More January Pictures

New Years Day fell on a Sunday and it was this girls homecoming! We only had her for a few days... she's already back out at BYU for the semester. 

Squinty eye Ivy looks like a full blown teenager here. I'm so proud of her, she sang at Caroline's homecoming and did an amazing job. She's got a lot of talent!

I enjoy the beautiful sunrise from my living room just about every morning!!

Some exciting news but also really sad news for our family, Ryan and Heather are headed to Paris for 3 years!!

My green-thumbed mother helped me identify the house plant I had for over 18 years that I finally killed... I had been wanting another. Here she is and I love her!

Ivy sending me pictures with her friends...

One of the girls favorite things to do is a cooking competition. They have so much fun but actually completely destroy my kitchen.

This face 😍😍😍

Back to Texas

The boys took a hunting trip to Texas back in December and didn't shoot anything. Well, the outfit they hunted at invited them back for a weekend in January to try and fill their tags and they couldn't resist. Jackson was cleared by the doctor to travel and Daniel took the boys back and this time they had success!! It was so good for Jackson to be able to shoot a nice buck at a time he was feeling like he couldn't do anything. Plus, they doubled up on javelinas which, I didn't know this, was on Jackson's bucket list. So happy they had another great time. 

When the boys went to Texas last time, Ivy got sick. Not this time!! We had a really fun weekend together. We watched some good chick flicks, spent a day doing some Christmas returns and shopping, we went out to eat and got pedicures! Love spending some 1-on-1 time with her!!

Ivy's First Girls Camp

This year Girls Camp was on an individual ward level rather than the stake level. And since we've moved to a new ward I am not involved in the Young Women's program anymore. So it seems fitting that, after going to girls camp for the last 4+ years, I was not at Ivy's first girls camp!! Darn! 

It was a little unconventional this year. First, it was planned over the long Martin Luther King Jr. weekend in January. Second, it wasn't actually camp... they stayed in an Air B&B down towards Miami! But where 2 or 3 are gathered in the name of Christ, there Christ will be also. Ivy had an absolute blast! She's brand new in the program since January so she made a lot of new friends and bonded with lots of the girls. They went to the Ft. Lauderdale temple. They had devotionals and sang songs and did all the campish stuff... got to swim and play games and be together and when she came back she said she had the best time!! So happy for my girl!

Daniel's Sibling Reunion January 2023

Daniel's parents, in the past, have taken all of his siblings and their spouses to Mexico. We've gone 3 times... to Cancun, Puerto Vallarta and Cozumel. We usually go in February. This year proved to be a little trickier to plan. First, Daniel's sister, Shelly, moved with her family to England the end of January so if we wanted them to be able to go we had to plan for January, but then secondly, Ryan and Heather have been called to be mission presidents in Paris this summer and had surrendered their passports to be renewed so couldn't leave the country without their passports and wouldn't have them back in time to go in January. So on a whim, it was decided that instead of Mexico, we would just convene together in Florida. We looked at some Air B'n'B's at the beach but we just couldn't find the right place that could accommodate us that had a pool and hot tub and pickleball courts. Ha!! We realized all we wanted was right here in our backyards so we rallied together and housed everyone here and made it happen! Everyone from out west was able to come (some had to bring a few kids with them) but for the most part we enjoyed some fun adult reunion time filled with meals, pickleball, spike ball, games and devotionals. It was a whirlwind weekend but so so much fun!!

We had a photo shoot with Eva on the coldest morning of the year 

We had Jake and Tiff stay with us and also all the teenage boys. Jake and Tiff brought Will along and the Quig's had brought Declan so because we wanted to keep Jackson under roof due to his condition, we had the boys all stay here (Porter and Austin, too). (We had an extra available bedroom since Ivy was at Girls Camp - that post is coming next!)  It was so good for Jackson's morale. He had a great time with the boys!!

Super Sunday Crew!

We played A LOT of pickleball... like pickleballed our brains out!!