Idaho Family Birthday Party

On August 6th we met up with my family to caravan up to Idaho for a family party to celebrate birthdays for my Uncle Bruce, who was turning 70, and my dad, who just turned 60. I was kind of thrown into the birthday mix too for entering a new decade this year because I turned 30 in June, but it was mostly for my Dad and Uncle Bruce and really just a good excuse to get everyone together.

We stopped for a bathroom break about half way there.  Aurora still likes to hold Talmage every chance she gets. :)

Our sweet, handsome little guy.

Cuties!


Talmage with Uncle Skylar

As soon as we got to Uncle Harvey's house (although it will always be my Grandma's house to me even though she passed away a few years ago), the kids headed straight to the water and had fun throwing rocks for a while.


Our cute girls up in a tree I used to climb when I was little.


My dad with all of his siblings--my dad is the youngest of 8.
Uncle Rodger, Uncle Bruce, Dad, Uncle Clair
Auntie Di, Uncle Harvey, Aunt Martia, Uncle Kip

The birthday cake.

I'm glad we took this picture.  This is me with some of my cousins, although there are a lot that are missing too.  This is maybe half of us.  We haven't done a cousin picture in a really long time.  It's extremely hard to get everyone together!
Mark, Skylar (my baby brother), Vance, Eric
Clifton, Kirsten, Kevin, Marci, Me, Shannon (my sister), Josh, Tiffany, Terra, Steve, Jon, Bri (my sister), Matthew
and Tyson is in the front all by himself.

We were supposed to be doing a goofy picture but only half the group participated.  Silly cousins.

Talmage got pretty tired and actually fell asleep on Marci for a little while.  It's nice to have so many other adults around who want to get their baby fix in :)  When he woke up he was happy to come back to me though.  Sweet little guy!

It was a nice but quick trip up to Idaho for the day.  It's about a 4 hour drive each way for us so we felt like we couldn't stay for too long in order to get back home at a decent hour.  We left the party and headed straight to a wedding reception for my cousin Annika's daughter, Hunter.  After staying at the reception for about an hour we headed home because we were leaving again the next day for another trip.  It's always nice to go up and see my Idaho family though.  Love you guys, and happy birthday to Dad and Uncle Bruce!

Castle Valley Pageant

August 4, 2016

Some friends we have in our new ward, Jake and Ashlee Brandt, invited us to go see the Castle Valley Pageant with them.  It's a pageant about the Mormon pioneers who settled the Castle Valley in Utah.  This pageant takes place every other year in a Castle Dale, Utah.  Darwin and I have been to several pageants together but we had never heard of this one.  It was a bit of a drive for us from where we live and we knew it was going to be a late night for all of us, but we were excited to go see it.

Smoke stacks in the distance.

There were some pioneer activities and festivities set up before the pageant started.



Waiting in line to get a prarie diamond for ourselves.


Watching the masters at work.

Savannah with her prarie diamond :)

They even made a tiny one for Talmage!

He's such a happy boy!

The girls each got a rag pioneer doll.



Excited to be getting a doll!


All the girls with their new dolls.
Keznee, Aurora, Savannah and Lexi

The girls got their hair fixed like pioneer girls.




A shot of where we would be sitting to watch the pageant when it got dark.

Part of the set on stage.

Our friends, Jake and Jaxon, practicing their lasso skills.

Aurora got to try out a lasso for her first time.

She'll be a pro before we know it! ;)


Then it was Savannah's turn.

This was a highlight of the evening for her.  She said she was just like Sheriff Callie with her noodle lasso! :)

Our cutie girls!

I was in the pilot feeding Talmage while they were doing all these activities.  Daddy thought it would be fun to zoom in and try to get a picture of me.  Can you spot our pilot?

We were amazed at how they had all the cars packed in.  It actually worked out pretty nice and it didn't take very long to get out of the parking lot after the pageant was over.

The sunset was really pretty.  This picture doesn't do it any justice.

Finally it was time for the pageant to get started and the actors all started filing in.


Ashlee pointed out to us that there were covered wagons making their way up the ridge towards the stage.


This was the presidency over the pageant.  They're the ones who make sure it turns out the way it should :)

Before the pageant started they honored each branch of the military by bringing in a flag.  This big water puddle was part of the set and they certainly took advantage of that water puddle throughout the night! :)


And then the pageant started!

Walking the horses and wagon through the puddle :)

Walking some kids through the puddle :)


More horses and a wagon going through the puddle

A shot of the same smoke stacks from earlier in the dark.

A family in the pageant having a little dance.





This was the funniest part of the pageant.  The guys were talking about how frustrated they were that they had to keep rebuilding a dam and it turned into a dance in the puddle :)



A portrayal of Samuel the Lamanite telling the people of Christ coming in 5 years.

Jesus Christ appearing to the people in America


Brigham Young

And that was about the end of the pageant.  We had almost a 2 hour drive home and got home pretty late. It was fun to go to the pageant and we're planning to go again when they do it in two years.  Thanks for the invitation to go with you, Brandts!