BYU vs. Virginia Tech Basketball

While we were together with my family just after Christmas, a group of us went to watch a BYU basketball game. The first half was really exciting as Tyler Haws scored 29 points. (He went on to score 42 total.) The second half put most of us to sleep, but it was some fun, quality family time! And those of us who are BYU fans were glad to see BYU win. :)

Adam, Isaac and Brynne (in a later picture) thought the game was a cover up for getting some Lindsey-time! She flew home from Maryland and was greeted by some very adoring nieces and nephews.

Lee, Brynne, and me at the game. Brynne really enjoyed watching the first half. She also really enjoyed the yummy goodies our nice extended family kept providing - popcorn, ice cream, pizza. Score!

I took a couple of pictures of the next crew: my dad, Zane, Brandon, and Alyson. This was my favorite picture of everyone except that my dad wasn't looking at the camera. I said, "Dad, you were watching the game!" He replied with, "Well what do you think I came here to do?" Quite funny. :)

Adam laid (is that the right word?) on Lindsey's lap the whole second half of the game. Then in the van on the way home, Isaac snuggled up to Lindsey for the whole drive. Brynne was happy to get one side of Lindsey's two sides any chance she could.

Brynne, Lindsey, and Adam walking back to the car after the game:

I must say I really enjoyed the game. Reminded me of the MWC game my dad and I went to in Las Vegas where Jimmer Ferdette scored 52 points. I so love being part of a family that loves sports!

Rawlins: Hilary's 20-Year High School Reunion

 Yes, the title is correct - 20 YEARS!! Crazy!! The girls and I headed to Rawlins the beginning of August so I could attend my reunion. I was a little disappointed at the small turnout, but it was really nice to see those who came!

Funny thing about this picture: Lee saw it posted on facebook and called to ask if I'd had a good time at the reunion. He was worried that things didn't go so well because I was on the fringes of the picture instead of front and center like he's used to seeing me at social events. :)

When I arrived at the dinner wearing purple, everyone started laughing. Good thing I'm not a self-conscious sort! :) Turns out all the other girls there were also wearing purple! We decided to take a picture of the "purple girls." After the picture yet one other girl showed up in purple. What are the chances? Quite funny! :)

 The reunion was my first time seeing Janaka Vanderkoi since graduation! I hadn't seen Mike Russell in a long time, either. Lots of fun to catch up!

This saddle is on display outside the library in Rawlins. My kids love to climb on it. I keep looking for the "please don't climb on the saddle" sign, but so far no sign. Brynne is much taller than the last time I took a picture of her on the saddle, though.

 The week after the reunion was the Carbon County Fair in Rawlins. We found out one of the banks in town provided free BBQ dinner a night we were there, so we chose that night to check out the fair.

 The girls were delighted to see Smokey the Bear... (I don't know the other kids in the picture, but I should have asked if they had any more mouth-sized blue stickers!)

...but they were even more excited to see Miss Wyoming, Lexie Madden! Morgan refused to go home until we found her and got her autograph. :) Miss Wyoming was SO nice to the girls and was great about moving to where we could get a good picture.

 One really great thing about Rawlins is that the public swimming pool is free! They had open swimming from 1-3 every afternoon and from 7-9 every night. I figured we'd go swimming once or twice while we were there, but the girls had different ideas - they ended up swimming almost every day, and some days went for both afternoon AND night!

I managed to snap some pretty good shots of the girls going off the diving board. Brynne got really good at jumping in...

 ...and Morgan figured out how to do a front flip! How do you like the in-action picture?

 They are planning to build a brand new high school and swimming pool in Rawlins soon (and tear down the old ones!), so I thought I better take a few pictures around the pool while I was there. It was interesting to see this group of three banners; I remember when there was just one banner and it wasn't very full! (Can you find my name?)

Some kids say "Grandpa, will you read me a story?" but my kid says

"Grandpa, can I play on the computer with you?"

2012 Summer Trip -- Reunion in Grayland, Wa

Every four years Lee's mom's family has a family reunion on the Washington coast. The reunion is always in Grayland, Wa where family members still have cranberry bogs. We had a chance to visit with almost all of Lee's sisters (we missed you, Dorothy!) and many of his cousins. Morgan and Brynne had a great time playing with cousins! Here is a picture of those who made it for the reunion this year:

 The kids all enjoyed a ride on some old, yet working, farm equipment.

Individual family groups each have a meal that they are in charge of preparing, and the meals are all served in a huge barn. Lee's cousin took this picture of Lee, Melissa and me:

 We got to spend an afternoon on the beach. It would have been lots of fun except that the wind was really, really bad! Lee's sister Ramona had some kites, but she was worried the kids wouldn't be able to hold onto them.

 This was Melissa's first trip to a beach. She was fascinated by the sand. :)

 When everyone had their fill of the wind, we went to swim at the hotel where some of our family members were staying. It was pretty crazy with the whole Roberts clan there. I had my suit but decided not to get in the water and swim. My cute niece Audrey had different plans for me, though. She got out a little farther than planned and was struggling to get back in. I tried to yell for Brynne to grab her, but Brynne didn't hear me. My lifeguard training from long ago kicked in and next thing I knew I was in the water fully dressed. What else is an aunt to do? :)

Spring Break 2010 -- Roberts Family Reunion in Zion National Park

We got to spend Spring Break with a lot of Lee's family -- his dad, step-mom, and four sisters (along with their families). This was an extra special treat because this was the first ever Roberts reunion, and we got to spend time with family we rarely see. We were the lucky ones, because we only had to drive four hours for the reunion. Lee's dad came up from Tucson, Katie and Dorothy came down from Washington State, and Ramona takes the cake by flying over from Italy! And although Ruth only had to drive down from Salt Lake City, she still gets major points for housing both Ramona's and Dorothy's families! Katie's family stayed with us for a few nights before the reunion and we LOVED having them here! Now onto the fun:

One day we got adventurous and decided to take the kids (all but sleeping Audrey) on the shuttle bus to a ranger show. We lined them all up for a picture and then counted them all so we wouldn't lose anyone! In front is Elijah (Ruth's). Standing is Gavin, Kaya, Phaedra (Dorothy's); Kiersten (Ruth's); Aidan (Ramona's); Morgan and Brynne (mine, all mine!!!); and Jimmy (Katie's).

I mentioned sleeping Audrey who missed the bus ride. Well, she's so darn cute that I had to get a picture of her in here somehow (she's on the left)! Aidan loved holding Audrey's hand and walking her around the camp. They were really cute together. :)

Kaya, Kiersten, Phaedra, and Morgan in the front of the second car of the shuttle bus. These older girls played so well together! I am seriously very impressed with how polite and friendly all the cousins were with each other!!

Each day we had a couple activities for the kids. The first day the kids made "Un-Birthday" cards, and then we had an un-birthday party -- complete with a dutch oven cake (thanks, Ruth!!!). The second day Ramona did a big Easter Egg Hunt for the kids and then taught them to make lanyards. In this picture Kiersten, Brynne, and Aidan are enjoying some Easter candy and picking colors for their lanyards.

I'm sad I don't have many pictures of the actual siblings all together. We did get one picture of everyone together (no guarantees about happy kids!), but I have to wait to get a copy from Ramona. Just before we were getting ready to pack up and head out, I took this picture of Lee with his dad and twin sisters -- Dorothy, Lee, Trout, and Ruth.

We had TONS of fun at the reunion! The only real problem was how cold it was the first night (35 degrees), but we all survived -- the girls actually made out great because they had super duper nice, new, warm sleeping bags -- and had a great time!

Spring Break 2010 -- Hiking in Zion National Park

During the Roberts Family Reunion, we had the chance to go on two family hikes. The first one was a casual stroll on a trail that goes along the river. We stopped several times to throw things in the river and to climb rocks. Two of my favorite pictures of Brynne from the whole trip were taken while she was climbing rocks on the trail. Here she is at the top of a rock:


And here Brynne is discovering that is more difficult to climb down rocks than it is to climb up them!

I also got a really good picture of Lee when he was rock climbing with the girls. Pretty handsome fella, don't ya' think?!

How'd this picture get in here? Oh well, here's Brynne hunting for Easter eggs in our campsite (thanks for letting us borrow the screen tent, Mom and Dad!).

This picture is great because it shows Brynne's personality really well -- she has her monkey on her back. The monkey has velcro hands, so she wrapped his arms around her neck and took him hiking with us! (This is all assuming the monkey is a "he"...)

The picture of Brynne and monkey above, along with all the rest of the pictures in this blog, were taken during our second hike. We went on a 3-mile round trip hike to the Emerald Pools. There is a lower, middle, and upper pool. Here's another picture of my handsome husband, this time in front of the upper pool. You can see the waterfall in the background that starts all the water flowing to the different pools.

On the way back down from the upper pool, we found yet another rock to climb on (always one of my kids' favorite things to do!). Morgan climbed up for a great picture of the waterfall that leads to the upper pool. This picture shows only a little over half the distance the water falls. It was amazing!

To get past the middle pool, you actually had to skip across rocks. Morgan paused in the middle for this super-cute picture: (In case you're wondering, the scarf came from Grammy Lo -- she brought a box of stuff for kids and grandkids to dig through and take at will. Thanks, Lo!)

I think I'm only in three pictures out of the 100+ I took during the trip. I guess that's what happens when you're the photographer. :) On our way back down from the Emerald Pools, we passed this little water well on the side of the path. Morgan was kind enough to take a picture of me next to the "well" so I'd have some sort of proof that I was actually there! :)

On the way home from Zion National Park, we decided to stop and tour Cove Fort. It's a fort that President Hinckley's grandfather built and "managed" for the church many years ago. I hadn't realized that it had rooms in it; although I'm not sure what that means I thought it did have. The girls loved climbing up to the top of the fort and looking through the look-out holes. Lee and the girls are standing at the top of the fort in this picture. You can see one side of the fort behind them. I've always wanted to see Cove Fort, so I'm really glad we stopped!

Even though we had tons of unpacking and cleaning to do when we got home, I absolutely loved everything about our Spring Break trip! Zion National Park is an amazing place, and Lee's family is made up of amazing people!

Lee's Family Reunion

This entire crazy trip was planned around our next event: Lee's extended family reunion. This reunion is for all the descendants of his great-grandparents. It is held every four years on the Washington coast. The last time Lee and I went was eight years ago when we were newlyweds. This year was nice because all but one of Lee's siblings was able to attend, so our girls had a chance to play with cousins. The sad thing is that it was rainy and in the 50s the entire weekend (until Sunday when everyone left). Here's a photo of everyone who came this year:

And here's a picture of our family in front of the "red barn" where all the eating took place. I was very glad to have checked the weather and known to pack coats.
The family out there have cranberry bogs, so we walked around to look at them and asked all about how to harvest cranberries. Here is Brynne, Morgan, and Lee in front of a barn that is on one of the cranberry bogs.
We joined some extended family members (one of the few other families at the reunion with kids) on a small "nature walk" behind the houses. Brynne found a nice worm (on her right hand).
Meanwhile, Morgan found a nice slug.

We were on the coast for the 4th of July. Lots of family members bought various fireworks to set off on the beach. The girls did a few sparklers and smaller things before deciding it would be more fun to play on the rocks (which I didn't mind at all). Then we sat up by the cars and watched the men-folk set off the big expensive fireworks. It was actually really nice because there were lots of different groups on the beach so there were the really nice, pretty fireworks going off almost constantly up and down the beach. It was fun, but we were ready for bed by the time they were done!

On Sunday morning at the end of the reunion, they had a sing-along in memory of all the family members who have passed on. It was really neat. At the end, Lee sang "God Be With You Til We Meet Again" with his sisters Meredith and Katie:
On the way home, we stopped in Grayland to see Lee's grandmother's grave. She passed away shortly after Morgan was born. This picture is of Morgan and Lee posing in front of a veteran memorial. The names of Lee's grandmother, Dorothy Cottrell, and her husband, Clark Cottrell, appear right above the flowers. Can I just take a moment to say how hot my husband looks in this picture -- oh yeah!
After stopping in Grayland, we had to drive to Seattle and drop Lee off to fly back to work. :( Then the girls and I stayed a night with my mom's cousin Becky Reynolds and her family in Auburn. We had a nice time visiting with them one night before having to head on to the next stop. At this point I was glad that the next stop was on the way home...

Crashing the Christensen Reunion

Have you ever wanted to just drop in on someone else's family reunion? Well, that's what we did on the next leg of our trip. I have two great friends from the Boise area - some brothers that I went to Ricks with 15 years ago (I'm old). I became friends with their whole family and had planned to stop in and see their parents on the way through. As it turned out, though, they were having their family reunion and were kind enough to let us join them. They have five kids and fourteen grandkids age nine and under, so it was quite the party. We had planned on just staying one night, but it turned into two nights and was a ton of fun! Here is a picture of me with my friends Lee and Dee Christensen:

We missed out on the first day of the reunion (which was water skiing--bummer), but we had tons of fun with them on their second day. It started out with swimming in a creek by their Grandpa's ranch. Here is a picture of Morgan and Brynne with Gayle (Dee & Lee's awesome mother!) and two of the Christensen grandkids.
The girls got to do a fair share of 4-wheeling during the day. The first time was down to the creek. Then they took the 4-wheelers up the creek and let the kids float down a small section. Brynne refused to ride anywhere other than right behind the driver where she could hold on tight -- good girl, Brynne. In this picture, they were getting ready to drive up the creek with Dee for their first of several rafting trips:
And here they are coming down the river with one of Dee's sons.
It was really nice of them to give my kids turns on the rafts and such when they had so many kids of their own waiting for turns. When it wasn't their turn to be on rafts, my kids discovered the fine art of floating downstream with a life jacket. Morgan even talked my friend Dee into going further up the river with her to float down a longer distance. (The water was never much deeper than my knees, so it was perfect if they held their bums up.) Here's Brynne floating down:
When we got done playing in the creek, we drove up to their ranch (which is in Sweet, ID somewhere between Boise and McCall). This is the only picture I have with me in it during the festivities. (We went in the barn for some singing and barn dancing just before heading home at the end of the day.)

They had a much, much smaller creek up at the ranch that Brynne played in for a good four hours or more.
The girls also got a chance to ride on some horses, do some more 4-wheeling, and ride a zip line. Morgan actually spent most of her time riding a bicycle they had up there. I wish I had a picture of that, because she seriously rode that bike for several hours. I think Morgan would have loved to spend more time on the horse (below), but rather than keep waiting for turns she busied herself with the bike. The funny part is that Morgan kept her swimming suit on the entire time and never wanted to put clothes on over it.
Here is Brynne getting ready to ride down the zip line. She was very scared of it but went down three or four times. I was very proud of Brynne trying all the new things even if they seemed a bit scary -- that was really good for her. Behind Brynne in this picture is brother Keeper (who was turning 12 when I met him and is somehow not a dad) and brother-in-law Jarett.
And here's Morgan riding down the zip line. She loved it and had no fear.
We had a hot dog roast for dinner and had a wonderful day. We didn't get back to the house where we all were staying until 10:15 pm. The kids were more dirty than I ever remember them being before, but we were so tired that all I could do was wash their faces and feet and put them to bed.

As a side note: The only other time I had been to their ranch was during the summer after our year at Ricks. My roommate Christine and I had gone to see them. They took us horseback riding up at the ranch. Neither Christine nor I had been riding by ourselves before, but they took us out "Man From Stormy River" style -- where we were riding almost straight down hillsides. I also remember running with the horse and trying not to bounce. Anyway, then we went water skiing for the first time before sitting still to watch a rodeo. While sitting at the rodeo, we decided to drive to our friend's mission reunion in Portland. The reunion was the next morning, so we went back to the Christensen home to ask their parents' permission to get in their tiny Geo Metro to drive all night to Portland. There were five of us (Dee, Lee, Andy, Christine, and me) in the tiny car. Considering that we had just had a full day of using our muscles we were REALLY sore. It was quite the site, I'm sure, watching us all get out of the car when we would switch drivers and fill up for gas. Fun memories...