Oh Baby!!!

Cale and Melody have had their baby. Finn Daniel was born on March 18th, weighing in at 8 lbs 3 oz and 22 inches long. Logan and Caden really love their newest cousin. Congratulations Cale and Melody.

The Funeral

I rained and rained on us at the Salt Lake City Cemetery on the day of Carlos' funeral. I wanted was looking at the pictures and remembered something that Logan did. I decided to post about it because this is a close to a journal as I have.

We were nearly the last people to leave the cemetery. Ryan's mom was driving with us. As we headed back to the car to leave, Logan turned around and ran back to Carlos' grave. I didn't know what he was doing, but I just waited. He took a yellow rose from one of the arrangements and took it to Derek's headstone. He set it down on the headstone, stood and looked at it for a moment and then walked to the car with me.

Caden was a good kid for Aunt Carlie and Uncle Steve. She had 3 two year olds all day long.

Carlos Bitner Dunford

Ryan's dad passed away on Sunday, January 18th. He died of complications related to Congestive Heart Failure. He really had a rough year in 2008 and had been on Hospice for a few weeks. Logan was a little sad, but he handled it all very well. Caden thinks that we left Grandpa at the new church (the mortuary) and when we went to the viewing all he could say is that, "his head is dead." I heard so many people make comments about how different the body is without it's spirit, I think this was Caden's way of expressing that same thing. Caden also wanted to know where Grandpa's legs were. The funeral director did a great job talking to the kids about death and showed them where Grandpa's legs were. He was asking all the grandchildren who was in heaven with Grandpa. Some replied Jesus, and God. Caden said that the Power Rangers were in heaven with Grandpa. Now he has the energy to play with them.

The poem on the cover of the program for his funeral contains a poem that was written by his grandmother when he went on his mission. It was really cool that they were able to find it.

Must be Santa...

Waiting in line to see Santa for one hour.....$4.50 (we bought cookies and a drink)

Purchasing the pictures on a flash drive.....$24.99 (Sucker will now be spelled C-A-R-R-I-E)

Pictures of your kids with Santa...Priceless (I guess)

I did get a very beautiful one hundred and twenty eight megabyte thumb drive with a beautiful green ribbon. It's really "schnazy".

Logan told Santa he wants a Lego Spiderman Mini-figure to replace the one his little brother lost, and the rest is "Santa's choice". Good, because Santa has already purchased many items.

Caden told Santa he wants an airplane. When asked what kind, he says..."a big one". Hey Santa, bring us a Lear Jet!

You can track Santa's journey and see the countdown to Christmas on http://www.noradsanta.org/

Oh Thistlehair the Christmas Bear...

We all love this Christmas song thanks to Aunt Lana. Ryan put up our Christmas Tree and started to decorate it while I was at work the day after Thanksgiving. Poor Caden sees it as pure torture that there were so many balls, but Mom and Dad won't let him throw them (at least when they see him try). I removed all the glass balls and we will start over later.

We raked leaves today. Logan and Caden had fun playing in them while I tried to coax them into a bag (the leaves, not the boys).

The end of an era...

Now that my grandma's second husband has married again my mom and her siblings have been closing out the house they grew up in. It's funny how just walking into that house makes me feel eight years old all over again. I remember making birthday cards from the stuff in Grandpa's desk, parties in the backyard and "tinkering" in the shed. There was a clay indian in my Grandpa's bathroom that glowed. It was a Sunday afternoon favorite. He also had a vial of a silver liquid (I now know it is Mercury) that was fun to watch roll around and hold (exept we now know it causes cancer.) There was not really a finished basement, but a big piece of the floor that lifted up in the kitchen to let you in the cellar and crawl space. I should have taken a picture of that. We made Grandpa take us downstairs virtually every time we visited. It was a novelty.