It's Been Awhile!

Gary has been the Xanga Master this past year but he's been so swamped I guess I better pick up the slack!  There's no way I can cover all the events of  the past month, so I'll try and skip over some highlights.  One of the biggest accomplishments from my point of view was the burning of the weeds!  YEA!!!!!  This has been on the list for ever so long- finally the blessed day came.  We raked into tidy piles, pulled out the matches and had a water hose crew on hand.  We made quite the little bonfires!  I think around a dozen piles were torched.  Our dirt looks so much better now.  I still can't get over the contrast of Camarillo yard days versus Cedar yard days.  Let's start dreaming of landscaping next!

Mid November also saw some serious canning action.  We picked up some "seconds" of the apple variety.  They were seconds mostly because of size, they were humongous!  We apple sliced, diced and sauced for several days.  Now the pantry is filled with lots of pie filling and sauce.  Oh, I also canned grape juice (my favorite!)  Georgianna is seen below helping me clear the shelves:

   

The end of November saw a happy gathering for Turkey day.  It was so fabulous to have family around and we're so glad so many would make the trip to share time with us.  Thanks fam! 

  

 

     

  

We got a Lucky Dog to get such lovings by Grandpa!  Table looked good, food was great, family was de-best!  I think that Risk photo means Dallas won.  

RIGHT after the Thanksgiving weekend we surprised our kids with a trip to Happy-land.  It was actually Gary's idea this time (I have to clarify such facts to prevent my name being paired with such terms as "addict" or "maniac").  Around the end of October he was imagining to himself that by the end of November his work schedule would be calm enough that we could take a few days off to enjoy some RnR.  Isn't that a funny joke? It is in hindsight as his schedule is worse than ever BUT we didn't know that then.  So we made the plans with the help of some friends and managed to keep the whole thing a secret from the kids!!  (Excepting Katrina who heard the original discussion and had to keep a zipped lip for a month!  UGH!)  We loaded the crew into the car on Monday and told them we were going to find a place for a family photo.  We kept driving and driving (they didn't notice the suitcases) until we neared Vegas at which point we said we might as well have Pam take the shots for us.  They went hog-wild with the thought of seeing family!  But as we neared the strip and they noticed we hadn't exited the freeway yet we finally dropped the bomb, "Since we are already THIS far, why don't we keep driving and take some family pictures at Disneyland?"  Then they really went crazy!  How's this for a family photo?

We had a great, RELAXING trip.  We didn't do anything but Disneyland for 3 days.  It was a lovely vacation.  We did get some great family shots, but none of them made the Christmas card cut.  We opted for a different approach this year.  Gary also made a big old video with all the vacation shots on it (the cousins will love watching it, although it may only further Evelyn's Mickey doom).  It's not loaded to youtube, but I'll work on that.

   

 

As for other stories of note, I'm working my tail off to be ready for Christmas.  It's such a great time of year, I love this kind of "busy-ness".  Gary is also busy as can be, I can't say it's so great for the family (we were spoiled these past few years to have him work from home) as now we don't see him so much.  We're adjusting and when things get too bad I'm getting good a pitching a fit to bring him home a little earlier in the evenings.  Now, for the cutest thing to be produced by our posterity lately- this one takes the cake:

Gianna prays each day the following:  "Thank thee for Mommy all lovely and pared for us."  At first we just smiled but when she said it over and over each day we wondered what she could possibly mean.  One day Gary figured it out.  Any guesses on the translation?  I'll post the answer soon, after y'all scratch your noggins a bit.

 

 

Wrapped Around a Little Finger

Lizzy often gets pampered by her siblings.  Here she is in a laundry basket coach with plenty to keep her busy - and stylish.

Lizzy has turned into a curly-Q as of late. This increase in cuteness hasn't improved her cleanliness at the meal table however.

  

 

More mealtime cuteness.

In other news, this evening we went to Joseph's first performance, held at the Heritage Center - the same stage where Katrina performed in To Kill a Mockingbird.  We were too far away to get very good pictures, but here's a photo from one of the numbers he was part of.

 

Hard at Work

As always, Liesl is always working hard to improve our home.  She recently tackled our dining room chairs which had become stained from extensive use by utensil-impaired small people.

Above is a "before" shot of one of said stained chairs.

 

Liesl handily delegated the chair disassembly to me as you see on the left.  On the right Liesl is stapling the new fabric onto one of the seats.

The finished product consisted of six chairs recovered with fabric purchased from the fabric district in L.A. - and covered in plastic to make for easier cleanup in the future.  Shortly thereafter we had the missionaries over for dinner.  One of the Elders was from Holland.  He sat down to eat and then stood up again saying "um...this seat is covered...in plastic?!"  With his accent it was a funny moment.

Speaking of Liesl's creativity, recently she was teaching the kids about art, Michelangelo specifically.  To make it more real for the young apprentices she had them try to draw something lying on their backs with their "canvas" attached to the bottom of a chair.  Fun!

Happy Halloween!

Jacob, Gianna and Lizzy are wearing family costume favorites. Katrina is wearing her Wizard of Oz Costume sewed by her grandmother. Liesl slid effortlessly into the cheerleading outfit of her youth (well, sort of ).  And Joseph and I are sporting costumes Liesl sewed for us.  I thought my Zorro cape was quite charming though my spirits were dampened slightly at the Ward Trunk or Treat when a little girl asked me if I was one of those guys from McDonalds... 

Fun pumpkins!

 

 

At the moment the photo on the left was taken, some lollipop drool escaped from G's mouth, providing an unexpected, albeit appropriate effect.

 

Lizzy's second Halloween.  Joining in the fray.

 

We were a tad on the fiercesome side this Halloween, but Joseph did add a bit of valor to the mix.

Now to enjoy the candy! (The appropriate Dad Taxes have been collected, of course.)  Happy Halloween!

 

Milestones for Joseph

Joseph has passed some significant milestones this month.  Here's a quick accounting:

A couple of weeks ago we took Joseph to do baptisms for the dead - his first time.  It was a great trip, albeit a tad early - the only available time was the 6:40am slot.  We went with our friends the Bertagnolli's who have a son Joseph's age, Thomas, and are good friends.  Thomas was recently called as Deacon's Quorum President and he called Joseph as Secretary.  Afterwards we went out to breakfast.  Good times!

Here we are in front of the St. George temple with Stan and Jalyn Bertagnolli and three of their nine children.  The Bertagnollis provided family names from Italy for the baptisms.  Fun!

 

On the left, proud parents and son.  On the right, Secretary Joseph and President Bertagnolli.

This past Saturday Joseph participated in his troop's 50 mile bike ride, the final effort on the Bicycling merit badge.  He was one of only three boys to finish and he came in first place!  He got the drafting thing figured out and made good use of it the last 10 or 15 miles and then just before the end he cut out in front of the adult leader who was in the lead and made for a glorious finsish.  I was so proud of him and all the hard work he has put in on his own initiative over the last month to prepare for this event.  Here are a couple of shots from the day:

 

Joseph and Thomas on the road early on, around mile 13.

 

Lunch break at the Kolob Canyon Ward building in New Harmony.  Joseph and Thomas - two of the three finishers.

In other news, Joseph has been enjoying his new schooling experience this year.  He participates in a local private school called a New Commonwealth School - basically a co-op for home schoolers.  He takes classes in Shakespeare, American Government and History, Dance, Speech and Choir.  In the past two weeks he has read over a dozen of Shakespeare's plays.  Most often he has the actual text that he reads while listening to an audio recording of the play and then he has a dictionary and Cliff's Notes nearby to help when he doesn't understand something.  A week or so ago Liesl took the three oldest children to The Tempest which was playing at the Utah Shakespearean Festival here in Cedar.

It has been a remarkable experience to watch Joseph blossom as he enters what is called the Transition to Scholar phase.  The past six years have been a leap of faith for us as we have implemented an educational philosophy that differs signficantly from what is considered normal and acceptable in our society.  We are seeing amazing results in self-direction, maturity, behavior, etc.  A few months ago, for example, he expressed interest in learning a stringed instrument.  Earlier this month he started Viola lessons and is making great progress.  Fun!

"It's a Hell of a Place to Lose a Cow..."

So said Ebenezer Bryce regarding the canyon that was later named for him.  Within those canyon walls is where we spent our day yesterday.  Breathtaking scenary!  Here are some photos from the day:

 

Our first trip to Bryce since moving to Cedar City.  As with Zions we met people from all over the world including one guy from Nottingham, England.  The kids eyes got wide when they hear that.  Jacob wisely informed the man that he certainly could not have known Robin Hood since he lived so long ago.

Intrepid hikers ready to descend to the canyon floor.

Intrepid Lizzy ready to be carried to the canyon floor.

 

 

The Navaho Loop trail is the first hike we did.  It takes you to the canyon floor via a set of switchbacks among amazing "hoodoos".  These geological formations are formed by erosion and the fact that for 200 days out of the year water in the canyon freezes at night and melts during the day causing the rock to crack and break apart.

 

The dark canyon of sorts seen on the right is "Wall Street" located near the bottom of the canyon.  The trail takes you through this narrow gorge with very narrow, high walls.

  

On the right is the view as you are emerging from Wall Street.  You are greeted by this enormous pine that has managed to grow tall enough to reach the sun light.  On the right is the same tree from outside of Wall Street.  The picture was taken at a 45 degree angle from the ground in an attempt to capture the whole tree.

  

On the left is a picture of two rock bridges randomly left behind after years of erosion.  A sign nearby warns hikers not to climb on them.  On the right is a picture of the kids under another such archbridge along the trail.

 

Scenes from the trail.

This hoodoo is called Thor's Hammer and is probably the most famous in the park.

A closer look at another cool hoodoo behind and to the left of Thor's Hammer.

I thought these formations were waaay cool.

 

At one point we went to a lookout overlooking the canyon.  On the left is what we were looking at.  On the right, I discovered, is what Georgianna and Jacob were looking at instead.  Pieces of asphalt that broke off the path...

 

Lizzy took a liking to her backpack especially if she could stand up (left).  On the right is a shot Liesl took of us when we discovered Lizzy was leaning over and giving me little kisses.  Way cute!

After reaching the end of the Mossy Cave trail the kids decided to hike up to this cool formation.

Here they are climbing on the formations.  All three of them actually crawled through the little hole you see on the right (the lower of the two small holes).  Here's some quick video of the day:

TRAMPOLINE FUN!

Before the weather turns cold permanently we made sure to get in some quality bouncing time.  Lizzy is now a full fledged participant in these activities.  Liesl watches with her hands covering her eyes.

 

 

The kids think that building up static electricity and touching Dad's nose is the thing to do.  I beg to differ. Good times nevertheless!! 

Has it really been almost a month since our last post?  Things have been so very busy.  I'll try to update bit by bit.

Friday night Liesl and I had the opportunity to go to a black tie banquet and ball at the Heritage Center in Cedar as part of the college's Commencement activities.  Always fun.  Last time we were in Los Angeles we bought me a tux.

 

On the left, of course, is my lovely bride and I on our way out the door.  Her dress had this really pretty flowery train on the back which unfortunately you can't see in the picture.  On the right is me and my good friend Russ Clarke who looks much better in a tux than I do.  Our families have been great friends since our Camarillo days.  Russ and Cindy moved to Riverton, UT about five years ago and we've kept in touch as they have pursued child-rearing, educational and financial paths similar to our own.  Russ is a successful physical therapist in the Salt Lake valley and recently accepted the invitation to leave his career and move his family to Cedar to replace me as Director of Admissions at the college.  He is already a PhD student there but now he'll be able to pursue his degree on campus rather than from afar.  They are closing on a home in Enoch (just north of Cedar) on October 26th and moving in on November 1st.  I am very happy that he turned down offers of greater compensation and other pleadings by his employer and that we'll be working so closely together.  Woohoo!

This weekend Russ and I also finished classes spanning the last several months dealing with Alexis de Tocqueville's classic work Democracy in America.  Tocqueville came to America from France in the 1830s and spent several months touring our country.  Upon his return he wrote this incredibly insightful book about the nature of American government and culture and was mind-bogglingly prophetic in his warnings to our people about the problems we needed to watch out for.  Astonishing and profound material.

Earlier this month was General Conference, of course.  Good times were had in Vegas with the exceptional hospitality that Pam and Brian always offer.  Dallas came down a day or two early and we took the kids fishing.  Not much luck on the fishing front (very cold and windy) but we did have some good adventures.  Here are a few photos:

This is Aspen Mirror Lake up Cedar Mountain.  We checked out the lake (really a pond) and decided not to fish, but it was very pretty.

 

The kids found a tree that had split four feet off the ground and had fallen exposing the upper root structure making a pretty cool jungle gym.

  

Lizzy feel asleep on the drive while eating a lollypop.  When she woke up one of her eyelids was glued shut from the stickiness.

Dallas let Katrina drive his truck, which - you can imagine - she thoroughly enjoyed.

Good times! 

September 2007 - Disneyland Trip

Part iii

Here's the third video from our California trip earlier this month.  Good times.  Enjoy!

September 2007 - California Trip

Part ii

Here's the next segment from our trip to Cali a couple of weeks ago.  A tiny portion is dedicated to the evil works of Possessed Baby Lizzy whose works shall live in infamy.  From crying for hours on-end while traveling to compromising the integrity of her diaper and spilling forth its unmentionable liquified contents into every crevice of her car seat...  Enjoy anyways!