Winter cold and winter storms

My first cold in a long time arrived a day before our first real snow storm last night (real is defined as snow that actually sticks on the grass for more than a couple of minutes).  Ben ran outside to take this picture of our house.  The second picture is out our backdoor.  I don't know if you can see it but the white "bubble" in the back ground is our neighbor's 'covered' pool.  It comes off in the summer but they enjoy swimming year around.

So I am hanging out at home having a very quiet Sunday while only Debbie and Amy from the Presidency are there with our great Primary of 170 kids or so (counting nursery).  Kristy is still recovering form her broken foot.  I am sure the kids are all excited because of the snow and the short week from school.  I miss them, especially hearing them singing and the funny things that they might say.  Having a hard time...visit Primary for the day.

I saw a title on a book as I was rushing by to grab what I was looking for at Seagull Book store.  It was "How do you stay close to your adult children (and still let them grow-up)?"  It is a question that I have wondered about.  On Tuesday of this week, I had a texting session with Jessica, talked on the phone with Scott, and then Tosha surprised me by coming over in response to a text I sent her asking how she was.  It was amazing how much those sweet interactions meant to me.  Nothing major was accomplished, just checking in.  Back in the day when I left for BYU, I thought I did well if I wrote my parents every other week.  After I was married it was more often like once a month.  Phone calls were expensive so we usually called only for special things or occasions.  I like the ability to interact by text, phone, email or in person with my kids.  I hope that I am still letting them grow-up........................maybe I need to get that book!

Hope your day is happy and bright----with or without snow!

"I walk in celebration of....

November is National Adoption Month and as part of the month long celebration, I attended an adoption walk down at Liberty Park in Salt Lake.  People dress in orange (not sure why orange?) and wore signs on their backs that said, "I walk in celebration of  ...and then you list who in your life is there because of adoption.  They ran out of signs before I arrived but mine would have said:  "I walk in celebration of my dad, his mom, Ramona and his birth mother, Viola, my own children Scott, Ben, Tosha, and Jena and their birth parents, and my niece, Lora and nephews David and Zech, and all of the wonderful birth parents and adoptive families I have know in my life......(and Jessica and Gary, too, because they are also part of our forever family)"  I would have needed two or three signs to get that all on one sheet!  Adoption has been a big part of my life both in our family, neighborhood, and also my volunteer and professional life.

Here is most of the group from Layton Families Supporting Adoption chapter.

We had another adoption event yesterday where we gathered at Boondocks a local fun center for a few hours of family fun....Jena and Gary had the fun and I helped collect money and manage clean-up as our agency was the host this year.  This was the first year that it was held in Davis County.  In the past, it was held just in Salt Lake county for the whole state.  This year we had 1000 people at our celebration and they had about 1300 in Draper.  The past high was 1100 in total so we were very excited.  Wendy's donated chili.  That was a lot of chili.......

Hug an adoptive child, birth parent, or family you know. 

On the way out of Libery Park which was beautiful at this time of the year, I drove past a line of trees where the leaves were falling like snowflakes.  It was so constant, the floating down of the leaves.  I pulled over and tried to get a picture of it, but it really didn't work too well.  If you look closely at the trunk of this tree you can see some orange leaves falling.  It was so amazing in person.

Enjoy your fall weather..............................



Rain Gutter regatta....

As Jena's value experience for Good Works and for a part of my Wood Badge ticket, she and I worked together (with help from Gary and the Mia Maids and Teachers) to organize and put on a Rain Gutter Regatta for the Morgan County Special Needs Mutual.  Jena designed flyers and made announcements, and put together the bottles for the boats.  Gary and I set up the Church with the rain gutters, tables, etc.  The Mutual meets at a Chapel in Peterson, Utah, about 40 minutes away.  Jena's friend Maddie attends that Mutual with her mom who serves in the YW presidency for the Mutual.  Here is Jena getting ready to help Maddie race her boat.  Our Mia Maids and Teachers came to assist and they were AWESOME.  They jump right in to help each person design their sail and assemble their boats.  In addition, they helped blow the boats to the finish line.  It was one of those events that worked better than we could have imagined and our youth would like to do it again.  We are looking at a rocket shooting activity as part of a summer BBQ and perhaps to include the entire YW/YM which would be a possibility of almost 100 kids.

Halloween Hall-style



There her Owl sits with the pumpkins
who will "live" another day.





A ttribute to our Texas time





No more tricker-treaters in our house these days, but Jena still wanted to dress up for our annual Hall Halloween dinner at Aunt Valerie's--chili and scones. It is fun to see the cousins and visit for awhile. Since it was in our neighborhood, we took over our candy and had kids take one from our bowls too. The Primary kids liked showing their costumes to us and one of Gary's class instructed him to bring the "left over" candy to class on Sunday (And she was disappointed that he didn't, but trust me they all had had quite enough candy.) Gary wore our old "Twinkle" costume and got a lot of comments. He started instructing the kids to NOT call him a name and then they would promptly call him "Twinkle". The best line was from one of the nine year old girls in the ward. She didn't call him "twinkle" but after we had finished talking to them, she said with a total straight face, "You look good enough to eat." and then ran off. It was very funny at the time, not quite as much in the retelling but it was all in her delivery.

Then on Halloween Sunday we had our "Meal in a Pumpkin".  It is one of those things that I haven't done enough to actually call it a tradition but have done it off and on over the years enough so I would have thought the kids would remember it.  That was blown when Scott walked in with Chantel and said, "What is that?".  It is a type of stew and you rub off some of the cooked pumpkin into it as you dish it up.  I like it.
This year I put a face on it.

The weather was rainy and cold on Saturday when it was time for trick-n-treaters but there were moments when it stopped and we had beautiful rainbows.  For a time we had a double rainbow which I tried to take a picture of but it is hard to see the out side rainbow.  Now we are enjoying weather in the 60s and clear.

These are outside Gary's sister's house.  The sky was awesome
during the breaks in the rain.

Happy Halloween and welcome to November!

How many shopping days until Christmas????