Happy Birthday's!!!!

Today is my dear sister Elaine's birthday. She's hm...... she's 47? 46? I can't remember. But she's old enough that she had to pull out her reading glasses to read the menu at lunch today! Ba hahahah!!! It was supposed to be my treat too, but another sweet old lady there at lunch swiped the bill from under my nose and took care of it for Elaine. Dang - now I'm going to have to go out and get a gift for her!!! ARGH!!!
After lunch, Kathryn and I took Kylie out birthday shopping - her birthday is in two weeks - but I insisted that she get some maternity clothes...UNDER MUCH PROTEST, I might add. Kylie is teenie...there is no doubt about it. She always has been the skinniest in the family. But she is over 6 months pregnant and she has been trying to pull off still wearing her size small shirts and size 3 jeans. The jeans, she's still fitting in to - but the tops have got to go!!! So I convinced her to let me get her some ADORABLE clothes for her birthday.
Of course, Kathryn had to go right along with the pregnant theme of things and in the dressing room, stuffed the 'fake prego tummy' under her shirt. It was hilarious!!! I had to take a picture because I was laughing so hard. But only Kylie came away with some cute new outfits!!!
So a fun day with the birthday girls..I really enjoyed myself with some of my favorite people.

Goofy Kids

I do love Sunday's. Not just because it's the Sabbath and we get to partake of the sacrament and be uplifted, BUT, we get to be together as a family and play games...Kathryn USUALLY becomes grouchy when it's time for games because she's not a real game player. But today??? Oh, she was fun - and it was crazy fun too.
We had our usual dinner together and then we started with some usual games until Del went up into the attic and got out a 'game box' that we had tucked away and it was like Christmas with all new toys to play with. One of Kathryn's favorite games is Zarahemla which she plays with her grandpa every time we go to Utah. It was in the box. So the three kids started playing while Del and I did up dishes and Del made our usual smoothies. Lots of giggling and laughing - We talked to Jordan on the phone and it was an overall fun experience.
It's nights like this that I always hoped and prayed for. I'm grateful when they come and appreciative of their memory when they don't happen.
Tonight, I'm happy.

Saturday Power Tools

After a long week and late nights at our various jobs, we went to dinner last night as a family to La Hacienda--- and it was good.
And now today - it's POWER TOOL day!!! Kathryn's been really good lately helping Del out with the yardwork. Just give her an IPOD and the lawnmower and she can really do some damage out there. Of course, she's sweating like a dog but she's losing weight while she accomplishes this whole thing so it's a great benefit for her too.
Of course, MY power tool of choice does most of the work for me...
I'm NOT stupid!!!

More of My Favorites

I expected to find my father very debilitating and old at reunion, but instead, I found him vibrant, active and very much alive!! I was thrilled that he was doing much better than I had imagined.
The Men in Black version of The Three Little Pigs
Visiting with 3 of my cousins - Debbie, Vicki and Theresa
My brothers are STILL kissing up to my dear mother!!

Yes, my family IS 'the Mafia'.
The 'twelve' with our spouses.
Games...
A series of races where the end result is coming...

Sheer Exhaustion




Uncle Steve - our first 'in-law' to carry a weapon.

Our family version of 'the running of the bulls'.
The Three Little pigs - from across the border!!


The Macarena

Before the garlic test..
Watching my daddy sing in The Mormon Tabernacle Choir

ALO-----HA!!!!
After 28 years, he STILL makes me laugh.
and laugh........


and laugh some more....
Always willing to help out a friend.....

Thursday - Day 5 of Family Reunion

I made a mistake with the title of the last post - it should have been 'Day 4' instead of day three again.
Thursday was the last day of reunion and Del and the girls were up that morning and left for Idaho to see Del's father and Darlene and then down to Logan to see his mother, Shirley' and then on their way home to Texas. That left Jordan and I to have our own fun.
We went and ran a few errands, having Jordan's car serviced, visiting a few Utah friends and then we went over to my parents home to hang with the rest of the family. We played more games, ate more food and then we prepared for the last event of our Family Reunion.
My sister Rachel and my cousin Ruth are both members of The Mormon Tabernacle Choir and they had made special arrangements and received special permission that allowed my father and Uncle Floyd, to sing with the choir that evening in their Thursday night rehearsal.
It has been a life long dream of my father's to sing with the choir, but he's never lived in Utah or been in a position until his later years to do so. But now, of course, he's too old. Except for this once.
I cried - of course. But so did everyone, including daddy. There were over 50 of us there to watch daddy standing in the very front row of the tenor section. I caught Rachel looking over several times trying to see if daddy was being taken care of and enjoying himself. He had been given the songs to practice and he had done his best to prepare himself to participate, but as he mentioned later, nothing could have prepared him for the emotion or quality of voices he was surrounded by. But he sang - I watched him. He was like a little kid in a candy shop, just in awe of everything around him.
He was formally introduced to the choir by Brother Mack Wilburg, the choir conductor and we stood and applauded, all 50 0f us....all his family. The rehearsal ended at around 9:30, where he was then ushered down, with Uncle Floyd, to their awaiting families. Daddy was thrilled, as were all of us for him and we spent the next hour or so visiting and reliving the experience outside on the grounds of the Conference Center.
There were some cousins and family there that I hadn't seen in years - Vicki, Theresa, Debbie and a few others. They had also come to see Uncle Floyd and daddy and it was so nice to have their support. What great memories we were able to share.
A lot of family left on Friday to drive back to their homes. Jordan and I went over to Lance and Becca's home to play some more games and then that evening, we took Mark Roberts and his wife, Allison, out to dinner to Olive Garden. After dinner, we spent one last night over at Lyndon and Chelsie's home playing some Make a Million before going back to Lon's for bed.
Saturday morning, I bought Jordan some groceries on our way to him dropping me off at the airport and then I flew home as he drove on up to Rexburg.
It's now that I'm glad I didn't have access to any more pictures for this reunion. This blog would have ended up waaayyy too long. But thank heavens the memories will still be there as it truly was a wonderful time for our whole family.

Wednesday - Day 3 of Family Reunion

By Monday night, Kylie, Kathryn and I had figured out that we could get a pretty good nights sleep if we wore ear plugs and tried not to go to the bathroom too many times. But nothing could have helped us Tuesday night.
Between my having eaten three cloves of garlic, Kathryn's 7 fish, Jordan's worms and an extra helping of beans at dinner time for us all, our tent could have easily ignited at any time!!! And we laughed our heads off about it until well past midnight. The teenagers mentioned to us the next morning that they had no idea the Lott family was such a party family!!! Had they only known...
But we must have slept because Kylie and I jumped out of our tent at 8:30 in the morning to the loud sound of bellowing cows. We looked up at the mountain side and saw hundreds of cows being herded down the road by cowboys on horses but there seemed to be a hold up at the point of our pavilion. That caused some of the smaller cows to panic and start slipping off the side of the mountain. Kylie raced with her camera to try and catch it on video while all I was able to get was the last cowboy and his dog at the end of the trail. it was humorous to see some parents running and snatching up their young kids to safety while Jordan and Del were wanting to get on some horses and help with the cattle drive. Del mentioned later it was the best thing about reunion - made him feel right at home. Jordan just wanted on a horse.But by the time we got to breakfast, it was the talk of all the kids and parents. It couldn't have been planned better.
The morning was spent with decorating t-shirts and playing games...we had a Make a Million tournament and Kylie and Kathryn helped tons with the t-shirts. Between the two girls, I imagine they made over 50% of them, and they turned out wonderful. There were many thankful parents and kids.
Kylie and Kathryn had convinced Del that they couldn't go another night sleeping in a tent, so during the day, they helped Jordan and Del roll up sleeping bags, pack up suitcases and take down the camp and get our car completely packed so at the end of that night's activities, we would drive back into Alpine and stay at Lon's house again. I agreed, but only if we stayed and supported Rebecca's family game that night...
And it was the best decision of all. A Talent Night, but in a Variety Show format. The story of The Three Little Pigs was told and then we were all separated into 6 different groups to retell the story with props that had been provided.
The first group were all the girls under the age of 14 - they were the 'Chinese Girls' who told their story 'oriental style'. Cute Cute Cute.. Next, all boys under the age of 14 - 'The Rappers' - complete with percussion and symbols - 'Men in Black' performed next - Jordan's group - all dressed in black suits with water pistols as weapons - hilarious! Then Kylie and Kathryn's group - COWGIRL style - Kylie was the narrator in her Texan draaawwwlll - Kathryn came in on a pretend horse with Kylie's shoes giving the clippity clop sound - ADORABLE!!! Everyone just hooped and hollered over how cute it was done....My group was from Hawaii - so we put a twist on it and ended up turning on one of our pigs and had her for the luau - Then Del's group - which was several of the brother in laws and my brothers...FROM ACROSS THE BORDER - Mexican Style. I about pee'd my pants. They hammed it up like you wouldn't have believed, made easier by the fact that half of them spoke Spanish anyways from serving missions in Mexico!! And then living in California, 20 minutes from the Mexican border gave them an even better insight into portraying the perfect 'layed back Mexican lifestyle'. It absolutely was the highlight of the reunion. Thank heavens Kylie got the whole thing on her camera videotaped.
Finally, when the laughter died down, Rebecca went right into a dance with the best music - we danced the Macarena, YMCA, country dancing with Kylie showing the steps, the Hokey Pokey and we even had everyone participate in 'the limbo'. Our family had to sneak out early for the hour drive back, so we missed the very end of the evening of cooking samores and then the following morning of packing up and breakfast.

Capture Moments at Family Reunion