They Grow Up So Fast

A few months ago we brought home a handsome baby boy, a week or so later he started school.  Last month that same boy graduated from high school and went off to college. Two weeks after that he returned from serving a Full time Mission for our church and last week he was sealed for Time and All Eternity in the LDS Las Vegas Temple.  .  .  .  . They grow up so fast.

 

We are very happy for our son Kyle and love his new wife, Megan.

I was prepared to not be so thrilled with my sons choice in a wife because I had heard so many woman say that's just how it is and now he has a new first lady in his life, but so far I could not be happier for him. I say "so far" because I'm sure someday Megan and I will have our differences or Megan will let it slip how much I bug her. When that day comes I'm sure, for a few days, I will find faults with her, it's just the "mother-in-law" thing to do, but at present things could not be better.

Megan is from Henderson, Nevada, which is why they were married at the Las Vegas Temple. We use to tease our kids about being able to elope because there are Temples in Nevada, I just never expected any of our kids to really get married there.

Kyle and Megan were sealed on Saturday, January 22nd. It was a beautiful sunny day and everything was perfect, other than we seemed to be running behind by about 20 minutes all weekend. On Friday we met Megan's family for the first time. Being an in law is great, it's not like in high school where you really need to get to know your child's boyfriend or girlfriends family; once they are adults it's their worry; sure you want them to have great in laws, but it's their choice and they are the ones who have to deal with them for years. So far all of our kids have great in laws and that now includes Kyle's. Friday night Megan went through the Temple for the first time and receive her endowment. We were staying on the Strip and it took longer than we expected to get to the Temple, but they were kind enough to delay the session till we all got there. I was told the next day that a dear friend of Megan's family was also running late and knew that they wouldn't hold the session till she got there, so as she drove to the Temple she prayed that somehow things would work out and she would make the session; knowing that, I don't feel so bad about being late. Saturday morning we were all on time, well almost. My brother Brent realized when he went to get dressed that his pants were not with his suit, so he and his son made a detour on the way to the Temple. With a minute to spare before Kyle and Megan entered the sealing room, in walked Brent and AJ.



 

The family and wedding party were to be at the reception one half an hour before things started. Again we were running late, but we weren't the only ones late. Megan had forgot her shoes and she and Kyle had to go back to her house to get them.  Even with all the late starts, things ended right on time and the bride and groom were thrilled to have all the hoopla over and to be able to get on their way. 

 

Between the sealing and reception we had a yummy BBQ lunch for the wedding party and family. Thanks to my wonderful and dearest friend Becky it worked out great. The food was yummy, the company was great and the clean up was easy. Happily we even enjoyed our son Kody there, well not really, but we pretended. We had a life size post of him made up and as you got you food you couldn't help but be face to face with him. We missed not having him there in person, but the poster reminded everyone that he was in our hearts and thoughts.

 

We all had a good time and had lots of good laughs. I think the best laugh we had was over the groomsman's pants. The wedding colors were Cranberry, grey (wet cement) and black. Megan wore a beautiful creamy while dress in a mermaid style with rooshed organza and dark red boots. Her maid of honor and brides maid wore black dresses and dark red heels.  

Kyle wore a grey suit and his grooms men were the best in show. They wore  white shirt, black skinny ties and grey tweed pants from H&M. We managed to find pants for my grandson to match the grooms men and made them little bow ties.

 

They looked almost like the groomsmen only the groomsman's pants were much tighter. Kyle had a pair of pants from H&M that were the perfect color and looked great on him, so the guys deiced that was the pants they wanted to wear. Kyle got me their pant sizes and I went shopping. None of them live by us except our son-in-law Tyler, and Ty said we had the right size for him so none of the guys tried on the pants until the morning of and by then it was too late to change anything. All of their pants were tight, beyond tight, comically tight. There were bets made on who's pants would spilt first. Kyle's best man and cousin Ian's pants were the best fit, but Ian was made to wear tight fitting 60's style pants. By the end of the night no ones pants had spilt but there were some stretched seams.

 

Watching the dancing was another enjoyable moment of the evening.  We love to dance and although there was not a lot of dancing at the reception it was enjoyable.

There was the first dance of the bride and groom, the father-daughter dance, the son- mother dance, but my favorite was watching our oldest grandson, Mack dance. He has the moves and he uses them. Our granddaughter Baysil is normally the one to watch dance, but this night was all Macks. 

 

We had great support from family and friends coming in from out of town and we loved seeing them all.

Friends from California and Utah came,

 family from Utah, Arizona, and Washington were there

and dear friends we had served in the Air Force were able to come.

 

The reception was held at the Dragon Ridge Country Club in Henderson. It is a beautiful place with a wonderful view of the Las Vegas valley. It was a clear night and you could see all the lights of the strip and surrounding area.

It was a wonderful day. Kim and I both agree that having sons get married is the way to go. Sure there are things to do, but mostly you just show up and enjoy the hard work of the brides family and friends, and we did just that. I'm sure in a few day it will really hit me that my baby boy is married, until then I have laundry to do.

Christmas in Seattle

We celebrated our 2nd Christmas in Seattle this year. The celebrations began the day after Thanksgiving and I feel like I am still cleaning up from things.

We started the season off with our annual tree hunt. This year Kaira Fern and Ty's family, and Kassey and Will joined in our search for the perfect tree.

After finding our trees we went home to decorate the house and the little people had fun tents to play in that Grandma Jane sent to them.

With our tree in place it was time for the Festival of Trees. This fun event is sponsored by the hospital where Kim works. The first week in Dec they put on a 3 day event. Large Christmas trees and wreaths are decorated and put on display at the Everett Comcost Area. 

There are fancy parties for adults, an open house for the public to view the trees, with crafts and cookies for the kids. The event ends with my favorite, the Teddy Bear breakfast and ice skating. 

We've made it a tradition to take the grandkids. Kim ended up having bishop responsibilities and wasn't going to make it so Kaira went with Kloe and I in his place. This year was Henry's first year. Santa and Mrs. Claus are there along with a giant teddy bear. We had a yummy breakfast, heard a story, sang songs and watched a fun play.

Then just as it was time to go ice skating, who showed up? Grandpa Kim!!! It was a fun day and started December off in a great way.

 

We found lots of Christmasy things to do all through out the season,one big hits was The Festival of Lights.

Karly got home the week before Christmas. Then day Junie and her parents, Kerin and Cory, came into town we all went up to Vancouver to the Christmas Market. It reminded me of the Christkindel Markets in Europe. They even had my favorite Christmas store, Kathe Wohlfahrt.

Kyle got in town the 23rd just in time for the big day. Christmas Eve started with breakfast at the Mukilteo Cafe, then that night we had our traditional festivities.

Family and friends gathered, we acted out the Nativity, sang Christmas songs, ate yummy food and had our talent show. Kassey and her family even joined us during our talent show through skipe. That was one of the best Christmas presents I got this year.

 

I tried to up load a video so everyone could see how much talent our family has, but couldn't get it to work. Thankfully Kerin and Cory were here and stayed up to help finish wrapping presents. This bishop stuff had really sapped Kim's energy and he went to bed as soon as the rest of the kids did, don't worry though we woke him up to finish with the "important" duties.

Happily everyone slept in until after 7am and Christmas was a nice slow day.  I was worried little Junie would wake us all early, but even she slept in.



Kaira and Ty's family came over in the afternoon and joined us for more presents and dinner.

 

The day reached it's peak with our call from Kody.  I loved my missionary phone call and am counting the days until Mother's day when I get to talk to him again. It really was a great Christmas and wonderful time together as a family. Now we are on to Kyle and Megan's wedding. Happy New Year!

Thanksgiving

This years Thanksgiving is one that we will talk about for years. Dinner was wonderful and it was a pretty normal Thanksgiving. We baked pies all the day before, Kids came in from out of town, we had the missionaries over and we ate later than planned. What wasn't normal is what we will remember. 

Kassey and the girls came out almost 2 weeks before, Karly flew in the Friday before and the Monday before Will flew in to town. In was also the Monday that Seattle was hit with a wonderful snow storm. It didn't seem like any big deal and we went about our day as planned and enjoyed the weather. Kloe went off to school and those of us at home ran around getting ready for the big day. By lunch time the snow was increasing, but still nothing compared to Utah or Idaho, the problem was the cold. It's wetter here and the snow had been melting during the day and around noon the temperature started to drop and so things were starting to freeze. By the time Kloe came home from school we had about one inch of snow, but it was on top of ice. Will's flight got in at 6 but just to be safe Kassey left at 4:30 to do the 30 minute drive so that she would have plenty of time knowing Seattle has poor drivers and with any weather they get over cautious. She took both the girls to greet Will and so she could use the HOV lane. Just as she was leaving Kaira and Tyler dropped off their boys and left to go on an anniversary date. The evening went great and just as we were expecting Kassey and Will to show up after having some planned family time, around 8:30, we got a call from Kassey. She was stuck on the 5 freeway heading south near Boeing and still hadn't picked up Will. The snow had gotten worse and as she reach downtown Seattle things had come to a stop and only crawling once in a while. She had been in touch with Will and he was waiting at the airport along with a lot of other people. She told us the freeway was like a parking lot and didn't know why. We looked into things and found out that there were lots of jack knifed diesel trucks. Kassey had been in the car now for 4 hours and had 2 very hungry girls and she needed to go to the bathroom. To top things off Kassey, 7 months pregnant, was having a some false labor. Kim couldn't handle sitting a waiting for things to change so being a true John Wayne kind of dad, got together a blanket, some juice boxes, cookies and donuts and went to help. As he was on the way we learned that there was no real efforts to try to get things moving on the freeway. The snow had increased and with the black ice there were cars all over the freeway that had spun causing blocks and accidents.  Drivers were having to maneuver their way around everything. The mess had started just as everyone was leaving work downtown and as Kassey reached the Seattle Boeing field there was a shift change which only made things worse. Kim drove streets to get as close as he could to her and found the best place he could hop the cement wall. He walked down the freeway talking to her until he found her. By now it was close to 10pm and Kassey had only driven about a mile since she first called home. People had started to run out of gas and were leaving their cars abandoned to go a get gas. There wouldn't have run out, but the temperature was now in the teens so you could only sit with your car heater off in the cold for a short time. Around 10:30 Kaira called and told us that they could come and pick up their boys but once they got to out house they probable wouldn't be able to drive back up the hilly streets to go home and would be stuck, so the boys stayed with us. By now everything was covered in snow, schools were closed for the next day and Kassey was still stuck. Kim had gotten her gas and helped her in every way he could, but things were just not moving and the longer things lasted the more people just abandoned their cars. There was only one lane open and Kassey was only a few miles away, but only going a foot or so every hour. Thankfully Kassey and Will had just bought a mini van with a DVD player and the girls were not completly out of controll. Kim had tried to get to Will by streets but the freeway jam had caused grid lock in the whole city and Kim couldn't get near the airport. By 1am Kim was ready to give up and just come home. We checked one last time to see if the other freeway that gets you to the airport and found that things were finally clearing on it, Kim found a route to get to Will and then came north on the 5 freeway until they saw Kassey on the southbound side. Will hopped the center wall of the freeway to Kassey and by 2:30am Will was with his girls. The whole thing felt like a movie that someone had forgotten to tell us we were part of. Kim said the freeway looked crazy; cars were all over and big trucks had jack knifed. As far as we know there were no fatal accidents. Kim made it home around 3 and Kassey and Will around 4:30am, 12 hours after she had left. Strangely there was almost no news about it that night or the next day. The boys woke up in the morning surprised to find themselves still at granny's house and as soon as the girls woke up there was a great cousin reunion. Things stayed cold and the snow continued for the next few days and Kloe got her dreamt of school snow days.

Our dog Georgia loved all the cold because it meant she got to sleep inside. Having to sleep in her kennel was no problem as long as she was in side she was a happy girl. She would walk in the house straight to her kennel and with in minutes the snoring would start.

Thanksgiving dinner was great and we enjoyed a calm day.

Kaira cooked our turkey for the first time and it was very yummy.

Kassey made the traditional sweet potatos as she always does and Karly tried her hand at pie crust and found a hidden talent.

Not everyone was here this year, but we are getting use to having to share.

Kerin and Cory were with his family, Kyle was with Megan's and Elder Kody Porterfield is in San Antonio, Texas.

By the weekend we had very little snow around and so by Sunday morning when Will and Kassey left things seemed safe to be on the road, except by the time they got to the pass it started to snow again. The rest of the drive home was done very slowly with chains on the car and took a day and a half longer than planned with a closed freeway in Idaho. Kassey told me they will never drive out to see us in the late fall through winter again.

Halloween

 Because Halloween was on a Sunday this year we had our own little party. Growing up my mom and two of her friends families, Barbara Lewis and Betty Skoglund seem to have the best Halloween parties. I looked forward to those nights almost as much as Christmas. We had spook allies, scary stories, great games, homemade root beer and yummy treats. I didn't get as our of control like my mom would have but I think we all had a fun time and a good laugh. We started the night with our traditional dinner in a pumpkin. I always think of Grandma Jane when we have this. I think she and I like it more than any one else.

 The boys came in their custumes, but only the important parts. They had been to two Trunk-or-Treat parties the night before and bits and pieces of their costumes were in the cars and somewhere at home, but that didn't stop our fun. This year all three of the boys wore hand-me-downs so Kaira Fern didn't have to make new ones, it was great and everyone was happy. Mack was Batman. He wore the same Batman suit Uncle Kyle and Uncle Kody wore when they were his age. As you can tell Mack is a bit Taller than they were, but when he wore the boots you couldn't tell. Henry was a dinosaur, his favorite thing these days. Kaira had made the costume for Mack a couple of years before. Wallace was a sweet lion. Another costumes Kaira had made for the older boys. I think at the trunk-or-treat parties Wally wore a pumpkin suit that the older boys had also worn, but I could be wrong.

 After dinner we played the spider web game. Kloe turned the "man cave" into a giant spider web. Everyone followed their yarn, untangling as they went to find the treat at the end.

Then we bobbed for apples. I say "we", but I was busy taking pictures so I excused myself. I think this was the game Mack was looking forward to the most. He had played it at his Grandma Karen's party and had success and could wait to try again.

 We ended the night with donuts on a string. Again someone needed to take the pictures so I made the sacrifice. I'm not sure if the pictures are blurry because everyone was moving or because I was laughing so hard. They all took this game serious which only made it funner to watch. We all enjoyed watching the boys, and I include Tyler, going for their donuts. This will be a night that needs repeating every year.