Some AUGUST highlights:
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| August 2 - Look what was at our house. Today was our last day to work with movers! |
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| With all that we had thrown away, given away, shipped by air and by sea, and were leaving at the house, I couldn't believe how much was still going to storage. I'm thinking another major purge when we get back after looking at this---and they weren't finished! |
IT WAS TIME TO RE-VAMP, HELP SARAH MOVE IN SOME MORE, HELP MATT MOVE OUT SOME MORE, AND ORGANIZE OUR "DESIGNATED BEDROOM"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I so wish I would have taken a picture of our "new" bedroom at this point. Anything that we didn't know what to do with went there so it would be out of the Arciniegas way, all of our new luggage was there---some packed, some not. It looked like a warehouse! It was AWFUL!
August 4 - Was up until 2:45 this morning (night of the 3rd) working on insurance valuation for the boat shipment so it could leave the harbor this week.
August 5 - We were still getting more of Sarah's things moved in, and things moved around. Got six rooms cleaned up, organized and arranged and had carpets cleaned in them. Packed and drove to Baton Rouge.
August 6 - Drove rest of the way to Pigeon Forge, TN. DJ was recovering from dental surgery, so we didn't do much. Besides, we were just a bit tired! :)
August 7 - Met up with Rachel's family after we listened to a time-share presentation, and we spent the rest of the day with them. They actually went swimming in our hotel pool while we were at the presentation. Took the girls to see Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (their parents had already seen it on a date). Sarah and Israel moved their furniture in while we were gone.
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| With four of our favorite girls in front of the theater. |
August 8 - Went to church in Russ and Rachel's old ward in Sevierville and ran into Norm and Jennifer Powell and three youngest kids---old friends from Sugar Land that now live in South Carolina. We spent the rest of the day at Russ and Rachel's.
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| Colee sang for us, and it looks like she might have played a little something on the piano. |
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| Becca played some on the piano, played her cello, and recited The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere |
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| Anna played on both the piano and her violin. |
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| This is Morgan reciting The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere. She also played the piano and the harp. |
August 9 - We were on the road 15 1/2 hours, as we drove back to Houston. It was a great time to make lists, make travel plans, catch up on talking to DJ, and reading the Book of Mormon for the summer challenge.
August 11 - We got DJ packed and off to Basel with my violin, too. I got the Acura detailed, and that evening I babysat the Kirkham kids as part of a service auction held months before.
August 12 - Moved computers all around and had pianos moved---Sarah's from The Woodlands to our house, ours from downstairs to upstairs.
August 13 - I was dealing with leftovers from the move - unmated socks, piles of paper that kept accumulating, things the kids hadn't returned to friends, things that needed to be returned to stores, leftover stuff out of the bathroom drawers and cupboards, unfinished projects, the stuff I forgot to ship. YUCK! And as I write this six months later, some of that stuff still isn't finished!
August 14 - I worked on projects, got things ready to start the painting in Kate's room, and went to the John's wedding reception.
August 15 - Sang with the ward choir for the last time before I moved. :(
August 16 - Out to lunch with some of my favorite people.
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| Ruth Dayhuff, Jan Meehan on the left with me. D'Ann Figgins, Terryl Speers, Linda Stolle, and Valerie Murphy on the right. Ann Broadbent was taking the picture. |
August 17 - It was my birthday, but no time to waste. I painted the lower half of Katelyn's bedroom with two coats of white. Abby's former and very yellow bedroom wasn't going to cut it with the nursery decor that had come from the Arciniegas. I just hadn't had time to paint until now.
August 18 - Painters were at the house to paint the master bedroom, bathroom, and closet. Also had an $1,100 plumbing fix that was all due to shoddy construction practices. Another story.
August 19-20 - Went to San Antonio for Mike's graduation from Air Force basic training:
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| Some of Thursday's festivities |
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| August 19 - Mike being honored as one of the top ten percent of his class. |
MEANWHILE, ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE POND...
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| DJ was touring a castle in France... |
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| and viewing an antique car collection there as well. |
August 23 - I was off to Idaho, met the girls, the grandchildren, and David in IF for lunch; then when David went back to work, the rest of us did some shopping and had pictures taken of Hunter, William, and Conner:
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| Our cute Hunter - almost 4 |
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| Our sweet William - 13 months |
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| Our darling Conner - 6 months |
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| The babies almost laughing, and Hunter giving us his "cheesy" smile! |
That evening we went back to the Morgans and met with all the guys and Graeber and his fiancee, Amber, for FHE and a hot dog/marshmallow roast. We also celebrated William's birthday late and Hunter's early. PICTURES COMING SOON, I HOPE.
August 24 - It was a day for the Butterfields. I spent the morning at the park with Liz and the boys; we went to Bajio's for lunch with Mark, too; then shopped while the boys napped, Mark was sweet to babysit; spent the late afternoon at another park for the Rexburg Youth Celebration with 2/3 of Madison county! Pizza and a movie with all the families at Dave and Marinda's that night.
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| Hunter at the park! |
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| Liz and William sliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiding! |
August 25 - It was a day for the Morgans. Marinda and I spent the morning bottling apples from their trees in the backyard. We met Dave for lunch at Famous Dave's, and went Christmas shopping in the afternoon. I found some seriously good deals for some of the babies on summer wardrobes for 2011 besides, and I bought a shower gift for Amber. We got some serious shopping done that afternoon.
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| We met the rest of the kids and their spouses at the Rexburg Temple that evening and did sealings (an ordinance that unites families for eternity). It was a "heavenly" evening---one of the most special times I've had in the temple with my children. |
We picked up the grandchildren and went for ice cream (and my bottled water) afterwards and then played Bananagrams at the Butterfields after we were done.
August 26 - Abby and I went for pedicures that morning, ate Taco Bell for lunch, ran some errands, and then I drove to Malad, Idaho and had an early supper with my former BYU roommates.
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| My BYU Besties! |
August 27 - It was a day for the Perrys. Abby and I spent most of the day shopping and trying to decorate and organize their apartment (it is so teeny, and let's just say there was about five different wall finishes and three different colors of curtains in the open space that serves as both living room and kitchen). We had lunch with my niece, Ashley Sutterfield Daw, who works in Rexburg. It was so fun to see her. Later that night, we went out to dinner with Steven at Applebee's and checked out the local Farmer's Market. I also went shopping for shower refreshments on the way back to Rigby (more on that later).
Some of our improvements:
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| Their couch looked like this with.... |
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| ...these red and blue plaid curtains hanging above it! |
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| A new slipcover, curtains, and a few pillows helped a bit. We found some fun things for the walls in the kitchen, a rooster-themed table cloth, a rustic metal rooster, and a new plant, too. |
August 28 - I helped do some cleaning at Dave and Marinda's because she was hosting a wedding shower that day for Graeber's fiancee, Amber. Graeber is Dave's very good friend that Dave introduced to the gospel back in middle school in Sugar Land. Dave got to baptize Graeber when they were in high school. Marinda had just had a wisdom tooth removed on Thursday so I wanted to help because I figured she didn't feel well. I had also picked up some fruit and veggies to help out with the food. I wasn't going to be able to stay because I had to head to SLC about the time the shower started.
I was so touched at all the work that my kids were doing to help Graeber and Amber have a special wedding day as none of their parents could be there. Mark offered to cater their food and let them use his catering conference room to host a reception. Liz drove back with the two boys to Moses Lake alone so Mark could stay and do that. Marinda helped them decorate with things from Dave and Marinda's wedding and hosted the shower. You could tell how much my kids loved the soon-to-be married Graebers.
I went back to Rexburg, tweaked a few things at Abby's, did some more shopping (found some cute things for our apartment in Switzerland and some cute hair bows for Katelyn, too), and worked on making arrangements for a wedding cake for Graeber and Amber.
Drove to Salt Lake and met four of my brothers (Sam, Farley, Chris, and Allen) and parts of their families and my brother-in-law, Kevin and his son, Jaden (15 of us in total) for dinner at Marie Callendar's. I went to Farley and Sherry's and spent the night. Had a really good visit with Farley's family.
August 29 - Headed to Vernal bright and early so I could be there in time for church. Mom, Amy, and I went to dinner at my brother, Scott's house later that evening. Louise is an excellent cook, the food was incredible, and we had a good visit. Mom insisted that Amy and I go to her choir practice to listen to them.
August 30-September 1 - I visited with my mom and helped her do some projects. The main thing I did was empty and clean out most of her upper kitchen cupboards. I bought her some lighter-weight dishes to go with some that Farley and Sherry had purchased. Did some windows and blinds, too. Had dinner with Tim and Ellen Hadlock and had a good visit with Nena Caldwell, all three of them classmates from high school. Spent some time with my niece, Amy, who was living at Mom's while she painted some of the dinsosuars at Dinosaur Gardens.
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| Amy's first paint job at Dinosaur Gardens in Vernal. |
Had a Chinese lunch with Scott and Mom one day and dinner with Amy and my Mom at Winger's another night. Also visited several times with Sam and Adrienne who were out that way doing some hiking and photo shoots. I just got a lot of good family time on this trip. Shopped before I left---some of my favorite places to shop for home decor are in Vernal and Rexburg. Weird, huh?
Some SEPTEMBER highlights:
September 2 - I left Vernal early so I could get to the distribution center and buy some church materials printed in German before my flight to Houston. Flew home and went to a Houston Symphony concert that night, outdoors at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavillion in The Woodlands with the Arciniegas. Good times.
September 3-4 - My only full days to work and to shop and to pack. YIKES! The reality of the whole thing really hit! Helped clean a little for Sarah and Israel's "BYU Opening Game" party on the 4th.
September 5 - Attended my last English-speaking church services for awhile. Dinner at our house (Sarah and Israel's house now) for extended family as both a good-bye for me and for Matt who was leaving for basic training that week as well.
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| The girls with Benson - Bri (Livi's daughter), Livi, Me, Sarah |
September 6-7 - Finished what I could and flew to Basel through Frankfurt.
September 7 - Matt left for Ft. Knox
September 8 - 17 - Except for Sunday, my days were filled with unloading dozens of boxes, re-organizing what DJ had unpacked, cleaning, lots of trips to IKEA, and building furniture. We also had the missionaries to dinner the third night I was in Basel. Some of what we built and/or put together were:
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| This desk, office chair, and lamp---a second, smaller office chair and another lamp for my scrapbook table followed, as did a floor lamp to go by the sofa-bed. Total so far - six items. |
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| One day while DJ was at work, I built this storage unit for a lot of my scrapbooking supplies, journals, and memorabilia---I did everything by myself but the last 5 screws! Total so far - 7 items Oh, and that doesn't count the ten storage boxes that either had to be snapped together or put together with dozens of teeny, tiny screws. |
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| Two smaller storage units. Total so far - 9 items (not counting six more storage boxes, what eventually became 8 more shoe-box size storage containers, and 9 new magazine boxes to hold paper). |
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| A bookcase for the extra bedroom. Total so far - 10 items. |
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| A small entertainment center for the TV and such. Total so far - 11 items. |
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| A dresser for our bedroom. Total so far - 12 items. |
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| And last, but not least, two night stands like this one for our bedroom and three wardrobes that I don't have a good picture of. Total - 17 items. |
September 18 - We went on a day-trip to Freiburg, Germany:
September 20-29 - More of the same work on the weekdays. DJ worked 12-hour days for the most part. I kept busy building the IKEA projects, finding a place for everything. Had a lot of tweaking to do, but most everything had a place at this point.
September 29 - Mike called to say that he was married! He wasn't at the wedding, however; the Air Force arranged for someone so stand in as proxy because Mike couldn't leave his training, and they needed to be married so the AF would move all their things in December---the paperwork needed to be processed right then. Since there aren't wedding pictures, here is a picture of Mike and Toni taken a few weeks later at Mike's wing ceremony:
September 30 - Left today for a four-day get-away. Drove through the German countryside enroute to Garmisch. Stopped for lunch at quaint German restaurant:
Some OCTOBER highlights:
October 1-3 - Really enjoyed Germany including Neuschwanstein, the Passion Play and Oberammergau, and our cute little hotel in Garmisch:
October 3 - Got to listen to some of our church's General Conference in English when we got home.
October 4-9 - Really got into fine tuning the scrapbook memorabilia, in addition to hanging pictures and other things to feather our nest! Also started German lessons on Rosetta Stone.
October 11-15 - Cleaned, sorted, filed, blogged, and studied German.
October 16 - Day-trip to Colmar, France:
October 18-20 - More of the same......sorted, filed, cleaned, studied German.
October 21 - I prepared food for Relief Society Meeting---an all-day project:
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| Made this sausage/vegetable/rice dish which was baked in a pumpkin and pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. Can you tell there was sort of a pumpkin theme??? |
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| Made this mini-pumpkin centerpiece at Relief Society. |
October 23 - Went to temple session as part of stake Relief Society conference:
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| Don't think he's excited, do you? |
Some NOVEMBER highlights (I posted "I'm thankfuls" all month and didn't keep as good a record):
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| November 6 - We headed to Titisee in the Black Forest (this is the lake the village is named after). |
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| In the village of Titisee |
November 13 - Did a bunch of my Christmas shopping online. I decided I liked it!
November 15 - This was my Facebook post on the 15th: While I've been posting my "thankful fors", been busy---finished organizing the last of 16 boxes of memorabilia, gearing up for 1st volume of our life story, been studying Deutsch, fixed food for 2 more church functions (still hard to cook here), took 2 dear friends to dinner in France, spent a Saturday in Germany, and have been blogging (morganmischief.blogspot.com) among other things. Hope all is well with y'all!
November 27 - Went to the Christmas Market in Colmar, France:
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| A booth at the Christmas Market |
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| Beautiful nativity |
December 6 - Fed the missionaries for a third time:
December 11 - Went to the Basel Christmas Market:
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| Overlooking the roofs of some of the market (we're up on a hill) |
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| These arched lights lined several blocks worth of this street. |
December 14 - Flew to Frankfurt where our flight to the states was cancelled. Spent the night there.
December 15 - Flew home to Spring.
December 17 - Matt got home on leave from Fort Knox:
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| Matt made it home on Friday, December 17th. He said it was amazing how many people stopped him at the airport to express their appreciation for his service. People even honked when they saw him in uniform on the road! |
December 19 - The Butterfields, Perrys, and David Morgans all arrived in Spring.
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| Cade, Conner, and Katelyn playing with cars and trucks |
December 20 - The Daileys arrived, and we spent the day having fun, had FHE, and went to see the lights.
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| Building our monument of "remembrance" |
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| Ice skating fun in The Woodlands |
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| Yum! Blue Bell! |
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| Fun at Chuck E. Cheese |
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| Most of us ready to go caroling and to take fudge and gifts to the neighbors |
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| The final blow! |
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| Going for the goodies! |
December 23 - Free day---each indivdual family picked what they wanted to do. Trip to the Alamo and a visit to Granny Dailey, a flight to Utah for Sarah's family, Christmas shopping, fun with friends, golfing....
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| Anna and the Alamo |
December 24 - Big Christmas Eve dinner, re-enacting the Nativity, singing...:
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| Christmas Eve Dinner at three tables! |
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| The Nativity cast |
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| Singing ALL of our favorites! |
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| Some dancing??? |
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| Finally ready for bed! |
December 25 - Here are some of my favorites on Christmas Day:
December 27 - Second step in DJ's dental implant surgery.
December 28 - Dinner at Pappasito's with the Figgins and the Hays.
December 29 - Arciniegas home from Utah. Latest Narnia movie with the Perrys in the afternoon.
December 30 - Sometime this week I finished Thomas S. Monson's biography, To the Rescue and accomplished my goal of reading the Book of Mormon for the second time since June (that's major for me)!
December 31 - Celebrated New Year's Eve with the Wallace cousins at Livi and Rick's:
And there you have it, 2010 at a glance, a long glance (honest, I didn't write down everything we did). It had to be one of the busiest years we've had, but we survived it all; and for the most part,
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