Hey everyone! We are trying to decide when to bless Lindley. We're hoping to do it over Christmas as everyone (almost everyone) will be here. Anyways if you could let us know the dates of when you'll be in town (as of now, we know things may change) we'd really appreciate it!

Love you all!

Wedding Day!

I hope emily doesn't mind that I am going to share some pictures of her in her wedding dress before she does!! I just want to celebrate the fact that em and jim are getting married today!! Plus she looks so beautiful in these pictures.

Just for you Melissa : )

Eli likes to "wash" things.... his bed, animals, cars. (And I'm not really sure why but he always calls the flip 'baby'....)




So Eli had been "helping" me make dinner but got bored. Apparently I really need to organize our wee pantry. Oh, and that's an apron he is wearing... in case you couldn't tell...

July 28-31, 2011 - McDonald Family Reunion

'This is The Place' Utah.

This really IS The Place when my family is here.

There isn't a better party out there! McDonald Family Reunion.

We spent some time in Heber, but this day - we visited the historical site of 'This is The Place'

My family is the best thing on the planet.

Let the Circus begin...

Kate & Parker.

Mom & Dad. Celebrated 35 years this year!

Elijah has become The Center of The Universe in our family.

Only grand-kid, only nephew. He's THE most perfect baby boy. He looks just like Jon when Melissa & I used to tote him around, dress him up, feed him dirt.

He was the baby when we played house.

I only wish there was as little competition around as there was when Jon was 2.

We're all learning to share Eli.

Jon, getting a shave.

I think we were all excited to see him get a real shave - and then we found out it was a theatrical show with a butter knife.

And then Bo wanted a piece of the action.

Handsome Dad.

Bo, consistently thinks babies and little kids are 'annoying'. But Eli has been the exception, and I have a hunch....

He told me recently that he was SO happy when Eli was born because, finally he wasn't the youngest in the family.

This is just a random and terrible photo of me (and Elijah) after a workout.

I am not one of those girls that looks cute at the gym. ugh.

Ty & Parker playing Chess. Parker... always competitive.

I think Ty might actually have surprised Park... they both love a good run-for-their-money.

Who is winning in this moment??

Parker is about as cool as it gets, according to the boys.

Ahhhhh... Cake Pops.

Katie and i decided we needed to make Cake Pops. They sort of inadvertently became the eye of our hurricane weekend.

So typical of my sisters and I.

Emily: Katie, we left the cake pop stuff at the cabin! Should we turn around!?

Katie: Ahhhh... screw it.

(That's for you Kate)

They looked nothing like the ones we saw at Starbucks and Nordstrom... surprised?

And then I guess we all decided to try to force Eli to eat them.... I didn't realize until I looked at the photos. Ha!

These are the days.

Turkey Bacon

Jon gave Eli a snack at Nonnis house-turkey bacon- and he loved it! Once he was 'done' eating we found him rubbing the bacon on a foot (?) So i took it and put it back on the plate and told him that we don't put turkey bacon on our feet, we eat it. Next thing i know he has the bacon again and is rubbing it on the OTHER foot! Somehow manners have escaped him-refer to previous post : )

Table Manners

Apparently we have really lax table manners..... : ) And i love how un-enthusiastic his uh-oh is. It's SO not worth his time and effort : )

Mom & Dad Fly to Mexico - April 22-25, 2011

I still don't know how I did it but I convinced Mom & Dad to skip town spontaneously and hop in the plane headed for Mexico. I literally called them the evening before. Apparently after long discussion and some anguish about leaving behind bananas that would surely go bad if they went - they said yes!

Co-pilot Kent

The oxygen system in the back is old-school and very flattering as you can see.

Check out Mom wearing reading glasses on top of her sunglasses... ha!

Somehow she makes it work.

Landed in Mexico.

St. George, Nogales (AZ), Ciudad Obregon, Alamos.

Alamos, MX

Hacienda de los Santos

I admit, it was pretty awesome to have them all to myself :)

I don't know why Jim looks like that.

Touring the town.

Best trip ever.

Only thing missing was everyone else. I want to take us all there together some day... with more than a 24 hour notice of course!

Beans

Here are the bean pictures I promised. Also a good pic of my E.T. hands. These plants were the first to shoot up. Then they flowered these little purple flowers.


Out of the flower grows a bean.



Then the bean gets bigger. I actually didn't eat either of my beans (yes, there were only two). I let them grow and they turned yellow, as they were supposed to. Then I was so proud of them, I saved them and they dried up. When my snow pea grew, I ate it. But I don't have a picture of that one.

I think with full sun and larger pots (or in the ground), these would do really well.

baseball and cars

sorry I sound so bossy! --kate

monkey's runny nose

let him eat cake!

Sparr Collision

So, Mom was asking me, "What is Sparr Collision?" as referenced in Amy's most recent letter. In case you guys were wondering too, I thought I'd post a quick explanation. Sparr Collision is a recipe that I used to make on my mission. It was invented by Sister Farr and it contains spam, hence the name. This is the recipe. It's not good for you. I remember thinking it was going to make me fat, but I also secretly liked it. As I told Mom, I don't really eat spam when not in foreign island countries, where it is often greatly revered and where it's good to learn to appreciate it. But here's the recipe anyway, for your edification.

Sparr Collision

1 can of spam
6 potatoes sliced in circles
4 carrots sliced
2 C Baguio beans (green beans) chopped
1/2 C "cheeze" (kind of like Velveeta)
1/8 C butter

Boil potatoes, carrots, baguio beans with onions until partially soft. Leave water in. Add cut up spam (or ham). When soft, turn off heat and stir in cheeze and butter. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve over rice.

Mmmmm! Delish.

My Plants

After this paragraph, you'll have to read this post backwards for it to make chronological sense. I decided to finally post about my beautiful indoor garden, which I love to look at and to watch grow. I decided to plant a garden after I read an article (in the Ensign) about gardening in ususual spaces. None of them were about indoor gardens per se, but I was inspired and couldn't wait until I have a yard or a balcony. I started with a large variety of plants, but have pared it down to just a few, mostly herbs. Last night, I repotted my basil plants from their starter pots into ones in which they will most likely permanently reside. The above picture is of the biggest one from the top. It is looking good, and sprouting leaves on top of the big leaves as well as underneath. I love my novice gardening project. It makes me so happy to watch my little plants grow. I know that some of you out there in the family are more experienced gardeners than I, but I'm always telling someone about my plants, so I decided to finally post pictures of them. Here they are. The oldest pics are at the bottom, the newest at the top of the post. It's a quick tour and doesn't show all of the plants, but I'll post some more later.

Two basil plants and some dill behind.
This is the present state of the plants. In the foreground is a pot with chives and cilantro. Behind is the basil and dill.
These are some young tomato plants that I originally thought were basil. Mom straightened me out just by looking at these pictures. I subsequently discovered that the ones I thought were tomato plants were actually basil, so nothing lost.
My plants getting so big. I used to love to come home and look at how much they'd grown (not very much) while I was gone at school. It's a very zen thing to watch plants grow. Good for slowing down to the pace of the natural world. The big ones on the right are wax bean plants. They were the first to really shoot up. They also bore fruit: two wax beans to be exact. I know I have never been so excited about beans before in my life. I loved those beans. (Pics to come).

I was so excited when these little guys started coming up.
Beautiful little bright green stalks! These were the pea plants. They have actually born a little fruit, even inside the house! I'll post more pics to show those later. They're pretty cool.
Little greens popping up. It's amazing to watch little things take on life!
In the beginning....without form and void.


The starting materials. Always an exciting time.