Highlights of January

Here are the highlights of the month of January after we returned home from Daniel's baptism.

I hosted a snowflake lunch/ birthday party for my Bible study friends.

We had  couple of inches of snow fall, but it didn't last very many days. 

The yard looked like a winter wonderland while it lasted!!

We had a new garage door installed.

I made a church bag for our granddaughter Sylvia's birthday gift.

We went up to Philadelphia to go to the temple and visited the arboretum at Longwood Gardens beforehand.

 It was a beautiful indoor flower garden in the middle of winter!

We mostly went because we have a season pass so it didn't cost anything to go. 

We arrived in Pennsylvania in good time and had a couple of hours to kill before the temple opened, so we went to Longwood.

They were showing off their orchid collection.

It we enjoyed the colorful display of flowers and are glad we went!

Daniel's Baptism in Kansas

After the family reunion in northern Texas Kent and I rented a car and drove it to Kansas. We traveled with Garrett's family and took Daniel and Makayla with us in our car.  Daniel had turned eight while at the family reunion and his baptism was scheduled for January 5th. Krystal's parents, the Jolsteads, had also come for the baptism. 

 It was about an eight hour drive and the kids did very well in the car with us. We saw lots of cotton growing and rolled into bales as we drove through northern Texas, Oklahoma and southern Kansas.

We were all a bit dismayed to arrive at the church 30 minutes before the time the baptism was supposed to start to find that no one had filled the font. We started to do it ourselves, even bringing in pitchers of warm water from the kitchen to speed up the process. The kids thought this was great fun, and I told Daniel it would be more memorable for him because he had to help fill the font!

                                          The baptism ended up starting 30 minutes late, but other than that everything went very smoothly.

One thing about starting late is that we had time to take lots of pictures before Daniel got baptized while we were waiting for the member of the Bishopric to arrive and open up the font.

Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of Daniel after he was baptized, wearing the new "CTR" tie we'd given him for his baptism.
While we were in Kansas we walked to the park to let the kids play.

Their dog, Indie, came along for the exercise. She's a really well-behaved dog.

Swinging was a popular activity at the park.

We had some birthday gifts for Daniel to open. Besides the CTR tie we also gave him a dinosaur model to build and I'd sewn him a piano bag since he started piano lessons in August.

Here hie is building the model. He's very good at following instructions.

Adam didn't seem to be in as many photos as Daniel and the girls, so here's one of him with his best friend, his blankie.

Alexa looking cute.

Story time with Mommy,  

 and picture time with Grandma and Granddad.

 

This is the dress I smocked for Makayla, so I wanted to take a picture of me with her. In the background are all the Christmas stockings I've made for every member of their family. 

We're very glad we were able to spend quality time with the Kansas Carsons and to be there for Daniel's baptism!!

Family Reunion in Sanford, Texas!!

Our family planned another reunion in Texas since Tyler found out he would be deploying to Afghanistan in February 2019, and since he hadn't been able to come to the reunion in Galveston. Tyler found a large vacation rental home north of Amarillo, Texas, near the town of Sanford, and we all chipped in to help pay for it.

It was the best location for us all coming from different cities. Kent and I were in Houston with the Lees and the Stinsons, and it wasn't too bad of a drive for Garrett and Krystal's family in Kansas, or Tyler and Rachel's family coming from El Paso.

We were there parts of four days before and after new year's day.

There were enough bedrooms for each family and a nice big open space for everyone to gather in.

The lodge was near a stream and a pond, but it was sooooo cold that the water was frozen. We still went out and did some hiking around the property.

  

Throwing rocks onto this frozen pond and trying to crack the ice was a popular activity with the kids!

Kent, Tyler, me, Jason, Russ and Carson. The guys are so bundled up it's hard to tell who is who! I have to confess I didn't think it would be so cold in Texas and I didn't bring a very warm coat.

Couldn't resist putting in this adorable picture of Melody! 

Enjoying some hot chocolate after playing outside.

Carson was thrilled to have some big boys to play swords with, and Adam and Daniel were happy to oblige!

On new year's eve we played some games with the kids. Even little Alexa joined in.

There was also a game for the Dads, with lots of help from their kids.

Rachel led a yoga class one morning.

Lissa brought four 500-piece puzzles and throughout our time there we built all four of them.

Krystal put together a family jeopardy game that was fun and helped us learn more about each other.

A sweet group shot of half of the grandchildren.

I made cinnamon rolls and scrambled eggs on the last day before everyone headed out.

Christian and Melody looking cute in their high chairs.

I didn't see a good picture of Carson in any of the other photos, so thought I'd put in this one of him eating his cinnamon roll.

                             

Sophia and Makayla looking down from the loft area overlooking the main room.

We took some group family photos, too, like the siblings in birth order.

                               The original Carson six.

I made snowmen wall quilts for the daughters and myself and gave them to the girls at the reunion.

These last shots are of each family (or part of the family) as they were leaving from the reunion.

Andrew and Sylvia were already loaded into the car when I took the picture of Tyler and Rachel's family.

The lighting was TERRIBLE--the morning sun was too bright.

Oh well, I tried to get family group photos before we all went our separate ways.

It was a wild and wooly four days, but hopefully we made some good memories and helped the cousins to get to know each other better.

Kent and I were really happy to get a new family photo with everyone in it, which is the photo at the top of our blog. Ready or not, 2019 here we come!