Epic Oregon

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WOW... this posting has made me realize that I take WAY too many photos. I have had such a hard time narrowing down these photos. But the posting is still just so long... but that just means I will try to cut back on my narration. :)

Aaron Jr. and I went to Oregon again in January. We stayed again for three weeks. It is so much fun being up there with Spencer and Kristi and their kids. We love spending time with them and Aaron Jr gets along with their kids so well... he has a blast. They just bought a house up there a few months ago, so this was our first visit where we got to see their new house. It is beautiful.
And here we go...


Spencer and Aaron Jr.
This is the 'tractor' (riding lawn mower) that Spencer bought after buying the house... he wanted to 'work the land'. :)


ME






Aaron Jr.


The kids eating pizza up top. They were called themselves 'pizza faces'.
The kids coloring down on bottom.


With it being winter and rainy, we would spend a lot of the days in the house and they would get so out of control, one night Spencer finally just told them all to get their shoes on and he took them all outside and told them to run back and forth down the driveway, then back up, then back down... they ran back and forth at least 30 times. They had no idea they were doing this to burn energy... they just thought it was fun.




Every Monday while we were there, we went over to the church for Family Home Evening after we had a little lesson. This time, it took these three kids about 3 minutes to each get into time out for separate acts. I had to get a photo because it was quite funny.


Top photo: lil Spencer, Spencer, Kristi, Luke, Aaron, Lila, Benjamin
Bottom left: Lila ready for me to throw her the ball
Bottom right: Aaron Jr, Leslie






Kristi, lil Spencer, Spencer each shooting their lay ups.


Here I am showing off a bit. I enjoy getting a running start and jumping up onto the stage. Here are a few of my jumps. I am not sure how high up the stage is... but if I had to guess, I would say about 3 1/2 to 4 feet? Does anyone know? I am sure it isn't THAT impressive, but I always think it is fun to do.




We started a basketball game of 2 on 2 and this was the injury I got when Spencer was blocking one of my shots. My fingernail bent back and it pulled away from the skin and bled. It hurt SO much. If you look close, there is a white-ish diagonal line across the middle of the nail. That is where it bent.
The bottom right photo was a week later... that is how much it had healed. It hurt to use that thumb for a long time.


Medord, Oregon Temple. It is right next door to their church house.


In the bottom, you can see the prism that they hung in this window. Every day when the sun would come in through the window and hit the prism, it would make rainbows all over the room. It was so neat. In this photo, Aaron Jr was trying to 'catch' the rainbows on the carpet.


Before I left for Oregon, Kristi asked me to bring a disk with any photos of the Salt Lake Temple that I have taken. She went through them and chose this photo and then we both worked on photo editing it the way we thought it looked great and Kristi had it blown up to 16x20 size and framed it. I loved seeing some a photo of mine up on a wall. :) Exciting.


Spencer reading to the kids.


I thought the hat was so cool, I asked Spencer to pose for me in the window. VERY GQ.


We drove to a little town called Jacksonville one evening. It is such a cute little town. Here are some photos from that town.




Aaron, Spencer, Benny, Luke


Leslie and Aaron Jr.


Kristi and Lila & Spencer and Luke




Us.




Kristi, Benny, Lila, Spencer, Spencer


Aaron Jr sure enjoys life. I love taking photos of him.

Below are some close ups I got of each of the kids in order of age. I LOVE close ups of children. Their faces are just so perfect and angelic.


Spencer


Luke


Aaron Jr.


Benjamin


Lila

LUKE'S BIRTHDAY FESTIVITIES


Spencer and Kristi made crepes for lunch for everyone.


Mmm... crepes are so good.


Mmm... good for all ages. :)


Spencer did a magic trick to help entertain the kids while we were transitioning between activities. Aaron volunteered to be his assistant.


Spencer planned a treasure hunt for the kids. He told a made up story about a pirate and his hunt for 'TREASURE'. Every time he said the word 'treasure', he said it in a pirate voice and would make a pirate face ... then would have the kids say it in a pirate voice. The kids were mesmerized by the story. Completely captivated.


Here are a few of the kids saying 'treasure' in their best pirate voice.


The bottom photos are of Luke opening the treasure and studying the map that Spencer had thrown together at the last minute.


Spencer and the kids hunting for the treasure. Each stop on the way had a paper sack with one of the kids names on it... that is what they would keep their treasure in. Bottom right photo is of them finding the treasure in that shed.
FYI: that shed has one of the best smells of any place on earth. It smells musty... but it is one of the greatest musty smells I had ever smelled. I could not get enough. Lisa... you would LOVE it.


Here are the kids with their bags waiting for the treasure to be SHOT from the 'canon'.


Spencer decided it would be fun to shoot the treasure (candy) from this pipe canon he built. He built that thing in that last couple of days before the party. He went to the hardware store and got the parts. It was pretty amazing what he did. He would use a compressor to put compressed air into the bottom part, then he would turn a lever and it would blow the candy up into the air. Very inventive.


Each time he was about to shoot it, he would make the kids say 'treasure' in their pirate voices. They faces and voices got more and more funny as the day went on. Here are Spencer and Kristi in a couple of their best pirate faces saying the word 'treasure'. Anyone who knows Spencer and Kristi would not expect anything less from them... than going all out even when photos are being taken. :)
Good thing they are both attractive people... otherwise I would not have put these photos on here. :)


Here is the group saying 'treasure'.


Here is the FAMILY birthday bash for Luke. The top right photo is of Spencer singing 'Happy Birthday to You' to Luke. He was getting very into it.




Birthday Boy Lukie Pop. 5 years old!


On Luke's birthday, that morning... he decided to cut Benny's hair.
Luke on left, Benny on right. Benny's great hair cut on top.


This is Aaron Jr. I don't know what I was doing... but it sure was fun trying different hair styles. :)


The kids at the park making a birthday cake out of rocks and sticks. Oh to be a kid again.


Darth Vader? or Dark Helmet? Whatever suits your fancy.


Playing Simon Says.


The last full day of our visit, Kristi and I decided to make it a day of indulgence. Kristi mixed up a batch of sugar cookies and we cut them into hearts and frosted them. Mmm... they were good. But also we had planned to watch a Masterpiece Theater version of the movie Emma. So the bottom right corner photo shows how we tried to have some peace and quiet for our movie. I put a blanket over a little table and set up Aaron's portable DVD player and they had a little theater to watch a movie in. It didn't help that much... we still had to pause the movie a lot and 'deal' with the kids... but we still got to watch our movie.


Spencer wrestling all of the kids.




Lithia Park. Always a fun outing when we are in Oregon.




Benny climbed all the way to the top for his first time.




Aaron and Luke were throwing wood chips into the water. They were their 'boats'.


Best of Friends. Aaron and Luke. Luke is 10 months older than Aaron, but he is the closest boy cousin in age to Aaron. They get along really well and have a lot of fun together.


Trying to get a good mom / son photo.


Did we get it?


Spencer, Kristi, Spencer, Luke, Benjamin, Lila
THANKS to you all... we had a blast... AGAIN! We always miss you guys so much after we come home. Plan on seeing us again... sooner than later. Love you all.


"Nooooo". Aaron didn't want to come home either. :)
(he was actually saying something about his 'booooaaat'.

Now you know why my title was EPIC OREGON.
This was so long. Sorry. But it was sure a fun three weeks.

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Happy Birthday Bruce

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February 16, 1969 - - - April 26, 1985

This is my brother, Bruce, who passed away when he was 16 years old.

We love and miss you Bruce.

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Because He First Loved Us

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"[God] offers to His children the promise of a glorious and infinite existence and has provided a way for us to progress in knowledge and glory until we receive a fulness of joy. He has promised us all that He has."If all that is not enough reason to love our Heavenly Father, perhaps we can learn from the words of the Apostle John, who said, 'We love him, because he first loved us' (1 John 4:19)."

- Dieter F. Uchtdorf

(to read this address in its entirety, click HERE)

I got this quote in my 'Daily Gems' email this week and I just got around to reading it today. I wanted to share it because with Valentines Day, a day for love, coming up... I thought this was appropriate. I am grateful for the LOVE of our Father in Heaven. He loves us unconditionally. It should be so easy for us to love Him in return when His love is so pure for us. I am so grateful for a LOVING Father in Heaven and I LOVE Him with all of my heart. He has given me all that I have.

(to subscribe to the Daily Gems, click HERE and choose which Daily Gems you are interested in receiving each day in your email. It is so worth it. A lot of the time it seems like the Daily Gem that day are exactly what I am needed to read to help me in some way)

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GIVEAWAY

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Click on The Recipe Society button above to check out what's new and what they are giving away! Enter to win!

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Talking Objects

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Okay... so I was just sitting here on the couch watching TV with Aaron Jr while he ate a vanilla yogurt. And he looked up at me and said:

"Mama, my yogurt just said to me 'I want to spill on you'."

And when he was telling me what his yogurt said, he said it in a low, rough, manly voice.

I had a hard time not laughing, but then he just went on eating it. He was being serious. :)

It reminded me of a couple of days ago, when I was putting him in bed and whatever toy he was playing with at the time... he told me that his toy said to him, 'I want to sleep with you'... and he said that in the same low, rough, manly voice.

I guess all inanimate objects talk to Aaron Jr. in that same voice. :)

I had to share... I thought it was so funny.

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First Half of January... revised. :)

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I love Aaron's angelic face. Aaron was really sad in this photo. I don't remember why... the two photos below this one were the two photos I took right before this one...


If you look closely at the end of his nose, you can see a tear... then you can follow the path of the tear all the way up to his eye. I wish I could remember why he was sad... but I think he cheered up pretty quickly... he usually does.


We went to a little New Years gathering at the Harkness home at the beginning of the month. They had the kids decorate their own 'piggy banks' and 'car banks'. They had a blast painting them and putting stickers on them.


Aaron painting his 'car bank'.


Here are a few phases of the car painting. The bottom right photo is of Isaac.


The fun can't possibly get THIS fun until you get messy, right?


Ta Da ! The finished product. Not sure why he looks mad. Maybe he is trying to be GQ. ;)


And of course a party isn't a party without a big dog pile. Thanks to Nick for being the one the kids wanted to wrestle with. He was a good sport.


Okay, so I had the brilliant idea that while my parents were out of town at the beginning of the month, I would have my sisters come over to help me paint their laundry room. My parents want to paint some rooms in their house, but they can't quite agree on paint colors, so I thought if they came home to a room already done, they had to just love it. :) Anyhow, the morning we were going to do it came and two of my sisters ended up not being able to make it, so Lisa came and we started on it together.

Well, I went that morning to pick a paint color and I was on the phone with my sister Lori. My sister Karey had suggested doing a sage green color, so we were trying to figure out which color to go with. Lori was online looking at the paint colors there and I was at the store. Well, we decided to play it safe and got a REALLY pale color of green... well, what we thought was pale green. I believe it was called 'Plantation Moss'. Once Lisa and I started to paint the wall, it looked so ugly... it just made the wall look dirty. So, we have nicknamed this paint color... 'dirty wall'.

We decided to take the paint back and see if they could mix in a brighter color. Well, I got the paint into my car and headed down to the store. When I stopped at the first stop light, I realized I had not put the lid on tight enough and the paint can was tipped over just enough to spill a bunch of paint in the front passenger seat. I was on the phone with Lori and very calmly told her that I had to go because paint had just spilled in my car. Well, I realized I would not be able to do anything until I got to the store, so I lifted the paint can onto the floor and set it on a paper sack. Then I continued on my way. Well, I was a huge lame brain and didn't secure it good enough and at the next turn, the paint can tipped over on the floor and started spilling out on the floor of my car. I grabbed it while yelling at the top of my lungs 'NOOOOOOOOOO' and held that NO out until my breath was completely gone. I could not believe what I had just done. I was not as calm this time. There was still nothing I could do, but I was so frustrated. I was trying to figure out what to do the rest of the way to the store... YES, I was still on my way to the store. I figured I might as well just get to the store and get the paint and go back to the house and then I could try to clean it up there.

So, once I got to the store, I used every napkin I had in the car to try to clean up what I could. One of the floor mats in the car was rubber, so I took it out and turned it over in the parking lot to let it drip. So, in the photo, the white spots in this parking stall are the spots where I let the floor mat drip. There was only a half gallon of paint left in the can... so an entire half gallon of paint spilled in my car. And if you are wondering why the color in the parking lot looks white... it is because it really was just a lame color. It looked like it had more of a color to it when I was looking at swatches. They should call it 'DIRTY WALL'. If anyone wants any, I still have a perfectly ugly 1/2 gallon sitting around waiting to make someone's wall look dirty. :) The 1/2 gallon spilled in my car is a lost cause. :)

So, Lisa was on the phone with me and she was looking at paint colors online we decided on a color called 'Asparagus'. It was a bright green color. I kept telling Lisa that it looked a lot brighter in person than on the computer, but because of the hideous color I had picked out the first time, she was not trusting my judgment. And I was to the point where I didn't care what color went on the wall... we were just getting this done today. I was not going to go through all of that rubbish with spilling the paint and such and NOT get that project done. :)

Anyhow, I got the paint home and when she saw the color, she said 'NO'. And then we both laughed so hard. It was so bright. But... we went ahead with it knowing our parents love bright colors. We just hoped once it was done, it would look awesome. Well, once we got a wall done, we were completely in love with it. The color in the bottom right corner of this photo does not do the color justice at all. It looks so much better than in this photo... but it gives an idea.

My parents got home that evening ... and after an entire day and part of evening working on this project and all of the mishaps... we presented the laundry room to them ... and they LOVED it.


Here is Aaron helping me paint in the downstairs where we are living now.


The many faces of Lisa's baby, Henry... on an 11:00 pm run to Wal-Mart.


We went to see the Princess and the Frog with April and her daughter, and Sadie and Nick and their kids. Aaron enjoyed it. It was fun. We had to stop and get a photo with these three... Alvin, Simon, and Theodore. Aaron LOVES these guys. :)


Mom (Grandma) and Aaron. Mom and Dad got this puzzle for Christmas. We had fun putting it together one evening. Then Aaron decided it would be fun to sit on Uncle Robert ... he looks like a little monkey sitting there... like Curious George.


Christa and their new little one, Evan Aaron. There are more photos of Evan a couple of postings down. He is so sweet.


Me with Evan Aaron. I stole this photo from Christa's blog. Thanks Christa. I am glad to have this photo.


Caroline, my niece, was in the school spelling bee. There were about 24 students in this spelling bee from grades 2nd through 6th grade. Caroline is in 5th grade. We were all so nervous for her every time it was her turn to stand at the microphone. Then she would get it right and we would sigh with relief. I believe it went nearly 30 rounds. But in the end... Caroline WON !!! She took first place. I was SO impressed with her spelling abilities. She now goes on to the district spelling bee. I am really excited to go and watch her in that one as well.


Hannah, Caroline, Elise (OR... Elise, Caroline, Hannah) :)
Caroline's twin sisters posing for a photo with their celebrity sister. They got to be there for the whole spelling bee to watch their sister take home 1st place.

Congrats Caroline ! We love you !

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