Thursday, May 28, 2009

Dan and Andrea plus 1 and Cabining




My life long friend Dan, (well friend since high school anyway, and THAT is a funny story)
and his wife Andrea just had a baby! Her name is London Rose and here she is in all her fabulousness!

They were up at our cabin [part of Memorial Day weekend and here visiting from Phoenix and we had a great time! We were lucky enough to get them for one night (they had a very busy schedule with friends and family and baby showers and meet and greets, etc) and we tried to keep their time with us low stress and relaxing. You cant help but do that at the cabin though! I cooked a "bit" and we had Cinnamon Rolls with Cinnamon Almond Frosting. Homemade Mac and Cheese, Carmel Brownies, and Caramel Popcorn. Yum! I'll post those recipes on my recipe blog too. Most are there already.

Cameron with London, he LOVED her. He asked me, "Mommy, is this new baby for US?"


Kevin and London, she really was a great baby!


AWWwwww...... so cute! We can't wait for them to come back again! I miss Dan, he's so fun and so great to talk to. He's the best person to talk to about stuff that annoys me. HE GETS IT. I tell ya what, it's always a relief to talk to him. You know? I always feel better when I do. He appreciates my quirky, unorthodox personality that I hide from a lot of people. Oh, did I mention we are cousins? Yup, second cousins to be exact. Our grandparents were siblings so we had the same Great grandparents? Yeah. I think that's it. Anyway, he's obligated to deal with me because we're RELATED!

I was in awe of the vivid colors up at the cabin this week, it was AMAZING. Since my eye surgeries last year I am enjoying more and more of what this world has to show me. The drives up and back and all over these last two weeks were a testament to how blessed I am that my surgeries went better than planned. I was seeing so crystal clear, and better than I ever could have imagined. It was the first time with no contacts at the cabin, so dust didn't bother me. The wind didn't bother me, and I couldn't stop just looking at the scenery. I can even see to CLEAN better. (which we did a lot of this weekend at the cabin) Spring cleaning. ICK.

The leaves had all grown in since CJ was there just last week. The contrast between the bright green aspens against the dark shady pines was really breathtaking. I couldn't capture it very well by my camera, Like my friend CJ says, "Sometimes, it's just better in your head" You can kind of tell with the pics of Dan's family.above.

We love it up there, a home away from home, an escape to fresh air, lots of space, it's a blessing we will never forget.




View from above, in the fall, courtesy of our friend John's fabulous talent.



This is a pic from my drive home though I-84 approaching Mountain Green. This drive is the most breathtaking of all and I get to do this like twice a month or more in the summer. It's amazing, the Morgan Valley, Red Rock formations, Devil's Slide, Echo, Rockport Reservoirs, Coalville area, Weber Canyon, Wow!!

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Cameron and Nate the Great

So, boys wrestle, I know of this phenomenon


Cameron will someday appreciate how tolerant his brother is,


Because I would be very irritated about now....


.......Nathan?

Um, are you okay?


Oh, well, if it ends in a hug, I think we've survived this round.

Until next time....

Monday, May 18, 2009

C.J.'s Visit





We had our good friend C.J. out here from Chicago this weekend. It was his first time to Utah and he loved it! "Yes!" It's nice to show people our beautiful mountains and valleys close to home. It's fun to see our place from other people's eyes that way. He enjoyed the scenery and commented often about how much he liked what he saw, and that he understood why we loved it here so much etc.
We got to show him our favorite places to drive. We went to Bountiful and drove up to the Temple to see the view of the Great Salt Lake. We drove down south to Thanksgiving Point's Gardens, then we drove through Provo Canyon to Kamas then to our cabin. We spent the night there, mom watched the boys for us, thanks mom! C.J. cooked us a fabulous dinner over the fire and we looked at the amazing stars (Beautiful! Amazing layers and layers of stars, we could see shooting stars and we tracked satellites too, I've never seen that before) We took him up to Smith and Morehouse Reservoir and we went on a little hike up there. We drove home on 8o/84 through Morgan and Weber Canyon.
That night we had dinner with my family and then went and played Rock Band with our good friends Matt and Teri which is always a blast!
I was hoping to take him on the Alpine slide or up to the Tram at Snowbird or drive the Alpine loop or Timpanogos Cave, but all of those things aren't open/accessible until after Memorial day. Darn snow.

Bridal Veil Falls
We've missed C.J., he's very generous and helpful. Fun to be around. He's interested in photography so he had a great time shooting different things he saw. He also replaced two belts on our car while he was here (Bless him!) and pretty much paid for gas and groceries/food too. (What a Sweetheart)
We had a great time! He says he'll be back so we didn't scare him away with our Sunday afternoon chaos. I cooked a bunch (which you all know I love to do) and he enjoyed that too.
Next time he'll bring his 5 year old, Christopher, we'll have a great time with the kids, tons of things for them to do here too! :)
Until then, we'll miss you C.J.!



Here's some of my attempts.....I need a better camera....Waaahhaaahhh!!






My new favorite flower! A hybrid daisy, Citrus daisy? Anyway, Pretty!!






This purple one is a tulip! Go figure they were that pretty when open!

This next one wont turn right side up nomatter what I try. Weird. It was my favorite too.


Saturday, May 2, 2009

Way to Go Nathan!!

So remember an earlier post where I told you Nathan LOVES Woodshop and I showed you just a couple of his projects?? Well apparently his hard work has paid off....


Well, his school just had their "Teachers Choice Awards" and Nathan got the only one from his shop teacher, Mr. Johnson.


(Apparently it's pretty tough to deserve an award from Mr. Johnson, according to the school counseler who announced Nathan's name)


Here it is! And Here he is!


Nathan and the Award Handcrafted by Mr. Johnson



Presentation, Some of the Teachers are in the background

Here's the Detail, "In recognition of being the hardest worker and in doing a superb job"


Of course we were all there to cheer him on!
CONGRATS NATHAN!!

Our New Neice!

It's been cool to say I'm an aunt, though I wish I had more time to be a lot more "involved" in "aunting." We've had Neices and Nephews for over 5 years now. Now there are 9 grandkids in the Broadbent family. That's 8 added in the last 5 years including Cameron. Poor Nathan has 8 years, quite a gap, between him and is oldest cousin, Shayla.

Introducing Tianne!

I love her pudgy cheeks :)



Isn't she Beautiful?? Congrats Lynette and Brian!!



Cameron Adores her!