Photo Crisis

Today I had a photo crisis and a melt down. I got on the computer to find a family photo to upload to our new ward website. GASP! All of my pictures were GONE! We searched throughout the computer. Nada. I checked the memory card from the camera. Nope. Only stuff taken in Oct. was on there. (We won't mention that in Nov. the camera was broken by some not so innocent children and no pictures have been taken since. Except the ones the kids take on their cameras, but do those really count?).

I admit it. I bawled my eyes out. I blamed my family. (Someone deleted the pictures and it sure wasn't me!) I sobbed some more. I spent the evening feeling depressed. All of the pictures we had taken in 2010 were on the computer. Hundreds of them. And I hadn't saved them to a disc.

A ray of hope!

My neglected blog! I have some of our pictures here. Wahoo! Nothing from the first five months of 2010, but from summer on we have some pictures to salvage. Mike thinks he might have some photos saved at work. Crossing my fingers on that. So I'm still missing hundreds of photos, but I have a few from several important occasions last year. That is better than nothing.

Lessons learned tonight:
1- Save your photos somewhere besides on the computer.
2- Keep your blog updated because you never know when it might be a lifesaver.
3- Don't play the blame game. (That's harder than it sounds).

Vegecation

Typically when returning home from a fun vacation with the family, you feel like you need a few more days to recuperate from all the sight seeing, entertainment and running around. A vacation after the vacation. This weekend my two sisters and I had a fun girls weekend, which we are calling our "vegecation". This means getting away for time to truly relax and take it easy. Vegging out with a purpose. Reconnecting. Coming home relaxed.

Our weekend consisted of driving four hours (each way) to stay in a condo in St. George where we watched chick flicks, sang along to favorite songs, played games, ate our favorite snacks and talked. We stayed up late and slept in. And we talked some more. We didn't stay cooped up in the condo the whole time though. We did venture out to Snow state park where we took a long walk and played in the beautiful red sand dunes.

And then there was the main reason for visiting St. George in the first place- the Abbamania concert. This is an Abba tribute band which sings all the most popular Abba songs and dresses in Abba costuming. They were actually very good. The women had beautiful voices. We were surprised by how many men were there. I'm sure some were dragged there in duress by their wives. Those were the men who didn't get out of their seats and sat there in agony. But the majority of the men seemed to be enjoying themselves, and that was entertaining itself. It was a fun concert. But who wouldn't have fun dancing and acting goofy with your sisters while singing along to Mamma Mia, Souper Trouper and Dancing Queen?

What didn't we do? We didn't get online, go shopping or gab on the phone. Hurray! And we didn't feel guilty about vegging out.

But we certainly did talk! And that was the best part of our three days together. Getting to know one another even better than we already did, re-living favorite memories and creating new memories together.

Birthday, Halloween, Birthday

This is the "How much junk food can we eat in a week?" time of year for our family. Within a 6 day period we get to have 2 birthdays and Halloween. It's always a fun, busy time for us.

On Halloween we went to the ward Trunk or Treat where families come and pass out candy from the trunks of their cars, eat hot dogs and socialize. Afterwards we went trick or treating around the neighborhood and finally came home and watched Halloween movies with our friends. A fun night for all.

We had small family birthday parties for Zach and Claire. Zach spent most of his birthday with his friends, except to come back for some cake and gifts. The joys of being 16. Let the dating and driving commence! Claire was happy to get a scooter and a few other fun gifts for her birthday and the birthday girl turned 6.

October Adventures

Here are a few photos of some of our October adventures. We went on a field trip to the Golden Spike National Park, Claire learned to ride a bike without training wheels, Mike's family came to visit (and we didn't get photos of their visit!), we went to the American West Heritage Center where the girls got to ride ponies, use a saw, pet the animals, go through a corn maze, and more. And our most important date in Oct. was when Zoe was baptized on Oct. 9th.