Birthdays, knee check and more

Had a busy week.  Went up for Paul's 6-week knee check up (stayed with Jay and Brynn) and everything is great!  One more appointment at 1 year.  Fun to see Jay and Brynn other than that Essie and Tahlia were feeling crummy.  On our way home we checked out the Body Worlds cycle of life exhibit at the Leonardo on Jay and Brynn's recommendation.  It was really amazing as well as a little creepy.  So interesting to see and learn so much about the human body.  Then it was on to the Randall triple play birthday dinner/celebration!  

We finished of the week with a Friday afternoon hike on a trail around T-Bone Mesa that we had never done.  It was a beautiful hiking day.  

Saturday morning we took a little bike ride on a trail out in Santa Clara that had beautiful views.  In the afternoon we looked a model homes with Moss and Christie as they are trying to decide what one they want to build when they get their house sold.  Fun week!  

We gave Brady and Bryan passes to go tubing at Brian Head for their birthdays.  They sent me this picture to show that they did go and Brady told me it was, "Awesome!"

New section of the Chinle Trail for us

After a morning of work for Paul and laundry for me we decided to take the afternoon off.  We went up to Springdale and enjoyed a few more gallery visits for the Arts to Zion show and then did about 4 miles on the Chinle Trail in a section we hadn't covered before.  We went until we got to Huber Wash and then turned around.  It was a spectacular weather day for this hike and the views were awesome! Paul did well, but may have pushed it just a little as his leg was a bit more sensitive that evening than it had been.  But he was sure it was worth it! 

Zion views from a gallery.

Mount Kinesava dominates the views along the trail.  Awesome! (Didn't get a gate pic so borrowed one from Joe Braun.)

Other mountain views are amazing too!  And the changing light made it awesome too.

Just got into the petrified wood section of the trail when it was time to turn around.  Love this stuff!  

Getting better every day!

Paul is working hard to get his mobility going again.  He's getting to where he can walk further without it hurting.  Friday after school we decided to go walking in the beautiful weather/scenery of Snow Canyon.  We started with the Johnson's Arch trail and that went well, so then we went into the park and walked up a wash farther than we ever had before.  It was such a beautiful day!  We totally enjoyed ourselves and Paul did great.  Getting better every day!

Saw this footprint and it said to me, "I love hiking!"  Only found it once along the trail...left there just for me!

Saturday we did a little walking in the afternoon.  It was urban walking this time.  We walked around town to different galleries that were displaying work for the Arts to Zion show.  On our way back to our car we looked up and there in the tree was this beautiful Falcon just hanging out in the down town of our city!  Seemed to be very comfortable and let us take its' picture.  Cool!

Sweet Eden's #8

Had a fun evening celebrating with Eden up in Cedar.  Can't believe she's getting so big and so girly. Jewelry, clothes, boots, and fake nails and something cute to keep them in and all wrapped up so prettily.  And there was a cute flower cookie/cake frosted pink, of course!  So glad we could join your party Eden.  We love you gobs!

The birthday girl gets a special plate, glass and giant silverware too.

After the birthday dinner it was time for presents! Zion loved helping out with all of the wrappings.

Making the frosting and decorating the cookie/cake and the traditional candle blowing picture!

Happy 2015!

Life has been pretty restful around here since Christmas...and I'm not complaining.  We've just been chilling (literally since we are heating only with the fireplace which works really well in the kitchen area but leaves the bedrooms just a bit cool) and recuperating.  Paul is doing really well and has even finished up his physical therapy in record time.  Many blessings in that area.  We ate some treats and played some games with Ferf and kids until they left to take Brynnli to her first New Year's Eve dance.  She was so excited!  I can't even remember if we did anything great on New Year's Day, but I am happy that during this time off school I have caught up on almost all of my paperwork and got the house cleaned!  Paul has been doing little honey dos around the house too. We didn't make it to Aunt Venna's funeral - just not a great time for a very long drive for Paul nor a very long drive for me with no relief driver.  We went to a good movie that we had read the book of.  So, tomorrow it will be time to get back at it.

Bean left a surprise greeter for us for New Year's Day (and we snuck it down into his closet to greet him when he got out of the shower!).  And snow that started the evening before brought us a white surprise in the light of day.  

I met Kenny Poulsen (Venna's grandson) at a stake baptism here in St. George the day after her funeral.  He shared this program.  We will miss Aunt Venna, but at 103 I'm sure she was glad to move on to the next chapter.  

Stoning the Smiths!

Juge, Lance, Moss, Supe and Paul spent some time helping Weed and Derek with their stone project during the Christmas break.  They made really good progress!  Kaebri, Tasia and Eden kept the younger set happy inside.  Great work everyone!  (I stood around watching and taking pictures and then got leftover Christmas stuff ready for lunch.)

Weed, Juge, Paul, Weed and Supe, Moss, Lance, Supe, Paul Supe and Derek (doing his trademark nosepicking pose).  

Christmas 2014

The Christmas Eve dinner - the Lillywhites and Grandma

Christmas day at the house 

Supe and Beacher

Grandma, Bean and us
After presents and breakfast we took Grandma and went to visit the in town families.

The Smiths

The Lillywhites

The Borrowmans

In the afternoon the Weavers braved the snow and came down from Cedar to visit
join the dinner get together.

We had planned to drive up to see the Randall's Christmas day, but a snow storm kept us away.   The day after Christmas when the snow had slowed down Lou came down with the kids and we got to give Afton and Ellie their gifts.  Brady, Lou, Joel and Bryan had already gotten theirs. 

Update from Oregon

We sure miss these two, but they seem to be enjoying the adventures of being newly married and living in a new place together! In Beacher's words, "I had the day off today...so Supe and I spent the day dying and weaving these sweaters from the sheep in our backyard."  Can't wait to see these two for Christmas!  

Knee #2 - no more please!

Once again we went to Park City for Paul to have partial knee replacement surgery - this time the left knee.  It was good to do it this year insurance wise and good because when they got in there it was bone on bone again.  Paul is doing amazingly well already and never complains or takes out his pain on anyone.  He was a model hospital patient laughing and joking with all of the staff who worked with him.  (He is trying so hard to make things easy on me.  Again, I am so blessed to have such a wonderful, unselfish man to be married to.)  Things went well and the recovery is looking good. Looking forward to him not having to endure that pain. We are very thankful for the priesthood blessings given and how well things are going.  This one seems to be going even better than the last one so far.  Some of that is experience, but we also need to give thanks for the blessings we are receiving.  So thankful for all of the prayers in Paul's behalf from those who love him.   Hope to be out hiking some again next summer!  

Waiting to go in, after surgery, working with a very enthusiastic PT and the gruesome, stapled incision.  

  

Christmas with the Lillywhites - early!

Jay and Brynn were wonderful hosts as usual.  We stopped in to spend the night on our way up to Park City for Paul's knee surgery.  And, since they can't come down after Christmas with Jay getting his wisdom teeth out the, we decided to bring our Christmas to them early.  They brought theirs to us during the Thanksgiving fun.  They brought us wonderful stuff like homemade fudge and a new State Park's pass, along with a fun handmade Christmas decoration by Brynn a new set of unsticky Rook cards.  They also gave Paul his birthday - an Outback gift card that we used for b-day/anniversary dinner feasting.  Thanks so much!  It was fun to open presents with them up there too!  A few too many surgeries for the normal holiday routine this year for either of us.  

L to R - We met Ella the bunny this time and she got involved by trying to eat gift bags, Jay and Brynn, Tahlia, Essie, Paul and Bonnie with Tahlia and Madi and Madi.