Lots of Visiting with Cousins - Jan/Feb 2011

I'm having quite a difficult time with this blog stuff tonight...pictures are just not cooperating, so I'm just going to have to go with it. I was able to go back out to Utah in January for what turned out to be a couple of weeks. Love being around the kiddos - the little ones AND the big ones. Lindsay was gone part of the time to her CHA conference in southern California. We were all quite jealous of her time on Venice Beach. Sarah came out on a Friday afternoon...Saturday morning she had her audition at BYU-Provo, which went relatively well. Saturday afternoon we did a little prom dress shopping and found "the perfect" dress for Sarah...yahoo! Saturday night was spent at Becky's house - we were up rather late making Valentine Day banners. I think we all are like our mom in that we never just make ONE of anything...it is always multiples. We had fun crafting and talking to early in the morning. Sarah and I left Sunday afternoon to go and visit with Chris and Holly for a bit, and then we headed over to visit with Jenny and David Hawks...our dear missionary friends. Had dinner and then hit the road to head up to Rexburg. We got to spend the night with Lindsay, Heather Porter's sister! We kept thinking we were hearing Heather! So fun. We also got to visit with Miranda Goree Conkle and her good husband for a few minutes. Monday morning we headed over to campus for Sarah's audition with the flute professor and it went amazingly well. Sarah's decision to attend BYU-I was pretty much made before we left town! We made our way back down to Provo Monday evening, only to find out that we wouldn't be leaving town on Tuesday as planned because of the bad, bad weather back in St. Louis. In fact, we didn't make it home until late Thursday.

So Wednesday, since we didn't leave, we were able to get together with Becky's family...way fun for the kids to be with their cousins. I LOVE the first picture above...2nd cousins! Baby Caleb Brewer and baby Matthew Ridge. (Katie and Nathan are cousins.) Caleb is about 2 1/2 months older than Matthew, but keep in mind that Matthew's parents are both 6 ft. tall, plus some! The second picture above is of Sterling and Nathan - Nathan is holding baby Matthew.
Katie, Jayne, Sarah, Ta, and Mandy...
Orson and Bryant in the back, Brooke, Poppy, Claire, and Isaac in the front...Claire loves kids!! Love, love, love being with family!!