Let's wrap up the reunion, shall we?

In the name of full disclosure, this is actually being posted December 10 28 30, 2012. I'm that good at blogging these days.

 Lucy wasn't feeling too well the day we visited Frederick and Lena's house. Here she is have a little snuggle time with Uncle Landon at the lodge.

With ingredient contributions from every family, Grandpa whipped up a mean Stone Soup for dinner. (Our reunion theme was Helaman 5:12.)

 The Grand Tetons were both a beautiful background during our stay at the ranch, and a fun destination.

 Here's the Duersch crew on the boat across the lake to get to our hiking spot in the Tetons.

 Breton, Benjamin, and Rhett. Love those boys.

 The 5 of us

 My handsome hiking boys.

 On our way home we love stopping for a visit at Paul's Grandma Sanders' house in Kaysville. Here Aunt Cyntia (who we also love and who lives conveniently next door plays Legos with Rhett and Benjamin while Lucy watches.)

And finally, here is the runner-up Christmas card photo for 2012. I love it! So classic.

(May 2013 be a better blogging year...)

Sledding

Paul and Benjamin took the opportunity of going sledding with Landon and the Sego kids the day after Christmas. Since I wasn't there I can't offer the best narrative of the experience, but these pictures may give some indication of the fun that was had by all.

Paul & Benjamin

Landon & Allie

Cara & Lane

Benjamin (all by himself!)

Cara & Breton

Lane & Allie

Cara's cool snowboard moves

Landon & Breton

Bellingham, Washington

Last weekend Paul and I went to Washington to check out the town where we'll be living and to find a house to rent. It was a great get-away for us! Benjamin stayed with Paul's parents so we could have some kid-free time, which was nice for us, but since then has had a hard time letting us out of his sight.

Bellingham is located about 1.5 hours north of Seattle, 20 minutes south of Canada, on the Puget Sound. Mt. Baker (the mountain pictured on the title of our blog), is located an hour east.

So for starters, here is the house that we will be living in. It's a nice little 3-bedroom home that should suit the needs of our family perfectly. It will be nice to have our own four walls and not worry about babies waking the neighbors! It's right in town and close to Paul's work and we love that it's in a nice, quiet neighborhood. Last Sunday we attended the ward that we will be in and everyone was so nice and welcoming! We were even invited over for Sunday dinner! That sure beat the tuna sandwiches we were planning to eat in our hotel room!


And here are some pictures of the rest of our trip. Our first day there we were treated to beautiful, sunny weather; Saturday gave us a taste of wet Washington weather. But overall the weather was nice and we didn't get too wet.

These are from Chuckanut Drive and Larrabee State Park.

This shot is of some boats in Squalicum Marina

This is the Bellingham Cruise Terminal

We left Bellingham on Tuesday and spent a little bit of time in Seattle before we flew back to Provo. One of our stops was at the beautiful Seattle, WA temple.

Then we ventured downtown and saw the Space Needle.

And went to the Seattle Center House where Paul rode the Washington State animal (just kidding, it's just a slug), and we got some yummy Seattle Fudge.

Then it was a rush through 5:00 traffic in downtown Seattle to return our rental car and fly home. We were so happy to get back early enough to pick up Benjamin and take him home with us! He seemed a little surprised to see us, but very happy. And like I said, he has been very reluctant to let us leave again!

We have about 6 weeks left here in Provo. Wow! We know it will fly by, and we'll be a little sad to go. But we're very excited about Paul's new job (we visited Ebenal Construction while we were there also, and I was able to meet some people he'll work with), and we're looking forward to the next step in our family's life.

Thanksgiving Break Fun

I know, I know. So late to post this! I'm a lazy blogger, what can I say? Anyway, here's a rundown of our Thanksgiving holiday.


For Thanksgiving this year we traveled to Albuquerque to be with my family. Here are some highlights from our trip:

For starters, we took a lovely detour through Colorado that we've never done before. Rather than going down to Moab, we took I-70 to Grand Junction and headed to Durango. On the way we passed through a little town called Montrose and found a great park to stretch our legs in. Benjamin loved the slides and the swing!

We opted to take a drive through the Rocky Mountains, which turned out to be a GREAT idea! It was so beautiful! Here are just a few snapshots of the scenery:

We're glad we took that scenic drive and look forward to trying it in the summer sometime.

Wednesday was a perfect day to play in the park with Grandma! We went to one that was recommended to us, and Benjamin had a ball, despite the wind and slight chill.

Later that day we visited with my Dad in Rio Rancho, New Mexico. He gave me a box full of family history info that I'm excited to dive into. He also showed us my great-grandfather's Army uniform, which I didn't know he had! At some point it will be donated to a museaum in Oklahoma, so we decided to snap some pictures before then.

Thursday we had fun watching the Macy's Thanksgiving parade, and I made (and slightly burned) some pumpkin pies. We took ourselves and the pies over to my sister Sarah's house and had a fantastic Thanksgiving meal put together by Sarah, Melissa (my other sister) and my mom. So good!

And would you believe that it snowed? It did!

It was a good visit in Albuquerque, although short. We headed back to Provo on Friday so we could be in attendance at the BYU vs. Utah game on Saturday, at which Paul got to go down on the field during halftime--but that's a post for another time since this one took over 2 weeks to get up!

Happy December!

A break from the daily grind

What a weekend! Last Thursday we drove all the way to Albuquerque, NM with Grandma Duersch and Aunt Ruth. The main event was the baptism of Benjamin's cousin Lane Sego, but we did so many other fun things, too.

Our 10-hour drive down took a few hours more than planned since we decided to stop at Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado. We saw some really cool ruins that look like this:

We arrived in Albuquerque late on Thursday night, and after a few hours of sleep woke up to go to the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta. This is an annual event in Albuquerque that I went to a few times growing up, but I haven't been to it since high school. Even then I didn't get the full experience, so it was great to go again. Paul thought it was amazing, and in a few years Benjamin will think so, too.

We got to Balloon Fiesta Park at about 6:30 a.m. There were yummy breakfast burritos, fun balloon shapes, chainsaw carvers, and plenty of people bundled up against the cold just like us. There were even Storm Troopers.

Early morning

Balloons starting to go up

Benjamin thought this guy was so cool

Balloon Gondola

Chainsaw carver guy

After a long morning, we were all pretty beat.

But there was more to do....

Next stop, Santa Fe. After a quick stop for the diapers we forgot to pack, we headed off with the Sego family to the capital of New Mexico. You would think that, having lived in NM for 18 years, I would have visited Santa Fe at least once. Well, I did go there once, but I didn't go anywhere in the city or see anything outside the campus of St. John's College, so it doesn't count.

We ate at a place called The Burrito Co. Cafe. It's so nice to have some real New Mexican food once in a while!



We spent the afternoon walking around the plaza and visiting galleries and shops. Below is a picture of Native American vendors selling their crafts and jewelery.



Saturday morning we finally got to sleep in! Than Paul and I drove with Grandma and Ruth around the neighborhood where I grew up. I wish I could show a good picture of the house I grew up in, but it's too depressing to look at now. (The new owner has let everything go to waste.) We also drove by the Ernie Pyle library, Bandelier Elementary, and Highland High School. Fun to see old spots, but so glad to be where I am now!

A very wonderful and important part of our visit to Albuquerque was our visits with my parents. We saw my dad in Rio Rancho first. Unfortunately, Benjamin was a little grumpy during our visit with Grandpa Key, but at least they could spend some time together.


Saturday evening I was going to go to the Rio Grande Arts & Crafts Festival with Paul's mom and his sisters Heidi and Ruth but I just didn't feel like spending $6 on admission that we thought was free. So instead Ruth and I stayed in the car and did homework, which really wasn't all that bad. (Sorry for the boring details. I'm just trying to be thorough.)

That night we joined Heidi's husband Landon's family (the Segos) for a hamburger cookout, and Paul's oldest brother Brett flew in from Pennsylvania with his son Tom. This is a picture of us playing a card game called "Big Fish, Little Fish," or something like that.

Sunday we had a nice visit with my mom. Benjamin had his first taste of Mac & Cheese from a box, and although I wanted to keep it clean and feed it to him myself, he has now decided that he won't eat anything unless he can do it himself. And I mean anything. But that's a post for another time.

Church with Grandma Key was fun because we got to visit with Brother Croasdell, a member of my old ward, and we got to watch the Primary practice their Sacrament Meeting Program since my mom is a Primary teacher.
We also got to visit with Benjamin's aunts Sarah and Melissa. Sorry, Sarah, we didn't get a picture with you!


Lane was baptized on Sunday evening, and it was wonderful! We're so proud of you, buddy! Thanks for inviting us! (Sorry, no pictures of that one... we left the camera in the car.)

And that was our vacation! Thanks to Grandma Duersch for taking us in her van, and to both her and Ruth for keeping Benjamin content in the back seat! And thanks to Lane for being baptised so we could have such a great mid-semester break!