Missing Her...

Okay....I know this is an awful picture of Abby, but I was cleaning my memory card today and came across this picture. It was the last one taken of Abby on October 13th, just 4 days before she died. None of us remember taking the picture. She obviously turned away from the back door right as the picture was taken...I should just delete it, I mean you can't even see her face...but I can't....and I don't have to right??

I can't believe it's already been three months. I never added this part in her original post, but the Monday before, on October 12th, we had given Lexie to a new home with a friend from work who has 3 little boys with lots of energy to play with Lex (and her new name is Lucy!). My thought was that I was going to start working from home and wanted Abby to hang out with me in my office, but Lexie was too wound up...she never would have sit still for that long, and I didn't think it was fair to leave her outside and only bring Abby in. Little did I know we would only have Abby for 5 more days after that. So here we are with Stella, three months later...while not a replacement...a fantastic companion and so very lovable.

Abby would have liked her!

Stella's Skateboard...

It's true! We've introduced Stella to the skateboard!! Although she hasn't quite got the hang of it yet she still plays with it and will ride on it for a second if you push her. We're just waiting for the weather to warm up so we can take her outside and show her how it's done! (well, so Michael can show her how it's done...you don't want to see me or Justin skateboard!)

Busy Weekend...

It feels like all we've done around here since Christmas is work. We fixed that this weekend! Friday night Michael, Josh, Justin and I went up to Bogus to try out our new-to-us snowboards we bought ourselves for Christmas. Now remember, we only went once last year and that was a first for both of us! We had a pretty successful evening. Justin and Michael stuck together and Josh got stuck coaching me. (poor Josh!) Josh and I got 4 runs in before we took a break at the lodge for some fries (and I only rolled down end-over-end twice!) After our snack we sent Josh out to board with the big boys and Michael stuck with us on the smaller stuff. We put in another three runs and called it a night.

Saturday afternoon I had lunch planned with the girls from work, after this week we were almost all officially Home Agents so it's nice to get together and catch up. You miss a lot of gossip working from home!

I met the boys at the bottom of the hill after lunch and we headed up for day 2. We were much better Saturday than Friday and even ventured up the Morning Star lift for some serious boarding for our last run. Michael's headed to Reno this weekend so we'll get two weeks for our muscles to recover before heading up again.

Sunday the guys hung around the house and worked with Stella on her skateboarding...(more on that when she gets good!) I went to New Plymouth for the evening and got some scrapbooking done with my mom, Julie and Rene (thanks guys!!). We really don't get together often enough and I don't think any of us had unpacked our stuff from McCall except Julie! It's pretty sad that the event I finished scrapbooking was a trip to San Jose in 2006...wow...talk about needed to catch up!

Here's to a slow week and a speedy recovery from our first boarding trip of the season!

Last Christmas 2009 Post...

Here it is--Finally--the last Christmas post! We had dinner and Christmas as the "Newman Family" on Saturday, December 26th. We had yummy sandwiches from Gandolfo's for dinner and spent the evening eating candy and opening presents!

We love Stockings!

Every year my mom mentions getting rid of stockings and every year we, as kids, win and there are stockings! Although she did get rid of the dog stockings last year and refuses to re-instate them!
Gangsta Faith

We love Grandma Geri! She is so fun, and does so much for us!

It took Tim and Jen and minute to realize the fruit went with the dehydrator. ;)

Faith and the boys had to help everyone open almost every present. It made it hard to get decent pictures sometimes.

Bring on the wifi games with Neen!!

Faith and Mason trying out Sadie's new box.

Grandma Geri got each of the boys hand made toy boxes. They were at my mom's house wrapped by the tree for weeks before Christmas and every time they came in the went over and touched them and looked at them trying to imagine what those big boxes were. Mason was sure it was a motorcycle...suprisingly...he was not disappointed in the toy box!

Thanks so much to our families for another fantastic Christmas Season!

Christmas Dinner...

After spending our morning and most of our afternoon with Justin's family we headed to Nyssa for dinner with my family. My cousin Chris and his family were down from north Idaho and it was fun to watch the kids play and get to know each other again.

Faith and Brycen

Grandma Geri's Great Grandkids

Mason, Ashton, Kaden

Brycen, Faith

Who would have thought that Tim and Chris we be the only ones of us cousins with kids?!

Check out this wink! I REALLY wish I could take credit for teaching her this!
The kids had a blast opening all of their gifts...what's better than 3 transformers and a baby!

One more installment of Christmas to come! Stay tuned!

Christmas Morning...

We spent Christmas morning this year with the laws. It was fun to have all of the law kids (minus Julie) there for Christmas morning to open presents and have breakfast together. I'm a little bummed that I don't have more pictures. I charged my camera battery the night before, and then left it plugged in when we left that morning. Thankfully, Michael dropped it off and had some breakfast with us on his way to meet up with his family! (thanks Michael!)

JD trying to fix Teagen's toy

Braden and Maddie both love the table and chairs Maddie got from Grandma and Grandpa
Grandpa with his "Street Sweeper--Keepin' it Clean!"

Sarah is Jacks' favorite cousin. Guess I need to make a couple more trips to Idaho Falls so next visit he'll love his Aunt Jamie best!

Christmas Eve...

Since Michael had plans with his family being in town all day Christmas Day we had our little "home" Christmas on Christmas Eve. Justin and I bought each other snowboards for Christmas this year so we just exchanged gifts with Michael. Michael thought it was necessary to completely tape up our boxes so there was no chance of us sneaking a peak before Christmas...okay...it may have been necessary. ;) He did a great job with bags and stomp pads for our boards.

We got Michael a whole bunch of random stuff, including a transformer. :) (yep...it transforms into a Scion XB)
Santa, aka me, got each of the guys a nerf gun. Justin succeeded in breaking his within 5 minutes...off to Target to exchange! Bring on the nerf fights!

Thank you Justin and Michael!

An Evening with Christ and Santa...

Every year Justin's family gets together at his grandparents house with all of the Aunts, Uncles and Cousins for a dinner of finger foods and an evening complete with the Nativity acted out by grandkids/great grandkids and a visit from Santa.

Jacks and Grandpa Jerry

Much to Netta's dismay Emma was cast as the Donkey this year in the Nativity.
Our Angel, Madison

Justin trying to convince Braden that Santa is exciting.

Braden trying to tell himself to be excited when he's really terrified!

Braden - 1 Justin - 0...maybe next year!

As always it was so fun to get together with all of Justin's cousins and their families to catch up and celebrate this wonderful holiday.

Even Puppies Love Tub Time...

Okay, so maybe they don't love it, but she certainly didn't hate it. This is how far behind I am. Stella had her first bath at home on December 23rd...just in time for Christmas!

Christmas coming soon...maybe tomorrow!