Homecoming

Homecoming 2011 will be a night to remember (at least I assume it will be - Chad still isn't awake to report on the evening).  Chad and 25 of his closest friends took the party bus to dinner, the dance and back to the Erikson's house for a late (or early) breakfast. Awesome!

Look at this handsome boy.  Can you believe my baby is sixteen and old enough to attend a school dance?  Now if only I could talk him into going to the stake dances with Aaron.  Chad went solo because he figured there weren't any girls he liked well enough to spend an extra hundred dollars on. (He's not nearly the womanizer that his brother is :)).  I decided that I would make him a buttoniere thinking it couldn't be all that hard.  Sadly, the moment I pinned it on his vest, the rose snapped off its stem. I guess next time we'll leave it to the professionals.

 There were just as many, or maybe more parents than kids at Cameron's house taking pictures.  What a magnificent photo op.  Below are Chad and his friend Darrin.

Cameron, Chad & Aubrey

 The three amigos - Cameron, Chad & Zak

 The LC baseball boys minus Alek and Darrin who had moved to the front yard by this time - Cam, Zak, Alex, Connor & Chad.

The whole group in front of the party bus.  It looks like it might be harder to find dresses with sleeves for my girls when the time comes than I originally thought.  I better start looking at dress patterns. :)

Amber sitting on the party bus.  That thing was awesome.  One of the girls' moms asked me when it pulled out if she should be worried that the back of the bus said "Lucky Boys".  Hmm...  Fortunately, the driver had driven the president and his posse around before, so he assured us that keeping these crazy kids in line would be a piece of cake.  Amber was so sad when the bus pulled off.  She wanted to follow it in our car and she kept sighing all evening and saying, "I miss Chad".

Bethany, Karson & Kate seeing their respective brothers off.  Bethany was a little tired of all the picture taking by this time and just wanted to go to Cam's backyard and jump on the trampoline.  The girls really enjoyed seeing all the kids dressed up though.  It's hard to believe that it won't be too long until they are going to homecoming themselves.  In fact, I can't believe they will be at middle school next year.  I remember these girls running around  Chad's and Connor's little league baseball games when they were just starting elementary school.  The time sure does fly.  Stay little, Amber!

Autumn Delights

Things I love about Fall.

#1 - The annual Brown pool party to celebrate my dad's birthday.  Now this is how you do the day before school starts right.

 Aaron in mid-flip.

And Chad will cerainly not be outdone by a fourteen year old.

I'll tell you.  The Browns have quite a set-up in their backyard.  These new fangled salt water pools are the wave of the future. (No pun intended).

Shirlene and Marilyn.  Two foxy ladies staying dry by the fireplace!

#2 - The balloons are starting to come out.  Oh, what joy it is to get up in the morning and see something like this in the sky.  Only two more weeks to fiesta time.  Yahoo!

#3 - The beginning of the school year.  Actually I have ambivalent feelings about this one, but for the most part it's good. The house stays clean for part of the day and I have a delightful uninterrupted nap after lunch. As long as I pretend there is no such thing as Snap Grades and ignore all emails from Aaron's science teacher, I do just great.

Chad's goals for this year - to get "yolked", to perfect his slider and to prove to Sam that he is responsible enough to have a driver's license.
My goals for Chad - that by the end of the year he will of his own free will and accord put down the cell phone and crack  a book like maybe twice a week.

Bethany's goal for this year - to be a "Star Student" each week when progress reports are sent home by having absolutely no missing assignments and getting "3"'s on all the ones that aren't missing.
Miranda's goal for this year - to get better grades than any of her siblings, because she's pretty sure she's the smartest. :)
My goal for Bethany and Miranda - that by the end of the year, they willl give up their obsessions with mess making - oops, I mean craft making and pull out some brain teasers when they are bored instead.

Aaron's goal - to convince mom and dad that next year he is way too old and cool to participate in band or piano lessons. And to flirt with as many girls as possible in a nine month period without his family members suspecting anything.

My goal for Aaron - that by the end of the year, he can sit quietly in science class and that he will hang up his towel after taking a shower, like maybe twice a week.

Amber's goal - to learn to read her favorite Dora book and to score at least ten birthday party invitations.
Mom's goal for Amber - that by the end of the year I will have at least a week where I don't have to send in yet another set of clean clothes because Amber either had a bloody nose or was locked out of the bathroom by some very slow potty-going fellow kindergartner.

Look at this great kindergarten girl go!  You might think that she is the newest member of the Smith family to enter school, but you'd  be wrong - because (drum roll, please) this year I am taking a class in preparation to apply to nursing school in a year or two.  I am having a blast.  I just took my first test and it turns out that I actually listen to myself  when I tell myself to study and consequently I have 101% in the class.  So, apparently, I'm the student I always wanted to make my kids into.  Who knew?

#3 - Fall Baseball - Do you know how much fun it is to have baseball games practically year round?  It is amazing, people, absoolutely amazing.  The weather is perfect, the company is divine.  It just doesn't get any better than this.

Above are Bethany and Miranda at one of Chad's club ball tournaments in Rio Rancho.  I could be wrong but I think it may not be as fun for them as it is for me since Bethany had to take pictures and Miranda had to take a nap.  Whatever!

#4 - the Mountains - below are the kids on our favorite hike.  My sister Emily and I take them every fall to collect acorns and pinecones for fall crafting.  Deliciously festive!

#5 - Apples - I love them.  I love the way they look.  I love the way they taste.  I love Dixon's Apple Farm.  And I especially love decorating my kitchen with them.  This is the only time of year when my kitchen is decorated appropriately for the season.  Please note the new gold paint on my walls.  What do you think?



Aunt Lizaboo's Funeral

It was not great to return from Denver shortly to have to leave again for my third trip and second funeral in a period of three weeks.  This time I took the girls because Bethany was convinced that Journey would need her moral support as well as a plate of caramel rice crispies. (As if this would make up for losing one of the greatest grandmas a ten year old girl ever had - Bethany having the other one).  Journey was indeed glad to see her though.  It is actually always great seeing everyone except that at funerals you become so keenly aware that there is someone very important missing.  I remember thinking that at my dad's funeral too.  "Wow, what a great party this would be - if only...".  Oh well.  I guess someday we'll have that perfect party and then hopefully no one will be missing.  Speaking of which, my Uncle Dale bore his testimony the Sunday before the funeral and he told his daughters that he was really sad that their reunion had been interrupted. (At least they were all there with Aunt Liz when she died though.  There was no other way she would have wanted to go)  But that now, it was their job to get ready for their next reunion and that he didn't want any of them to not be there.  Let me tell you, there was not a dry eye in the place.  Uncle Dale does have a way with words.

Here is the floral arrangement we got for Aunt Liz.  I had to specially order the ribbons but it was totally worth it.

We had to fiddle with ribbons until we got it just right.

My cousin Amy, my Aunt Cindy, My Aunt Sandra (who got to come because she was still in West Jordan with Stephanie's family) and my cousin Kathy.  I love these guys to pieces.  Stay healthy guys!

 Mom, Becca, Cordell and Aubrey finishing a quite delightful dinner.

Amber on her way home from the funeral.  There was some reason she posed in front of a Coke cooler but I honestly can't remember what it was.  That is what you get when you go too long between photography and blogging.

Apparently Bethy got ahold of the camera during the trip home and decided to try out her budding talent.  Not bad for a moving picture.  This was on the Napi route between Ship Rock and Cuba.  We finally figured it out Amber.

It's a good thing Bethany took the picture above and below because I no sooner got home than I lost the funeral program.  I have been wanting to cry about it until I saw these on the memory card.

Sometimes, I wonder if it will ever be the same going to southern Utah without Liz being there.  But I know she would want us to keep the family close, so we will give it our best shot.

Chad's first Out of Town Baseball Tournament

So, the bad news is that I turned 40 about a week and a half ago and I am now settling into my dotage.  I have bought myself a rocker and learned how to knit.  Now I just have to add on a front porch to our house to complete the image.  The good news is that for my birthday, I finally got a new computer.  Yeehaw!  And so now I will catch up with our summer pictures, one post at a time, starting with Chad's first out of town baseball tournament to Denver.  (Funny, that was where his first out of town basketball tournament was too).  For this trip, I took two of my favorite guys along for the ride.  Aaron already got to go to SLC with me the week before so he had to stay home with Grandma.  Below are the aforementioned men in a Mexican  Restaurant in Trinidad.  The picture in the middle is a brick in the cobblestone sidewalks.  It's kind of a cool little town. (Alert!  Lyssa has just informed me that Trinidad is actually a den of iniquity and that you should run and not walk if ever waylaid there.  Who knew?)

And here are Wyatt and Chad getting ready to take on some team from Parker, Colorado.  I think they won that one.  They also won a couple of other games but they got killed about three times by the same team from San Antonio during the following two days.  Those boys were for sure rustling cattle and eating a constant diet of steaks between baseball practices and I was not sorry to bid them adieu.  The boys had a great time though and maybe now Chad will give me a short break from the talk of how I've ruined his life by never letting him play on a club team.  He actually had another tournament last weekend and now legion ball has started again so the whining will no longer be tolerated.

Meanwhile, Sam and I had a grand old time.  We went to dinner with my friend Lyssa before she left for Italy, visited the Molly Brown museum, went to dinner mystery theater and checked out the tourist section of Pueblo on our way home. Chad somehow talked us into leaving him in Denver with his friend, Darren, to finish up the tournament.  Of course this meant that he somehow arrived home without his bed spread.  Luckily I was replacing it anyway in the course of the grand boys' bedroom remodel (more to come on that later.)  Awe!  Good times!

The Jolly Mountain Spirit

Well, it's birthday month at the Smith house and soon I will get my brand new computer with photo uploading capabilities (courtesy of my darling husband) and then you will know all that we have been doing since my last picture upload 50 years ago.  In the mean time, here is what Aaron's awesome birthday present can do.  He got an ipod touch and it is actually quite fancy.  We went to the mountains for breakfast this morning and we found this little tree whose branch kept waving back and forth at us as if it were welcoming us to our familiar and much beloved hiking path.  Aaron pulled out his handy dandy ipod and took a video.  He called it the jolly mountain spirit.  It just makes me feel happy.