Thanksgiving Week and The felling of Big Trees.

Thanksgiving week wouldn't be thanksgiving week without lots of Christmas prep which mainly comes in anticipation of Festival of Trees set up that happens the following Monday.   This week started out with picking up a few Christmas items that I had agreed to buy on line from a friend in American Fork.  That lead to some junking, of course, because that is how I roll.  

On Tuesday I did a bit of crafting for my blog post the next day. Dad came home from work, instead of going to the temple, as it is closed.  He then spent three hours mowing up leaves, until well after dark.

On Wednesday I worked, as usual. Dad came and got me after closing, and we headed to Maui Chill in Hlghland (Lehi) for our first vertical dogs ... Yum!

Of course Thursday was beyond  busy ... Dad was off early to run in the Turkey Trot in Orem, (picture at the end ofmthisnpost) where he met Ben and Trevor.  Dad came in fourth in his age group, and loved spending time with his sons.  I, meanwhile, was starting the turkey and setting tables, three of them.

Dad got home about eleven and helped with finishing details .... He is the perfect sous chef ... And I love working with him.  Thanks honey!

Brittney invited a fellow student at BYU, Mia and  her sister My (pronounced Me) from Vietnam, which was very cool.  They even brought a pie they had made, and it was yummy!  While  Brittney and Spencer were in Vietnam this past summer, they met Mia's family at home, wow what an amazing experience.

after dinner Nell took the opportunity for a mini family photo shoot ....

Then it was time for pie!!

... And baby snuggles...

... And while the adults were visiting and singing the family songs... The grands were

Finding their own snacks ....

And reinventing the pyramids ... art is by Ian!

Friday I spent the whole day working on Festival of trees ornaments and props.... Including painting dots on everything in site.  Dad spent the day hauling the remains of the catalpa tree off the front lawn to the side of the house, including a couple of huge logs that required Spencer's help... Thanks Spencer.  

We rewarded ourselves for a long day of labor by meeting up with these love birds for dinner and a romantic movie, what else?!

Saturday I did more Festival of Trees ... And Dad mowed up the leaves on the back lawns.  Then Ben came in the afternoon to make a mess of the front lawn again, thankfully...  

He brought down the trunk of the first tree, then very skillfully brought down the second tree, whole, and very carefully.  He has serious skills, and we are so grateful for him and his skills.

That night dad and I went to see the new bbc version of Great Expectations at the Spanish Fork Water gardens ... It made me laugh that the flying children sculptures there boasted holiday headwear.  Oh and we enjoyed the movie too.

Sunday morning I headed to church early and was able to be set apart as the Gospel Doctrine teacher, then I got to teach for the first time ... Which went ok, but I definitely have room for growth.

Spencer and Brittney also went early and finally received callings ... Spencer as the 15 - 18 year old Sunday School teacher, and Brittney as the Beehive Advisor ... Coincidentally the two callings Emily held at the time she left the ward last February.

When dad got back from his second set of meetings, we dragged Spencer and Brittney and headed out to see grandpa.

... And last of all here is a picture of my handsome men at the big race!!

McKenna Arrives in the Nick of Time!!

So this is another week with the Perkins clan ... It started with me picking up a work day on Monday at Treasures ... So not much exciting there.

This pic is of Titan having his scan, after having a mild seizure a few weeks ago, its just precautionary. Sorry this pic is out of order, I am blogging on my iPad, as Mike is giving our computer a select  lobotomy, and changing out pics on my iPad pretty much means starting over, so not going to happen.  Still thought it was a cute picture.

Tuesday night I went to another art retreat, which I enjoyed a lot.  The three girls in the picture with me all belong to the Reclaimilogists that I sell with on FB.  

I worked again on Wednesday frantically getting stuff moved out of the van into the store, as we needed to empty it to add all the seats for our trip to Idaho the next day.  

As often happens I didn't sleep well that night and got a text from Dave while I was still up about 1:30 saying they were at the hospital.  When I got up, about 6:00 Scott read me the text announcing McKenna's birth.  Happy day!

With dad and I putting seats in the van, packing, loading, it was after nine that we got to the hospital to see our newest addition.

Such a pretty little girl, and such an unusual birth story.  Briahnna has given me permission to share, so here goes...

After a few hours of serious labor, Bri opted for an epidural.  Her mom and Davin were with her, and after a while, being so exhausted Bri fell asleep, so did Davin and her mom... A while later they were awakened by the sounds of a baby coughing ... And there she was, head and shoulders to the world, as Davin ran for a nurse, Lisa caught little McKenna as she finished her task of getting born.  

This is the cute quilt that I found at the doll house festival, perfect for our sweet dark haired doll.

I ran to work and got there just 5 minutes late.  Dad came by after my shift, and after getting all new tires for the van, and then we headed north. We picked up Ashley and her family.  Then Becca and her kids, then Darby and it was off to Idaho!

We got in about 1:30 A.M. And spread out beds and rearranged couches for a giant slumber party ... That is when someone decided it was a good time to start a movie ...  Then that someone fell asleep while, the rest of us watched the new superman movie ...Yawn .  The next day we all just hung out, cousins getting aquainted, and sisters enjoying each  other.

And of course there were more movies to be watched ...

... And babies to be played with.

And some pretties just preened.

Titan found an unusual set of bears to be scary with.

Then it was time for the big event ... Seeing the second Hunger games movie, Catching Fire.

The next day dad and I spent six hours junking ... 

And when we got back, Alex was giving his cousins rides,  while the  adults were watching another movie.  Then it was time to pack up the van and head home.

Dad and I got home before midnight. .... And for once I had no problem falling asleep.  But morning came early and with it a call from the ward exec sec and a new calling for moi ... Namely as one of two gospel doctrine teachers, my favorite calling ... And just in time for Old Testament next year!!

After our block we went to sacrament meeting again in Pleasant Grove where we got to hear Scott play a piano solo... He did a great job, and his grandpa and I are so proud of him!  After church we stopped at their house to visit for a bit, and Eva made dad and I sandwiches, which was so very nice.  We enjoyed a visit with Nell, before Trevor came home to get the family for tithing settlement.  What a lovely week we had ... Time spent with all our grands except the southern ones...

A Perfect Week With Prince Charming at Home!

... and another week begins. On Monday dad was off to work locally, of which I totally approve.

I got to meet the girls for lunch in American Fork at the Olive Garden for Briahnna's baby shower.   Darby put it together and Becca, who had been visiting grandpa Carlo, decided to bring him along.

Bri  seemed pretty happy with the cute things for her baby who will be born later this month.  

That night dad and I made dinner and ate in our room while we watched the last regular Downtown Abbey episode ... Good times ... (Btw, I purposely misspelled downtown abbey so no one will pick it up off google and read our blog ... :-). 

On Tuesday I played with setting a thanksgiving dinner table to enter a FB page contest.  I later used the pics for  a blog post.  

I worked on Wednesday and Thursday.  After work on Wednesday I made this flea bits sign for my booth of small crafting stuff, part of which is shown above.   

On Thursday dad surprised me by coming by with lunch. As he was leaving my coworker Richard calls after him and say "you are making the rest of us look bad, you know!"  So true.

 Then after work on Thursday I headed off to the ward book club with my friend Ginny. Emily had  read the book, The Book Thief, and I knew she had an opinion about it, so we called her in Texas and She told us what she thought, that was pretty fun. 

Dad took the day off on Friday so that we could get the garage in shape for the winter, when we don't want to park in the driveway.  In the early afternoon I ran up to PG to pick up Trevor and Nell's children as Nell was headed to Arizona for a family visit.  

The girls got in some art time before we headed to Spanish where we saw Dispicable Me at the dollar movies.

When we got back Eva said she didn't want to sleep in the library because that portrait of her grandpa in the library was like the ones in the haunted mansion at Disneyland, and she would worry about it changing like they do. Mi ended up taking it off the wall and turning it around. Funny girl.

Saturday morning dad made the kids waffles and then took them to BYU where they met up with Trevor and they all watched the game with Idaho State.

I, mean while, met my friend Wendy at the fleattitude sale in Pleasant Grove.  Above Amy, one of our former flea.o.logy dealers shows off a cool arrow she found.

Two Pitts of a Pear's Brandon made this awesome reinvented conservatory, which I loved.

Brandon also made this super cool 'mantel'.  Wendy and I spent a couple of hours at the sale before heading to a craft retreat we had signed up for.

It was hosted by Marci who does the Fallow Field Farm sale in the fall. This is the first time I have attended one of her craft retreats.

Here we are inside the building at Lindon park... The collected goodies to the right are the raw materials for the Christmas advent calendar I made.

This is the nice Texan I met with the advent she made.

Here are some of the new ladies I met.  I also ran into a gal named Becky who lives in our ward in Orem... I recognized her face and she recognized my name ... So funny. She lived just west of Barb's old house, but moved there just a year before we moved to Payson, so after Barb Moved.  She wasn't active when we lived there but has an autistic son who decided he wanted to go to church every week, and she didn't like him going alone.

Long story short, she was just released as Young Women's President, and was in during the time Kim was going to Young Women's and went to camp.  She said Kim is adorable, and I had to agree.

After the retreat I met dad at the Hale Theater and we saw a play called 'The Heights' which we both liked .

On Sunday we went to church, and then dad came home early from his second set of meetings so we could go and see grandpa, who was positively grumpy!!

It was fun to have Spencer and Brittney along.

When we got home I put together my gratitude stand that I had made at the craft event so that I could blog about it that night. 

Here are the other pages I got done.

Then dad and I put together dinner, and the Kews and downstairs Perkins joined us, which was lovely. Brittney said it was fun to get to know the Kews better.

So that does it for our week.  It was so nice to have dad around.