Heaven Sent

 My parents haven't been here in almost 2 years but they just happened to be scheduled to fly in on the very weekend Bridger was in the hospital.  I knew that the timing was not just a coincidence, but a beautiful blessing!  I can not even tell you what a comfort and help it was to have my Mom and Dad here when I was going through such a scare with our little Bridger.

I had big plans for their visit...fun Chattanooga area places to go, wonderful  restaurants to introduce them to, and historical sites to see, but things changed and instead they happily spent their time....

building pirate ships...

 and battlegrounds on the kitchen floor:)

Reading Magic Tree House...

 Playing Settlers and Rumikub...

and  lots of Battleship with Bridger,

backyard football ,

 finding educational activities online for our restless little 7 year old who was supposed to be taking it easy)

giving encouragement and love to their daughter (I needed it at times)

making crafts (brought in Grammy's suitcase)

 building Jenga towers

Cleaning up after us constantly (seriously my Mother is the best help ever--all my bathrooms are sparkling)

 even washing fingerprints off windows--all this service and love all week long!

 I really can not even describe how great of a blessing this was.  It made all the difference!

I am so grateful!

 We sure do love you Papa and Grammy and miss you like crazy now that you are gone!

 But we will cherish this week we spent together cozy at home:)

My Mom even insisted on helping me get out and put up most of my Christmas decorations.  I hope I can always be as unselfish and thoughtful as these two are!  And my goodness I hope they can come again soon so I can treat them to to all the Southern fun I had planned!

Happenings

We had such a fun weekend with 'Papa' in the house!

Even though we moved across the country two years ago,

the boys didn't seem to skip a beat in their relationship with Grandpa.

 It was sweet watching my boys with my Daddy. 

He is a wonderful Grandpa...we sure miss this guy!

 In other news...we have had a TON of rain!

It is such a fun change from the dry hot summer--that we are thrilled!

In fact school was cancelled today due the excessive rain! 

Can you believe that?  I swear they look for any excuse to cancel school around here,

but we are NOT complaining:) 

It was so fun to sleep in, relax and read today. 

I love having lazy days in our cozy home.

 And last, but not least, oh my goodness, I am so excited to tell you about the most DIVINE Caramel Banana Cream Pie I made this weekend in celebration of Grandpa being here for Sunday dinner.  It was incredible!  I will share it next Monday on The Sisters Cafe.

Seriously, it was heavenly:)

Recently I have been working on organizing my kitchen pantry, cupboards and drawers.  What a big job, but happily I am almost done and LOVE they way it feels to have order in my kitchen with everything neat and easily accessible.  Now I can actually see and find everything with ease.  BIG improvement, let me tell you!  With a small kitchen, I have to be very organized to maximize the space that I do have.   If you are interested, I will write a post with  the products and ideas that I found that helped. 

What do you think? 

I hope your week is going great!

Exciting News

As you all know,  we have some SERIOUS BYU fans (remember Sweet 16) in the house.  So you can only imagine the excitement when we heard that the Cougars 2011 season opener was going to be at 'Ole Miss' here in the South.  And the boys were beyond happy when Brad got tickets for them to go!  BUT what caused the MOST excitement was the news that Grandpa was flying out from Utah to join them for the game! 

The boys had just walked in from a Sunday night Youth Fireside at our church,  when Coleman told them the happy news:) 

Grandpa will fly in on Thrusday night and will make the road trip with the boys on Friday morning to Oxford Mississippi to cheer on their beloved team together. The plan is to be there in time on Friday night for the BYU Team Fireside. 

This is exciting stuff, it feels like Chrsitmas around here!

Go COUGARS!!

Source: cougarblog.wordpress.com via Michelle on Pinterest

Rainstorms and a Memory

(Me and my Dad..many years ago)

This week we have had some MAJOR rain!! Like all day and night and the streets are flooded kind of rain! Much to my little boys dismay the storm has knocked the power out for a few hours. Bridger and Cannon were quite worried about the darkness in the middle of the day and the LOUD wind and rain that seemed to be rattling our home.

It brought back a memory of a time when there was a HUGE thunder and lightening storm and my Daddy made us ice cream cones and we sat in the kitchen right in front of the sliding glass doors and watched nature put on a show. It was so fun and has stayed with me always. I wonder if that is why I have always LOVED a good rain!

So I tried to recreate that happy feeling for my boys. We had ice cream cones on the window ledge of our dining room--where we have big 20 foot windows. It was the perfect place to enjoy the storm.
Pretty soon their worry changed to happy giggles and now they want to do it every time the power is out:) Already twice this week

Thanks Daddy for that happy childhood memory and inspiring a new tradition around here:)

PS I am so sorry that I never got to posting my menu this week--I have been too busy making ice cream cones and doing other important Mommy duties:)

Happy to be Here

So happy to be with our Grandpa (Grandma is in China but will be back tomorrow) ...

after lots of this...

and this...

and even a little of this..

we made it safely to Utah!

The boys all cheered when they saw the "Welcome to Utah" sign.

We are happy to be here!

Grandpa and Grandma in Tennesse Marathon of Pictures

The first day they were here, we enjoyed visiting, reading and just catching up.

Then we were off...
We took them to see Lookout Mountain (a big civil war site) where you can see into 7 states!!

We went to TJ's basketball game!

Connor's Wrestling Match


Coleman and his cute flag to cheer Connor on (It says Connor Rocks!!!!)

Playing Boggle with Grandpa

We went to the Tennessee Aquarium with the two little boys while 'the brothers' were in school.

Grandma got down all fours to explore with Bridger!

Checking out the crabs

Augh!! They are swimming with the sharks!!

Look at the penquin stopping to say hello!

Petting the sting rays

This cracked me up. One night Grandma was reading to the two little boys and slowly but surely all the boys were drawn in...




Awe what a good story teller!

And then all too soon their stay ended.
On our way to the airport--boo hoo!
Oh we miss you so much Mom and Dad!! Come again soon!

XOXO

Sweet Morning Surprise

Although they arrived in the middle of the night when the boys were sound asleep...there is not doubt that Grandpa and Grandma are in the house:)

We are all over the moon happy to have them here!

Connor the HUNTER

Connor headed up into the autumn mountains with Grandpa and Uncle Matt (and the HORSES) this weekend for the opening weekend of the ELK HUNT! This has become a yearly tradition that he looks forward to and loves!

On the way they saw lots of SHEEP (blocking the road), cool FISH (that Matt caught with his bare hands--what a MAN!) and some beautiful FALL COLORS.

They were up before the sun and off to find the BIG ELK! They were RAINED on all day...

They tracked down several RAINBOWS...but did not come home with that BIG ELK! O well there is always next year!! THANKS Dad and Matt--Connor had so much fun being with you up in the mountains riding horses!! The perfect weekend for a boy!