Thursday, November 29, 2007

A Good Prayer



May our eyes remain open even in the face of tragedy.

May we not become disheartened.

May we find in the dissolution
of our apathy and denial,

the cup of the broken heart.

May we discover the gift of the fire burning

in the inner chamber of our being

–burning great and bright enough

to transform any poison.

May we offer the power of our sorrow to the service

of something greater than ourselves.

May our guilt not rise up to form

yet another defensive wall.

May the suffering purify and not paralyze us.

May we realize the greatness of our sorrow

and not run from its touch or flame.

May clarity be our ally and wisdom our support.

May our wrath be cleansing, cutting through

the confusion of denial and greed.

May we not be afraid to see or speak our truth.

May the bleakness of the wasteland be dispelled.

May the soul’s journey be revealed

and the true hunger fed.

May we be forgiven for what we have forgotten

and blessed with the remembranceof who we really are.

~ The Terma Collective
PS: Happy Birthday, Kelli Melin!

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

For the Beauty of the Earth...

I have a ZILLION pictures to post and no time, but I couldn't wait any longer to post our beach pix. I have to hit the hay soon, but here's a look at what we did after Thanksgiving dinner...
We drove 90 miles out to Canon Beach on the Oregon Coast to play and watch the sun set (at like 4:40pm!!!) Here is our family at the Beach...
(our nephew, Gabriel was sleeping in the van)

I think this is my favorite picture of the day--my girls at sunset.
Addie collecting shells
James facing the sun set with the moon rising behind him
My cute boys

Me & my 15 chins, my hubby, and my darlin' son
Addie walking with her "kid-uncle" Marshall
Good night, sun...



"For the beauty of the earth
For the beauty of the skies
For the love which from our birth
Over and around us lies
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This our hymn of grateful praise."

Beautiful ending to a beautiful day.
Hope y'all had a wonderful holiday!

PS: Yes, that IS the beach from Goonies, which was filmed in Astoria (30 miles north of Canon) and at Canon Beach! Good eye! I didn't even notice, but I haven't seen Goonies since I was 13! Laura, there is a 30% chance of snow on 12/7 and 0% on 12/8, so maybe you can caravan with Posties for safety, then go home in the clear! Both highways are pretty major, so I imagine they'll be clear. Anyway, thanks for all the comments--luv U guys!

Thursday, November 22, 2007

More Washington Pix

Heidi is really enjoying Nana's dog, Sydnie

In the backyard on Wednesday

We found the best DVD for Heidi in the Target dollar bins--Video Zoo! We gave it to her when Addie was opening her gifts. It has relaxing music and no talking, so it will be perfect for quiet time!
Addie riding Marshall's scooter--she loves it so much, we got her one for her bday!
Nana & Addie
Cousins/ Aunt & Uncle singing to Addie at her bday lunch party
Opening her new sweatsTalking to Grandma Melin
Reading her cards
Excited about her Furberry
More card reading with mom


Dad and James at Ad's bday lunch--

Bubby still has a fat lip from falling at our hotel last Saturday.


Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Birthday Girl

Sweet Adeline Turned SIX Today! Her day started with a breakfast date with Uncle Michael. Mike let us sleep in this morning and took Addie, Heidi and Abby out to a birthday breakfast. They loved it and Addie felt so special and grown up to be taken on a date with her uncle! (Thanks, Michael!)
At lunchtime, she got a call from Grandma Melin back in Montana (buried in snow!)...Gram Melin and I agreed the Addie's birthday is extra-memorable because it's the day I became a mother and she became a Grandmother!

And even though Addie was Nana's 10th grandchild, Nana thinks she's pretty special, too!
I love this picture of my girls just waiting for the festivities to get going...

...and here's Addie with her long-wished-for Furberry Bear from Nana!

We had such a fun day today, still working yo sort through things at the house...I have tons more pictures to post. Hopefully I'll get a second wind later. Let me just say that Rich found the BEST bday surprise for Addie. She's been having so much fun riding around on Abby's razor scooter, Rich looked up on the internet where they might be on sale. This morning he found one online at Target for $18.99, so we went and picked it up in time for Addie's bday lunch party. She is THRILLED and I have the cutest pictures to prove it...coming soon! What a fun daddy!

If I don't come back by tomorrow, yall have yourselves and Merry Little Thanksgiving now...it's my favorite holiday, remember?


Tuesday, November 20, 2007

The Gorge

Columbia River Gorge
I-84 east of Portland, Oregon...these waterfalls were everywhere!

So...we made it to lovely Vancouver on Sunday afternoon at 4pm, 3pm local time. We left Spokane around 9:30am, stopped briefly in Kennewick, and enjoyed the MOST BEAUTIFUL drive down I-84 along the Columbia River. Oh, my, it was beautiful! Seriously, in the Top 5 most beautiful places I have ever seen. It was raining really hard for our first three days in Washington State, so we didn't get any good pictures of the river Gorge, but I took a few from the car as we drove.



The Drews were still at church when we arrived, so we came in and straightened up the (mostly empty) house and inflated our airbeds. We had a really fun reunion and went out to Baja Fresh for Sunday dinner. It was exciting to bed down and be ready for the movers at 8am on Monday & Tuesday. We worked really hard and enthusiastically on Monday, and more hard and LESS enthusiastically on Tuesday to get Mom and Mark moved in to their new house. This house is HALF the size of their Missouri home, which is a good thing, but Mom is continually surprised by how little room she has. It will take some time to get all settled, but it has been fun. The pine trees are so tall, the woods are thick and pretty, and Mom's house faces a tiny farm with chickens and little goats, with lots of green grass and big trees--it's really beautiful. The neighborhood borders a rural area, a lot like where they lived in Missouri. The kids are having a great time riding scooters and bikes around the wooded circle. There are lots of nice stores and restaurants nearby.



I will post more photos ASAP...tomorrow (Wednesday) is Addie's 6th Birthday. Adios...

Sunday, November 18, 2007

Road Warriors

Greetings from the nicest QualityInn Suites on the planet! We are in Spokane Valley, Washing ton enjoying another beautiful, overcast day on the road. Yesterday we left home in Montana at 9:30 am and drove to Butte to do some insurance business (Rich had to photograph a beautiful new restaurant we have insured in downtown Butte). Since Laura and Darrin have to work all weekend, Matt drove Gabriel down to Butte from Helena to meet us. We all had lunch at the BK and let the kids play a little. We topped off our gas tank and kept on truckin' with nephew Gabriel (age 13) on board. We arrived in Spokane at 5rpm our time, 4pm local time.

We checked into our surprisingly luxurious hotel (with my $25 employee price) and took the kids swimming. We found a Taco Bell for dinner and talked to Cousin Dave Clark who is the mission president here. He is on assigment in the Spokane North Stake this weekend, but invited us to come stay over at the mission home next Saturday our way home. We weren't going to stop, but we'll change our plans to visit the Clarks!

So we just ate dinner ad snuggled up and watched Animal Planet all night (guess who was soooo excited about that?) and played computer games (we inherited this laptop last week a it's fun--although my typing is even worse on this keyboard). The kids fell asleep later than we thought they would, but our room was so comfy and nice! This morning we enjoyed a full fresh breakfast buffet with eggs, sausage, waffles, yogurt, etc. Now we are packing up to go to the temple and head over to Nana's house in Vancouver (350 miles from here).

The drive was so pretty! There are a zillion little mining towns tucked in crevaces next to the railroad and the highgway, all in dense fir forests with creeks running through them. This is a part of the country I have never visited and I really love it!

Here's a funny surprise: my kids are watching "Atlantis Squarepantis" right now and the King of Atlantis is voiced by none other than David Bowie--yes, Bowie--and it's CRACKING ME UP!

We're all done chugging our Airbourne, so it's time to load the car. Best wishes for a beautiful Sabbath...we'll post more from Vancouver!

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Back in October: Party With Postums

Matt and Amie had Thursday, October 18th off work & school, so they cam eto Livingston to visit us!Of course we had to make out traditional trip to Chico for Pizza dinner and swimming.
At dinner, we realized the last time we had been together at Chico, I had stayed out of the water because I was sick and prego with James and I held 10-day-old baby Sam the whole time. Now Sam is almost two and James loves to float, Matt has been to Iraq and, and we just felt really grateful that things are, miraculously, "back to normal!" It's so nice to be together again!
Here's crazy Heidi jumping off the edge of hte pool...it's super steamy because the water is hot and the air is cold. MAtt is probably watching the Indians' game on the pool bar TV...
And here is Super Jake following Heidi's lead...those two little three-year-olds are like two peas in a pod! SO FUN!

Heidi, Addie, & Jacob
Matt & Amie brought muffins from Wheat Montana Bakery, so we ate them for breakfast with yogurt and juice on Friday morning. The stuffed animals also ate muffins, apparently.

After breakfast, I hid some Halloween treats and made some clues and sent the kids on a treasure hunt around our house.

Here's Uncle Matt reading one of the clues to the kids
Here we are walking to find a clue. ..

...more walking (taken by Amie)
Addie was excited to find a clue on the slide out back.
And here, Addie, Jacob and Heidi listen to Uncle Matt read the very last clue...they foudn the treasure box on the front porch and enjoyed their treats. And then the Postums had to head home to Helena. We're sooooooooo glad they came to play!




Back in October: Fall Birthdays Rule

This is a picture of Addie & Heidi on 10/20/07 getting ready to go into Boston's and Alexander's birthday party (they are born the same week--Boston is now 6 and Allyjander is now 5)
Here's their yummy jack-o-lantern cake
There's the back of Alexander's head blowing out his candles
Heidi helped Alex open and play with his gifts
Addie (along with Kelli adn Gracie) helped Boston open her gifts and then all the girls went downstairs adn played dress-ups while the boys adn Heidi played dragons and dinosaurs. We LOVE Boston & Alexander!


Back in October: Family Night Cookies

On Peter's Last Night with us, we made Halloween cookies The girls decorated them...
...James was curious...
...he thought they were GREAT!

Back in October: The True Story of Halloween

That's mom, ready to take the kids Trick-or-Treating at the banks in her Pumpkin Shirt
Heidi, Addie, and James at the bank
Addie's Jack-o-lantern
Mommy's huge Jack-o-Lantern
Our proch
AT THE TRUNK OR TREAT...
Addie and Boston

Heidi and Alexander
(her knight in shining armor)
Cousin Danny the Astronaut
Cousin Rosalie the Witch

Grandma with James wearing Rosalie's witch hat
Addie at our trunk
Uncle Mike (Yosemite Sam) surprised the kids and took the trick-or-treating



Danny, Mike, Addie and Heidi
Heidi played with Uncle Mike's cowboy gear when we got home
Addie won this cute cake at the Trunk-ot-Treat cake walk





FAMILY LETTER 07.28.19

Dear Loved Ones,                                                                                                        We have just ...