Dance Class

On Election Tuesday, Gail had her last class for her ballet dance. It was the open class to show off for the parents. She was really wanting me to come. I had spent the whole morning and lunch hour getting "pimped" (put on the spot) with interventional radiology cases to get ready for oral boards. My brain was so toast. So for the afternoon, I just couldn't handle it anymore, and really wanted to see this dance show, so I told them I needed to go see my daughter dance. They seemed cool with it, there were plenty of people to do the work. So I went and voted and then went to the show. It was great.

Warm up stretches on the floor.


Practicing positions. So cute. the girl on her right is her good friend. Her dad is in the residency with me, they are also in our same ward and village. It is great to have good people around us.


More floor moves.


Playing the freeze game while dancing. She was supposed to freeze in her position. Pretty fun.


Gail's solo dance across the floor. She did so great. I was so glad to be there.


At the end of her solo dance. It is nice because the dance company is right here in our village on Main street. She had lots of fun, and I sure enjoyed being able to see her. She was always so bummed when I couldn't come in the past. So hopefully you can feel some of the joy I was feeling seeing the images.

Warm Wisconsin Halloween

We had a great Halloween. It was unseasonably warm in Wisconsin. I was able to get off of work at a decent time, and we had a big party at our house with tons of people it was fun. The Trick or Treat time in Wisconsin at least our village, was from 5:00 to 7:00. Gail went around the block once with some friends and thier parents, then after I took her with 6 or 7 other princess from the ward and village, it was way fun. Little Marjorie rode along in the stroller growling and singing as we went. Granite went with his buddies and filled his bucket to the brim, he was complaining how heavy it was. Franklin went on a rampage to get as much candy as possible and took his pillow case, he did make quite a haul, with his friends.


Granite trying on his Yoshi costume. This is a great costume. Last year he wanted to be Yoshi so bad, but there are no Yoshi costumes available. We found this mask on e-bay for $30 bucks only thing we found and he saved his money to get it. Lydia made the white belly and orange spikes and shell that go on his back. I am bummed I didn't get a photo of it from the side. His mask came the day after halloween last year and he didn't get to wear it. He had face paint, but wasn't to excited about that. So he was pretty excited to be Yoshi in full force this year.


Granite and Gail, you can kind of see the side of the yoshi costume.


Gail trying on her Cinderella Princess costume. She was super excited about it. Of course she was extra cute.


Me looking like a Schmow with my little Marjie, she is so cute.


Family night twister. I spun the needle and they played. Little Marjie was getting in on the action and of course Casey didn't want to miss anything either.


Little Marjorie on Halloween. We didn't get her dressed up as anything. It must be that we are old and tired. But she steals the show anyway.


Marjie playing with little Luke our good friend's baby that are in the residency and ward with us. Can you believe she is standing up.


Cute Princesses on Halloween. Gail with one of her best friends.


Me with Little Marj, she is way cute, that shawl is the same shawl that her Mom, were when she was a little babe back in Kaysville, Utah well, maybe they didn't live there yet. Hey cool hat. Go Utes!!!


With our good friend Sam. Sam is a big fan of Casey, so we like to have him over to play with him. Sam is a huge inspiration to me, and is such a giant spirit. He came over for the party. We got a picture last year with him on Halloween and he didn't have any hair. He has tons now. I asked him what the secret was, he said, "You just have to be cool." He has been through a horrendous year and is looking great.


My sweet Casey pumpkin. Turned out pretty good, I think.


The boys pumpkins, Franklin carved the grim reaper on the left kind of flying. And Granite carved the flaming skull on the right. Pretty cool. I realized that I didn't get a picture of Franklin in his costume. He was one of those super scary black guys from Lord of the Rings. Thanks everybody that came over to our house. We had a double feature of Ghostbusters I and II, it was taking me back to the Kaysville, Theatre days. Some good memories there.

Pinewood Derby 08

The cub scout pinewood derby was on Oct 22nd, I am a little delayed in getting the images up from it. We had a great time. Of course we were the defending champs from last year, and we had our title to defend. Mostly me that is was feeling that way. Granite just wanted a cool car that went good, which I think he did a great job.


Seriously stiff competition


The Yoshi Mobile. Granite thought up the shape, cut it out with the help of Brother Osterhaus, painted it, put on his Yoshi, and put the green paint on so that it would look like a yoshi egg. I of course put on the wheels. We are talking about defending a title here.


The sweetest pinewood derby track in the history of Cub Scouts. Our friend Bro Richards in the yellow, built this and it is seriously nice. All electronic, long straightaway to seperate the fast from the good cars, etc.


Little Marjorie keeping it interesting.


Granite and his best bud waiting for the race to start. Come on already.


Some pretty great faces.


Lined up ready to race. The Yoshi Mobile is next to Swift Cheese that ended up taking the title from us.


Granite and his best bud showing thier cars.


Notice the cool copper rocket booster on back. We lost our title, but you cant win them all. Granite did great finished in the top third of a big group, and was happy with the outcome, a super sweet car he made from his ideas, and fun. I should have spent more time with the wheels.

Nauvoo

On, our way home from Lake of the Ozarks we stopped by Nauvoo, illinois. It was really great. We stayed at the Nauvoo family inn and suites and swam at the pool. We arrived on Friday night, just in time for me to make it to the temple for the final session of the evening. It was really great to see the temple. I haven't had a chance to go the temple for a long time, and it was so pretty and peaceful. It was funny because I was trying to find a place to park with the boat pulling behind the van, to go the temple. There were signs everywere, no parking on the road, no rv's etc. so I found the parking lot for the temple and it had a real narrow entrance and I couldn't get in. So I had to park along way away and run up to the temple because I was late. I kept looking for the entrance in the back of the temple or some little building to take you underground to go in, like allot of the temples that I am used to, but I discovered after a complete walk around the block and investigating all of the buildings that you go right in the front door. I guess it isn't all that funny, I just never expected to go right into the front door. It was a great experience.


Granite at the Quincy sign. Over two years ago we went to Nauvoo, and came across this sign on our way to Carthage to see the jail. Granite was really excited to see it again, so it is kind of a tradition to get our photo by this sign.


Joseph ans Emma Smith Mansion House. He only lived here for just over a year before he was killed.


Joseph Smith's Red Brick Store. Many, important things happened here. The twelve apostles recieved endowment, the keys to adminster the church as a quorum, beginning of relief society, and many revelations. It is a cool place. This is a reconstruction of the original which basically deteoriated to where it wasnt safe anymore. The Community of Christ Church, formerly RLDS rebuilt it from the original blueprints.


Oliver Cowdery's (I am not absolutely certain of the person now) original desk in the tithing office at the back of the store.


The outhouse behind the red brick store (the necessary) Granite of course is checking it out. He is drawn to the necessaries for some reason. What was cool was that this one had a flush toilet and sink in it. We borrowed it for a minute.


Jospeh and Emma Smith's log home. Granite and Gail are standing in front. The Community of Christ church owns all of the Joseph Smith properties. This place was cool, Granite was really getting into it and kept saying what a peaceful place it was. The log portion is the original part and in the 1860's Joseph Smith the III moved in with his wife, ironically Emma and built the white additions on the side and the back. Joseph and Emma lived here until 1843 when they moved into the mansion house.


Just another view of the log home with the replaced windows, added on roof and white portion.

The Mansion house with Granite and Gail out front. We really wanted to go on a tour, but unfortunately Franklin was captain grump that morning and was not allowing anything to happen. You can only go in if you go on a tour that cost $ with the Community of Christ church.


Little Marjorie and Gail being extra cute. It was such a beautiful fall day.


Beuatiful Lydia and Marjorie. So cute.


The crew, absent super grumpy Franklin with the Mississippi river behind and the marsh leading up to it with giant lilly pads. It was very pretty, and such a nice day.


I really love this one, if only everybody had been looking at the camera. Large Gaggles of Canadian Geese kept flying in and landing in the marshes. It was so pretty and the honking was just so neat. It is difficult to capture or relay how peaceful it was and so quiet, except for the geese of course. So if you haven't noticed already, there are geese flying in in the back of the picture.


Little Marjorie, she is just a bundle of joy lately so much fun.


Crazy Marjorie, you never know what she is going to do lately.


Hurry, take the picture it is really bright. Those bags are old fashioned hard candies that they sale at the Joseph Smith store. They are not anything special, but since we got some when we have been the past the kids remember them and think that they are the very best in the world. So they each got a bag to keep with family tradition, that way memories are more likely to be engraven into their brain.


The Nauvoo temple from the Knowlton property site. So pretty.


The Nauvoo boat launch onto the Mississippi river. Desptite the many massive protests from Franklin we put our boat into the river so that we could go for a drive to see the city from the river. Granite is standing on the dock. As you can see it is not exactly deep or super enticing.


Backing up to launch into the "Big Muddy"


Granite and super happy Franklin. Notice the yummy water, brown and crawling with flies and water bugs.


Out into the main channel of the river which is maintained to be a minimun of 8 feet deep. The water was lots nicer out in the channel though still very brown.


Little Marjorie with Captain JQ. She shoud have been wearing her life jacket. It was such a beautiful day and the water was so smooth.


Nauvoo from the Southern approach to the town, if you click to blow it up you can see the Red Brick Store on the left, White log house more center and red Nauvoo House just right of Center with the temple on the far right.


Nauvoo a little bit more North up the river. Red brick store on left, temple, white part of Joseph Smith's log hsoue on the right of themple below the water tower, and the Nauvoo house in picture right. You can see the marsh up closer. I didn't dare leave the main channel because I just didn't know how deep the brown water was and didn't want to ding the prop or get high centered and throw everyone our of the boat. We kept it at a real slow speed as well.


Where Parly Street hits the river. This is where the initial crossing to come west took place on Feb. 4 1846 on the ice. They have a reenactment every year on the anniversary of that day.

The temple. So pretty. You can see the wake of another boat that went flying by us outside of the main channel. I decided that I could probably speed up a little after that. I wanted to go for a wakeboard ride on the Mississippi just to say that I had done it, but Franklin I think would have run me over in the water, he was not a happy camper about being out there. Hopefully they will remember seeing Nauvoo from the river when they are older. We figured that it is not something you can do very often so we needed to take advantage of the beautiful day and the opportunity.