Melissa's been busy!

You all remember my friend Dolores? Well, Melissa decided to make a gingerbread house that looked just like her house.
She needed help, so she engaged Dad & his building skills. He drew it & constructed it out of paper all from a picture!!



Rusty helped!! NOT!






















The finished product - the picture doesn't do
it justice at all! And yes, Dolores was speechless & that never happens to her!!

I'm Having A Girl!

Sunset at the beach

We visited with Eldon's family several weeks ago & had supper at the beach. The pictures speak for themselves. I understand better why they don't want to leave California.
We watched the sunset in "high definition", & listened to our grandkids chase the seagulls in surround sound!

















Tell me again why our parents left California for the cactus of Arizona?

Haylee

Haylee said the prayer the other day. It was too cute. She said, "Please help us to see our cousins again soon, just like we did at the Family Camp." We haven't really talked about it all lately, but apparently she still remembers and thinks about it. What awesome memories these kids will have of their Thomas Family. And did I already mention this? Mindy, you rock! That was a great family camp!

Competitors

CONGRATULATIONS TO MELISSA!!!!!
SHE TOOK FIRST IN HER AGE GROUP IN THE TRIATHLON!!!!!!
GOOD LUCK TO ELDON WHO WILL COMPETE IN A TRIATHLON THIS WEEKEND!!!!!!
Can you stay up with your sister????

Pictures

Mom let me know that some of you have asked about getting a DVD of all the pictures from family camp. I can send them out tomorrow, or I can wait until the end of the month and get about 10 more pictures from Mom (saying goodbye, packing up, etc). What do ya'll want?

Maybe, just maybe if I do this often enough I will get the hang of how to put the words with the pictures!!!! Use your imagination!

Family Camp 2009

Everyone had fun even the big boys!




Some, more than others!!

Some flew high!!

Some were

builders-

There's a story

behind this

picture!!

Awards were

given -

But as always, there are things

left -

Anyone want to claim anything??

Hello?!

I've tried to be a little patient, but COME ON!!!! Where are the pictures!!! Where are the stories!!!!

Suspicions

Well, I had my suspicions at the cabin but suspicions are confirmed.

Baby #4 is on the way!

I think I got the spacing right this time.
Three and a half years between Rusty and this one.
That seems so relaxing compared to 19 months, or even 22 months!

I think it's a girl.
Russ thinks it's a boy.
All bets are on!

Separated Shoulder

Here is an x-ray that looks like my x-ray. Unfortunately I didn't get to keep mine. It would have been nice to keep track of all of my broken bones with pictures. The doctor called it a class 1 separation (class 3 is the worst). My x-ray looks most like this one but mine has a bigger gap (about 1").

I still want a Rhino!!!

I'm so excited!!!!!!

Are you guys excited for family camp or what!!!

G. Thomas & Sons Campout 2009

Since Glenn is out of town (to Vegas) I thought I'd give you a run-down of the Father's & Son's Campout in Texas!

A TOTAL BUST!

Glenn left with three of the four sons at around 2pm. They were going a bit early to set-up camp. (It's only 1 night, so I shoosh them out!) Nick had gym so I took him up later. I wished I would have taken a picture of what I saw at around 7pm when I drove Nick into the campgrounds! Boys, boys, boys... Nick could barely contain himself and he wanted to jump out!

There were at least over 70 families (Dads & sons) from our ward. Since it was a Stake activity and we have at least 8 wards... there were just a lot of people.

Emma and I took off for town - to Double Dip! We were set. We then went home and read books, watched 1/2 of The Little Mermaid. We were in bed by 10pm.

At about 2:30am the winds woke me up. I ran out to grab the flag, pull some tomato plants under the eave and get ready for the storm! And at about 3am, the rains came a tumblin' down! And the rains did come down and the floods came up. Oh, I forgot to tell you, the guys were camping next to Lake Lewisville. :)

In Glenn's words... I just lay on my cot listening. I decided to get up and close up the windows and as I got the last one untied... oh did the rains come down. The campsite next to them (Jensen's) had a trench dug around the tent... talk about prepared! But Glenn said he was confident and the tent stood fast and tall. The winds came, the rains poured and people were mad-dashing for their cars as fast as you can imagine. Dad's were throwing their sons into their cars, grabbing the tents and shoving them into the cars... it was a MAD RUSH to get out of there. Tents were ripped up from the grounds, falling over/in, kids screaming...

But not Glenn and a few die-hards... as the boys slept (they must have been tired), Glenn kindly helped others pack it up and then he too went back to bed (at around 5am). When the sun arose, so did some hungry boys. They ate their fill of Honey-Buns (nasty 15 grams of FAT cinnamon rolls) and drank a load of juice and were happy! (There was plenty of food to go around since nearly 90% of the campers LEFT!)

No pictures were taken... except this one as they pulled into the drive. Till next year!

Fathers & Sons outing 2009

We had a good time at Fathers & Sons outing.  Lots of games and lots of kids.

Here is Luke sitting on a stump.

Logan playing dodge ball.

Mason playing whiffle ball.

Me and the kid who kept me up all night by wiggling out of his bedroll.

Mason

Here is a video of Logan playing dodge ball.

                                

Can anyone tell me the name of this plant??????
It seems to like me because I got rid of, no, that's not exactly how it was but almost. I shoveled it out of my pot & took it over to Melissa's & planted it in her side yard. It's doing very well - has blossoms on it - likes where it got planted!!
It had taken over my pot that I had planted basil in.
After I thought I was rid of it or so I thought, I went to the nursery & bought some brand new basil & planted it in my newly cleaned pot.



As you can see my basil is doing so good, green & fragrant - love my basil.

But as you can see this other plant is also growing in my pot!!!!!!!






Did you guess what it was????? Well, it's a BLACKBERRY BUSH!!!!! And no it wasn't planted in the pot ever!! It just came up on it's own. Now I have another blackberry bush growing in the pot with my basil!!! Any one want a "Satan Bush"?? Come on Heather, you can take it home with you!!

Jeff & Melissa's Garage

Jeff & Melissa made the extremely smart decision to have me put some shelves up in their garage.  I forgot to take a before picture, but here are the after shots.

Puerto Lobos, Mexico

I took that table down to Mexico to Puerto Lobos. I took Logan and Mason with me and we spent 4 days there. Here are a few photos.

Sunset from our back porch.

Here are the boys on the boat fishing.

Logan worked on this Yellow Tail Tuna for about 20 minutes. He finally got too tired and my friend Wells Davis finished him off.

Here is the big one that I caught.

We went for a drive down the beach and found this whale. He smelled great!!!

Here we are on the white sand beach looking for cool shells.

Here is a whale bone.

This is another whale bone. This one is the flipper.

Me and the boys.

Here is Logan working on the Yellow Tail.

Here is the fish that Logan started and Wells finished.

Table

I just finished building this table with my friend Wells Davis.  I thought it turned out nice.

It is bigger than it looks.  5' X 11'.  Each bench is 4.5' long.  It weighs over 600 lbs.  We made it for his brother.  He has a house in Mexico and wanted a big table for large groups.

Some Thanksgiving Pictures

What a bunch of cuties!