Way Too Much Fun!

 

BEACH FUN:

 

 

‘CHEESEBURGER IN PARADISE’ FUN AND MEMORIES!

Note the guy’s T shirt in the background above.

LAHIANA AND THE BANYON TREE MEMORIES!

THIS LIMB, SUPPORTED BY HEAVY BLOCKS OF WOOD ALONG THE WAY WOULD EASILY HOLD ALL 41 OF US! GUESS WE’RE GOING TO HAVE TO BRING EVERYBODY OVER FOR THE NEXT FAMILY PICTURE!

WHAT A TRIP DOWN MEMORY LANE! OUR KIDS WERE ONLY A FEW YEARS OLDER THAN JONAH AND AJA’S KIDS WHEN WE FIRST STARTED COMING TO OUR FAVORITE PLACES ON MAUI!  WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT THEN THAT JONAH AND HIS FAMILY WOULD BE LIVING HERE SOMEDAY?  HAPPY DAYS! (Thanks to Saydi for Dad’s cool T shirt.)

AloooooHA!

Well, our nomads Jonah and Aja have chosen yet another great place to live and for us to visit a little. Also just happens to be one of our favorite spots on earth… Maui! 

Now we have kids in two “green and pleasant lands”:

We flew in straight from AZ and went straight over to see Ana and Cam participate on their swim teams.  They are both terrific swimmers and of course, stand out like stars.

The most important reason we went right now was that this cute little guy was being baptized!  His other grandma Luvie (Aja’s mom) had been there for 12 days and was leaving the day after we got there. The timing was perfect so that we could all be there to see him be baptized on Valentine’s Day!

At 8 a.m. on Tuesday morning the view from the church parking lot was spectacular! And the warmth of the moment was priceless:

 

Camden was so kind to ask Grandfather to baptize him. He thought it would be cool if both he and his dad were baptized by the same person!

 

It was a beautiful service!  So fun to have Tess there so we could enjoy it all together!  Their former jam and jelly making land lady came too (on the back row) and it was fun to meet some of the good people they have already bonded with.

Sorry…blurry and my battery died right here.  Aja will have lots better pictures taken with a lot better camera on their blog soon here.

HAPPY DAY!

More coming on the amazing stuff they’ve done with the new house soon!

Here’s to a new life as an official member of the church and a new cub scout! Don’t worry he’s going to grow into this shirt very soon.  Is he cute enough? 

Pothier’s Big Weekend

We are now in AZ with the stellar Pothier Family. Claire was being baptized so on Friday morning we left San Francisco and flew on over to Phoenix.  Saren came in about the same time so we had a fun reunion.

 

 

 

Dad and Josh love hanging out.  Especially because is usually involves Josh telling Dad how to use his computer.

 

Saren and I  had fun helping Shawni prepare lunch for 50 for after the baptism service the next day and Josh and I picked up Charity at the airport at 10 p.m.

The next day was a day none of us will ever forget. Claire was beautiful. The service was inspiring and Charity and I got a chance to play some music together (Charity brought her flute at Claire’s request) while Claire changed her clothes.  Hearing the confirmation prayer was a delight. That is one dynamic little girl!  What a woman she will become (before you know it).

We had a few short hours to have a “Sister Retreat” which we all loved. We are thinking about writing a book together next year, including Charity who is such a good leaven in the loaf!  We Skyped with Saydi for almost two hours which was a great fix for all of us! FUN!

So glad that Charity has a long arm:

Just a little humor:

First stop from the airport….Trader Joe’s. The sun lover waited patiently while we shopped! Shawni is still laughing about the “backprint” on her windshield.

We got toothpaste and soap J & A but we couldn’t find the shampoo. Sorry! 

 

We packed it in! After lots of great conversations with the many aunts, uncles and cousins and especially grandparents of the Pothier family after the baptism, several visits to Shawni and David’s new house and some time to pour over the reconstruction plans as well as great talks with Josh and fun with the kids, we packed up and headed for another chapter of fun with the next baptism on Tuesday…..in Hawaii! 

Viva la San Francisco!

Nothing makes us happier than being able to visit our kids! It’s uncanny how many times we are asked to speak in places where our kids live. We marvel that we get to see four or five of our nine every month for one reason or another, even though only one lives close enough to be with on a regular basis. We are truly blessed!

Last week we spent a few minutes with the Looslis on Monday on our way up to see Grandma Ruthie up in Logan. We took the twins along and they joined us on our radio show on Satellite Radio on the way. They were adorable telling everyone about how they saved up for their transformers.

On Wednesday morning we headed for San Francisco where we were picked up by our darling baby Charity and taken for a quick tour of her house (for dad’s sake) and then on to a truly spectacular (I know I use that word a lot, but there is just no other way to describe it) view of her beloved San Francisco from a hilltop above the city.

Then it was on to a dinner to die for at the Slanted Door at the Ferry Building. I don’t think I’ve ever had such a wonderful variety of divine food! It was so fun to be with our baby!

 

We were there to speak to the Entrepreneurs Organization of San Francisco. We had a terrific time talking about parenting with about 110 dedicated parents doing all kinds of interesting things in the San Francisco area! Of course the presentation is always a lot better when we have a child there. Charity was spectacular as well as lending some credibility to what we had to say. It was so fun to have her there with us!

We had all three been reading Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, the book so one of our goals while we were together was to see the movie. So kind of crazy, but we went to a 10:15 show at a theatre in the area after the presentation.  It was so thought provoking and fun to compare it with the book. It’s really worth seeing.

Charity thinks I’m so funny for taking this picture but it was good proof that we went. It was 12:30 when we walked out and Charity still had to take us to our hotel and get back home to get ready to get up in a few hours for work. It was worth it! 

I just have to say that the food in San Francisco rivals the food in New Orleans. This watercress salad was one I’m going to try to copy. Delectable! 

On to Gilbert AZ where we get to see our adorable grand daughter baptized!

From Bourbon Street to Main Street

What a city! We’ve been to New Orleans about four times in the last six and a half years including just a few weeks after Katrina devastated the area. Remembering the unimaginable damage that we saw then, it was pure joy to see the indomitable spirit of the New Orleanians when we returned last week. With the excitement of little children, they are preparing for their biggest event of the year on February 21st….Mardi Gras.

What we never would have guessed about this wild and wacky celebration is that the residents of New Orleans have traditionally been faithful Catholics ….which is why Mardi Gras always comes the week before lent when supposedly everyone is expected to give up the wild life and go without things that they want for the next several weeks until Easter. They feel the need to celebrate as much as possible while they can! We could feel the excitement in the air!

 

 

 

Every time we’ve been there it’s been just a day in, a speech at night and back out the next morning. But this time we had a whole day to do our own kind of reveling in this really fun city! We visited the amazing Cafe du Monde started in 1862 which is open 24/7, 365 days a year. It’s mostly a huge tent which seats about 200 is always crammed with people even though it only offers french doughnuts called beignets buried in a mountain of powdered sugar as well as coffee or hot chocolate.

 

 

 

Across the street was Jackson Square where General Andrew Jackson is immortalized in a beautiful bronze statue with a beautiful cathedral for a backdrop.

The French also sent a sent a beautiful statue of Joan of Arc:

Nearby is the place where the Louisiana Purchase was signed in 1803.  It was bought for $15 million dollars which is 3 cents an acre and about the same price as nice house in The Colony at Park City. The US could only come up with $3 million, borrowed $12 million from England and then because of the war of 1812, never paid it back.

Royal Street was amazing. Street musicians and entertainers abounded. The shops were delightful with everything imaginable. 

 

 

I even saw a funeral procession accompanied by six police cars. About a hundred people were marching behind a woman with a black umbrella followed by a mournful band, just like in the movies. Pretty much everyone in the group looked like drug addicts. There were tatoos and dreadlocks and lots of black and sad faces. I didn’t dare take pictures but there were so many police cars that before I saw the procession, I thought the president must be in one of the shops on the street!

We took a mule ride through the French Quarter and on to an old cemetery where a voodoo queen was supposed to be buried when she’s not out haunting the streets.

We even saw the future tomb of Nicholas Cage. For some reason he is emotionally attached to this cemetery just outside the French Quarter and has arranged for a pretty strange resting place:

Te each his own!

We spoke to a group of terrific Entrepreneurs on Thursday evening and again with a smaller group the next morning on marriage relationships. They were so bright and fun to be with!

We had the privilege of staying at the stellar Ritz Carlton.  How lucky are we?

The food was simply TDF (to die for).

Seafood Gumbo, beef sliders and a delicious Po Boy Sandwich kept us rolling our eyes and smacking our lips!

 

 

We had SO much fun! 

After a hairy flight which connected through the monster snow storm in Denver (600 flights had been cancelled there that day) we arrived home safely though many hours late. The next day we were headed for Castle Dale, a mining community about three hours away from SLC. for another speech. There couldn’t be a more stark contrast in audiences. From successful fabulously wealthy entrepreneurs in New Orleans to a wonderful salt-of-the-earth audience full of terrific people who were also concerned about their relationships sponsored by the USU extension agents in Emery County was about about as different as any two places could be. Our dinner at Taco time was less than scrumptious and our cute Bed and Breakfast on Main Street wasn’t quite the Ritz  but it was delightful! Our ride home this morning through Utah’s San Raphel Swell was spectacular! 

 

How lucky are we?