Conference Weekend

This Conference weekend is a little different from all the previous. This weekend also marks the end of our Grandparents mission at the Church History Center in Salt Lake City. So today (which is Sunday) the family decided to have Brunch in Alan and Leanne's home, cause today or this evening our Grandparents return to the Cook Islands ( Rarotonga) to be released off their mission. So exciting and sad emotions all at the same time, and we also get to hear from a living Prophet and Apostles.

Leanne set up a Bingo game with words and phrases that might be mentioned in Conference and it made you, at least listen to the talks in order to win the great prizes she had.

I know, the interest level looks low, but this picture may have been taken after Conference.
La-Shana and Blake were down for the weekend. It's always fun to have them home.

Wow

The pins in the x-ray eventually will be removed but the two black spec's next to the pins are anchors which will remain in his finger

These are some of the before and after surgery pictures.

Well Dad finally had a real doctor look at what he thought was a dislocated finger. Well Dad was right about one thing it wasn't broken, but both ligaments and a tendon had been damaged. So this is what it looks like now. So Mom has to doctor him back to normal. Mom says that he is such a cry baby, all men are she said. Yes he has a couple more pins holding him together but these two come out in two weeks.

Planning Process

It's been really weird, cause we have been planing this trip back to the Cook Islands for a while but we feel like time is going by to fast. We would ideally like to make the trip to the Cook Islands really for our Grandmothers Birthday, but at the same time there are a lot of family our kids have not yet met. So there is a lot of planning going on to arrange the perfect timing for all involved. The young kids are really excited and the teens are saving feverishly. Part of the planning is going to be where we are going to house everyone and the second leg of the trip to New Zealand. La-Shana has requested we make a short trip to New Zealand to see where our family all started, which we are excited to do. It just seems like time isn't moving fast enough for the little ones but there is so much more planning to do, in so little time.
Will keep you posted.

Photo shoot

One of the weekends we were fortunate enough to have La-Shana home, she decided to have Makenna dress into her cheer outfit and take a few pictures.

La-Shana had just bought a new camera, so it didn't take much to get her out to try her new toy. We don't know how long it took to take all the pictures that they took, but we did here a lot banging and clanging and yelling at the dogs in Hunter's room. But here are some of the final pictures.

Thanks Shana, it did help that you had beautiful subjects.

Makenna had to be cold............

Vegas, Rugby Sevens

Dad found out from some guys at work that the World Rugby Sevens was in Las Vegas, so Dad made some calls and he and Uncle Alan and his friend Alex decided to attend. So after work Friday night they drove out to Vegas to enjoy a weekend of Rugby.

Uncle Alan drove which made it possible for Dad to sleep, which didn't happen. Dad said that Uncle Alan drove at 90 miles per hour all the way to Vegas.

The weather was weird, but nice. It was cold in the Morning and evenings, but hot after the sun showed it's face.

Here they are enjoying the games. The games were 14 minutes long. So they watched over 30 games.

New Zealand looked really good but was beat by a better Fijian team.

South Africa won the whole event.

Had a ton of fun, must do it again

Ethan played earlier in the week, so they met up for the rest of the weekend. It was fun to go out as the guys. Just like old times....

Here Dad had to use the program to cover his head to avoid the sun

Uncle Alex out cold

Uncle Alan purchasing a Manu Samoa sweater.

Go Maverick's

Some of the pictures that Makenna took under water

We decided to make a last minute trip

to Colorado to visit Blake and La-Shana and watch Blake play basketball. We stayed in Fruita this time at a La Quinta because their swimming pool is indoors. When we arrived the first thing Makenna and Hunter did was find out what room Drew and Barret ( Blake's Nephews) were staying in and persuaded them to go swimming. Dad had bought a new underwater camera and wanted to try it out, so Makenna is taking pictures of everyone underwater and it also takes video pretty cool contraption.

After we watching Blake's game that evening we all decided to eat at Texas Roadhouse with Blake's parents, his Aunt Doreen and his Brother Mason and of course Drew and Barret.

It was a fun evening and we look forward to our next trip out there.

Had no idea that the indoor pool wasn't heated.

La-Shana helping Makenna upload pictures to Makenna's laptop

They took this picture cause Makenna wanted it as her wallpaper on her laptop

Here you can barely see her, but La-Shana is under that pile. Don't remember why, but Drew,Barrett, Hunter and Makenna attacked La-Shana. Below is the first opportunity to use the waterproof camera so it may be blurry, shaky but a lot of fun.

Snow Snow and still more snow

Hunter, Makenna and Mikey built this slide with a ramp, that runs the full length of our back yard and through the backyard of the home below our home.

Blake & La-Shana visit

We are completely filled to the brim with moms cooking, the best we could do is to watch movies and sleep.
There is so much snow outside, we were not leaving the house, not even for all the sales that were going on.

La-Shana and Bo, the new addition to our family.

Here are our eldest children. Just glad that they made the trip home this year.

A couple days after Christmas the kids were able to travel home for the holidays. Always eventful when we are all together.

This year we spent more time relaxing at home.

And more relaxing

Christmas Eve

Well it's that time of the year, where we should have the birth of Christ on our mind and all that transpired cause of his coming. Instead we are so concerned with what we are going to receive from our loved ones. Anyway this Christmas Eve we decided to have each family bring their favourite soup, then have game night the rest of the evening. The evening was a blast and went relatively well for our family.

Puzzle assembly

Here we are attempting use your facial muscles to manuever a cracker from your forehead to your mouth

Lounging around and relaxing consumed the rest of the evening