St George get away.

For the weekend we went to St. George to visit my good friend Erin and her fam! It was so fun spending time with her and being able to hang out! Steve and I needed a nice get away!

Friday I had to work, so we left later in the day. We met Erin and Easton at the Hurricane football game since Chet coaches the team. Steve was thrilled. He LOVES watching football. I on the other hand could pass anyday. BUT it was fun. I reallyjust talked with Erin the whole time. It was the first time I officially met baby Easton too. He's super cute. He's like a little man.

After the game we went over to Chet's family's house and just hung out there and talked and got to know his mom and dad. Super sweet people, and way caring.

We went over to Chet and Erin's after and stayed up until 2am talking and laughing about youtube video's. They showed us this video on Antoine Dodson. SO Funny. Not the actual story line, but the interview he did was HILARIOUS.

Saturday we went shooting. I had fun shooting the tiny gun... ha ha..i don't know the real name of it.. but it was SO loud. Erin was loaded up on allergy medicine so she was a dud. (inside joke)HA HA totally kidding Erin. After shooting we went out to "Olive Garden" hmm..my fav. with Chet & Erin, lil' man and than Nicole and her family met up with us. I went to high school with Nicole so it was fun to see her too with her fam! They were driving to Disneyland!!

AH I CANT WAIT until next month for our trip to DISNEY!!!:)

Sunday we went to church with Erin and her fam. Than we all just hung out at her place until we drove home!

It was such a nice little getaway! Oh and I seriously LOVE Easton. He's such a cute little guy!

Old-Fashion Movie Night!

Hello Blogging World, it's Steve signing in. I know it's not common of me to add a post, but I have been studying non-stop and need a break. So here it goes.....

Last night Keira and I went to my parents house for dinner and a movie. When my dad heads out of town on business, my mom and sister always want Keira and I to have an old fashion movie night (because my dad doesn't really like the old fashion movies unless it's a western). It is at these times that I get exposed to some of the classics movies that have stars such as Doris Day, Rock Hudson, Tony Randall, and Cary Grant.

After Keira got home we headed right over for dinner. My mom and Whitney made stuffed peppers and got them cooking (they were so good). While they were cooking Keira and I showed them some of the dance moves we've learned in our dance class. I think they were impressed that a big lug like me can move his feet :) (It sure makes it easy when your dance partner/wife/eternal companion is so dang beautiful!) Anyway, after that it was fun for me to watch the three of them talk about the latest and greatest, dance to music, and laugh until their sides hurt. Observing the three of them, I thought to myself I'm so glad that they have so much fun together.

After dinner we started the movie. Last night's feature film was Pillow Talk. The movie was pretty funny especially when one of the main characters gets caught in his entanglement of lies while trying to win over the girl he likes. At the end the main stars end up together creating the "happily ever after". In addition to pillow talk, here are a few of the other old fashioned movies we've watched.

So, that was the night. Now I'd better get back to studying :)

Great Grandma L.

oh how I miss you.

Grandma has passed away 3 years ago now. This was the last picture I have of her.

I've been thinking about her a lot lately. Her birthday is on September 11. A day Ill never forget, now the world won't forget that day either.

I miss just being able to call her up, or getting a card from her in the mail. She had the softest hands in the world. I loved when she would hold mine. Or when I would kiss her soft cheeks.

Little things remind me of her still.

The smell of coffee brewing. Or her contagious laugh.

Grandma showed me all the old fashion movies. Tonight I watched "Pillow Talk." My grandma would always watch it with me. I love watching old movies. I think just because I have so many good memories that go with them.

So this post. Is dedicated to my Grandma.

Labor day Party 2010!

Theme this year: Chinese New Year!

Grandma let Petey (Preston) choose what theme he wanted for this year's party since he just got home from his mission. Why he choose Chinese New Year- I'm not sure, but it was a BLAST!!!

How lucky are we do have such amazing grandparents? They do a themed party EVERY year for Labor day. Every year we all look forward to it.

Grandma always decorates the house with lots of cute stuff to go along with the theme! (I took pics mostly after all of them were being taken down..dang.)

We all met at grandma's on Sunday and had a great Sunday dinner and than after dinner the games began! All the old folk-yep, that would be us too. Any one who is married is considered in the category. We all come up with a game for everyone to play.

Here are some of the games we played...

1. Chinese Jumprope

So fun!! It was super hard for me though. I don't know HOW in the world some of them jumped over the rope with the rope up to the waist. Are they really Frogs? Jack Rabbits? I don't know..but the Fords are good. Game by the Wilson Family.

2. Tour of China

This was a relay race. You have to put rice in your straw and shoot it at the tinfoil on the wall, you have to hit it. No matter how hard that wind is blowing, and doesn't really give you a chance..you still have to it hit before you can move to the next obstacle. You have to jump over the great wall of china (boxes with a lovely sign that says "The Great Wall of China"-love it!) and then with a racket hit this ball around this Chinese famous public square..blast, I can't remember the name. THAN you need to put on somewhat traditional sandals and a Chinese hat on your head while balancing a ring on that hat and carefully putting it in a bucket with a Chinese bow.

Tidwell Family...you are so creative and brilliant.

3. Chopstick Relay

Chopstick relay where you can only use chopsticks to pick up marshmallows (worth 1 point),

smarties (worth 2 points) and marbles (worth 3 points) and than quickly put them in a bowl without dropping them. The team with the most points at the end of the relay wins!

Cute Grandma came up with this game. She was super excited for all of us to try it out.

4.Ninja

Steve and I used this game. I wish I could say I created it, or was the fancy pants who came up with it. BUT I was not and I don't know who came up with it. Here's the jist of the game. Everyone stands in a circle and before you start you take a bow and than step back. You then say "High-ya!" and get in a karate stance and freeze. You go clockwise and each individual tries to get another person in one motion to try and hit there hand, you have to stay in that same stance. If you hit there hand then it's out of play. The ultimate goal is to get every person's hands out and then you win the game.

Here's some of the other games that were played without pics (since I don't have them)

5.Ellen came up with Chinese Stars. She bought these replica's of chinese stars and you had to throw them at a target. These stars had to be thrown at the target within a certain amount of time. You also wanted to get the most points.

Super creative and fun pretending to be a Chinese ninja. bahaha... (evil laugh)

6. Shannon Ford did a game called Dragon's Tail. Super fun! We had to get in a human train and the end person puts a red handkerchief in there pocket or belt loop. The person in front of the human train tries to catch the red handkerchief (the dragon's tail) while the train of people are blocking that person from doing so.

7.Josh and Shannon taught us how to write/draw Chinese characters that are common phrases. I learned two things from this. #1-so happy I don't live in china. It would take me FOREVER to write two words. #2- I'm not a very good artist. We all had fun though!

8.Michelle and Travis were creative too! They came up with Egg drop soup. This was also a relay race.

Everyone gets in a line and is holding a spoon. They gave us a plastic egg and we had to pass the egg from the back to the front of the line without dropping it. The person in the front of the line on each team had to carry the egg on the spoon (while spoon now in the mouth) to the bucket and drop it in the bucket without dropping it.

We all had a blast! Seriously love this.

Grandma bought these Chinese cut outs...

Then we had some fun with the umbrella's that Ellen brought...

We couldn't get enough of the games..SO we went back inside and played cards, Catchphrase and Leaping Louie-the airplane game. :)

Everyone sleeps over at grandma and grandpa's...some of us inside but most outside.

We all had a breakfast casserole-Keish and Sweet Rolls and than went and played some sand volleyball. Okay, more like gravel volleyball.

After we won, and kicked the other's booty's..ha ha. Kidding Jason! We had a fun couple of rounds.

To end our Labor day fun we went back to grandma's and had a Chinese lunch. Complete with your choice or using chopsticks or not.

We seriously love you Grandpa and Grandma Ford! We love your annual Labor day party! Can't wait for next year!!!

Incredible Pizza Company.

This is a new place close to home and so we decided to hit it up on Saturday night with the Rappleye's! We seriously spend any chance we get with this cute lil' fam!

Incredible Pizza Company is a lot of fun! It's not only a buffet, but also has games and rides. I'm generally not all for buffet's they kind of gross me out with random people grabbing the same spoons and digging into the food. BUT this place was super clean, and the food was really good.

We all had a fun time! Steve and Tim loved, LOVED, loved the race cars!

My camera didn't get a good one of Steve and Tim on the race cars..dang.

Now they are 8!

Steve and I were invited to go to my primary kid's baptism's. I was pretty excited. I taught these kids when they were only 4 and now there 8! It blows my mind how quickly time goes. I seriously love these kids, and I'm so happy that I got to spend such a special day with them.

4 of the kids had there baptism day today. How neat is that? They are all really good friends too.

The spirit was so strong, and it was like a proud mom moment. Not that I'm there mom OBVIOUSLY. But, seeing them "glow" as they were dressed in white standing with there dad's was a pretty amazing experience. I love these kids. Steve loves them too. This was my first calling in this ward. I have a lot of really good memories. For one- I think it helped us get to know more people in the ward. It was a little hard for us to get to know people in the ward (a lot of the people had kids and are quite a few years older than us, so we didn't have a ton in common) Two, I met one of my very best friends-Marie. We taught together.

We LOVE our ward. I never want to move out of it. Someday we will have to though. Can't live in our basement apartment forever.

Anywho, it was a perfect way to start our Saturday morning.

Dallin, was another one who I taught but he doesn't turn 8 until next month. He sat by me during the baptism's. This was our conversation.

Me: Dallin your sure getting big! Stop growing up will you?

Dallin: No way, I want to be big

Me: What grade are you in now?

Dallin: 2nd but I want to be in college

Me: (laughing, and pretty surprised he would say he wanted to be college) Why do you want to be in college?

Dallin: I want to be in college so than I can take over my dad's business. He's going to get old and Ill be the manager.

LOL!!! Oh my goodness. How I miss hearing what these kids have to say! They always had something clever to say.

What a special day though. What a great reminder for me of how special my baptism day was. I hope these kids never forget it.

Here's pics of four of the kids, for some reason I don't have a picture of Amanda. (This is when I taught them so they were 4 only 5 years old)

Colton

Amber

Dallin

Cody-This is him now. I used this pic from his baptism invite! :)