Cousin Party & Pillow Cases, Willow Flat-Summer, 2015

Too Busy to Blog

1. I have just been so busy there has not been time to do my blog.

I will cut way down on the pictures, because I have a very busy month to cover.

As soon as we got home from Paul's we got ready for the Jensen Reunion.

We ended up having 131 on Friday night. We had a great time.

Noelle with Chandler's girls. (A. Silvia's son)

2.  A. Cathy, Julie, A. Silvia

3.  Miscellaneous pictures from the reunion.

I had to leave at 4:50 Friday night for a singing concert,

but it sure seemed everyone had a great time.

4. Tesha and Leah

5. Sunday was Eric and Jacoby's blessing - It was a beautiful day.

6. Leah loved meeting all her cousins - With Noelle

7. Off to the Old Barn to see Noelle, Mallory and Caleb in Alice in Wonderland

They did such a good job!

8. Up to spend a few days with Tesha & kids visiting David's family

9. David's outdoor cooker 

10. Working in the garden - We have never had as successful of a garden as we do this year.

11. Barbara Capener (Dick's wife) passes away. Here are 3 of U. Lee's 4 children.

Dick and Bob (twins) with MarLee their sister. Joyce Cornwall was the oldest.

12. Joe is here! - He looks at all the Kids Discover magazines with Ben.

They get so excited

 13. Games!

14. 4th of July at the kids games 

15.  Aunt Mel fixing Leah's hair

 16. Sammi's turn

17. More 4th of July - Yeah for Arizona cousins!

 18. Parade time

19. Chris, Colleen holding Mia, Noelle

 20. Dinner time

20. 5th of July gathering

21. Leah and Marri

22. Emily and Lacey holding the twins!

23. There was the most beautiful complete double rainbow in the Eastern sky.

I wish I had a camera that could capture it,but here is part of it.

24. No Jensen gathering is complete with a huge game of Main Deer Tag.

Everyone had so much fun. Thank you Mike for instigating it.

25. Sunday night began the big cousin party!

We had 21 kids who slept over Sunday night. Monday we had all kinds of activities

and everyone played and played, and ate and ate.

Crafts

 Games

26. What happens when one person asks for hot chocolate? 

Everyone has to have it, of course, and it's July!

27. Getting ready for the mystery dinner. Me, Tesha, Spencer, Josh, and John

We had a lot of fun and so did the kids. 

 28. Giving instructions and handing out the order menus 

29. Orders filled and the table is ready. We put the utensils on first.

Wire whips, tongs, spatuala, everything in the drawer, but NOT forks or spoons

30. Pine float = pine needle in a cup of water

31. Chloe's utensil was a big baster. It was good for drinking her drink!

32. Jared

33. Taylor

34. Sammi, Nikki, Mallory

35. Audrey, Noelle

36. Mallory

37. Sammi

38. Chloe

39. Shooting off bottle rockets was great fun

40. Can you guess who this is? Honestly. If you think you know, call me and I'll 

tell you if you are right. This gets the best costume award yet.

(For posterity's sake, it's Cecily)

 41. So fun to get to know Leah

42. Zander and Zach

43. Tuesday we begin the pillowcases among all the eating and playing.

This is Marri sewing.

44. Noelle's finished pillowcase

 45. Sophie at the machine

46.  Her finished product - I loved the pillow cases because they

picked what they liked and it was them. They are surely a one of a kind.

47. Cecily with her Dr. Who

48. Spencer making his Marvel Comics

 49. Cierra with hers

 50. Hudson and Mia get to know each other. It was so cute.

 51. Kaden with his Star Wars

 52. Suzi making her princess and My Little Pony

 53. Roasting marshmallows and Peeps

 54. Isaac with his

55. Dusty sewing his Star Wars.

56.  Jeffrey and baseball - not a surprise

57. Wednesday we had a beautiful day at the temple doing baptisms for the dead.

We had 9 grandchildren there, 4 boys and 5 girls. 

It was such a beautiful sight to see them all there together dressed in white.

 Mike and Emily came to join us also.

58. Grandpa, Josh, John, Spencer with Sophie in front, Marri, Noelle,
Emily, Steven, Nikki, Marri, Grandma
 59. I'm not sure who is the most tired by this time.

60.  Oh yes, Nikki and Steven made red jello. That was a late night snack.

61. Marion's boys and Rob's kids went home on Thursday morning.

We served our shift at the temple on Thursday and Friday. 

Saturday we went with Paul's family and Chris's family and Ellen to Willow Flat, U. Marc's

to pick raspberries, the cemetery, and then ice cream at Caspers. I loved the whole day.

We talked about G-Grandma & G-Grandpa Jensen on the way up.

The kids could tell 10 things about each of them. 

There is just something about Willow Flat

62. Approximate place where the Avalanche story took place

63. Caleb.

64. Zander

75. Dad, Levi, and Paul were at the end. Levi walked most of the way

76. A tree had fallen over on top of the bridge making a tree bridge

77.  Best water in the world!

78.Noelle found some water coming out of another spot and said

it was the best. She brought me some, and it tasted as good, but

it was even colder. So I agreed with her.

79. Chloe said, "The best day of my life!"

80. Mallory, It can't get fresher than this:) 

81. I wonder what Levi is thinking?

82. Me and Ellen

83. Levi and Paul

84. Back at camp 

85. Caleb.

86. It's skit time. No need of costumes. It was actually quite good.

Purpose of and advertising mud shoes.
Mallory, Nikki, Sammi, and Caleb

 87. Caleb was so cute giving Levi rocks to throw in the water. 

Zander and Levi had a great tie with rocks and water.

88. The muddy shoes from the skit

89. Then we went to Great-Grandma Jensen's to pick raspberries.

That house has a lot of memories.

 90. Then the cemetery 

91. Ice cream and Daniel has joined us.

92. This is pure joy. After the ice cream, we went the back way to get home.

We had to stop as a train went by. For those of you who don't now,

LEVI LOVES TRAINS!!! He was so excited to see it so close.

93. When we got home, we made two of Great-Grandma's cakes - Lemon cake with a lemon

chiffon topping and a 4 layer cream cake.

And we had to play a game while waiting, of course.

94. I had forgotten how good the lemon cake was. Grandma used to bring one over when

I was taking care of Grandma Capener. My mother didn't like sweets, but she loved that cake.

95. This brings us to today. Tom took us out to lunch for our birthday.

Taylor and I finally got to spend our actual birthday time together on the real day.

She is my best birthday present.

I'm sorry this blog is so long, but as you can see we have been VERY busy.

I love watching all the relationships develop and strengthen. We had a

wonderful time. There comes a strength when we get together.

 I love you all. Thank you for bringing me such joy and rejoicing in my life.

This world and its philosophies are getting crazier, but the

Plan of Salvation is true and solid. The gospel is real and the

temple blessings are sure.

I felt such a closeness to Dad's parents lately. I guess Willow Flat does

that to me and all the talking about them.

They are busy where they are, but they are aware of us and love us all.