Sanford

#mortensenreunion2019

I (we) came home with our buckets filled.  I love our Mortensens.  I love being around them.
Just an itinerary and then I wanted to highlight reel.

Our drive there was one of my least favorites to date in our family.  SOOOOOO much fighting and a high blow up with Aubrie that did not go well and ended up with her phone gone indefinitely and sad Aubrie and sad parents.  We got to Tyla's at 10ish on Wednesday night and Teija and Chas and family were already there. We gave hugs and unpacked the car and went to bed.  (Sleeping on an air mattress with Ryan=no bueno, sleeping on a partially deflated air mattress with Ryan--especially no bueno.)  Thursday morning we just played all day at their house.  Dirtbikes, bikes, baseball, lots of cousins. That afternoon we went over to the ballfield behind the church and played a baseball game.  AT 5:00 everyone had arrived (we counted it up--there were just over half of the first cousins there with their families) and we met at the park for a bbq, vb, basketball and just playing.  It was a blast.  So many people to catch up with and talk to--Kelli, CLint and Lawant, Sheree, Kayla, Kelsi, and Mike, etc.   Once it got dark, a few families had bought lots of fireworks and we spent 1.5 hours lighting it up.  It was so much fun!  Sometimes the big fireworks are so fun and sometimes its fun to do the work ourselves.

Friday we all met up for breakfast at the church and talked and talked.  We went to Alamosa and played at a stake center all-day--mountain ball, whiffle ball, huge water fight (off and on all day--Neal and crew started it of course), lots of catching up and Tyla, Trina and I running away from all the 8-9 year olds that were soaking us all day.   We all ate dinner and then we had rented out Splashland, natural hot springs converted into a pool with slides, diving boards, etc.  It was so awesome!

Saturday we rode dirtbikes, had lunch at the church altogether and then about 25 of us all got on dirtbikes, four-wheelers, and trucks and rode down to McIntire Springs and saw the mansion, drank out of the springs, etc.    Saturday night we ate dinner, had a slide show while Marsha, Lois, Gordon (via phone) and Neal all narrated.  Then we played games at the church.  Last second I told everyone to be at Rod and Jan's at 10:00-adults only for a meeting--and that ended up being one of my favorite parts of the reunion.  We all teased, laughed, shared etc. I love our cousins!  We all decided to do a reunion every other year and do it on the 4th of July weekend (Wed-Sat).

Aubrie played with Teija, Natty and a few other cousins the whole time, Robbie with Carson and Austin.  Hallie with Emmajane and then she finally met Kenzie (Ashlee's daughter who happens to have the exact same age and birthday as Hallie) and they became inseparable. Blake played with lots of different cousins/second cousins and Clara and Gracie were inseparable all weekend. 

Luke did decent at sleeping.  It was a lot of driving but always sooooo worth it. 

Reactive and proactive

I have been absolutely almost 100 % reactive in life in the last year.  I do what needs to be done in front of me.  I am slowly trying to be a little more proactive but it's slow coming.  One of the counselors in our RS told me today that they are going to switch who I minister to (because I haven't been doing a very good job, and there is a little bit of needing to forgive on my part anyway).  And in an interview with the bishop today for my reccomend I told him that maybe I should be released from the Primary presidency because I am doing such a poor job of being involved.  The president, Marlene likes to wing it as she goes along and that is just hard for me right now.  I want to just have a set day that we do presidency meeting and have an agenda and go visit regularly on a specific time, but she doesn't operate that way and I often am distracted most of Primary with Luke and Ryan isn't always available to help.  Anyway, I feel alot of guilt about it (and so much of what the Presidency does has changed since the last conference anyway).  He said that he wanted to hold off because it will be three years in the fall and they are planning to change the whole presidency anyway.


June brought warmer weather, school ended June 6th which was exciting.  The boys went with Jordans to Lagoon that day and had a blast with Blake conquering some fears:)  and Hallie went to school and loved the last day and was sad to to say goodbye to Ms. Emily (who will now be Clara's teacher for kindergarten).  She loves Ms. Emily alot!
 We jumped into summer, with daily jobs, a little math and some music (Which has fallen to the wayside for sure!).  Robbie has lawns with LaMo, Hallie started babysitting regularly for Karla and Aubrie talked to Melissa Draper and ended up babysitting a few days a week for her while she teaches violin.  I am sooooo grateful for them to have some work to earn money and stay busy working too.  We've have spent a lot of time working in the yard and getting our garden ready.  It's all looking good.  We planted rasberries and a strawberry patch this year that hopefully will keep coming back.  I should be better about researching how to care for our grapevines and peach trees.  We've killed two of them now.  One is left of the peach trees. 

We just returned from a week long trip to reno, NV for Youth Nationals baseball for Robbie.  His team went 4-1 in the pool play and Robbie had some awesome hits--I think one game he had 7 RBI's.  He played great!  Then they had a bye for single elimintation tournament since they were 1st in the D3 level and then lost 12-0 when they played their "second" game.  He, Ethan and Andrew were chosen to play in the Allstar game which was the last night and Robbie's "team" got crushed.  He said it was so fun to play with so many good players though.  He had a hit and played catcher for 3 innings and he said the pitchers were so accurate, anywhere we motioned to throw to, they hit it.  He loved playing in it.   He sure does love baseball.  He is also in the middle of fundraising for football.  Elliot and Julio are planning to play with him and they all are selling beef jerky to raise their $300 to play.  I think they are going to have a blast playing together.  That all starts end of July. 
In Reno, we played at Tahoe, went to eat Thai with Doxeys, played alot at their house, went to Circus Circus, lots of games, did our weekly track running across the street from their house, and had lots of cousin time.  Doxeys were so patient with 12 kids in their house. Syd ended up coming home with us and Hallie and Aubrie stayed in Reno for a few days till Doxeys come to Utah on Tuesday.  And then we'll leave Wednesday morning and drive all day to Sanford.  I am sooooo excited to see everyone and also so not looking forward to another round of poor sleeping with Luke.  I was ready for him to get home and be in his bed.  But the Mortensens are so fun and Carl and Court are coming with their crew as well.  It'll be a blast!

I've gone to a chiropractor a few times in the last 2 weeks and I hope that it helps my body to feel stronger over the next month to have things back in place like they should be.  They also manipulated my ankle to break up scar tissue that had gotten worse through my pregnancy even.  I really hope that improves my range of motion.

Se la vie!