We had such a fun weekend in St. George/Ivins with my family!! Friday we went to the splash park, hiked the little slot canyon (the crack) and hung out at Katrina's house. It was so fun to have us 4 oldest siblings with all our kids, plus Jonathan and Melissa, just hanging out and talking and getting to know all the little kids who grow and change so fast!
It's fun to all be parents of little children together. :)
And some kids that are growing up...
And too involved in their ninja game to even pause and look at me for a picture. :)
Maris enjoyed the water,
and so did Owen and Lydia.
The next morning we met up bright and early at Phillip's sister's farm to take pictures. It was a really pretty place, and SO fun to finally have my parents, Jenae, and Derek and his girlfriend there!
Unfortunately Owen wasn't in the best mood...
But Whitney was! Love this girl.
Here she is swinging with Jenna. All weekend I kept finding her playing with Jenna, or Evelyn, or Ryder, or Seth. She loves babies and toddlers!
While I had my kids dressed cute I tried to take a couple of other pictures I've been wanting:
Their cute feet...
And their heads all together.
come on Whit.
Now Owen's doing a weird smile.
And Maris had to get the tongue out...
...aaaand we're done.
cutie.
After playing at a park for a while, it was time to go to the funeral. Grammy chose to be cremated, so we just had a graveside service. This is her and Pa's headstone and her ashes box! Crazy. The service was really uplifting and fun even-- her kids and grandkids shared fun and sweet memories and all of us on the Wallwork side sang an old hymn "The Church in the Wildwood" which she wanted sung at her funeral; it was a song she and her girlfriends used to go around to different churches on Sundays and sing. It was a fun old-timey song and we even let Kate, Whitney, and Natalie sing one chorus on their own which was SUPER cute. My tender-hearted Whitney even cried a couple of times during the service, when they read poems about how Grammy was gone now but would be watching over us, that kind of thing. So I just hugged Whitney and shed my own tears. :) I'm so grateful for my great-Grammy and everything I learned from her. She is part of me, and I'm so glad my kids got to know her a little from all our pit-stop visits on California trips and such.
After the funeral, we had a super fun early dinner at Golden Corral with all the extended family, it was delicious and the kids were in heaven. We all just talked and talked, then we Wallworks went back to the park in Ivins by Katrina's house and continued the party all evening until it was time to put the kids to bed! I was sad to miss out on some fun by staying in a hotel, but at least I got a decent amount of sleep!
Anyway, at the dinner and the park, the girls got to know Sarah Larson, my cousin Tiffany's little girl who is Katelyn's age, and she and Katelyn really hit it off! It messed with the normal cousin dynamic, but then Whitney got to play more with Natalie and she sometimes gets left out, so I think it turned out okay.
It was so fun to see my grandparents and let everyone meet Maris!
And I finally got to spend a little time with my Jenae!!! My baby sister who is all grown up and living her own life and I hardly ever get to connect with her, the big senior in high school! I love her.
Stupidly my flash was turned off, so I messed up this adorable picture of Whitney playing with Lydia.
It was also SO great to see Tiffany, who I haven't seen in years and was always one of my closest cousins, and my uncle Rodney, who has been living in Israel!
And here's proof of Maris' ridiculously long tongue!!
We used Katrina and Phillip's nice camera to take our family pictures-- they turned out awesome! (taken by Raycelan-Derek's girl-and edited by Phillip!)
Then Phillip took our core family pic
Don't we look great??? Have I mentioned Katrina's pregnant, having a GIRL in February/March?
Then Mom was dying to have one on her phone haha
Then we tried to take a grandchild picture...
Remember how I said Owen was in a bad mood??
He did NOT want to be in the picture, so I had to intervene.
I crouched behind him, holding him in place, while everyone else made silly faces to get the kids to smile!
My Mom and Dad!!! It was so fun to be with them. And they brought us DELICIOUS grapes and pomegranates!
Phillip also took a few quick pictures of my family, and I love them!! I think these will be my official family photos I was going to take this fall! Now I just wish I'd lined up the kids and had him snap a quick individual shot of each of them so I could update the 8 x 10's on my wall... maybe next time you come up here Katrina bring your camera??
Also I had no idea at the time that Kate was doing this pose lol.
But remember Owen's uncooperative mood again? We managed to get him to sit for literally 30 seconds while Melissa and Jenae did crazy dances and Phillip worked his photographer magic.
Then on Sunday we all went to church together (with the Wallworks too), Katelyn and Sarah promised to be pen pals, we had an awesome Hansen Sunday School, and then lunch at Katrina's and we all went our separate ways!! I thought it was an extremely successful get-together. Thanks Katrina for hosting!!
No comments:
Post a Comment