Can you believe that this is only a fraction of Grandma's posterity?
We wore purple as a tribute to her
Andrew's sister Stephanie turned 40 while I was there and her husband, Sean, threw her a surprise birthday party at an Irish Pub. Josie and I went and had some yummy food and totally surprised Stephanie. They had a live bag piper playing and Josie fell asleep to his playing. The bag piper was playing when Stephanie walked in and she turned to her friend and said, "Hey these are the guys that played our [annual St. Patrick's Day] party." Her friend turned and looked at her and said, "I know." Then she looked around and realized that she knew everyone in the room and that her parents were even there. :)
We got notification that Andrew's Grandma Gardner passed away while I was on the airplane flying home. So I literally got home and unpacked just to repack to drive to Wyoming for her funeral. Andrew's grandma was a Marine so her funeral wasn't as lively as my grandma's but it was still a beautiful service. They did the traditional military funeral gun salute and firing at the graveside service, it really made an impression on me. Peter loved the snow, there was about 2 feet or more on the ground, but he wouldn't leave his gloves on so his hands got cold but he got upset when he had to come in and warm them up.
Grandma & Grandpa Gardner's wedding picture (they were both Marines)
I had a minor meltdown when my diaper bag went missing. Both Andrew and I searched the church high and low for it but couldn't find it. We were prepared to give it up as lost and just leave without it when we ran into Andrew's Aunt Ann and family at the restaurant in Afton. Originally we were going to eat at Rulon's Burgers (he won the Olympic medal for wrestling a few years back, he's Andrew's dad's cousin or 2nd cousin or something like that) but Andrew's brother's decided that they didn't want a burger from the same place you pump gas. I had noticed the restaurant on our trip through Afton and suggested it as our alternative eating place. Everyone agreed and when we walked in who was sitting there waiting for their food but Andrew's Aunt Ann and family. I mentioned to her that I had lost my diaper bag and she said that the bishop had found it and asked her if she knew whose it was and she said no so he had locked it in his office for safe keeping. She happened to have his number so I called him up and he brought it to the restaurant where we were. I was SO relieved, my camera among other important necessities were in there. No pictures for this event either. :(
When we got back we were informed that it was a good time for us to be away because there had been a major nasty sickness that went around while we were gone. It took until the end of the month but we did get it. Poor Peter was SO sick I felt so bad for him, he got so upset when he threw up, he would try and run away from it, and then just when we thought he was feeling better, just in time for Josie's blessing (I'll do a separate post for that), he had a relapse and was worse. I'm grateful it was just a really nasty flu instead of RSV, croup or pneumonia all of which we knew several kids in our area that had all of those. Josie was lucky that she only had a bit of congestion for a while. Sometime in the mix of all of this my brother Reed announced that he and his girlfriend Audrey were engaged and going to be married in March in Las Vegas. We were SO excited to hear this for two reasons: #1 we LOVE Audrey and #2 Vegas is only an 8 hour drive from us so it would be easy for us to go to the wedding (also going to get its own post).
My poor sick Peter
Josie and Peter "playing" together
My cloth diaper babies
My cute Josie sporting her new winter gear
