Megan with us. We also had my brother, Tim's, family join us. Shelley actually came a few days early and helped me, while I enjoyed having Noah here. Here are some photo's of the fun!

Rachel and Taylor peeling the potatoes.

Noah got in trouble. Grandpa sent him to the dog house :(

This is everyone but TT who is taking the picture.

Noah and Aunt Joye

Nanny watched our next door neighbor's father bring his horses and unload his buggy. He absolutely could not contain himself. He HAD to have a ride. After wandering around outside with uncle Kelly for awhile he kindly offered a ride. This is one happy cowboy!

We missed those of you in our family who couldn't make it this year. We love you, and are very thankful for all of you!

Elle, Kara, James and Tennessee

I spent the first week of October visiting Kara and her sweet family in Tennessee! I had originally hoped to find a decent priced flight between $300-$400, but Shelley clued me in to a promotion where I got a ticket for $150! Yippee - so I bought two! I am going out again in December with Shelley and Noah.

Here is my cute family in Tennessee.

Elle is pulling her funny face!

While we were there we went to the kids museum in Memphis. It was awesome! We took Elle to the Dental Office where she learned all that her daddy is learning in dental school.

She learned how to put teeth in.

She is now professionally qualified to be a dental hygenist!

Her favorite part of the museum was the three year old sized Kroeger's Supermarket.

She had a blast picking out her own food and loading up her very own cart.

It looks so good it's hard to believe it's all plastic.

We had a hard time getting her out of the supermarket without the groceries. She thought she could take them home.

Grammy took her on a Police-Motorcycle ride.

This picture captures the real essence of why Kara wanted to buy this house.
We went to Huey's for lunch.

There's a hole-in-the-wall in downtown Memphis called 'The Barbeque Shop'. Mmm good barbeque! It is tradition that everyone blows a toothpick through their straw to poke it in the ceiling. There are a bagillion toothpicks up there. I got mine in first try!

I made some fun memories with the kids while I was there. Elle had her choice to sleep with Grammy on the blow up matress, or in her own bed. Guess what she chose! (I had fun snuggling with her.)

On one of our long drives I was sitting in the back seat with her. I started dozing off. Every time my eyes would close she would yell out "Grandma!" until I would open them. She didn't care if I was playing with her or not - she just didn't want my eyes to close.

We went to the Memphis Zoo one day (you can see pictures on Kara's blog).

I'm excited to go back in December.

Pumpkin Patch

Kelly and I traveled to Boise the last weekend of September. We love visiting our kids! While we were there we went to "The Pumpkin Patch" with little Noah B. It was kind of late, so it was getting dark and the pictures didn't turn out so great. But here they are!

This is a kid sized "hay maze". Noah was leading Grandpa around.

We love it when Megan comes along!

Brad and Shelley posing in the sunset.

And below: it was getting cold, so Megan offered her shawl to Noah. He was such a doll all snuggled up next to Grandpa.

We bought Noah his first pumpkin which he promptly called a "ball" and threw it on the ground.

Below: Shelley had gone to an 80's ball earlier this year and wore this dress - she was taking a picture of Megan wearing it to put on EBay. We decided it was way too cute, and would look good in 2008 as well. Maybe it's just that Meg is such a hottie!

Prelude to Glory

For anyone that knows me very well, knows that I enjoy reading. But I am pretty picky about what I read. One thing that I enjoy very much is historical novels. I started reading the nine book series, Prelude to Glory, by Ron Carter, about six or seven years ago. And I just finished the last book two days ago. Prelude to Glory is the story of the John Dunson family and friends beginning in about 1775. Living in Boston, they were in the middle of the animosities that started the Revolutionary War. John Dunson, the father of the family became involved as a soldier against the British beginning with 'the shot heard 'round the world'. Dunson's oldest son, Adam and his best friend Billy Weems also were young soldiers at the time. The whole series takes you on a journey with this family as they are involved in 'actual battles' and 'events' that took place in history. It begins with the first battle of the Revolutionary War, through the Constitutional Convention, and to the end of the war of 1812 when the Star Spangled Banner was written by Francis Scott Key. There are hardships, joys, deaths, marriages, babies, heartaches and more. One thing that I love about historical novels is that they take actual historical events, real people - and the things they said and did, and weave a fictional family into the events. It makes me feel like I have been on a time machine! I have gotten to know the great man, George Washington; Benjamin Franklin, a man born way before his time; and many great patriots that gave everything they had so they could pass on the gift of freedom from tyranny to their posterity. What a tremendous gift they left us! I wonder if many of us even know, or remember, what was done for us just over 200 years ago. They knew that they wouldn't live long enough to enjoy what they had fought for. They literally did what they did for their children and grandchildren that they would never know. Anyway . . . off my soapbox. I loved the books. I thought it was fitting that I would finish them on "Constitution Day". Thanks to our Fathers!

Happy Birthday to me!

Yesterday was my @#th birthday. I decided that I need to make a birthday commitment to write more regularly in my blog. It's kind of like a New Year's resolution. Only it's a New Age resolution. So if I don't write once a week or more, I want to hear about it from YOU!

So my birthday was a very normal day. When you get to be my age, you don't want to remember all day long how old you are. So I just did the regular. Kelly did twist my arm into taking me to dinner, but he insisted that we stay in Blackfoot. So I had basically one of two choices - Rupes or Homestead. So I chose Homestead which was perfectly fine with me.

A few days ago Kelly asked me what I wanted for my birthday. I told him "nothing". He recently let me buy plane tickets to go out to see Kara and Elle pretty soon. And then we bought a gorgeous new desk for my office. I figured that was good enough. But later I remembered that I really needed two new bra's. So I told him that was what I wanted for my birthday. He said, "Okay, but will you pick them out!" Ha! So I did. Anyway, I was going to post a picture of my two new bra's, but I figure that even though a teenager might do that, I'm at a little more "mature" age and that wouldn't be appropriate.

But like a sweet and good husband, he brought me flowers!

Here is my new desk. I love it! I kind of feel bad that I have it and that Kelly doesn't. I told him I would share. But hey, he threw away my last desk when we moved and I need it!

Back to Work!

I know, I know, I've been very lame at blogging. I have a lot that I would like to catch up on, but the first news is this: Kelly is going back to work for Wyeth Labs! For those of you who don't know, last March, Wyeth did a huge corporate downsizing. Kelly's job was eliminated. So we have been jobless and searching for about 5 months. It has been frustrating and trying on us. About a week ago, we learned that his company decided they made too many cuts in Idaho, and they have offered Kelly his position back. We are soooo grateful! He will be starting again on September 3rd. Now he can feel like the rest of his time off is vacation time;).