Sitting in traffic headed to D.C.

Trek starts tom. Kids staying with cousins. Yay!

I AM THE ONLY ONE THAT FORGOT ELLERY'S BIRTHDAY

I absolutely loved my time in VA. Darla gave me the best compliment ever! She said Geof. told her she was suffering from Post Mother-in-law Leaving Blues. She said most women can hardly wait for their mother in laws to leave, but she misses me! How sweet is that? The smartest thing our kids have ever done is choose the spouses they have.  They are all wonderful!

After 14 hrs in transit I arrived home and climbed into bed about 1:30am  PST......that's 4:30am EST. I was up and on the road to Lacey the next morning to see Sadie perform in her school talent show and to take her out for ice cream. She performed beautifully!!! I was so focused on getting out the door I forgot all about Ellery's birthday until one of our missionaries gave him a big hug and said, "Happy Birthday Brother Bennett!" Nuts! I was busted! Both Elders had bought him a tie and had them all wrapped and sitting on the hood of the car when he went out the door for work.

He texts me a picture of his entire team from work. They have thrown him a surprise BD party for their "stand up" meeting that morning....cake, cards, balloons etc. The picture's caption reads, "My team didn't forget my Birthday!" OUCH!!!

Being thoughtful has never been my strong suit. I told him he could go get that $79.00 golf pass at Costco if he really wanted to....what more could he ask? I always like it when he tells me that I can go do something I really want to. I thought I was being nice since I knew he was going to do it anyway!

To continue...

HE and some of his staff had been invited down to the home office for a chili cook off. Werner, the CEO of Touchmark ( Ellery's Company) stands up and announces it is Ellery's BD and preceeds to lead everyone in a rousing rendition of Happy Birthday Dear Ellery....!!!! Does it get better than this?

Yes it does....the Chief Financial Officer of the company comes up to him later and says, "It is a great day to be Ellery Bennett!" He related a conversation he had with one of the other VP's where they discussed the fact that Ellery's building is 100% full and has been for a while and every segment of operations is beating plan and making money for the company. These guys love him. He has maxed out his bonus plan every quarter since he has been hired. And to think he got this job off Craig's List when he was 61 year old "has been!" Pretty impressive!

 It is a great to be Ellery Bennett. He is a blessed man! He is loved and adored by all his children and grandchildren. I even like him! He is so fun to be around..... before 9:30 pm and when he is not on a liquid diet......even then I love him!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY EL! OH YEAH.... AND HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!!!!

too Tired

I had to catch up on all the posts and now I am too tired to write but I will tomorrow!

Camping!

Last Fri/Sat we took our first camping trip of the year up to Guanella Pass. Weather was perfect, we found a new spot that worked great for a big group (11 kids 6 adults plus 5 day campers), and the river didn't take any children away. Kaia did cut herself while widdeling and we discovered she has my "quick to faint" when injured problem. After this trip, Adam loaded all our gear into Pop's camper and three days later Ad drove to work and the kids and I went to Great Sand Dunes National Park with my parents. The Great Sand Dunes National Park quarter doesn't come out till 2015, so this is a fake shot. Have I already written about my goal to go to each park featured on the 56 quarters? I forgot the backpack for Rubicon, so she was on my shoulders for all the hikes.

Visit from Grandma

Can't we all agree that visits from Le Anne are absolutely perfect?! Not only does she work and clean like a live-in maid (but better), she also loves on your kids, is a great friend to talk to, and is up for playing anywhere and anytime. So great. We love Grandma Dana! Here's some pics (I know, too many..) of our last few days. Did I mention that Le Anne's had to deal with our kittens' fleas? What a mess. Here they all are living on the front porch where they'll stay until we find homes for them-hopefully in a week?

 Can't remember the reason for this outburst..but that sure is a sweet face.

 I think Le Anne loves our front porch more than I do. It's the greatest.

 Our walk along downtown's river canal. We've had perfect weather.

 A strange but cool mural..the kids couldn't figure out why people were stuck in the cement wall from waist up.

 Yorktown.

 Grandma's cookies..can't get enough.

 View from the Jamestown ferry

Le

Boston and kitties?

An excessive amount of pics..but really, how do you edit such a great trip?! Geof. and I were able to fly up to Boston for three days US ONLY time. So nice.  The pics below only show ONE day in Boston. My camera's battery died after day one and I forgot the charger. Check Geof.'s facebook pics to see our day trip to Maine and New Hampshire's coasts (beautiful!) and our Celtics/Heat basketball game (I didn't realize how fun watching bball could be..)!

 Here I am at Harvard begging them to reconsider my application..?

 Harvard..we took a train from Boston to MIT and when that proved to be disappointing, we walked the mile and a half to Harvard's campus. It felt like 100 miles--to both of us--maybe that's because we'd already walked all over Boston? Didn't drink enough water? I dunno..

 Benjamin Franklin

 Old State House

 Street performers. If you've ever been to NYC's central park, this was almost exactly the same thing. Fun..but we didn't give them the $20 they asked for BEFORE showing us the flip-over-five-girls trick.

 Fresh market-CHEAP produce! We bought raspberries and cherries for nothin'!

 We were told we HAD to try out Italy's famous cannolis in a restaurant in the North End of town where you literally feel like you're IN Italy. The cannolis proved to be DELICIOUS and we only wish we'd bought more. The people were great--out on the street talking with their hands and gesturing just like you imagine Italians to do. So cool. We even walked up to a group of them and tried to have a discussion. I don't know how much they or we understood. Awesome.

 Paul Revere's home

 Waiting in a restaurant for take out pizza. SO GOOD.

 Paul Revere and the Old North Church in the background.

 This was Geof.'s face pretty much the entire trip. Do you think he enjoys history/travel much? The Old North Church housed the nation's first organ and oldest clock..cool, huh?

 Revolutionary War Era graveyard. Graves as old as the 1630s!

 View from atop the Bunker Hill Monument. 294 winding steps we "almost" ran all the way up..

 U.S.S. Constitution, the world's oldest commissioned warship afloat (my words, not the "official website")...

 Three levels down..where they packed in 450 crew members! They had to rotate sleeping downstairs and keeping watch on deck.

 There's that face again.

 Train ride to Boston. A bit tired..

 Dayne with fuzzy kitten (before we realized they had fleas).

 I don't know who taught him that (see below).

 Love this face.

 And these faces, too.

Good momma