Monday, December 29, 2008

a baby to end the year,...and one to look forward to in June!!!


"2008" was in deed a busy year,we moved to Utah in July and the days have just passed so quickly,here we are at the end of the year.I just wanted to say to all of you that might read this Merry Christmas a few days late!! and a Happy New Year!!! Bill and Cassie had a new baby girl on December 17th her name is Madelyn Brooke,we are so blessed to have a new sweet little spirit come join our family. Looking forward to the new year to begin I have a feeling it will be just as interesting as 2008. We are looking forward to June not that I want to hurry half the year away but we get a new......baby!!! Laurel and Mosiah are expecting their 2nd child so Samuel will be a big brother.We are blessed to be here at this time of our life,to have close family friends around and to be able to have most of our grandchildren around us.

Austin,Seth,Chase and Samuel Christmas Day

Madelyn Brooke 10 days



Cassie,Mosiah,Laurel






Thursday, December 25, 2008

so much to do......so little time!

We recently were able to take a quick trip to Salt Lake, I wanted so much to see the Temple grounds with all the lights and displays.Mosiah and Laurel received a call from a good friend who was going to be in SL for the weekend, so they were able to meet up with us for awhile.




the bubbles on the water have lights in them!












Samuel and Uncle Zac



Zac, Norah and Laurel (Laurel demanded a retake she said she took a MOM look picture).


Mosiah, Laurel and Samuel it was so cold, yet we just wanted to see everything we could!


Samuel standing in front of the big Christmas Tree we must have taken 6 or 7 pictures before we got one without someone walking by there were a lot of people.He was so good he just stood there until it worked.

The Riordan Family they are so cute!


Bill,Norah and Zac" The Gunderson Family"
Zac is at 6 foot 1 and half he is the tallest of all of the kids Bill included!

My wonderful husband and I he still looks good after 32yrs!!

So beautiful, loved being there, I loved to see everything all lit up.

We were inside the Joseph Smith building enjoying the music, when this young lady said hello,I knew I should know her it took me a few minutes my memory is...anyways it was Sierra Veek(Backus)with her husband,Matt the last time I saw her she was expecting her second child she now has 5 and the last 2 are twins a boy and a girl !! We were able to visit awhile, they are living in Co. it was nice to catch up and get a picture of her wonderful family.Thanks Guys, nice to see friends from home.


Little story about the cake.......we really wanted writing on the cake so we waited for the cake lady at Wal Mart to return from her break.(when Laurel ordered the cake she didn't want to make that big decision all alone)Back from break, we talked about what we wanted she was very nice and then last minute she ask us what color we wanted purple or green we both said purple! When we got the cake back it was in GREEN I looked at Laurel and said didn't we say PURPLE???It still was very cute, it's things like this that make us question our sanity!!!


Dec.10th Laurel hosted a baby shower for Cassie,we had a wonderful time good food, good cake and lots of BABY GIRL stuff to look at, YES we are getting our first granddaughter!!













Cami, Diane (Cassie neighbor) & Elizabeth they are sister in laws they are both in Cassie's Ward
We all had so much fun Cami, Emm and myself were the only ones there "Not" expecting.Diane just found out that she is prego, Glad I wasn't sitting on the couch.......Cami??


Laurel serving up the punch .
Dec.12th: we had planned a quick trip back home to Oregon,Emm is buying a car there so we had the pleasure of picking up Jordan, her boyfriend in S.L. he is very nice and we really enjoyed getting to know him a little better, nothing like a long road trip!! We had a great time visiting with Maureen and Pete, we were able to get most of the family together at Stephanie's.There just wasn't enough hrs in the day, I stayed up both nights until 3am wrapping gifts and visiting. I really enjoyed going to Ross's ,I really tryed to stay out of Wal Mart but last minute I found myself there. Beverly(sister)Branden and I shopped Sat.Branden was able to get all of his shopping done.

Branden(my oldest grdson) he's 7 to cute.
.We were able to enjoy a dinner with
DeAnn my wonderful daughter (in law) and Nathan my favorite!!! Merry Christmas to you both.
We were able to attend church at Beacon Hill Ward so nice seeing everyone.


We left at 5am Monday morning it was snowing lightly, the closer we got to Medford the heavier it got. We decided to head to Susanville,then on to Reno. 6 hours later......... we were pulling into Susanville I couldn't believe it took us that long.The rest of the trip........... well it was a blurr, I spiked a temp,chills and a SORE,SORE throat. I climbed in the back seat put my coat on next thing I knew we were in Winamucca and it was still snowing,we went as far as Elko.We decided at 11:00pm to call it a night,I think, you are half way to Vernal at that point. (12/16 )We met up with Emm in S.L. where I got in her car and had to get us to Vernal. The roads were pretty clear I just kept remembering what my dear husband, said to me" DON'T" go faster then 45mph ok, so Emm and I started out in the lead. I would find myself at 50/55 and would of course slow down, so now, I'm looking in my mirror to find Bill way back behind me and I thinking he wants me to slow down so I would reduce my speed some more. Next thing I know there are red flashing lights coming up very fast behind ME, I'm being pulled over and I'm thinking I really should have slowed down . The officer came to my window and ask if I knew why he pulled me over ,of course, I had no idea??he told me that I was going 42mph and wanted to know if there was a problem? Seeing our" Oregon" plates, he asked if I was use to driving in the area NO was my reply, he checked everything out,now I'm still confused(cold meds)so Emm tells me Mom you were going to slow! When he came back to the window and told me that I needed to be going at least 65 when the roads are clear I WAS HOLDING UP TRAFFIC he went on to say that the trucks have a hard time at that speed etc etc......thats when I stated that my husband who was behind me WAY behind me and who had just passed us, told me to keep my speed at 35 / 45mph because of ice. He was was nice and said" this was a first for him" he usually has people going 75/80 not 42 . I pulled into the station where Bill was waiting for me,he comes up to my window and says," why were you going so slow "?you would speed up then slow down............all I'm saying is. ... I'll follow him next time!!

Dec 16...We made it home around 10:30pm and I'm still sick, all I want to do is go to bed and stay there, however we have a baby coming and mommy has to be at the hospital at 6am.

December 17th....
We have a Baby and she is really a" SHE". I was so bummed I didn't get to see her until Friday, yes still sick.I put a few pictures up of her below such a beautiful baby!

Madelyn Brooke Gunderson 12/17/08

she is so small ,you just forget how small newborns are.
I asked Bill & Cassie how do you two have such small babies!
6lbs 10oz 20"

She really is in there,Best Christmas present ever she was due on my B- Day 12/21 however the Dr. didn't want to come in on Sunday!!!!






































































































































































































































































































































































































































































Monday, December 22, 2008

.......catch up time! These pic were taken Friday after Thanksgiving, Vernal has an annually "Holly ,Days" the town puts on a big festival it's all free and it's really geared for the kids.They had free drawings,free food like cotton candy!they had all kinds of activities, we went over to see all the Christmas trees, that were going to be auctioned, there were some awesome trees.The parade was that evening, boy was it cold.The locals were saying how warm it was, last year it was like snowing and freezing weather the middle of Oct. glad to say there was no snow that weekend.My grandsons Bill & Cassie's 3 boys got to see Santa Clause,Chase was not sure about sitting on Santa lap (he still won't sit on my lap). Samuel went to visit his Grandma Riordan for the Holiday.



Chase was screaming the place down!



Seth was right into this he told Santa what he wanted then when Santa gave him the candy cane he asked for a different color that's my Seth!



Austin was ready with an answer as soon as Santa ask he had it out (hope mom heard)



Some of the Trees, there was a lot there, this is the "Park" where they hold the county fair.




Bill,Zac and Cassie with the boys taking a break.




Bill taking in the sites! After the parade, they had a street blocked off right down town and there were 4 or 5 very very large fire pits that they set up and light, so the kids can roast marsh mellows.
It was interesting there were sticks in these holders at the end of each pit and they had people standing around with bags of marsh mellows. there were chest nuts being roasted, yes on an open fire!! Steph, Cami,and Laurel you all really missed out!!




Austin and Seth on the ride.




Parade, lots of lights was fun!