Thanksgiving

We are so blessed. We now get to have three amazing Thanksgiving dinners every year. Two on thanksgiving day and one on the following Saturday. My family always has one at the traditional time. This year Sara hosted the group and we had everyone but Cindy, Kevin and Todd and their families. It was a tight squeeze but we somehow managed and had a ton of fun. I was in charge of potatoes.

Our second meal is with Josh's family in the evening. Kayleen has been kind enough to move it to that time so that we can all be there and Jeff and Kari and their family and Grandpa and Grandma Parry are always there too. Then we have one with Grandma and Grandpa Brown at their church. It always turns out lovely too. We're surrounded by family at such a special time of year and couldn't be more blessed.

Baby Hudson

Brady and Jordan had their baby on Brett's birthday so we decided to take a trip down to Provo to see him. He's adorable and looks just like Jordan to me. It was fun to talk with Jordan and to hear their experience. It was also fun to see their new place. They are going to be such amazing parents. We are so happy for them.

Grass Shrine

I'll never understand why grass is so much fun, but I remember piling it up as a kid and loving it too. We went to the park to play volleyball and the kids immediately grabbed handfuls of grass and made some sort of shrine out of it with flowers and all. Then they started playing hide and seek. It's pretty funny watching a group of kids play hide and seek in an open field. As long as they couldn't see who was "it", they seemed to think they couldn't be found. Doesn't quite work that way now does it.

Easter Egg Hunts

We started off the day today by heading to my parents house for our first Easter egg hunt. The girls were so excited and quickly collected a bunch of eggs.

Ashlyn recently decided that purple is her favorite color and only picked up purple eggs while Emma didn't enjoy the hunt at all. I thought she might like to crawl around and pick up the eggs. But as soon as I set her down, she lifted her right leg up into the air because she didn't want it to touch the grass. Don't ask me why her left leg could touch it but not her right leg. After about fifteen minutes of holding her leg off the ground, she got tired enough that she started to cry and the hunt was over for her.  

Then we got to enjoy a lunch with hot dogs (good quality ones according to Josh, because I only buy the cheep ones) and visit with family while the girls played with their cousins.

Then we were off to Josh's parents for the second hunt. They recently started hiding a gold and silver egg with larger money in them mainly for the adults, but Kali's old enough that she understands the value of money and really wanted to find those eggs this year. Unfortunately, our family didn't find any of the big prizes. Brady found one and Danielle found the other.

After the Easter egg hunt, the girls got to swing at an egg pinata.

Thankfully it held up just long enough for each of the kids to get a turn. Kali was last and finished it off. And then we enjoyed our second barbecue of the day along with more visiting and family time. What a fun day!

Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving, we tried something new that I want to keep as a tradition in our family. I always feel like Thanksgiving comes and goes and because I'm so worried about food or about getting from one place to the next, I forget to count my blessing and really ponder on the things I'm thankful for. So we set a timer and every hour that it went off, everyone had to say something they were thankful for. The girls really got into it. Sadie didn't want anyone to say the same thing that someone else had said, and for the most part we didn't. We are truly blessed.

For our Thanksgiving meal, I was over the potatoes. I now have a greater appreciation for all those moms out there that practically put on the entire meal themselves. It took me two hours just to do the potatoes and that was with Josh's help. Thankfully, I didn't have to do the entire meal myself. Cindy hosted it and the food was just as yummy as I had been anticipating. This year was also a little different because Josh's family decided to do their Thanksgiving meal in the evening. So we ended up eating two full Thanksgiving dinners in one day. It was nice because all his grandparents were able to be there too so we got to visit with almost all our family on one day. 

Ninety-Four

Grandma Bair has turned 94. Between her and her dad, it's apparent that longevity runs in the Astle blood. For the last two years, all the grandkids have sent her homemade birthday cards because that's what she has done for each of us our entire lives. It's been kind of fun to personalize them and send meaningful photos in them. This year we added a dollar bill just like she always did for us when we were young. I love this woman and the example she has always been to me.

Emmalyn's Baby Blessing

Emma was blessed today and got to wear the same blessing dress as all her sisters.

We had a ton of family and friends that came to join in the celebration. As a matter of fact, we knew that we would have such a large crowd that we decided to hold the open house the night before at our stake center. that way they didn't have to suffer in our hot house with no room to move. It turned out nice.

In her blessing she was told that her middle name, Rae, was given to her as a reminder of a wonderful person (Grandma Parry) and to help her think of that person.

Easter Egg Hunts

I love this picture because of all the bright colors everyone is wearing. They almost look like a basket of colored Easter eggs themselves. This was taken at our first Easter egg hunt of the day at Grandma Bohman's house. She had a silver egg and a golden egg hidden with bigger prizes in them and Kali found both of them within the first few minutes of the hunt. She was so excited.

At Grandma Smith's house, a silver and gold egg were also hidden, but they were for the adults. They were not easy to find at all. But after a lot of hints, Josh ended up with the silver one. The girls just loved the candy. Ashy would open up the eggs, and if they didn't have candy in them, they were thrown to the side.

Andrew

My cousin, Andrew, was tragically killed in an accident at the age of sixteen. It's always hard to lose someone and especially at such a young age. But if you could be happy about anyone moving on, that's how I feel about Andrew. He was such a good kid that I have no doubt he is in a much better place and will receive every possible blessing Heavenly Father has in store for him. One of my favorite memories of him was from the year I got married. It also happened to be the year he got baptized. Grandma Bair lived in California at the time and was only able to travel to Utah for one family event. She chose to come to my wedding and Andrew was a little disappointed. My punishment for Grandma having to miss his baptism is that he asked me to speak at his baptism. It was so cute. I was more than happy to oblige and ended up really enjoying my preparation for the talk. That's the kind of person he was, good-natured and kind-hearted and he lived a gospel-centered life.