Ranch Halloween 2012

Hugh decided on Davy Crocket..it was in the costume box (wink!).

Jake and Rachel were so pulled together as the vampire family!

Jamies (cutest nickname ever) and his Daddy were great together.

About half of my nieces and nephews were at the party, maybe more it is hard to count objects in motion!

My boys!!  Liam loved having Dad's hotshot gear and Hugh is a great Davy Crockett!

Brenton's sister Misty made this amazing costume for Wyler.  Maybe I should order up a Diet Coke version for next year?

My niece Emma has become the most beautiful young lady, and such a sweetheart she is.

Rachel, Jamies, Jake, Travis, Jen and I.....just sneaking in some adult conversation.

Kasee making his LAST football run before being moved to a less trafficked area. 

The annual trunk or treat at the Goring Ranch was wonderful as always.  Grandma Sherie always provides great food and seeing the extended family is always a treat.  Brenton missed this year's fun as he was at home helping pump the septic tank.  Poor guy, but there was enough leftover candy to make up for the tragedy.  Brenton also put new lighting in the office (aka Cody's room) so that it is more user friendly for schoolwork.  Moira likes to work in the office especially for her Gaelic (Irish) lessons, it is hard to focus on language with dogs and brothers underfoot.  The weekend seemed to evaporate with all the unexpected things that needed quick attention.  Hugh ended up giving an unexpected talk in primary.  He let Brenton 'help' write the talk and then changed much of it to fit what he had originally decided to do, funny kid.  Well I will try to get a few more 'backtracks' on here later this week...I was looking at our pictures of our family gathering at Cherry Hill...I miss the water already!

Halloween at the ranch 2012 sort of

Well I was going to write this great post about our Halloween party at the ranch (Brenton's parent's sheep ranch)  but we took the pictures with the GOOD camera so they do not upload or down load or whatever without all kinds of technical manuvering so post=fail.  I have decided that even though I would love to have some phenomenal post up about our time at the ranch (Brenton missed out as he was home supervising the pumping of our septic tank), complete with pictures of all the cute cousins in their costumes...that I am ging to go to sleep becuase I am in no way, shape, or form even the least bit prepared for tomorrow.  So, hopefully, tomorrow I will get the picture situation under control, sorry Cody I know you only get to check on things on pday and I promise next pday will have all knds of amazing blog posts for you!!!!

First snow!

So yesterday morning I awoke to find a light snow on the lawn and the mountains covered with the first snow of the season.  This picture was taken by Moira later in the afternoon so the snow had thinned a bit but still it was significant with all the drought we have been experiencing.  I will know begin the love/hate relationship I have developed with our dear treadmill over the past several winters.  I love that it lets me keep my mileage decent but am not a big fan of the monotony factor.  However, playing with the buttons and changing speeds often and randomly can help with this.  I don't mind running in the cold or in the dark (I have a killer headlamp) but I do mind icy roads and less than stellar drivers!  So back to the treadmill I go for the bulk of my daily miles but whenever possible I sneak out for an afternoon session!

Backtrack #2 BC Temple Celebration!

Getting ready to go to the last day of practice/celebration for the temple opening. At 6am!

Happy siblings.

Moira's preemptive Advil stirke.

"Really I love mornings!"

Fielding Stake was Spanish dancers complete with massive, twirly skirts and sombreros.

Our nieces Maddie and McKayla were Native Americans.

Liam's partner was tiny and they were so cute together!

Liam was serious about his dancing and that is our cousin Elyse in the pink.

Moira danced front row center and was amazing in every way!

Our nephew Dalin looks a bit angry here.

Our Bishop surprised Hugh with a ticket to the performance...he really was thrilled and tired!

The cultural celebration for the Brigham City Temple opening was weeks/months in the making and it turned out amazing.  I am so grateful that our kids ( and many nieces, nephews, and cousins) had the chance to participate and feel the Spirit in so many different circumstances.  Brenton spent countless hours ushering, directing cars and acting as security for the open house while the kids went to endless practices and dealt with adults who were getting quite stressed about nearly 4000 thousand teenagers pulling off a performance.  I even got in on the act and sewed a few costumes.  This was one of those experiences that you almost have to go thru firsthand in order to understand the scope of it.  One of the sweetest things that happened was being able to sit with Brenton's brother and his wife as well as some dear friends who are going thru such medical trials at this time, it was just special to experience this with them. Brenton and I were able to attend the dedication of the temple in person with our friends (Tiffany and Jared); now that is amazing in and of itself.  So many little things happened surrounding the opening of the temple and so many blessings will come because of its presence in our valley.   So enough updating for awhile, I need to go email my missionary because it is almost pday in France!

Backtrack #1 Hugh's Baptism

Hugh with his 'special' towel for his baptism!

Treats for family and friends after the big event.

Ready to head out the door with Dad.

Lance (uncle), Dan (uncle), Carson (super special friend), Jr. (grandpa), Dad, Bishop Larry, Jared (uncle), Brance (uncle) and the baptism boy after his confirmation.

Love this boy!

Ahh...the cousins...Ruger, Liam (bro), Dalin, Hayden, Lincoln, Tanner, Porter and the boy himself.

The girls...Berkli, Kyli, Lydia Moira (sis), Allie, Eliza, Lucy, and Molly!!!

And finally our family minus the missionary!

Hugh turned 8 on the 17th of September and would normally have participated in the Stake baptism day on the first Saturday of October...however, that is the weekend of General Conference so no baptisms.  Which meant that the baptism day would be the 13 of October the same day of a half marathon that I signed up for a year ago before the Stake calendar was out.  But the Brigham City temple dedication was scheduled for the last weekend in September and our sweet Stake President did not want the new 8 year olds to miss out simply due to having to wait for a baptism date so he scheduled a special day the day before the temple dedication.  Fabulous right?  Wait the plot thickens.  Our two older (at home) childers were dancing in the temple celebration and after practicing for nearly two months found that if they left the "day of performance" practices that they would not be permitted to dance in the celebration.  There were actually a few other families affected by this and they all had to work it out.  By the time all was said and done Hugh was baptized on the Friday night before the Stake baptism so that Moira and Liam could keep their involvement in the celebration...of course this was all decided after we sent out invitations for Saturday and after several people had thought they could get around the ladies in charge of the dance for the celebration.  Silly men nobody intimidates a dance teacher...lol.   So my little 8 year old got his own shining moment with many special people rearranging their schedules to be there for him.  I wish I had pictures of everyone who came but the following capture a bit of the joy I would say.  Ok so the pictures came first, that is on tomorrows agenda how to insert pictures where the stars I want them to be!!

Saturday Success!

Brenton and Liam working on the new feeder.

The beautiful new dwarf goat feeder.  Indoors for all the snow we need to have!

Hugh 'wearing' the pvc pipe that was destined to be part of a mineral feeder for the goats.  I will post a picture of that later.

Well today was the first Saturday we have not had to go somewhere or do something for someone in a long time.  Not that we don't enjoy the going or the helping out but it was nice to be here.  nothing to dramatic; lots of cleaning, ironing, laundry, bread baking, and Brenton made a few amazing additions for the goats of Shamrock Farm.

The loose mineral feeder and trough feeder turned out great!  It is amazing what we can get done when we stick around our little place.  The past few weeks a dear friend(really family) has been finishing the porch we started this past summer.  We poured the cement at the end of June and they just finished putting the roof up this past week.  Now we need to get the metal roofing and siding all on it before weather starts happening (we hope the weather comes this year).  The truly neat part of this new addition is something Jared snuck in on us; see above picture.  Too cool eh?  Well I am off to sleep because morning comes early and I am trying to keep my miles up even though it is harder to do during late Fall and winter months.    I am so grateful my family was here and happy today, makes me miss Cody all the more.  I would not have him be anywhere but on his mission however we can still miss the heck out of the kid!

Half marathon and a Feis on the same day!

This past weekend was a whirlwind of fun, wrapper food, cousins, running, dancing and whining!  We headed for Park City on Friday to pick  up my race packet for the Pink Series half marathon on Saturday.  Then dashed into the Nike outlet to get all the kiddos shoes, Moira scored some with a double discount!  Then a quick drop in at Sephora for the princess before we pointed our road trip towards Lehi and Uncle Jake's place!  We spent Friday night eating pizza, watchin movies, playing Wii, and of course there was an epic nerf war!  Not able to provide pictures which is a bummer.  The weather turned cold, rainy and windy.  I was threatening to boycott my race but the morning dawned cold but decent so it was off to Park City I drove (again).  It was worth the extra drive time to hang with the other Hammons family thought.

Sorry not sure how to rotate this picture and my tech advisor is unavailable at the moment.  This is Hugh before he competed on Saturday.  It was a rough day for everyone.  All danced decently but not at the level they wanted to.....so we are off to set goals and practice so that the next feis is more in line with what we want.  It was a good but long weekend and we are facing the same kind of week with Brenton leaving town for three days and trying to wrap up outside projects just in case it should once again snow in Utah.  Well next time I will post all Hugh's baptism pictures and maybe some of the oh so sad they are funny pictures that cam from our 'school' photo session. 

General Conference 2012

So this is General Weekend for the LDS church and we normally chill at home and watch it on the television or listen to it on the radio while we are keeping up with life (hey, I could manage to be keeping up not catching up someday).  Well this year we had the surprise opportunity to attend the final session of Conference!  Brenton and Liam went to the Saturday night priesthood session and then we (myself, Hugh and Moira) met them at the Neal's house for doughnuts and monkey bread after the session was over.  Brenton walked in with a big grin on his face, I figured that the priesthood session had been great. A friend had tipped me off that the presiding bishop would be speaking and he was amazing.  However, part of Brenton's grin related to the above picture...our Stake President announced at the beginning of the session that he had had 8 tickets to the last session turned back to him and that they were available.  Brenton said he waited until the Stake President made it clear to the back of the chapel before he approached him, he got all the tickets!  So after a few minutes of quick debate we were set to go with our friends (the Neal's) and one of their sons along with our three at home children.  It made for a whirlwind finish to an already packed weekend but it was well worth it.

  The 'dads' dropped us off at the corner of the conference center and went in search of a parking space.  The children were all excited but my what a huge crowd!  Our small town kiddos were a bit overwhelmed by the sheer number of people.  But we got in line and made it into our seate about ten minutes before the session started.  However, the poor dads struggled to find parking and by the time they did and got in line they were not allowed in with their tickets and were directed to the standby line.  A sweet lady tried to get them in but another usher said they could not deviate from procedure which makes sense when you are dealing with thousands of people.  So they sat on the grass in Temple Square and listened to the conference.  Inspired talks and a wonderful spirit marked the afternoon.  So pleased with how the children handled themselves, especially Hugh since he is barely 8.  The Neal's were wonderful they even drove us all down and home, they are great friends/family.

We had a busy week even without conference but that will be wrapped up in tomorrows post because it is time for a quick game of Uno and scriptures before bed.  and I must email my missionary before bedtime as his pday starts late on our Sunday night.!!!