Today is my dad's birthday. He would be 69 years old. He was born in a family of 18 children. Twelve lived to adulthood. They all had red hair and lots of freckles.

My dad had the best sense of humor ever! He did the funniest things and we had the funnest times together!

I didn't really get to know him until I was about 14. My mom kept him out of my life until then. Once I got to know him and spend time with him, I started spending summers with him and staying with him every chance I got. Since my birthday is in December, during the summer, he would have a half-birthday for me. Half a cake, half my present, we had a good time!

I remember when Blaine and I were first dating and I was taking him home to meet my dad. I KNEW I shouldn't have called and told him I was bringing someone home to meet him!! The more I thought about it, the more worried I was and more sure I was that he was going to do something to totally embarrass me! I warned Blaine all the way there to expect anything....be prepared....don't let him scare you.... etc.

So we got to dad's...I walked in the door... and there sat my dad in the living room...in a lawn chair... in his underwear... his dentures not in his mouth... a fruit crate next to his chair....a can of beer on the crate... wearing socks and flip flops....and not a stick of furniture to be found anywhere in the living room!! I about died!!

I immediately said, "Dad, where is the furniture?" He stood up, came over, hugged me close and said in the worst possible southern accent ever..."now, honey....you know your daddy ain't got no furniture...there's no sense putting on like we got nice stuff just cuz you got yourself a boy." OH MY GOSH!! I didn't know whether to laugh, cry or choke him!!

Blaine just stood there very politely and tried not to laugh! After my dad was finished having his fun... he put his teeth back in, got dressed and he and Blaine went next door to the neighbor's shed and brought all the furniture back to the house!

I remember after we were married, I took the kids and was spending a week with Dad. The last time we would spend together... He took Travis to the sale barn for the day. Oh the fun they must have had. Travis was about 3 and he kept him out all day long! By the time they got home, we sat down to dinner and poor Travis fell asleep at the table and fell out of his chair! Grandpa wore him out! He doted on Travis and adored Amber and Tama and always wanted to spend time with them.

We were lucky enough that when Travis was just a baby, my dad, my aunt Mary (his sister), and my Uncle Ed (his brother) were all working road construction in Riverton (building the Sand Draw cut-off road) and parked their trailers at our house. What a great time that was in my life!

In January 1984, my dad, my hero, the man I thought would never leave...died. He was 44 years young. They said he had an aneurysm burst in his brain after surgery. I don't believe that. I think something happened from the surgery they did on his back two weeks earlier. Someday we will know the truth. It doesn't matter now. Either way, I lost my dad and my kids lost their grandpa before they ever got to know him.

I had wonderful aunts and uncles that tried to fill the void and make sure my children knew the Cole side of their family and made sure they knew all about their grandpa and what a great man he was. My Uncle John was so much like my dad! He was a wonderful surrogate grandpa for my kids! Uncle John left this world much too soon as well though and I miss him daily.

After Blaine and I went through the temple, we were doing some of my family's work in Billings in the temple. We were doing baptisms for my family when our nephew, Scott, was reading the names, one after the other... then he stopped, he looked at me...he said, "Aunt Kathy, was your dad's name James Luke Cole?" I said, "yes, it is" He said, he is here with us, and he is accepting this work. We did over 100 names that day. Scott had no idea who my dad was, it was the spirit testifying to him and letting me know, through Scott and the work we were doing, that my dad was there and that he loves me. I have felt my dad with me several times through the years and I know he watches over me and my family.

I miss my dad every day. So many things I want to share with him, so many times I wanted to ask his advice, so many times my son reminds me of him, so many times I have repeated one of his silly sayings or told one of his silly stories to someone.... I am so thankful for the knowledge I have that there is life after death and that I will see him again. I look forward to that day!

Happy Birthday, Daddy. I love you.

Ramblings on a Sunday Evening...

This past week was spent catching up at work, at home and with our church callings. Work has been pretty busy lately and things piled up in a hurry. It took me until Friday to finally find my desk!

We had a great time with the grands and kids over Thanksgiving and miss them terribly now. I can't wait for them to come to our house over Christmas! They all fly in to Phoenix on Christmas night, and get to stay with us until January 2 and 3rd! We have several fun things planned. The boys are going to build us a lodge pole bed, the girls and I are going to do some canning and the grands are going to play outside without wearing coats and snow shoes!!

I have my kids coerced into family pictures and have bribed them with going to Amazing Jakes after the picture sitting! Last year we went there and had a blast!

I have so much to do to get the house ready for their arrival! I don't know if I will get it all done, but I'll give it a good shot!

Not much to say this week, so I will just post a bunch of pictures of our latest adventures! Enjoy!

Thanksgiving is Over---Bring on Christmas!!

We had a great Thanksgiving! This year we were lucky enough to be able to have time with family on three seperate celebrations! We had our early Thanksgiving with Wade and Steph (you can read all about it below), then we went to Wyoming and had the BIG Thanksgiving dinner with Blaine's family, then on Friday we went to Thermopolis to celebrate with my mom.
The grands were all wonderful and we enjoyed them very much! They are growing by leaps and bounds and are all as cute as can be! Kolby and Abbie picked up right where they left off the last time they played together. Baylee and Abbie had fun playing together and are becoming fast friends. Taylor and Kallie played a little together but mostly kept their distance afraid one or the other of them would take a toy or something.
Blaine's parents are sure looking their age. His mom is not doing well at all right now. She had a little fall one day and it takes her awhile to recover from that. His dad is doing pretty well and taking care of her as much as he can.
My mom is doing pretty well. She is just getting over a bad cold but enjoyed the great grands very much. We took them swimming and to the dinosaur museum which they loved. Abbie has decided she wants to be a palentologist.
Travis and Robin contracted some bug that was going around and had a sick day. Unfortunately it was on the way home. Travis slept all the way home, Robin slept most of the next day. I'm glad I was here to help take care of them and take care of the kids.
Tama and Karlo haven't gotten it yet, but Kallie is a little sick today poor baby.
We returned to Cheyenne on Saturday and drove home in snow! The top of Elk Mountain was slick, black ice and blowing snow. I was way glad Blaine was driving and we were in Travis' four-wheel drive truck!
Today the sun is shining but it is still way too cold for this Arizona Grandma! I'm sad to leave the grands, but I am looking forward to returning to the warmth of the desert!
While we were gone. Amber and Terri decorated the house for Christmas. I like it when she decorates it and I don't have to be there. Believe me, it's for the best! That way, she isn't yelling at me about the way I do it and I don't have to get frustrated (because we all know I don't yell! haha!) about the way she is doing it. I like it when I can just go home and the Christmas elves have all the work done!
Well, we are off to Taco Johns one more time before heading for Denver to the airport! Until next time, keep your face to the sun and bloom where you're planted!

Early Thanksgiving

We had an early Thanksgiving dinner yesterday with Amber, Wade and Stephanie and the kids. It was great! Amber has to work so won't be able to join us in Wyoming, Wade and Steph will be in Yuma with their families there. So we wanted to have a family thanksgiving together.
I made ham, jalapeno poppers, and little smokies, Steph made funeral potatoes and pretzel raspberry salad (both of which were AWESOME!), Terri brought rolls, and Blaine made a dessert in the dutch over called Almost Pumpkin Pie which was to die for! He is really getting into cooking in the dutch oven. I may just turn the spatula over to him and he can do ALL the cooking at our house!
Stephanie also brought a 'friend'. She went to a party in Yuma for the opening of the Twilight movie and won the grand prize which was a life-size stand up photo of EDWARD!! We set him up in the dining room to watch us eat (we all know vampires don't eat!) and Steph and I took our pictures with him! Way Fun!! Blaine and Wade were jealous of Edward though and kept trying to do mean things to him so we had to remove him from their evil ways!
Bryce had a good time. He found a John Wayne movie called Big Jake and thought it was the Big Jake from Jay Jay the Jet Plane fame, but was not very impressed when he put it in and sat down to watch it! :-)
McKenna is having a band and choir concert on December 16 that we will be attending. She was singing to us most of the evening. They both wanted to go see the horse again, but it was too dark too quickly. Next time...
Wade had a great day yesterday! He was feeling very well. He ate more than he has in three months which is great considering he has dropped over 50 pounds since September! If you ever want to lose weight and have no motivation, Wade suggests the Cancer Diet! He had more energy, looked good, and really seemed to have a good time yesterday! It will be a good memory to hold onto!
Steph had a good time yesterday too. They were both happy and relaxed which makes us feel great! I took several pictures which I will post when I have time to stop and download them.
We are off to Wyoming tonight. We fly into Denver at 8:30 and Travis will pick us up and we will stay at their house until Wednesday. Then it's off to Riverton and Thermopolis for the Thanksgiving festivities! I'm way excited to see the kids and grands! (oh, and the rest of the family too)!
Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving and count your many blessings!

Wordless Wednesday on a Thursday!!

I can never seem to get these done on Wednesdays! Oh well... better late than never! Enjoy!

We Are Very Thankful for Our Blessings!!!

Monday night we had the phone call no grandparent EVER wants to get! Travis called and said they were taking Taylor to the hospital. He had just hit her with the car!
Oh my goodness! Blaine was very calm, I was ready to get in the truck and head for Wyoming! Blaine said, "let's wait and see how she is" Travis said she seemed to be okay, but they were doing a CT scan to make sure. I told Blaine, "it takes FOREVER for a scan! I could be in New Mexico by the time they get the results!" I HAD to get there! I HAD to be there for my grandbaby, for my son, for their family! I HAD to see that she was okay!
Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed (Blaine is always much cooler than I am when it comes to crisis), we said a very heartfelt prayer for her and waited for Travis to call back. The CT scan was fine. She was fine. Just a little scratched up with a fat lip and nose. Thank Heavens for answered prayers!
Travis told us what had happened later. They were all outside playing and working in the yard, he was going to take some things over to his friend's house real quick and Robin was taking the kids in the house. Robin was in the house and taking Baylee to the potty. She thought Kolby and Taylor had come in with her or were on the deck, Travis thought so too. HOWEVER, Taylor was not in the house. She was by the front bumper of the car and when Travis looked behind him and turned to backout, the front bumper pushed Taylor to the ground and she face planted into the hard dirt.

Of course her nose and mouth were bleeding which scared them to death! So they loaded everyone up and headed the 20 some miles into town to the ER. Robin had to remind Travis on the way that if they got in a wreck for going 95 miles an hour, (that's my boy!) it wouldn't help things much.

They got to the ER and they cleaned Taylor up and tried to do a CT scan. Of course Taylor does not understand the concept of "you have to hold very still while these strangers take you away from your parents and put you on this hard table and shove you in this huge tube". So they tried taping her head down! Yeah... that worked!! NOT! Our fighting Taylor does not stand for being taped down! She ripped the tape off and sat right up before they could get back to their computer! So they had to give her some Benedryl and Tylenol with codeine to relax her enough to get the scan done.

Once they determined she was fine, they figured it would be a good idea to keep her overnight just because the kids live so far away from the hospital, Taylor is only 2, and they had given her drugs to sedate her. So Robin and Taylor had a sleep over in the hospital while Travis took Kolby and Baylee home. I'm sure neither Travis nor Robin got any sleep that night! Taylor seemed to enjoy it though. They have a pretty cool play room there!

The best thing is that Taylor is just fine. She is a tough girl and such a sweet angel. (With the cutest little bum ever!)
Prayers were answered, Blessings were given and received. We are so thankful that it wasn't as bad as it could have been. Now we are just praying that Travis can realize it was an accident that could happen to anyone. He is really beating himself up about it.

It has made us all even more aware of how important family is and how everything can change in the blink of an eye. I am so blessed with the kids I have. They are all there for each other and love each other very much! Tama said that she is so glad we will all be together next week for Thanksgiving because she just really needs to give her brother and Robin a hug! It makes my heart swell! (and my eyes water!)

I made Robin send me pictures of Taylor as soon as she could. I HAD to SEE her (since Papa wouldn't let me drive up there to make sure she was okay!) and Robin is so sweet, she humors me and sends me pictures whenever I want! I love her! She is more my daughter than an 'in-law'! Travis chose very wisely when he chose her!

Family...... isn't it about TIME.....