Special Company

Wanda and Halle

The boys explaining about Webkinz to Tania

Halle and Bertha

Grandpa Jack

My Grandpa Jack passed away on Monday. He was my Dad's dad. There won't be a formal service for him. However, I feel a need to remember him and share some of my memories of him...so here it goes...............

My earliest memory of Grandpa is probably when Jay broke his arm and Brenda, Jeff, and I stayed with Grandma and Grandpa in Denver. I remember Grandpa reading to us a lot. He played the good cop and Grandma played the bad cop during our stay:). I remember him in the car pretending to control the traffic lights. I remember hanging out in their 5th wheel with him. He always had a hug and a smile for me.

There were a few times that I remember him from Uncle Robert's house on the rare occasions that the Halfacres would gather. Most of my memories of Grandpa are from when he lived with Mom and Dad in Alaska. We had this one great day together, we ate lunch out and then went to a parade. He really wanted to have a family reunion, so we planned it together, and he was so happy that it actually happened. He also came to Detroit with Mom and Dad for a week and we took him to the Henry Ford museum. He shared a lot of his memories of the "old days" with us there. The last time I saw Grandpa was this summer. Robert and Evelyn took us to see him at the nursing home and we all went out to eat. Then we went back and hung out with him in the courtyard and he watched the children play. Cigar smoke and button up sweater vest, square dancing, and camping will always remind me of Grandpa. My redheaded daughter is an everyday reminder of Grandpa's love of redheaded Grandma as is my inability to eat wheat. I remember Grandpa groaning about all those rice cakes:) We will miss you Grandpa Jack. I'm glad we have some sweet memories that can live on in our hearts.

Happy Birthday Halle

Happy Birthday to our sweet two year old. We had a little party for Halle with some of our friends. I actually made a layered birthday cake.

Halle for a very brief moment wore her fancy party hat.

O.k. Leann- you think your family birthday pictures are bad? Try this one on for size:) This was the best one!

Freda and Martha

Warren, Elizabeth, Brooke, and Lauren

Donna, Howard, Jack, Alexander, Celerino, Marcos, and Mary also came but I didn't get any good pictures. Actually, I have a great one of the Laws, but it will only upload sideways- fellow bloggers, what is up with that?

So we head into the year of the terrible and terrific twos. Wish us luck, we will need it with this feisty little redhead!

A Magical Midwinter Break

We went to Durango during the boy's midwinter break. It was one of those crazy, spur of the moment trips. Amazingly, Trevor had enough frequent flier miles from his China trips to fly us all out first class. The boys loved having a row all to themselves and we loved the flight attendents who took care of them the whole trip. We had a great weekend with Ron and Jan before they had to go to the Builder's convention. They let us use their condo while they were gone (Thank you!). It was the perfect set up for skiing with kids. The ski resort had a great daycare that we put Halle in a few mornings. We skied with the boys in the morning and then Trevor would hit it hard by himself in the afternoon while the kids and I relaxed. We had some really nice times with Aunt Bernie and Uncle Donald also. Thank you for the delicious meals, Aunt Bernie!

Grandma Jan looking especially cute while doing the dishes

Halle must have thought Grandpa Ron looked lonely so she gave him her dog to sleep with.

There was so much snow!

Connor and Dillon

Dillon hanging out at Hoody's

Grandma and the kids

Halle Aspen ready to go to daycare

Another beautiful Colorado day

Trevor's extreem patience skiing with me all these years has finally paid off. I can now confidently ski blues, which means he doesn't have to walk with his snowboard!

My little boys are super skiers! Dillon skied blacks and deep powder with Trevor. He also skied with Quinn and Holly. Connor skied down everything we did without the harness this year. Now if he would just quit chewing on his glove and look up, I could really relax.

It snowed 2 feet one day. We had a great time playing in it.

Halle really wanted to ski! We will probably start her next year with the harness.

On our way to the airport we stopped to see my cousin Robb and his wife, Dawn. We finally were able to meet their sweet little guy!

Something froze over

We had Sean and Stacie for dinner one evening while we were staying at Ron and Jan's condo. It was so great to see them and meet their precious daughter. Katie James

I'm so glad that I lived to see the day that Sean had a baby in his arms and a burp cloth on his shoulder! Sean says that if he knew babies were this much fun he would have started a lot sooner..................we know what you mean Sean!

A Double Digit Dillon

January 28th..............................Happy Birthday Sweet Dillon!

Where has the time gone? It seems like yesterday that Trevor and I first became parents to this sweet little boy with giant chocolate chip eyes. Now that little boy is in the double digits! Dillon had a few school friends over to go sledding. These are the friends that have passed the "nice to the little brother" test. They are really a nice group of kids. A strange thing to me about having a ten year old is that I vividly recall being ten. Do you?

Dancing Halle Video

To see an adorable video of Halle as a dancing princess ...check out Brenda and David's blog!