My Family Reunion

MY FAMILY

Let me start by saying that I love my family. It is a shame that I don't get to see my extended family very often and because of this I made a great effort to get to our family reunion in St. George. Financially it didn't make sense to bring the rest of our little family, which was sad, but what it did mean is ....... I had a Mommy vacation.!!

Really there are a TON of us, but this is all that could come.

We were in the hot tub every night.

We went to go and see a family history landmark. Sarah Sturdevant Leavitt is my greatx4 Grandmother. She was an incredible pioneer who managed to get her entire family across the plains by herself after her husband died. In fact my little sister is named after her.

Here is my family standing at her monument.

I am a direct descendant of Thomas Rowell Leavitt (do you see the family resemblance???)

My little sister was torturing my brothers, cousin, and dad with snow. They ended up getting her back really good.

THE 82' CROP

Peter, Kira, Kristin, Meaghan ... yes we rock!! The last time we took this picture was right before Peter left for his mission (almost 10 years ago!). I love my cousins, and I love that we are lined up youngest to oldest AND tallest to shortest (poor Meaghan!!) I am glad that I got to spend some time with them. Love you guys!!

We went to see the John Hamblin home (which is sooooo fascinating!!!!!) There is a picture of John Hamblin and we were shocked by the actual resemblance that you can see in my cousin Tyler's face.

I learned that the pioneers used cow skulls as mail boxes. The indians felt that these were evil and wouldn't touch them so the pioneers would leave messages for eachother along the trail.

CAFE RIO!!!!!!!!

need I say more???

My brothers were a little obsessed with chasing the geese. Why the geese kept coming back I will never know, but don't worry they got us back in the end :-)

We went to see the monument at Mountain Meadows. I didn't wear the proper foot gear and was quite worried about my beautiful suede boots. They did survive, but I had a lot of help walking up and down the snowy hills. I actually love this picture of me and my dad.

Sisters!!

How do you feed a large family???

Casino Buffet, it actually wasn't that bad.

I had a little buddy attached to my hip the whole weekend. My cousins daughter, MaCenz, was so sweet and I showed her how to work her model walk.

How do you do this Brandon??

We ended the weekend playing games until 3AM and then my mom and sisters and I stayed up until 3:45AM giggling in our hotel room.

The family had so much fun that we couldn't say goodbye.

We lingered in the hotel rooms.

we lingered in the hallways.

way too many of us lingered in the elevator.

then we lingered in the parking lot.

and then..............

the geese had a little pay back to dish out.

Do you see the car, and my dads face? My aunt got this shot as it was happening!

p.s. there was so much poop that it splattered onto my dad, my cousin, and I.

Yes ... we had green poop on us.

And that was my short, but really fun family reunion.

My angels

This sweet little man is growing up so fast I can't even believe it!!! Today was Evan's first day of Primary. He no longer attends the nursery at church but is a full fledged big boy. He loved his sunbeam class and didn't even throw a fit when I left. In fact ... he gave me a big kiss, told me he loved me, blew me another kiss and told me he would see me later (with a huge grin on his face). He wasn't really a fan of going in his stander for the second hour and I am thinking that we might just leave it at home from now on. It worked really well in nursery, not so well in primary. Oh well, we tried! I couldn't be more proud of my little grown up big boy!!


I have been trying to load this video of Landon since Sunday. Oh well. I wanted to get this out before I left. If anyone knows how to get blogger to load videos I would love the input.

And my baby number two........
I caught the pinball in action!!! I hope you enjoy the video ... it cracks me up :-) No wonder he eats so much:-) Tell me, have you ever seen someone so full of joyous energy?

Christmas Break in pictures

Here is a "few" of my favorite pictures from the break with my whole little family.

swimming on Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve fun with Justin's Dad and family

check out Landon's bruise and black eye from slipping at the pool

our special family time: focusing on the REAL reason for the season

Evan is sprinkling his "Reindeer" food on the ground so that Santa can find us!!
one of my favorite parts of the evening???? We were singing carols while laying bed and Evan says ..."no more! Stop!! We have to go to bed so Santa can come!!!"
This year was so much fun!

yeah ... We totally went overboard. To our credit, not all of these are from us, and most of what we gave the boys were movies and games.

Christmas afternoon we spent the day with Justin's mom and family. I got to talk to my brother on Skype with the rest of my family. I still can't believe that I got to see him while he is on his mission. Justin was in charge of the camera this night so we have no pictures.

Boxing Day we went to church and then drove to the mountains with Justin's mom and step-Dad. It is a completely secluded cabin in the area of Canada that gets the most snow fall in the entire country. I wish I didn't get "female" ill while I was there, but at least I am married to Justin who is very hands on with our boys and knows how to take care of me. I was only out of commission 1.5 days so I still got to see some of the frigid beauty of this country.

We even got to meet 70 sled dogs!!! Seriously fun, sweet, loving, beautiful animals!! We loved getting to play a little bit with these animals.


I can't put my arms down!!!!

snow shoeing is exhausting!!

Banff hot springs!
The boys all rented the "historic" bathing suits, although Logan told his mom they were "pre-historic" bathing suits. I think he may have been right :-)

check out the ice in my hair

I think it is hilarious that since moving to Canada I have spent every New Years that are in town with my cousin Kari. She doesn't even live in the same city and I am always lucky enough to see her on this special day.


I rang in the New Year with one of my best friends Kristin.


HAPPY 2011