Sweet Sixteen

Ok. Everyone get out your hankies.

Oh. . . maybe that's just me!

Beauty and the Beast

Oh what a BEAST. Lindsie played in Cyprus' powder puff homecoming football game. Seniors vs Juniors and Sophmores. The Seniors won (I think it's rigged) but Lindsie was out there playing for all she was worth. Here she is lined up. She was a lineman (linewoman), both offense and defense. She only sat out maybe three plays all game.

Doesn't that look like a tough face? I'd run the other way if I was on the other team.

Lindsie, Coach Eddie and BFF Destiny

And now, the transformation into BEAUTY . . .

Doing makeup . . .

And hair . . . (thanks Kimi for being the beautician for the day)

And here is the beauty. Oh my goodness isn't she beautiful?!?! Sniff, sniff. .

Pinning the flower on her date. Well, actually mom had to do the actual pinning. First date jitters I suppose.

Whew!! A wrist corsage. Now I didn't have to keep a close eye on hands that were pinning a flower to her chest! hee hee : )

The most beautiful homecoming couple ever. Out the door they went, and down flow the tears! How did my baby girl get so grown up?? I had to go for ice cream to distract myself! Just wait my sisters, the day is coming sooner than you think!!

I love fall!!

Went camping with Grandma and Grandpa last weekend. We've been looking forward to doing that for a long time! And fall is totally the best time for camping. I love all the color in the canyon in the fall. Here is just one view of all the color.

Trying to get a picture of the leaves and I had a little help. He is such a poser.

Making ice cream with our cousins.

Fishing. For the first time all year, we didn't catch a single fish.

Hmmm. . . Who is she going after with that log.

AAAHHH!!!

Lindsie just came home and told me she has been asked to homecoming next month. AAAHHH!!! It begins. Can I just lock her in the closet? I'm trying to be happy for her - FIRST DATE and all, but I'm just scared to death. : )

Grandpa, if you still want to be her first date, you better get on it.

THEY'RE HOME!!!!!

Well after two long, but also short in some ways, years, Mom and Dad are back from Mongolia. What an emotional and exciting day this has been!

Here are 13 very excited grandchildren making a Welcome Home banner to take to the airport.

This banner says Welcome Home in Mongolian. We think.

Waiting. . . and waiting . . . and waiting. It was only about 30 minutes, but it felt like an eternity.

First glimpse. You can see Dad at the very top of the stairs to the left. Mom is just behind.

Coming down the stairs. Man those were long stairs!

And finally reunited! Lots of hugs and tears of joy. Can't believe they are really here. I keep pinching myself to make sure it is real!

Mom and Dad and their four children.

And all 13 grandchildren. Leave it to Jarod to stick his hand right in front of Lexi's face. Sorry Lex. Jarod lives for the camera!

First thing Dad wanted? A glass of real milk. They haven't had any real milk for two years, just powdered. Good thing Becky and Amy bought three gallons! That should get them through till morning! (And of course . . . an American donut!)

Welcome home! It's great to have you back.

$$$

Ok. So here we go again. This time Jarod has found a way to really make some money.

He's quite the salesman. He sits out there yelling "Lemonade! Get your ice cold lemonade here!" I kid you not. And he is making a killing - he raked in $10.00 in just under 2 hours.

Who needs to do chores and get only 3 dollars a week?

Yellowstone

This year we decided to make our Yellowstone trip low key. Usually we try to "see it all" in one day and end up rushing everywhere. This year we just went to the Old Faithful area and spent the entire day looking around there. One of the things we have always wanteed to see is the Castle Geyser. It only erupts every 14 hours, and we have never been there at the right time. Well, this year the sign said "May erupt between 4;15 and 6:15." It was about 4:00 so we thought, why not? We can wait to see it. So we sat, front row seats. Some of us explored the trails while others sat and saved our seats. For awhile it was kind of fun.

However, at 6:40, we were still waiting! Darn thing didn't erupt. After 2 1/2 hours we all had to go to the bathroom pretty bad, so we gave up and headed back to the visitor center.

We weren't 20 feet down the trail when we heard a shout go up from the crowd. We turned around and sure enough, we could see the water up over the trees! We sat there for 2 1/2 hours and it decides to erupt the minute we leave!

Thank goodness it's a long geyser (30 minutes or so) so some of us ran back and were able to see it.

We lost our front row bench, but we were able to sit here on this log and still have a good view.

It had been a very cloudy afternoon. We thought for sure it was going to downpour any minute as we sat there. But as the geyser was going off, the sun peaked out just enough to give us this little rainbow, off to the right.
Better shot of the rainbow. It was definately worth the wait. Very cool to watch. I have a little video of the geyser, but for some reason I can't get the sound to work. That's the whole point of the video is the cool sounds. If I can get the sounds to work I'll post the video later.