Our Family Is Growing!

Our Family Is Growing!

We just heard within the past 2 weeks that 2 new grandbabies are "in the oven"!!! The Hurds and the Pollards will add to their families in early April and early June respectively! We know that a few more of our married children are planning to add to their families in 2010 as well, so our family might be growing more than we presently know ! How exciting! There may even be couple of wedding in 2010 for all we know! (Update as of 10/21/09 The Pollard family is going through some medical problems and a miscarriage :-( We are sad and our thoughts and prayers and support are with them. They are doing fine and understand that this is nature's way of dealing with problems sometimes. They are happy to have their sweet Brynlyn and hope to add to their family at some time in the future.)
During Fall break last week, we worked really hard on our back yard. We got the windmill water pipes unplugged with the help of 4 huge rigs and lots of sophisticated equipment, Craig got the solar panel tower welded and put up, the kids pulled weeds till their hands bled, and Kelli sneezed from all the dust and weed stuff in the air till her eyes swelled almost shut!! No pictures of any of this yet, but are forthcoming (minus the swelled eyes!)
Happy Halloween Everyone!

Still Feels Like Summer!

We haven't taken any pictures since we've been home from our RV vacation, so I thought I'd share a few more of those! We should be adding to our picture library real soon as fall is my favorite time of year and fall pictures show all the pretty colors that Arizona offers.
This pic to the right shows Weston holding an indian ruin in his hand! Well, at least it looks that way from this side of the camera!

The picture below shows 4 tired,sweaty, smelly hikers who just got to the Mesa Verde ruins. They don't know just how hot, tired, sweaty and stinky they will be after they have climbed UP the mile high trail!

A cute family picture below taken at the Riordan Mansion in flagstaff. We are all smiling

except for Weston!

Elise and Natty enjoying the scenery at the Painted Desert.

Grama & Grampa walking down the train tracks with the Brynnie grandgirlie! Good thing there was no train coming!!

Wow! September already?!

Just some more pictures to add to our blog!

Happy September

Fall is almost here! Wierd Weston playing Frankenstein with a few of his buds.

Four Generation picture of Brynnie, Jess, Beth, Kelli, Grama & Grampa Hansen taken this summer in Monticello, Utah

An Awesome pic Kelli took of a hummingbird in mid-flight in Alpine, AZ

Craig's latest weekend "hobby"--fixing all our broken down cars!!

Greasemonkey! (It was worse than it looks--you shoulda seen the back of his pants and shirt from laying on the garage floor!)

Another picture as evidence of what happens when a parent leave his camera unattended with 2 teenage girls in the house. Not sure what they ate---probably something GROSS!!

RV-in' it across 4 states

We had a great time on our RV vacation to the 4 Corners area these past 9 days! We left Tucson for Queen Creek and then headed to Monticello, Utah for a Hansen reunion and 24th of July celebration. It was wonderful seeing all the relatives that were there. Go Big Four Tractor! From there we drove through Cortez, CO and onto Lake McPhee where we spent the night and then on to Durango which is where the first picture is taken. We went swimming and enjoyed seeing/hearing the Silverton train go right past our RV park several times a day. Then, on to the lovely city of Farmington, New Mexico (cough, cough). We met some missionaries in our RV park and learned that this was part of the Albuquerque mission. We had fun exploring a children's museum there and tired Bryn out completely! Then, on the way to Shiprock, we got a little lost and had to backtrack through the rez about 20 miles. . .but we did get to see the rock (or shipwreck, as Craig calls it) and made it to the 4 Corners monument. We droveto Canyon de Chelly in Chinle and spent the night really roughing it with no hookups at Spider Rock campground. It was a beautiful campground and Weston built a lovely 2 story red sand castle that he topped with a cactus and got needles on every finger on his right hand! He won't do THAT again, I'll bet! Then on through the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest and some cool photos and then to a KOA in Flagstaff where our camping neighbors were a cross country track team from Mountain View High School in Mesa!! Small World! Nat and Leesy kept peeking out the windows at them---I wonder why?! Then on Friday, July 31, we drove back to Queen Creek and Sat. we turned our vacation home on wheels in. We were glad to sleep in our own comfy beds Saturday night and use a REAL flush toilet! Good Memories, Good Times!

This is our Cruise America RV parked in a beautiful spot in Durango, Colorado. It was a 30 footer that seated 9 and had the possibility of sleeping 8. With 7 adults + a baby for 2 of the nights and 6 adults + a baby for the rest of the trip, we were pretty crowded! We all loved the fact that we could use the bathroom while traveling (especially Natty!) and we didn't have to make any potty stops! We also enjoyed being able to cook our own meals in it although we did eat out a couple of times. We all even showered in it even though it only held 6 gallons of hot water at a time. I don't think anyone had to have a cold shower though!

This is the Blue Spruce House at Mesa Verde, Colorado--an ancient Anasazi ruin that we hiked down to (a vertical descent down and heck to climb back up!) and got to roam around in. That is rare that people are allowed in the ruins--usually we just had to look only, but we got to explore this one and it was way cool!

At Lake McPhee in Colorado, Natalie cooled off by reading her book IN the lake!

Leesy took Bryn out into the cold, but refreshing lake where Bryn promptly bit the dust and fell into the water and scraped her knees up on the rocks! It took her about 15 minutes before she would step foot in the water again, but she did!

Some of the gang at the Petrified Forest sitting on a petrified log/rock. Notice the happy smiling faces even though this is the 3rd National Park we visited! Kelli and Bryn stayed in the RV and enjoyed some 1 on 1 time together while everyone else traipsed to all the sights.

We took lots more photos, so if you want to see them, you'll have to come visit us in St. David!

Back from Girls Camp

Alpine, AZ--July 6-10, 2009

We love being in the cool pines but,

this is how we all looked at the end of the week after 4 days at girls camp!

It kinda makes ya stir-crazy!!!

This picture is of the stake leaders doing a bit of Michael Jackson's Thriller--notice the blue gloves on their left hands?! Pres. Kartchner, Merrill and Curtis got into the act too! It was pretty funny!

"Indiana Jones" and his 4th level gals and airplanes he had them make.


Miss Natalie on her horse "Waylon"! She also went Aussie style rapelling (as well as regular style), and "superman" traversing! Awesome! You Go Girl! (. . .and she was nervous about having to "rough it". . .)

On the way up to camp, Kelli was driving a load of 7 people plus a trailing luggage rack on the back when her car had a complete blowout of the back right tire going 75 mph---AAAAAAARRRRGGGGG!

Not just a flat tire, but a complete blowout along with a shredded to the metal tire, a ripped off side trim and a shattered right rearview mirror!!! It was pretty scary, but we are pretty sure she had some Heavenly help getting the car safely to the side of the road with no rim damage to the tire. 12 girls and 3 leaders waited on the side of the road for our hero--Bishop Jones--to come and rescue them! (The leaders tried to jack the car up to change the tire themselves, but it was so flat that they couldn't get the jack under the car safely and without going into oncoming traffic to jack up the other side.) Our Hero came with his floor jack, got the car jacked up, took the tire off, went into Wilcox (about 2 miles away), bought a new tire, came back and put it on. When we tried to start the car to be on our way, IT WOULDN"T START!!! The battery had died during all this trauma! So, we went on a hunt for jumper cables, but to no avail--no one had any! So, our Hero, drove back into Wilcox and bought some along with a new battery and some extra tools. Just as he was returning, the Highway Patrol FINALLY showed up and gave us a jump! (Our tax dollars at work!) Our Hero followed us to the next off ramp to make sure the car wouldn't give us any more trouble and then he turned around to go home. Thank goodness he was still at home when Kelli called at 7 am to come rescue us and thank goodness his boss said he could work from home that day rather than drive into Tucson after the rescue!

All went well on the ride home--no blowouts or dead batteries!!!

We loved going up to the cool mountains, but are glad to be home too!

The Dog Days of Summer are Here

Yes, the dog days of summer are here. The skies are gray and threatening rain, but never deliver! It just keeps getting hotter and more humid (is humider a word?!) Here is a picture is a quail family that frequents our birdfeeding area. The poppa bird is on the table keeping watch over the momma and babies that are feeding on the ground. If any other bird comes and tries to join them, poppa quail scares them away! Behind them is the beginnings of our garden which the birds like to eat from too! So far we have bellpeppers, green beans, corn, squash and assorted melons starting to grow. A little cottontail bunny that likes our garden ate our 2 strawberries that were growing. Oh Well!

ELISE IS HOME! Yep, Elise came back to St. David after her 6 month stint in So. Ca. with G & G Jones! We REALLY appreciate grama and grampa for taking such good care of her and we know you must be missing her. We are glad to have her back and right at this moment, she is playing the piano and singing at the top of her lungs---oh how we missed that!!!! (Teddy isn't impressed with her modeling pose in this photo!)

Before Natalie went to Idyho to visit her 3 sisters that deserted Arizona, she had a mishap on our scooter! She went around a sandy corner too fast and BIFFED IT! Right in front of a group of people to make matters worse! She was fine, but they kept asking! Her hand and knees did get a bit scraped up and here is the proof!! Hopefully by now both hands and knees and dignity are well on the way to healing!

OUCHIE!

Dead Windmill

Our windmill died :-(
While Craig was in Idaho and Kelli & Weston were in Queen Creek and only Natalie was home (but not at home at the time it fell), our windmill head bit the dust--literally!! We did some research and discovered that it weighs about 1300 lbs and costs $ 6,300 to replace!! We are going to hammer the dents out of it and put it back up as purely decorative--not functional--especially since we now have solar panels to pump our well water!!




While visiting Idyho, 2 girls (ages 25 and 21) got ahold of their dad's camera and decided to take some "glamour shots"!!! I guess dad's camera is too much of a temptation for even 20 something year-olds!! (what's that in your nose, V?!!)

Craig with his 3 beautiful grandgirls; Sydney, Tenley and Mallory. Cute Smiles!

We found a momma coyote and her 3 babies out in our front yard and Natalie and Weston thought it would be fun to howl at the moon with them. . .