A prophet's challenge

In the women's session of General Conference in October of this year President Nelson issued four challenges to the sisters. 

"First, I invite you to participate in a 10-day fast from social media and from any other media that bring negative and impure thoughts to your mind. Pray to know which influences to remove during your fast. The effect of your 10-day fast may surprise you. What do you notice after taking a break from perspectives of the world that have been wounding your spirit? Is there a change in where you now want to spend your time and energy? Have any of your priorities shifted—even just a little? I urge you to record and follow through with each impression.

Second, I invite you to read the Book of Mormon between now and the end of the year. As impossible as that may seem with all you are trying to manage in your life, if you will accept this invitation with full purpose of heart, the Lord will help you find a way to achieve it. And, as you prayerfully study, I promise that the heavens will open for you. The Lord will bless you with increased inspiration and revelation.

As you read, I would encourage you to mark each verse that speaks of or refers to the Savior. Then, be intentional about talking of Christ, rejoicing in Christ, and preaching of Christ with your families and friends.2 You and they will be drawn closer to the Savior through this process. And changes, even miracles, will begin to happen.

Third, establish a pattern of regular temple attendance. This may require a little more sacrifice in your life. More regular time in the temple will allow the Lord to teach you how to draw upon His priesthood power with which you have been endowed in His temple. For those of you who don’t live near a temple, I invite you to study prayerfully about temples in the scriptures and in the words of living prophets. Seek to know more, to understand more, to feel more about temples than you ever have before.

My fourth invitation, for you who are of age, is to participate fully in Relief Society. I urge you to study the current Relief Society purpose statement. It is inspiring. It may guide you in developing your own purpose statement for your own life. I also entreat you to savor the truths in the Relief Society declaration published almost 20 years ago. A framed copy of this declaration hangs on the wall in the office of the First Presidency. I am thrilled every time I read it. It describes who you are and who the Lord needs you to be at this precise time as you do your part to help gather scattered Israel."

I began the social media fast immediately. It was hard. I knew that I wasted too much time scrolling, looking, reading, etc but didn't realize how programmed I was to check Facebook first thing in the morning, last thing at night and multiple times in between. It was a challenge but a good lesson was learned.

I finished the Book of Mormon this morning. That was also a challenge. I can sit down and read a novel in a day but have always struggled with regular scripture reading. I know that President Nelson is a prophet of God however and if he gave me this challenge it was important for me to try.  I found some passages that spoke to me this time through that I haven't noticed before. As I read just this morning I came to a particular scripture in Moroni chapter 8. As I read this I thought that this was also my prayer for my sons. This is Mormon speaking to his son Moroni.  

"I am mindful of you always in my prayers, continually praying unto God the Father in the name of his Holy Child, Jesus, that he, through his infinite goodness and grace, will keep you through the endurance of faith on his name to the end."

Perhaps it spoke to me this time because of the struggles some of my sons are having with living the Gospel principles. I weep for them, I worry for them, and I pray constantly for them.  I pray that someday that their faith will become bright again and that they will endure. 

Unfortunately the other two challenges have eluded me thus far but I'm trying to do better. With my Crohn's acting up I haven't been able to attend the temple like I want to and should. I did have a definite impression one day however that told me to work on my genealogy. This is another way to participate in temple work until the time comes that I can attend again. 

President Nelson posted this two days ago. It helped me feel better that I haven't completed all the challenges. I will persevere. 

"I hope that each of these invitations has brought you closer to the Savior. If you have struggled with any of them, please don’t be hard on yourself. You can start today. The Lord is happy with any effort we make to draw closer to Him."

Movie day

Since Derek and Shelby are off on a 10-day cruise celebrating their 5th anniversary and Zoe is staying with her other grandparents we didn't tend today. Also Doug didn't have rehearsal (a once yearly occurrence) and so we had the whole day/night free. I worked a bit in the morning while Doug worked on his puzzle. We went to the Newgate Mall and had lunch at the Greek place in the food court. It's always good and we enjoy eating there. We then went to see Mary Poppins Returns. As soon as I knew the movie was coming out I knew I wanted to see it. Doug wasn't quite so sure since he's such a Julie Andrews fan. It was my very favorite movie as a child though and I was anxious to see this sequel. Wow, what a great show. We both thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The theater was completely sold out and I think the majority of patrons were people around our age, people who knew and loved the original movie. It was fun to see nods to the original movie in this script. It was a great day and I loved spending it with my best friend.

Christmas Day

While I miss the excitement of Christmas morning with little ones it was also nice to be able to sleep in a bit! We were able to FaceTime with Finley and he excitedly showed us what Santa had brought and showed us every one of his new toys. He was so excited and so cute! We had sent him a firefighter dress-up outfit and he put it on and looked really cute in it. I had sent several firefighter things (Legos, books, pillowcase, puzzle, outfit, etc) and coincidentally his Grandma Whale had sent him fire engines so that made it neat for him.

I made our traditional German pancakes breakfast and after that we started cooking and getting everything ready for family who would arrive for lunch at 1PM.  Dave came as well as Richard and Joleen and Hugh and Beth. I'm glad the weather cooperated and they were able to make it up without worrying about road conditions. We ate and talked and ate some more and had a good time. Derek, Shelby and Zoe came up for a while and everyone was glad to see them. I really didn't expect them to come all the way back up but Derek said that they wanted to see everyone since they'll be moving (relatively) soon and won't be able to see family much. They left first because they needed to get back to Shelby's family for their get together. Doug's family left next and Dave stayed. We opened presents from him and he opened the things we got him. Honestly we were tired and just wanted to have a nap (I had a monumental headache from not sleeping the night before) but Dave didn't want to spend the holiday alone and I understood that. We visited for quite a while and then played some games. After a while I pulled out the leftover pizza from last night and heated it up for our dinner. He left around 8PM (his normal leaving time) since he had to work the next morning.

Christmas celebrations have changed much over the years but as long as there are loved ones around it's always a great day. I'm not sure what will happen next year with all the kids living in different states. Don't know if someone will come home or if we'll go visit someone or what will happen. No matter what it's nice to be able to stop, relax and reflect on the blessings received as a result of the birth of the babe in the manger so long ago.

Christmas Eve

Holidays are always better with family and Christmas Eve was no exception. Doug had the day off, the first time he hasn't worked Christmas Eve in years. He helped me get things ready for tomorrow's dinner, helped clean the house, etc. Derek, Shelby and Zoe came early afternoon so we could start our festivities early. We had to make cherry cookies of course (that will probably forever more be known as smash cookies since Finley likes to smash the cherries onto the dough). Zoe wasn't big enough to help this year but managed to eat some cookie dough and be cute while we worked together.  Meanwhile in Arizona, Chad's family was making smash cookies too!

We FaceTimed with Matt and Sherlyn, Chad, Anney and Finley all at the same time. Everyone's picture was together on my iPad screen. It was pretty cool. Technology has made some neat advances. We were all able to talk to each other. Zoe was fascinated with it but kept wanting to push the red X which would have disconnected us.  Finley and Zoe kept waving at each other. It was adorable.  After the cookies were baked there was a little bit of down town while Zoe had a nap and we just visited.

Later we baked our pizzas downstairs so we could eat them while watching Muppet Christmas Carol. While they were baking it was time for the reading of the Christmas story from Luke. I don't think I'll ever forget this experience. Doug started reading and Zoe was babbling and playing with her toys and then suddenly turned and focused right in on Doug. She watched him for a few seconds and then reverently folded her arms. So sweet. The veil is thin for these little ones. She knew that Grandpa was reading a special sacred story. She looked at all of us until we folded our arms as well. We were all in tears at the precious innocence of a child. "And a little child shall lead them."

We only made it through half of the movie because she was so tired and needed to get home to bed. We had her open her presents from us. She kept hugging and "loving" the stuffed Winnie the Pooh toy we gave her. It was a fun, special and sacred day with family.

Santa(s) and the cutest kids

A nice winter day

It's always a pleasant surprise when we have a nice enough day in December that we can go outside for a bit. The sun was shining and we could actually see the mountains for a change. The inversion has been awful already and the air has been really soupy.  It was still a bit cold (after all it is December) but it was nice to get outside for a bit. We walked over to the church and Zoe had fun crawling all over that big lawn. She kept trying to eat the leaves however. What a silly girl!

Another new quilt

Since turning the "toy room" back into my office I've been trying to change things a bit in there. I finally finished the purple/blue batik quilt for the bed. It's different than anything else I've done but I really like it and I love the quilting pattern (Baptist fan) that the long-arm quilter Aimee did on it. I still have a purple batik "storm at sea" wall hanging to make and hang in there and then the room will definitely have a new look to it. Once Derek and Shelby move this coming summer I'll take the crib downstairs to the spare room and then the office won't be quite so crowded. I willingly and happily gave up my office while we watched Finley so much but must admit that I'm so much happier working upstairs where it's light and I can see out the window while I work. It was really hard to get motivated some days to go work in a dark windowless room in the basement.

37 years!

 Today is our 37th anniversary!  Doug had to work tonight so we started our celebration earlier than usual. We decided to go out to the Bear River bird refuge since I had read that the eagles had started to arrive and hoped to get some pictures. Well, we didn't spot any eagles but saw a lot of eared grebes, tundra swans, ducks and herons. I love seeing those herons. It's just so surprising to me that they're in the area. I hadn't ever seen a heron outside of a zoo or aviary until we first went to the refuge in May.  I loved watching the swan too. There were hundreds of swans in the distance but just one swimming near us. It's an entirely different feeling to watch a bird that is free and can fly away any time it wants to as opposed to those with clipped wings in zoos and aviaries. I'm glad that we discovered this sanctuary and can go whenever we want to.

We stopped at Rovali's on 25th Street in Ogden for lunch. It was really good. I had gone there with Jerri, Denae and Pam in May for Denae's birthday and had wanted to go back since. We brought home a piece of spumoni cake that was really good too. I think I'm going to try and make one for Christmas dinner.

It was a fun morning/afternoon with my honey. I love him and am grateful for the time we've had together.

Christmas concert

The annual Christmas concert with the Tabernacle Choir is always something I look forward to. It's a hard/busy week for Doug with rehearsals every night except Monday. The last several years I've gone to the Saturday night concert. That way we can get a hotel in downtown SLC and spend the night there so Doug can make one less trip to the city. He had to be there close to 1PM this year so the plan was to park the vehicle and then I would wander City Creek until I could check into the room. I felt awful all morning with stomach problems and wasn't looking forward to that 2-3 hours but when we went in to get the parking validation they told us our room was ready early and we could check in. That was a blessing! Doug helped carry things up to the room and then left for his rehearsal/filming. I laid down for well over an hour until I started to feel better.  I finally felt human so walked over to Blue Lemon and bought a plate of hummus/veggies and spinach artichoke dip/pita bread. It was delicious and hit the spot. I wandered over to Harmon's and got some groceries for breakfast Sunday morning. I wanted to find a Christmas dress for Zoe while I was in town but nothing jumped out at me and I really wasn't feeling 100% yet so gave up on that idea fairly early. Went back to the hotel room, pulled out my crocheting and watched "White Christmas" until Derek and Shelby arrived. They brought food from Olive Garden for us. The bowl of soup was perfect and tasted so good. We walked over to the Conference Center and arrived an hour before the performance started but knew that the tickets had sold out and wanted to get there early to get through the security lines and find a good seat in our section. I had a bit of a run-in with a very ornery usher who wouldn't allow me to sit in an aisle seat ("everyone wants an aisle seat, everyone has a sore knee, you can't sit there!") He was really out of line with not only me but several others (including Greg and Kathy) and I was pretty upset for the first half of the concert until I calmed down enough to enjoy myself (which was also hard with a cramped and sore knee....)  Anyway, the guest artist was Kristen Chenoweth and she was a 4'11" bundle of energy. She was delightful. Her vocal range was huge and she sang several different styles of music and it was a lovely concert. I was glad that Derek and Shelby came and sat by me too. I've attended myself before but it was more fun to have them there. This is Doug's last Christmas concert before he retires in April. He will have been in choir for 12 years. It's been a blessing and will be bittersweet when it's over.

She's full of energy!

We love having Zoe come on Thursdays, but boy is she full of energy! By the time Derek picks her up I'm totally exhausted. That's okay though because it's such a joy to have her here. I lovingly call her the destroying angel as she's just into everything.  Since I turned the toy room back into my office there really wasn't anywhere for her to play so we brought toys into the TV room and baby proofed it so she can play in here. Of course, she's not content to just stay in one room so we follow her from room to room. Doug gets down on his hands and knees and plays chase with her. I can't do that anymore but they have fun. It's been so fun to get to know her better and see her fun personality emerge. We also enjoy those rare winter days when it's warm enough to go outside for a little while. She loves being outside and it's nice for a change of pace.

 

What's old is new again

When I was a little girl my Uncle Jerry made me a dolly bed. It was much loved and much used. As I grew older it was relegated to the attic. When we got married I got it and moved it from apartment to apartment, house to house, waiting for a little girl to come along and love it as much as I did. It was finally sent back to the attic and stayed there until earlier this year. Well, after 55+ years it needed a little TLC.  I took it apart, sanded it down, repainted it, bought new vinyl for the mattress cover and finally got it all put back together this week. I also made a little quilt for it (although I'm pretty sure I still have some of the dolly blankets and pillows my mom made for me in my cedar chest). Zofia is too young to appreciate it yet but she'll grow and I hope she'll love it as much as I did. I plan on keeping it here at grandma's house where she, and anyone else, can play with it. Finley has a nurturing soul and would love to be able to put stuffed animals, etc to bed on it too. In fact, I was binding the dolly quilt and another one when we were in Tucson in October. Finley kept borrowing them from me so his "guys" (stuffed animals) could have a nap. That prompted me to make him a little dragon print quilt for Christmas so his guys (and a new stuffed dragon puppet I bought him) will have their own blanket now. I'm also thinking about making him another small play quilt with the leftover fabric from Ari's baby quilt.

Messiah Sing-In

Tonight was the annual Messiah Sing-In at the Ogden Tabernacle. This was the 39th year. We went once years and years ago with Dave and Mary Shaw but it's mostly been something that Doug and Derek have enjoyed together over the years. Derek was invited to sing the baritone solos in it 2-3 years ago and then invited back this year again. This time the director asked Derek if he would contact his friends who sang with him in Madame Butterfly at Weber State about 4-5 years ago. It was amazing that they were all still in the area and that their schedules allowed them to get together again for this performance. They all did a wonderful job and I was justifiably proud of Derek. He has a beautiful strong baritone voice and I love listening to him sing.

Coincidentally our Stake Conference was held in the same place earlier today at noon so while we rarely go to the tabernacle we were there twice today.

Snowman row quilt done

Jerri and I signed up for a block of the month program at Quilter's Attic in Bountiful at the beginning of the year. Normally when I sign up for these kinds of programs I finish them, eventually, but never within the given time frame. I kept up on this one though and was excited to finish it in time to have it quilted, bound and hung by the winter season. I plan on leaving it up through January since it's really more of a winter scene than a Christmas scene and I purposefully used fabrics that would work for more than one month too.  Jerri, however, was an overachiever and made not one, but four of the same quilt. She did one in the kit colors (but different sashing and borders than mine) and then did three others in a blue colorway. They're all great.  This was supposed to be a "learning quilt" because it taught several different techniques. Well, I learned that I still hate paper piecing (the church row) and I'm not a fan of hand applique (snowman row), but partial seams (the poinsettia row) aren't too bad. All in all I'm happy with it.

Christmas Devotional and ponderings

Desire is important in this season of gift giving, when we are particularly mindful of the desires of those whom we love. During this season, I also invite you to consider your own desires. What are your deepest desires? What do you really want to experience and accomplish in this life? Do you really want to become more and more like Jesus Christ? Do you really want to live with Heavenly Father and with your family forever and live as He lives?

If you do, you will want to accept many gifts offered by the Lord to help you and me during our time of mortal probation. This Christmas season, let us focus on four of the gifts Jesus Christ gave to all who are willing to receive them. These gifts are:

1. He gave you and me an unlimited capacity to love.
2. The ability to forgive.
3. Repentance.
4. The promise of life everlasting.

These four gifts will bring us more and more joy as we accept them. They were made possible because Jehovah condescended to come to earth as the baby Jesus.

 The above quote is part of a message given by President Russell M. Nelson at tonight's First Presidency Christmas devotional. It was a wonderful meeting and I felt the spirit strongly through several of the talks. I was so grateful that Doug was able to participate. This is his last Christmas devotional to sing in and it was a spiritual feast and the music was spectacular.

 I've had tender feelings all day for a variety of reasons and tonight just amplified them. I'm so grateful for my Savior and for the Christmas season to remember his birth, life, mission and atonement.

 Christmas has always been a special time for me and I'm enjoying it even more this year watching Christmas through the eyes of children. I'm afraid that I was sometimes (usually) too busy as a mother to enjoy the magic. I'm glad that I can step back and enjoy it now through my beautiful grandchildren.

Finley wanted to Face Time with us the other day. He was so excited and wanted us to see his Christmas tree and decorations in the house. I snapped a screenshot of him showing us the tree. 

Fun with friends

We had a fun night tonight with friends. After a busy day working in the morning and then helping out at the luncheon following Karen Thornley's funeral (our sweet next door neighbor) it was so nice to relax with friends.  We used to get together with the Adams and Wingets quite often when our children were younger and do things like have picnics, barbecues in the canyon, etc. We'd get together as couples quite often on Sunday evenings just to talk and have a treat. Well, life gets in the way sometimes. By the time all three men had served as Bishop several years had passed. Life was too busy during those years to get together much. Now we're trying to make amends for that.

We went out to dinner together and then went to the Centerpointe Theater in Centerville to see "Five Carols for Christmas" which is just a fun musical show. We laughed and had a fun time. Of course I had to snap pictures of everyone in the Elf cutouts in the foyer.  Good times!

Zofia Rose is 1 year old today!

 Wow, where did that year go? Our precious little girl is a year old today!

I wanted to do something special for her first birthday and even though she really wasn't old enough for the gift she'll grow into it. I had our friend Dave make a cradle for her and then I bought a dolly, made a new quilt for Zoe and a matching quilt for her dolly.

We knew we wouldn't be able to make it to her "official" birthday party tomorrow since we had tickets for a show with our friends (didn't know about the party when I bought the tickets and made plans) so we went down to Murray in the afternoon so we could take her gift to her.

I think it really worked out better anyway. It was fun to let her rip through the wrapping paper and just have fun.

She'll hopefully enjoy the quilts more as she gets older. At any rate, I had fun making them for her. It's fun to have a little girl to sew for.

Her favorite thing was to take the binky out of the dolly's mouth and put it back in. She did that over and over (only occasionally stopping to put the binky in her own mouth).

She had her party on Friday night at her Grandma and Grandpa Ostler's house. It looked like she had lots of fun and enjoyed her cake!

Thanksgiving in Portland

Just a note that pictures won't relate to the accompanying paragraphs and probably will be out of order but I had a hard enough time trying to choose from the over 200 pictures that I took in a few days!


What a wonderful time we had gathering with the whole family in Portland this year for Thanksgiving. Last year Chad sent a random text out saying we should meet in Portland for Thanksgiving 2018 and before long everyone jumped on the wagon and we began to plan for it. With Chad and Anney's fairly sudden move in August we didn't know if they'd be able to join us since getting time off work in a fairly new job can be complicated but they made it work too.

We were the first to arrive and flew from SLC to Portland on Tuesday the 20th. We had arranged for a shuttle to take us to Matt and Sherlyn's place in Tigard. We arrived around noon and the traffic wasn't bad as all; not nearly the nightmare we remembered from our trip three years ago. The driver dropped us off at their place and then we hopped in their vehicle to go find a late lunch. We ended up at a food court of sorts where everyone could get what they wanted. I had the best sandwich ever (pork with griddled manchego cheese and a romesco sauce). It was wonderful and I've already found some romesco sauce recipes to try at home.  We also stopped at Salt and Straw for some amazing ice cream. After lunch we went to Powell's City of Books which is a HUGE bookstore (new and used) that takes up an entire city block and is four stories high. Doug wanted to see if he could find some piano scores since he's planning on taking piano lessons again after he retires from choir in April. I wanted to look in the children's section and was able to find two books each for Finley and Zofia. We visited a bit more and then Matt took us to Safeway to do some shopping. I needed to buy ingredients for banana cream pies (it's not Thanksgiving without those) and we also got some produce, cheese, crackers, milk, etc to have in our hotel room with us. Matt then dropped us off at our hotel, the Best Western in Tigard where we stayed last time. It's only about five miles from their place.

Wednesday we spent more time with Matt and Sherlyn. Derek and Shelby were due to arrive around 7PM that night and Chad and Anney not until much later around 10PM.  Unfortunately Doug wasn't feeling good so we didn't do much. It was also rainy and a rather dismal day. We went to a section of Portland with a bunch of little shops. It would've been a really fun place to be on a nice day and had Doug been feeling well. We shopped at a toy store called Thinker Toys that had a great selection of fun educational toys along with some great classic toys. Sherlyn wanted to stop at a yarn shop as well. We went to lunch together and then they dropped us off at the hotel so Doug could sleep and hopefully get feeling better. I had taken my afghan to work on so I just crocheted while he napped. After he woke up, and before it got too dark (it gets dark so early there) we walked across the street to a Rite Aid and picked up a few things. Didn't really feel like eating much so bought me a frozen meal to heat in the microwave and got Doug some chicken noodle soup. We ate, read, watched British Baking Show on Netflix on my iPad and went to bed.

Thanksgiving morning came and Matt came and picked us up after we had breakfast at the hotel. Derek ran a half marathon early that morning about an hour from Portland but they arrived back at Matt's first. Chad, Anney and Finley were next to arrive and it was great to see them. It was so funny because Chad and Anney had decided not to tell the rest of the family that they were expecting and just to surprise everyone when they got to Portland. (That was hard for us to keep a secret since September!)  Not long after they got there it was time for Matt to go pick up the Thanksgiving meal that he had catered from a local high-end grocery store. Doug went with him to pay for the meal (since Matt had already spent lots of money on other foods for the day) and Chad decided to go too. Derek was in the shower so it was just the girls and Finley hanging around. Anney finally took her coat off and her baby bump was very obvious but no one said anything!  Sherlyn kept stealing glances at her and smiling but didn't say anything. Shelby started feeding Zoe some baby food and Finley said something like "our baby might eat baby food" but still no one said anything. It seems like he even said "we're having a baby" but still no one dared say anything (because you really never know when kids say something).  Finally Shelby whispers to me "Is Anney pregnant?" and I said "Yes, say something!" It dragged on for a while but Shelby finally said something, the secret was out, hugs were shared and everyone was excited.

Finley was in heaven in Uncle Matt's house since Matt is a huge Legos fan and Finley loves them too. Matt got out several sets and that's all Finley really wanted to play with. It's a good thing too since it was a rainy day and he couldn't go outside. Finley was really good with Zoe but she kept wanting the Legos so I finally got out the Duplos set I took for her and that kept her entertained for quite a while. It took close to three hours to get all the food heated as we had stuff just stacked in Matt's oven so we just visited and watched the kids and enjoyed being together. Finley wanted to have "an adventure" so he and I went up on Matt's roof for a while in the rain to look at things.

I had texted the kids and said we needed to have a "meeting" after dinner but we decided to have it while the food was heating. We had talked about going to Disneyland in May (I told them last May when we were all together for Derek's graduation). After that initial meeting however Chad and Anney told Doug and I that they were trying to get pregnant so didn't know how things would work out and maybe they wouldn't be able to go.  I told them that we'd make it work one way or the other because I wanted it to be for everyone.  Shelby kept pushing me to set a date (since her family kept pushing her since that family is taking  a cruise in early May) but I kept putting everyone off because we needed to find out what was happening with Chad's family. Well, when they told us in September that they were expecting in April one of the first things Chad said was "and we're fine with going to Disneyland in May." Well, okay! I wouldn't want to drag a month old baby around but they're okay with that and it's really our chance before Derek and Shelby head to parts unknown. So, anyway, now that everyone knew their news we were free to plan a bit and talk about when we'd go. Of course, Chad and Anney want it to be  a surprise for Finley so we had to talk in code (while he blissfully colored). I had grossly underestimated how much hotel rooms would be and the amount I figured (even in a fairly cheap hotel) was almost what I had budgeted for the whole trip and didn't include any of the tickets, meals, etc.  I had to come up with another option so I wanted to see if everyone would be okay if we rented a house instead. Everyone was fine with that. It will be a bit crowded in a way but everyone will have their own bedroom although we'll have to share bathrooms. It will be nice to have a kitchen though and we can play games, whatever too. The place I found has a backyard that kids can run around in too so that's a bonus.

Dinner was finally ready and it was really good. Everyone pitched in to get the tables set up and ready. I was worried that we'd be too scrunched in their small apartment but it worked out fine.  I loved being together with my family so it wouldn't have mattered anyway. I told Doug that I'd already had my Christmas because no gift could be better to me than that!

I just couldn't get enough of being together and loved being able to love on my two grandbabies and dream of the next one to come. I got teary eyed a few times looking around at everyone just talking, laughing and having fun. It's such a blessing to me that my boys love each other and want to be together and that the whole family gets along. I know so many families with internal problems so I'm extra grateful for that. We're not perfect by any stretch of the imagination and I wish that I could "fix" a few things but in the end we love each other and that's what counts.

Since Matt and Sherlyn missed Finley's birthday they had some presents for him so let him open them before they headed back to their hotel. They got him some big "Hulk" hands and he delighted in "smashing" everything with them. He was hyper and very wired and they finally decided they needed to head back to the hotel to calm him down before bedtime.

After they left we visited more with Derek, Shelby and Zoe (since they were staying at Matt's place) and then Doug, Shelby and I played a rousing game of Farkle. We were all pretty slap happy by then. Derek drove us back to our hotel room that night.

Friday morning came and we called a Lyft ride to take us to the kids' place. We had decided not to rent a car this time because it's SO expensive but then we hated not having our own vehicle and having to have others run us around so I'm not sure we'd do that again.  We had slept in and dawdled that morning and didn't even get to the breakfast in the hotel before it closed at 9AM but had plenty of food to eat in the room. We didn't realize that the kids were all there and waiting for us (so we could be the babysitters while they had their swell PDA tournament). It's silly but they have fun with it and have been carrying on for 12 years. This year Matt reigned supreme. The funniest thing was watching Finley try to learn how to spin the pecan and paying close attention to what his daddy and uncles were doing. 

We had told everyone that we'd take them all out for a meal together and so off we went for lunch. Sherlyn found a place that was family friendly when choices for everyone. Doug rode there with Chad, Anney and Finley; I rode over with Derek, Shelby and Zoe; Matt and Sherlyn drove alone (and then we rode back with them).  We loved seeing how beautiful and green it was. It's still fall in Portland and there were lots of gorgeous trees with fall color. After lunch Derek and his family decided to head out and see some of the area (hoping Zoe would sleep in the car) and Chad and his family wanted to go shopping for a while. We went with Matt and Sherlyn and stopped at a bakery to buy a dozen fresh beignet (which was really kind of stupid since there was still pie and goodies at the apartment but oh well).  Everyone finally gathered together, ate leftovers, visited some more and then it was time for goodbyes. I held back the tears until Chad, Anney and Finley were out the door but then lost it again. Goodbyes are just hard for me but May will be here before I know it!

Matt and Sherlyn took us to the airport the next morning and just like that we were home and back in our routine but with some great memories!