After Christmas

December 26th we packed up and left the townhouse and everyone kind of went their own way. Brandon and Ali went to Logan to spend time with her family, Chad and Shannon went to Salt Lake to spend time with her family, shop and go to a class reunion, Natalie and Doug moved to Grandma and Grandpa Keyser's where they had room to sleep and Dad, Jordyn and Judi went to Grandmother and Grandad's. That night quite a few of the Rowland family gathered to visit, Chad and Shannon dropped by for a bit and for a little while it was fun to have everyone together, Grandad took pictures whenever he could.

The next day Natalie and Doug were so nice to let us take James to the Chlidren's Museum (actually it was their idea, I think we heard celabrating as we drove away:) We had such a great time withJames. What a fun place to take kids.

Ice House

I am still working on Christmas day stuff. Sorry I took a bit of a break. Cool snow fort though. Like the light above Brandon? He installed that by icicle.

Christmas Snow Fun

After presents we went outside to play!

Christmas Morning Injury

Story of interest. Christmas morning while we are opening presents Kent borrows Blake's new knife to help James open packaging on a new toy, sure enough the knife slips and Kent has a wound worthy of stitches

Close up shot
Only problem is that we are on a mountain and it is snowing out side and we are not driving down the slippery roads. What are we going to do?

Yeah! for broken ornaments we have super glue.
Dr. Brandon glues the wound and then braces the thumb to immobilize it.

Christmas Morning

Christmas Eve

I know I've been doing a lot of writing about this past holiday, I apologize but from my point of view this is kind of like my journal and the best way I have of remembering these good times, so forgive me as I go into another description of our holiday.
For Christmas Eve and Christmas day we had rented a town home near Snow Basin in a town called Eden. It was very roomy 3 floors, 5 bedrooms and bathrooms, large kitchen, a great place for 13 people to gather for Christmas.
On a side note I must mention for posterity sake a little thing that happened just before we left Salt Lake, We were at Kent's parents house in Salt Lake when Brandon gave his wife Ali a hug, there was a loud popping sound, followed by pain in Ali's chest and the Ali was slumping to the floor. There was a unanimous consensus that Brandon and Ali should stop at a hospital on the way up the canyon and check it out. After an EKG x rays and other tests it was determined that her condition is Costochondritis, and has to do with swelling, iritation or popping out of place of the cartlidge located between the muscle and rib. It also means weeks of being careful and allowing it time to heal.
We get to the townhouse only to discover the heating is broken and the inside temp. is somewhere in the mid 40's. The people get maintenance over to fix it right away and by evening we are warming up. In the mean time we discover the tree they told us was under the stairs was about 2 feet high so Kent, Jordyn, Brandon and Ali take off to see if they can find a real tree. They follow signs to a farm house and the farmer agrees to sell them a tree only problem is the horses that pull the wagon are put away and they will have to take the tractor Kent and Jordyn take the ride and pick out a beautiful tree. Back at the car with the tree on top the group stops at a local little store for supplies (ie: scissors, construction paper, ribbon etc.) I call and let Kent know I need super glue. When they get back everyone chips in making decorations for the tree. It was like a true old fashioned Christmas where the tree goes up Christmas Eve and the decorations are all hand made. What a fun evening. The pictures below tell the rest.

Doug and Natalie's House

Doug and Natalie were super great hosts. The house was just the right size for the 13 of us including 4 couples. We all had privacy, bathroom space and even a little "office" in the laundry room for when Kent was working while the rest of us slept. Natalie fixed great meals, Sunday we had glazed ham with pineapple, butt rolls and other good stuff. she made so much we had leftovers for lunch and more. Monday she made delicious pork burritos, too bad we ate at Big Judd's for lunch, some of us couldn't eat that night. Doug and Natalie cooked and cleaned and worked very hard to help us all have a great time. Thanks Natalie and Doug
We also had fun playing games, watching movies and playing wii our big event of our time in Idaho was Monday when we went sleigh riding. When we woke up that morning it was snowing so we had to make changes to our plans, we were going to the sand dunes but concerned about the road conditions we went to the college campus hills instead. here are some pictures and videos of our adventure.

Jordyn

Grandad and Lexi

Doug's super idea

James
Judi/Grammy

Auntie Jo and Lexi

Eating Snow

Myra

When we were done we drove to a little town too far away and had a terrific lunch at Big Judd's (see Chad and Shannon's blog for pictures). When we arrived back to Doug and Natalie's house we discovered there was too much new snow and we were unable to drive up the 100 yard long drive way to the house. instead while the women ran with the children to the house the men cleared the neighbors driveway and we parked our 3 vehicles there instead. The rest of the driveway story is found on Natalie and Doug's blog. sorry no pictures. Also see Chad and Shannon's blog for video of boys jumping off roof into the snow. Thanks again Natalie and Doug and James for a great time at your house.

To Natalie's House We Go

We left Florida December 19 a little worried that we might be spending part of our vacation in Houston, Salt Lake was snowing and flights were being canceled. We even carried 4 decks of cards with us so we could play Hand and Foot (canasta) all night long if needed. In Salt Lake Kent fell into a fabulous deal on a car rental - we got a mini van for two weeks at a price that was equal to 1/2 a week.
We spent our first day visiting with Kent's parents, shopping for last minute stuff, visiting with my parents and then we were off to Idaho with a short stop in Logan. Or so we thought...Somewhere near the Willard Bay exit along I-15 there was a huge accident that involved a total of 31 cars, South bound was closed and we were North bound with the nearest exit 5 miles away, it took us nearly 2 hours to get through that mess.
We got to Logan eventually in a round about way, visited with Chad, Shannon and the girls, (Grammy gave them each a Pez candy machine and even Lexi snuggled up enjoying pulling the little pieces of candy from the snowman's mouth).
We added Brandon and Ali to our car making our group six (Kent, Judi, Jordyn, Blake, Brandon, Ali) Made the drive to Idaho without much more excitement but arriving too late to see James.
I gave him his pez Santa at church the next day and he sat still for a little while.
Well that is about it for this one. sorry no pictures...Natalie, Chad if you have any feel free to add them. Next Post...Our time at Natalie and Doug's.

Christmas in Florida

This is our porch mailbox decoration for Christmas

House lights without a flash

House lights with a flash

Quick picture that ended up on Christmas card.

Thanksgiving

This is my mailbox decoration for Autumn

We haven't posted anything for a really long time and we have a lot to share. I thought it best if I did it in little posts so we will start with Thanksgiving. If I had been on top of things I think I would have had a message about all that we are thankful for (which there are a lot, like family, health, job, church grandchildren etc.) Lucky you I"ll just share events.
Thanksgiving was a very long weekend for us Starting on Wednesday we had Ali and Brandon come up, we started cooking and preparing for the big dinner that day and we must have done something fun like go to the beach or something that night.
Thanksgiving day I probably spent the morning in the kitchen cooking and Kent probably went golfing or something like that, I was in the kitchen most of the day and then Melissa and Sean showed up with their girls and I abandoned everyone in the kitchen to go make turkey pictures with the girls. (Thanks Linda for sharing your grandchildren with me). Too soon I was forced to resume my responsibilities. We set the table for 11 people as the missionaries came for their second meal of the day. The food was traditional and great.When finished we rushed the missionaries out and hurried off to - where else - the beach, it was a fairly cool day so no swimming, just shell collecting. Then back to the house for pie! YUM!
We set the girls up with paint and they did cute things to their shells while most of us played games and Sean watched football.
Friday we ventured out too early for the black Friday sells, Kent and Brandon left us early to go golfing, Ali, Jordyn and I finished our shopping and went home to rest. We played the rest of the weekend, Brandon and Ali stayed until early Sunday morning.