Madison Turns 10!

Madison getting ready to open up her family gifts.

Brandon surprised Madison with a birthday banner hanging in her doorway so he would be the 1st to wish her a Happy Birthday!

Jason made Madison a powerpoint presentation on why he loves his sister for her Birthday present.
Madison fell in love with this giant chick at Sams Club -- so it was at the top of her list. It has become her favorite TV pillow.

Madison had a friend party on the 28th. Here are all her girlfriends, they had just finishted tracing themselves and coloring them in on our driveway with sidewalk chalk.

Look at this adorable banner Megan made! It ended up being 12' so we had to find a special place to hang it.
The table is all set and ready for our "unusual" dinner.

The girls loved making a mess with their food and odd utinsils.

Madison lucked out with getting bear claw salad tongs.

The girls all decorated their own cupcakes and then helped to make Madison's big Double Digit 10!

Madison's friend Karly gave her a pool themed gift that was turned into a cute flower.

The girls also played a balloon stomp game, went on a treasure hunt to find their treat bags and guessed how many candies were in special jars. Prizes were given to the closest and the farthest.

Madison loved her birthday week!

Lake Tahoe March 8 - 13th, 2009

This year the whole gang was able to come. Pictured below from left to right: Eric, Donna, Paul, Pam, Mike, Janet, Marleen & Brian. Here we are at our favorite resort in Tahoe - Kirkwood! We love it becuase we know if we come mid-week there won't be any crowds and once again . . . we were right! This year we had two day of skiing at Kirkwood.

Boy, we must be getting old. We never used to just chill at the resort!

Relaxing in Lake Tahoe

This night the group went out to dinner at Chevy's. We discovered $3 appetizers during Happy Hour so we enjoyed the bargain and came back again later on in the week.
Eric's back went out so "Chiropractor" Brian tried his best to help out his buddy.
Tossing the ball in the streets is always good for a little R & R.

It's always sad to pack up and head for home -- the 9-10 hour drive seems to take longer than on the way up. We've been coming up to Lake Tahoe now for 17 years -- amazing

Visiting Utah Family

After the 1pm sealing in Manti and pictures and visiting took place on the temple grounds, we drove 1 1/2 hours up to Springville and stayed the night with the Crooks and Harrison's. This gave us CA drivers a few more hours to visit with our Utah family. Harrison's hosted a dinner and everyone came. We got to meet new additions to the family as well as visit with one another. We left Saturday around 9:30 am waiting for the roads to dry up and get plowed as Southern Utah got 6 inches.

Congratulations to Mr & Mrs. Wetzel!

My neice, Sandie & Mathew were sealed in the Manti Temple. My Mom and sisters, Della, Mary Alice, Carolyn and I all drove up yesterday and spent the night in St. George. We got up at 5pm to make the 3 hour trip up to Manti and came acrossed some pretty icy & scarry round around Cedar City. We made it in time to do a session before the sealing and then got a chance to see meet Mathew in the hallway and then found Sandie & Diane in the bride's room before the ceremony. It was bitter cold and a stressful drive with a trip that was always "weather permitting" but it was so worth it all to see this happy couple sealed.

The Manti Temple

In the visitors center there were these framed pictures of some of the rooms in the temple and I took pictures of them with my camera. Pretty good hun? I loved being in this temple -- build in 1888 -- it took 11 years to build. Amazing!!!