Photos of Zak's 18th b-day party

Here are photos I took at Zak's (Andrea's oldest son) birthday party on April 5, 2008. The party was held at Andrea's house. It was a suprise party for Zak.

The party started out as a party for Andrea's friends son Jack who was turning 5. That was the excuse Andrea gave Zak why he couldn't go anywhere or do anything that day. He had to help with the party for Jack. About an hour later everyone that was coming to surprise Zak was to show up at Andrea's.

Unfortunately when we got there, Zak was in the front yard & saw us. We told him we were just in the neighborhood & thought we would stop by & say hi (we live 1 1/2 hours away). But he bought our "just in the neighborhood" excuse. It wasn't until a few minutes later when Eric's family was also "just in the neighborhood" that Zak figured out something was fishy. So the surprise was spoiled.

The 2 parties were then combined & everyone had a good time. There were 2 bouncing houses, Zak's band played, Jamey BBQ'd hamburgers and hotdogs. And there were 2 birthday cakes. One for Zak & one for Jack. My son Brandon & Eric's son Cade were not able to attend. Brandon was sick & Cade had a track meet.

The photos:

Mike (my husband), Jesse (Mike's youngest son) & Jase (Eric's oldest son)















Simon (Andrea's 3rd son) & Dad















Mike, Dad & Mom















Me. I took this photo by holding camera out in front of me.


















Eric, Jodi, Taylor (Eric's youngest daughter) & Danica (she is lying across everyone & is Eric's oldest daughter)















Noah on guitar (Andrea's youngest) & Zak on drums (Andrea's oldest & the birthday boy)















Danica, Jeannette (Eric's wife) & Jase (Eric's oldest son)















Jamey (Andrea's husband)















Mom & Taylor (Eric's youngest daughter)















Zak the birthday boy (Andrea's oldest)















Andrea. The pic is blurry but it was the only picture I took of her that day. She was always in the kitchen getting the food ready, cutting cake, dishing up ice cream, etc.

Easter 2008

Here are some photos I took at Easter. I know I am about a month late posting them, but I am the world's best procrastinator. I didn't take any photos of my family for some reason. Probably because I didn't think to take photos until everyone was leaving.

I had Easter at my house again this year. The weather was perfect. Last year it was so cold & this year it was very warm. Mom, Dad & Jodi were able to come up for the day. Eric's family only lives about 15 minutes from me so they came too. Andrea's family was not able to come up as Jamey had a broken collarbone from a snowboarding accident & was in a lot of discomfort. Todd's family did not come as they live too far away. But we had a good time with the family we did have.

We cooked 2 hams so that we would have left overs. Easter is so much easier than Thanksgiving. You don't have to cook as much & the food you do cook is much easier to prepare & cook.

Jodi hid Easter eggs in the backyard for the kids to find. Even though the youngest kid is now 15 and the oldest is 24, they all had fun searching for the eggs.

What did the rest of you do for Easter?

Zak

The many faces of Zak.... As you can see the hair changes periodically (father, like son).

Eighteen already??

Today is Zak's 18th birthday! For those of you who don't know Zak, he is our oldest son, the first born but still my baby. I still can't believe it has been 18 years since he was born... I can remember it like it was yesterday. Really, I just can't believe how fast the time has flown by. If you were to see my boys, Zak is the one that looks most like me. Although in many other ways he is a lot like Jamey. He has grown into a handsome, talented young man right before our eyes. As the next year passes (hopefully not a quickly as the last 18) we will be savoring every second with our family. Once Zak turns 19 our life as we know it will never be the same. Of course it will be great & wonderful to send him off on his mission, but before he comes home we will be sending out our second son (Nate) on his mission - so life as a family of 6 will change once the boys all return from their missions. It's crazy to think we will be starting a new faze of our lives very soon. So as I said, this next year will be bitter/sweet as we enjoy our time together as a family. We are so proud of Zak & the man he is becoming, the choices he has made in life & continues to make - keep it up son!! We love you & Happy Birthday!

Spring has sprung?

I don't know about any of you, but even though I love winter (by California standards), I am always so happy when Spring arrives. I don't think it is "officially" here yet but it is getting close! The last few days it has been sunny & warmer - which always makes me happy. I hope that as you read this none of you have snow outside or you might not appreciate my blog as much as me.
This last week has been crazy around our house. Jamey was invited to go to Rome, Italy with a friend of his & just returned late last night. As it turned out my girlfriends & I had been planning a weekend away (to Santa Barbara) for the same weekend that he was going to be in Italy. So we had to farm the boys out - but luckily Zak & Nate are old enough to stay home alone & we only had to find places for Simon & Noah... Any of you who have more than two kids know what I mean when I tell you it is IMPOSSIBLE to find someone who will take care of all 4 kids at one time!! So the fact that we only had to find somewhere for 2 kids (instead of all 4), made the task much simpler.

Anyway, my mom picked up Noah after school on Friday and he stayed with my parents & Jodi until Saturday morning. (Hence the video that Noah & Brandon taped at Grandma's house).... Simon went home after school with his buddy from school (and church) until Saturday morning. Jamey's brother Kevin picked up the boys from their respective places & they spent the night with him & his family. I think all in all, these two boys had a great time with family & friends. Thanks so much for all of you for helping make our time away more relaxing because we knew we didn't have to worry about our boys.

Believe it or not - my two teenage boys that stayed at home did just fine. No parties, girls or anything bad. I am happy that I know I can trust them to do what is right. Thanks boys!!

Once I figure out how to post pictures on this I will add pictures from Santa Barbara & Italy. We both had a good time & I hope to report sometime soon that we actually vacationed together... although we did go to San Francisco in November for our 20th anniversary (which reminds me, who owes me money for betting that we wouldn't last 6 months??? Jodi, was that you??).

I've rattled on long enough. Again, it would be nice to hear how the rest of you are doing (Reeds & Bunkers). As much as I love to hear about Kim & Jodi's day - I talk to them often so it would be even more interesting to hear about the rest of your lives!!

Love ya,
Andrea

Fun evening with Brandon & Noah

Hello all. Mom, Dad, Brandon Noah & I all went to our Stake Emergency Prepardness Night tonight at the Stake Center. We got lots of information and tried some new things prepared with food storage. They had wheat and other kinds of stuff we don't normally eat. It was really informative and fun. While we were there Noah kind of got bored so I took him up on the stage (they were setting up for the band that was playing) and he talked to the drummer. He said he liked punk bands and that he started in a punk band in the 70's.

After we got home, Noah wanted to have Brandon record him singing the song "Billy Jean" by Michael Jackson. So I went and got my digital camera and Brandon and Noah recorded it. It was really funny. At the beginning Noah was too embarrassed to perform while Mom and I were in the room, so he made us leave. I am putting one of the recordings here on this blog. I hope it works. Enjoy and hope everyone is having a great day and weekend.

Jodi

Finally!!

Okay, if any of the rest of you are as computer illiterate as me, getting into blog on this isn't quite as easy as Kim made it sound. After many attempts & lots of help - I finally did it!! Thanks Kim.

My boys are growing fast. In fact faster than I can even believe. Zak is about to graduate from high school & I still can't figure out where the time went! Our youngest will start middle school next year.... before I know it they will all be grown & mission bound. Bitter sweet I suppose.

I was trying to insert a picture, but it won't work... again, not as easy as you said Kim. Oh well, I guess I will have a try at this some other time when I am not trying to watch a movie & do this too.

Hope everyone's doing well. Write soon, I'd love to hear about the rest of your lives.

Andrea

Happy Valentine's Day!!!!

I know yesterday was Valentine's Day, but I am always a day late & a dollar short. What did you get or do for Valentine's Day?

Mike gave me a beautiful heart shaped diamond necklace. Too bad my neck is too fat to wear it. I have to get a longer chain before I can enjoy it. He also gave me some flowers, a Lenox basket with candy Kisses w/toffee.

I gave Mike 4 lbs of pistachios and some candy and a new mug for hot chocolate (mug has hearts on it. How sweet!). Looks like I received the better gifts. Oh well, I don't feel too bad, Mike loves pistachios.

For dinner, Mike cooked steaks for all of us & I fried some shrimp. We also had baked potatoes, corn & salad. I love steak & shrimp!!! It was very good.

Mike didn't really want to cook steaks as it was so cold outside, but he just moved the BBQ closer to the back door. Which could have been a disaster. Last time he BBQ'd that close to the door, he almost burnt the house down. Mike is really a good BBQer, it was really a fluke when he almost burnt down the house. It happened when we first moved into our house & got our new gas grill. He hooked it up by the back door & put on a brisket to cook. He left it & went to the other side of the house. I was doing dishes & looked out to see an orange glow. When I ran out back, the whole BBQ was on fire & so was the side of our house. Luckily we got the fire put out before it did much damage. However, we still have a black spot on the outside wall of our house to remind us of it. We kind of laugh about it now, but it wasn't too funny when it was on fire.

Anyways, back to Valentine's Day. I had baked a cake for dessert & put a lid on the pan. Mike moved it to another counter while we were cooking dinner & somehow it got knocked off the counter onto the floor. And of course, it landed upside down on the floor. Luckily the lid stayed on so no cake got on the floor, but the icing was all over the lid. We never did eat any of it last night as we were so full from dinner.

After dinner, Mike & I finally got some alone time out in the jacuzzi. It was sooo cold outside (I know it wasn't cold compared to all of you that live in Utah. But for California, it was cold). The water felt so good being hot. Luckily we weren't out in the jacuzzi when the sheriff helicopter was flying around earlier as he lit up our back yard a few times with it's light.

One time we were out in the jacuzzi when the sheriff helicopter flew over heard & shined his light on us. Eric & Jeannette were with us at the time. It was quite funny. We just waived to the helicopter.

Well I better close for now. It's been a long day at work and I am so looking forward to going home for the weekend. Too bad I don't get Monday off for Presidents Day. For all of you who do, ENJOY!!!! And think of me slaving away at work. Heres to hoping it will be a quiet day at work on Monday. Anything is better than this week. Ugh!!!!

Bye for now,
Kim

Vacation

Howdy one and all. We are on vacation here in Palm Desert with Aunt Joni, Aunt Marilyn, and Uncle Clark. We have been gone since Jan 25th. We went to Las Vegas last week for a Painting Convention that I attended. I took 3 classes. It was a lot of fun. It was very cold in Vegas. The high most day's was 52 degrees. It was rainy and windy.

We are in Palm Desert now. It's been fun. Sunday Kim's family came over and watched the Super bowl game with us. Yesterday we went to the Imax theater and watched a movie on Lewis & Clark. It was really cool. anyway, today we are doing a puzzle and watching TV. We will probably stay until Thursday or Friday.

Palm Desert vacation

Hi Family,
Thanks to Kim personally helping me I'm on the family blog. We are here at Palm
Desert for 2 weeks enjoying the green and beauty of the CA desert which is quite a change from 2 feet of snow at home in Logan. (We understand we got another foot this morning.)
Dorothy, Carlos, Jodi, and Joni are here with us for a week and we are enjoying being together.
Kim and her family joined us today to watch the Super Bowl. It is so nice to be together...wish all of you could join us. Goodbye, for now. Kim needs to go and I need to stop. Love to all.
Marilyn

Marilyn says Hi

Hi Again,
I'm trying to get on the family tree blog, with Kim's added help. I hope this one is a goer.
More later, if it works.
Marilyn

Where is everybody?

Hello!!!!! Anyone out there? Seems I am the only one to post on this blog. Where is everyone?

Well the week is almost over & the month is more than 1/2 gone. Time really does fly when you get older.

Did everyone get their Christmas decorations all put away? I finally got mine done last weekend. I have a few minor things I still need to deal with, but my biggest problem is finding room. I tend to buy new stuff every year, but I have a hard time getting rid of my old stuff. Does anyone else have this problem? I know my Mom does, that is probably where I got it from. I sort of envy Eric's family, they have no problem getting rid of stuff when they get new stuff. The problem is, I am usually the one who takes their old stuff. My favorite saying is: "Are you getting rid of that? I'll take it." My husband has the same problem as me. Except he thinks I am the one with all the stuff. He forgets that 2/3 of the garage is full of "his" stuff. I can at least admit I have a problem.

The reason I started selling on ebay was to get rid of some of my stuff. But I have a real hard time. So sometimes I just buy stuff on sale, clearance, thrift store & resale on ebay. That way I still get to shop, but I also get rid of it & make some money in the process. That is what I call a win/win situation.

I started selling again on ebay this past weekend after taking about 3 weeks off. I only got 2 items listed. I took photos of everything that I wanted to sell, but Mike made me some stained glass windows for our bedroom & when I looked at all the pictures I took, it was too dark. So I need to retake them in better light. So my goal for this weekend is to list at least 10 items on ebay. If you want to see what I am selling, you can click on the ebay link at the bottom of this page. It takes you to My World page & you can click on items selling to see what I have for sale.

I love selling on ebay but it takes alot of time & effort. I hate when people ask if I can sell something on ebay for them. I usually tell them no, I don't have enough time to list my own junk, let alone list for someone else & not make any money. The easiest way to sell on ebay is to sell new items that you have multiple of. Then you only have to take the photos once & make a listing once & just relist each time an item sells. I did alot of that this past year. My best item at Christmas was a glass Eiffel Towner ornament. I bought about 20 of them at Mervyn's on sale for about $4-5 a piece & sold them on ebay for $12 a piece. I stocked up after Christmas so I'll have them for next Christmas as well.

Well I better get back to work as my lunch hour is over. Hopefully someone else will take the time to blog as well. Otherwise you will be stuck with me.

Talk to you later!
Kim

January Blues

I don't know about you, but I get the January blues. Christmas is over, boo hoo. All the lights & decorations are coming down & it seems so dark and depressing when I come home from work.

Probably the biggest reason for the blues is being sick. Seems I always get sick around this time of year. I'm just getting over some sort of stomach bug. Everyone in my family had it. Took us about a week to get back to feeling somewhat normal.

Eric's family had it too. In fact, I think we got sick from Eric's family. We all spent New Years together & Jeannette was just getting over a stomach bug. A few days later, Jesse & Mike got sick, then me & finally Brandon. I was never so happier that we have 2 bathrooms. Even then, sometimes there was a line. I called Eric & he said that Cade, him & Taylor had all gotten sick too. Poor Cade, he was sick on his birthday. So far Jase & Danica are still well.

I just spoke to Andrea & no one in her family has come down with the sickness & her boys had been staying at Eric's house when all the sickness started.

I need a vacation!!!!!! But alas, no money to go anywhere.

I think I am doubly blue as this is the year I turn the Big 5 0!!!! I can't believe I am that old. Grandmas are that old. Oh yeah, I am a Grandma. But I don't feel almost 50. I still feel like I'm 25, OK maybe 35, but my body tells me another story. I also think that I am still thin, but my body tells me that is a lie as well. I'm always bumping into things because in my brain I am still thin & can fit through certain places when in reality I can't. Getting old can be a PAIN!!!! And I mean literally.

Did I say that I need a vacation? We were suppose to go back to Europe this year or to Australia. But alas, since we now own a home, we can't afford to go anywhere except maybe to Vegas. But I love Vegas. The hotels are nice, the food is good & plentiful & I even know where to find some deals. My pleasures in life all seem to involve food. Maybe that is why I am no longer thin. I need to go on a diet or at least eat less. But I love to eat.

I am just rambling now. I am at work & don't really want to be here, so that is why I am writing. I wish I was anywhere but here at work.

Hopefully someone else will write in this blog besides me. Does anyone else get the January blues? Let us know.

Bye for now,
Kim

Christmas Photos-Kim's family

Here are my family photos from Christmas. The first picture is of Mike (my hubby). The next 3 are of our grandson Gunner Michael Chalfant. He was born on 08/16/07 (my daddy's birthday). Then there is a picture of my son Brandon (24) & my stepson Jesse (17). The last picture is of my stepson Brandan (25), his wife Crystal (25) and Gunner (4 months).

I did not include any photos of me as I was the one taking the photos.

Happy New Year

I wanted to wish everyone a Happy New Year. What did you all do for New Years? On New Years eve, Mike, Jesse & I went to the movies to see "I Am Legend" with Will Smith. It was a great movie. I jumped and screamed a few times during the movie. Brandon doesn't like going to the movies so he stayed home.

This is the first movie that Mike & I have actually seen in about 5 years. We tried going to the movies last winter, but once we were in the movie theatre they had a riot in the mall that spilled over into the movie theatre so they evacuated everyone. When we got outside there were cops everywhere & a helicopter. The cops had machine guns. It was kind of scary as we didn't know what was going on or if we'd be OK. We did laugh about it later as we never did get to see the movie.

Anyways, back to New Years Eve, we got home about 10pm & watched TV until midnight. We then toasted with Martinelli's (apple/grape is the best!!!), went outside to hear all the neighbors yelling "Happy New Year" and some lighting fire crackers.

On New Years Day we had Eric's family & Andrea's 4 boys over for tacos. We had a great time. I made 50 tacos & only had 4 left over. We had a total of 14 people for dinner. Eric & Jeannette brought brownies & ice cream for dessert. I love when Eric brings ice cream as he almost always brings Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough. I love it!!! My family doesn't really like it so I never buy it. I only get to have it when Eric brings it or we go to Eric's house and have it for dessert.

Eric & Jeannette have Andrea's 4 boys for about 4 days. Jeannette always invites them to stay a few days over Christmas vacation. So it is always nice to get to see them. Since we live more than an hour away from them, we don't get to see them that often.

The weather was nice, about 70 degrees. We didn't get any of the high winds at my house as we have mountains directly to the East of us so they block the wind. When the Santa Ana's come from the north east, then we get the high winds. But this time, we didn't get the winds. But about 5 miles north of us, they did. We are a little more protected where we live.

Tomorrow it is suppose to start raining & rain for 5 days. We will believe it when we see it. It seems every time the weather people say we are going to get a lot of rain, we hardly get anything. When we do get rain, usually nothing has been forecasted. So I have a hard time believing all this global warming crap when they can't even forecast the weather correctly for this next day.

So much for my political views. I hope everyone had a good "New Years" and that this coming year finds everyone in good health and happy. If not, let us know, we love good gossip.

Love,
Kim