27 years married!!

Benjamin has a goal to visit all 50 states before he turns 50. So as his dutiful partner I want him to accomplish his goal!! So naturally we went to the state of Michigan for his 43rd state on our 27th anniversary!! We also headed up to Canada to make it a foreign experience. We hit one of the Great Lakes, Huron. We walked the beach, ate Canadian foods like (poutine, butter tarts, and had pickle soup....I don't know if thats Canadian but man they sure had a lot of pickle products. We ate fried pickles too). Canada has a lot of national pride, flags in their yards and signs in their grocery store indicating if the product is Canadian made. They also don't put ice in sodas at fast food places, Benjamin loved that!. We went to art museums, thrift stores and nature parks. It was a relaxing weekend to celebrate "my love forever and a day"

 

Nana turns 75 years young!!

Nana turned 75 on September 2nd!! We had the best week celebrating her. On Monday we went up to camp Zion to do our annual labor on Labor day. We painted the inside of the outhouses!! Hillary made it down along with her new foreign exchange student. We shot BB guns, shot arrows and played Telastartions. Tuesday for Nana's actual birthday Lindsey and I took mom out to Millie's Pancake house for lunch then we met up with our husbands for the evening and went to the Olive Garden. Afterwards we went back to mom and dads place and ate these fancy cupcakes that our friend makes. Then on Saturday we had dinner with all my siblings and a good amount of our children. We went to Pinnacle Peak Steak House, its a cowboy restaurant and if you wear a tie the Sheriff cuts it off! There were several brave members of the family who got their tie cut off. 

We sure love this lady!! She is adored by all her family, the rock and cheerleader of our large and growing crew. Mom always says she wakes up and tells herself that she is 60...What a great way to stay young!!

 

UofA event with visitors!

I helped run a booth at the Student Union so I called my boys up to join me. Parkin brought two high school friends ( one of which was Claudia's son Marco) with him. Holman is hiding but he was there too! I got a yummy Indian food meal out of the deal

 

New shelf!

I wanted a shelf to hang these 4 photos up in The Cottage so that they would all be straight! Benjamin constructed this and I sanded and stained it! It turned out so well! No to make some more 😁

First for our college boys!!

 The boys moved to the condo downtown. They work and go to school and live on their own like grown adults, making it happen! I asked them to take first day photos and they were sweet enough to obliged. 

I love their faces. Flashbacks of their childhood 😭. All grown up 💖 Their cousin Jared is also their roommate.  I am hoping for an excellent year for these boys!!

Samuel!!

 When Bella and Sam were were just starting to date, Benjamin and I ran into Sam and the Pershing family at Golf n' stuff. We very awkwardly went up to Sam and said hey take a picture with us so we can send it to Bella, she'll think this is so funny. Bella did not think it was funny. She was quite embarrassed but Sam was (is) such a good sport!! That's when we fell in love with him ❤️

Sam flew in this weekend to be there for when his brother went through the temple. So we met the Pershings at Golf n' stuff again and had a round of golf. We made sure to recreate this photo from 3 years ago. 

Bob Ross night

 We had a Bob Ross painting night for YWs. I love how each painting ends of being so unique. I wish I would have taken a group shot. This is a picture of Adrian with one of her besties Nayeli.