Joshua's Baptism

Joshua Michael Barlow was baptized and confirmed a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints on Saturday, January 15th 2011. Congratulations sweetie!!

Dad performed the baptism and confirmation. Uncle Jon, Grandpa Jaussi, Grandpa Barlow, Uncle Tony, and Uncle Daniel were in the confirmation circle. Grandpa Jaussi and Grandpa Barlow were witnesses for the baptism.

Joshua's best friend and next door neighbor, Mitchell, got baptized the same day. We had a joint program. What handsome young men!

Grandpa Jaussi presented Joshua with the beginnings of an impressive missionary savings fund.

Cousins, cousins, cousins! How we love them!

After the service we had a lovely lunch at the Mayfield Town Hall. It was then that I realized this is the first real "right of passage" for any of the children in our family. It was a wonderful, emotional, and happy occasion.

Handy Man

I love that I have a handy husband. In our time together he has fixed so many things I loose count. He has saved us so much money by doing jobs that anyone else would hire out. He landscapes, he does electrical, he repairs walls, he can do plumbing, he fixes cars, he can install anything. Mostly it is his no-fear attitude and sound mechanical understanding. I can only think of one time that he took something apart and couldn't quite get it back together the right way. That's a pretty good track record.

Anyway, these are all the things that were running through my mind to calm my anxiety as I watched my husband take apart my car piece by piece. The kitchen looked like an auto salvage yard. The inside of the car looked eerily like the terminator. Why was he doing this you ask? All for the cause of having a DVD player on the ceiling. Santa brought us the unit for Christmas knowing full well that it would mean a very big project for Michael.

Long story short, the car did go back together again. We have a wonderful DVD player in the car for those long drives, and I have a happy husband who has completed yet another impossible handy man task for the family.

Caitlin

What a sweetie

she smiles

she flirts

she cuddles

she loves

she eats with gusto

she sleeps like the dead

she has cut a tooth

she lights up our family

Joshua's 8th birthday bash

This year for Joshua's Birthday party we took a group of kids to "Jumping Jacks" just south of Provo. Our neighbors boy, Mitchel, turned eight the same week so we did a duel party for the two of them. What fun we had! The kids (and adults) had a fabulous time romping in the inflatables, eating pizza and cupcakes, and playing with friends.

Joshua and Mitchell -- BFF!!

The men mostly liked the pizza - something for everyone!

Merry Christmas!!

Christmas morning is so magical! The boys were spoiled with Santa gifts and gifts from doting relatives. We had a blast opening presents in our new pajamas. Joshua got transformers and a race track, Andrew got a pillow pet and tent, I go picture frames and a griddle, and Mike got a nook digital reader. Of course there were all kinds of other neat things and we all had a good time fiddling with our new stuff all day.

Christmas Eve

This Christmas Eve was a particularly special one for our family. This is the first year the Barlows have come to our house to share the evening with us, and it is also the first year we have been privileged to have a visit from Santa himself.

Mayfield has a wonderful tradition. Every Christmas eve Santa visits every house in the town. In order to do this, several volunteers int eh town spend Christmas eve out and about instead of a t home. Mike helped out this year and I so wish I had a picture! But the Santa that visited us was fabulous. He talked with the kids and told us about his reindeer, and then gave everyone a sack of goodies. It took Andrew a while, but in the end he decided that our Santa really was the real Santa.

While Mike was gone I read "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever" out loud, and Grandpa Barlow read "Twas the Night Before Christmas" to everyone. Of course we had wassail, chips and dips, chocolate, and all kinds of goodies.

Once Mike got back we held our traditional Christmas eve pageant. It was a very nice one. Andrew was the wise man, with Grandpa as his camel. Grandma is always the angel of the Lord. Becky was Mary, Joshua was Joseph, and Caitlin was baby Jesus. Daniel did a fine job as the shepherd and I played the part of the inn keeper. Michael narrated and directed.

All in all it was a wonderful Christmas Eve.

Cache Valley Came With Us

We had a very impressive snow storm a few days before Christmas. Our neighbor says he hasn't seen this much snow from one storm since 1997. Our response was that we usually see three of these storms a year in Cache Valley! The power was knocked out for 14 hours which made us grateful to be living in an adobe house with walls a foot thick - the temperature only dropped 6 degrees the whole day. We had a great time playing in the snow, shoveling, and living without all the electronic things we take for granted every day. Our neighbors Mitchell and Lincoln came to help with the snowman, and then we all enjoyed some luke-warm hot cocoa which was all we could muster out of what warm water was left in the water heater!