A New Nash And A Reunion

Owen

What is about a wedding that makes one look at their love with a renewed devotion and appreciation? New love is contagious and one can not help feeling sentimental and romantic.

Michael's Brother Matthew and his new bride have that contagious love! The kind that you know will last forever. You know that their love of life and each other will help them in the hard times that will inevitably come. I don't know how Matthew got so lucky to find Randi and hold onto that girl. She is a light in a dark room. Her smile lightens your heart. She is genuine and spunky! What a fabulous addition to the Nash family. She will be sure to spice things up in our family! Hopefully she cheats at games as well as Matthew!

Randi was so sweet to involve Ashley and Mikie in the wedding party as flower girls. It was like Christmas for them! They barely slept the night before and they loved being in their adorable little dresses and being the center of attention!

My mother in law, Betta, was in charge of the Davenport family reunion this year. All of her living siblings came to Utah except for her brother David and sister Joan, who is a Presbyterian missionary near Bethlehem, who was having passport problems. All together there are 14 children, eight still living.

Can I just take a few minutes to brag? Betta's brothers and sisters are so awesome!! I felt pretty blessed when I married Mike and got amazing in laws and it just keeps getting better with wonderful aunts and uncles! I had the best time getting to know everyone and listening to their stories of growing up on a farm in North Dakota. I loved listening to each of them talk about their children and their grandchildren. We had a fantastic time cooking in the kitchen together. That aunt Lois has some serious skills in the kitchen! They all had a way of making me feel loved and like family!

This is Uncle Roy and Aunt Rachel! To be honest, I was kind of intimidated by them at first, but through conversations and getting to know them better I think that they are the kindest and most Christ like people I have ever met. Aunt Rachel knows so much about nutrition (I learned A LOT!) and Uncle Roy is very captivating when he tells stories! Plus they put up with our loudness while playing heated card games till all hours of the night and they didn't even complain! Now that is patience!

Uncle Larry and aunt Lois crack me up! They always have a smile on their face and an amusing story to tell! Aunt Lois is a whiz in the kitchen and is very nurturing. She is quite the spit fire, I'll tell you what! She and May May became fast friends even when May would scowl at her. Uncle Larry has the best legs I have seen on a man! Really he does! They are muscular and tanned, men thirty years younger couldn't hold up to the competition! They made us feel like we truly belonged!

This is Aunt Sharon and her daughters Beth and Mary. Aunt Sharon has a great sense of humor! They all drove 38 hours STRAIGHT to spend time with everyone! Aunt Sharon has a close relationship with her daughters and they are very supportive of one another. Mary and Beth were both so nice and there children were such good kids! I am so glad that they took that long drive so that we could see them!

Uncle Marc doesn't say much but when he does it is always hilarious! He's got this joke about a hair lipped dog...what a hoot!!! Aunt Gina is a sweetie! You instantly fall in love with her southern accent and her genuine love and concern for you! There daughter Gretchen came from Hawaii. It was the first time Michael had seen his cousin in NINETEEN YEARS! Crazy huh!?

Uncle Tim and Aunt Cindy were probably the quietest out of the bunch. I wish had gotten to talk to Tim more. I think humor is genetic cause Tim had some good ones too! I enjoyed talking to Cindy though! She is the best and proudest mom and grandma there is! They are both very intelligent people and very kind hearted! Cindy took time to paint Ashley and Mikie's finger and toenails for the wedding! What a sweetheart!

The reunion consisted of visiting out on the patio, good food, hikes, drives, The Arts Fest, playing games till 3 am every night, a train ride on the Heber Creeper, and a trip to Moab. We had such a good time with everybody! Goodbyes were hard and not just because I had stayed up till three that morning! It made me wish that we lived closer to all of them to have that love and support close to us all of the time! I really hope that they all liked us as much as we like them!

Roughing It

Michael is on a four days on and four days off schedule and he woke up Thursday morning and decided that we should go camping. What a spontaneous guy! This is the first time we have camped with all five kids. We usually take two vehicles and I would go home with the two babies at bed time and Mike would stay and camp with the older kids. I might sound like a pansy for going home but I am really not, I promise! Mike likes to rough it and keep things very simple, no planning, as little preparation as possible. We don't own a tent, we don't own sleeping bags, we don't even have a camp stove, and if you think we go to your run of the mill campground with portapotties and fire pits, you're mistaken! We go on these barely drivable roads and bounce around for hours until we find a remote spot by some unknown lake or creek so he can fish and you have to squat in the woods and bury it. See I told ya! I plan easy meals like hot dogs, cut up fruits and veggies, and chips or whatever I have in the pantry. Cold cereal in a cup for breakfast, easy stuff like that. Mike packs everything else up including almost every blanket that we own and we just go!

This time we went to Uranium Peak above Meeker. It's 9,000+ feet in elevation and there was still snow on the ground in places! It was getting dark so we settled for some flat looking spot and set up camp. The kids love looking for kindling! This time, since it was still pretty cold mike lashed together a makeshift tent out of tarp and all of us slept in a blanket bed with Michael and I on each end so that no babies rolled out in the middle of the night.The batteries in my camera died so I have no pictures of the next day. We had a blast! The next day the kids made a hut and Mike and I napped and we got stuck in a big pile of snow that didn't look that big. Luckily for us some nice people with four wheelers pulled us out after Mike had spent a half hour digging with a little irrigation shovel.

There is something exhilarating about waking up with the sun when you are camping. Getting out of your warm bad and getting a fire started. I love it! I love the isolation, feeling like you are the only people alive on earth. I like being all together as a family with no interruptions or distractions! Now that the babies are getting older I think we will be camping a lot more often!

May staying warm by the fire!

Behind May is our "tent".

Tough Mike is to manly to wear a coat!

Enjoying SCARY stories by the fire!

Fishies from the ground taste just as good!

Goodbye Purple!!!

BEFORE:

One last thing...

AFTER:

We moved into this horrid purple house a couple of years ago. I detested the color (not the house)! My little girls loved it! All of their little girly friends loved it as well! I got plenty of compliments from little girls but not so much from adults.

I don't know what it is about this part of Colorado but houses are all kinds of funky colors here and it gets worse as you go up to Glenwood Springs, Aspen, and Vail areas. I am not kidding! In Eagle there are these houses that are the same color as fry sauce! Next time I get up that direction I'll be sure to take pictures for proof.

We finally hired a painter and it took about a week due to some weather but I am just so HAPPY that it is no longer purple. Mike still thinks it's purple but what does he know! He is just traumatized by the awefulness of the old color!

To be exact main color is Taupe mist which is this taupeish greyish color

and the shutters, door and posts are clam brown and the trim is white.

We put new lighting up and a new door...well Michael actually put up the door and lighting but I did help! It looks a little more updated and put together and I am glad that is not purple anymore... oh did I mention that already?!

Living Scriptures = Debt

I was going about my Saturday cleaning and supervising the kids' chores when there was a knock at the door. Like always the kids got to the door before me and there was a friendly girl that called me "Sis. Nash" I assumed that she was someone new in the ward and I let my guard down. That is when she and the guy she was with asked if they could come in and show me a short presentation about the Living Scriptures. I have a lot of them on video that my grandma had given me and I told them that. We watched them as kids but I didn't know that my parents went into debt for them. They were really good salesmen and used names of other people in our ward as references of people that enjoy LS in their family home evenings. I was totally taken in! By the end of their presentation they had me signed up for more videos than I had intended to buy and bonuses that I really didn't want. I kept telling them that I would have to discuss this with my husband before I signed anything and she assured me that I could sign the contract now and I could discuss it with my husband later. The whole time I had "that feeling" and I just kept ignoring it. I even ignored it when she told me that I would be paying close to $2,000 in the next four years! TWO GRAND!!!??? Who has that kind of money to throw away on videos? I know I don't but I felt pressured into signing that contract anyway even though there was that heaviness in my heart and that thought in my head that told me I shouldn't. The guilt of turning down two young LDS kids who were saving for college no was just stronger I guess. Ugghh! I am such a push over! Don't get me wrong, when those trashy looking guys come around with dusters or frozen meat from a freezer tied to the back of the truck come to the door I just don't answer or I flat out tell them no but when someone calls me Sis. Nash I have a hard time saying no. Maybe those duster guys should call people Bro. and Sis. to get a sale. So I signed the stupid contract and immediately called Mike and let him know that I had done something REALLY stupid. He told me to fill out the cancellation papers that minute. He said that when he worked at Wellsfargo that they had so many people whose credit was ruined because of Living Scriptures. I decided to do a little research online and everything I read was so negative. Their marketing practices are sneaky. I decided that I should call the lady that the salesman had referenced in the presentation and she has no idea that they were using her name and she gave them no references. So far everyone I have talk to said that they didn't give them any references, so how did they know where I lived and how did they know that I was LDS? It seems a little fishy to me. So even though I mailed in the cancellation form I am feeling pretty stupid for giving into pressured sales tactics. I feel that they take advantage of our religion for a sale and they go against everything we are taught about living within our means and staying out of unnecessary debt. I am glad that I am not obligated to pay all of that money and hopefully I can get a hold of people in the ward so they can avoid the situation I got myself into.
http://www.ripoffreport.com/searchresults.asp?submit22=Search+Latest+3+Months+of+Rip-Off+Reports+Now%21&q1=ALL&q2=&q3=&q4=&q5=Living+Scriptures&q6=&q7=&searchtype=0

Do The Shuffle

I borrowed this post from one of the many blogs that I stalk! I'm not a copy cat, I'm just resourceful!

I had to beg and plead for what seems like years for my ipod so now that I have it, it goes EVERYWHERE with me! I grocery shop late at night and wear a hoody or sweater or anything with big pockets and I jam out while I shop. I probably look like a really big dork but it takes the pain out of spending insane amounts of money on food. I actually look like one of the late night shelf stockers minus the tattoos and piercings!

So here is the name of the game: You hit shuffle on your ipod and list the first 12 songs that play.

Here's my random 12:

1. The Frames~ Your Face

2. The Avett Brothers(my all time fav band!)~ God and Me

3. Say Anything~ High School Lows

4. Cute Is What We Aim For~ Risque

5. Coldplay~ Viva La Vida (this is the song I am currently obsessed with!)

6. Blues Travelers~ Back In The Day

7. Jason Mraz~ You And I Both

8. The Postal Service~ Random Song

9. The Cure~ Lullaby

10. Kings Of Leon~ The Runner

11. Bright Eyes~ I Will Be Grateful For This Day

12. The White Stripes~ You Don't Know What Love Is (You Just Do As Your Told)

So...what's your 12?

I'm In Heaven!

Let me just tell you about the last couple of days! Cayl (formally known as Elder) Gardner (you can read about him in older posts) and a few guys that he served a mission with stayed the night with us! It totally made my day...heck my month...okay, my year! When missionaries go home I don't really expect to hear from them so when they call and ask to come stay and hang out, it just makes me feel pretty darn special! Yesterday we had a big BBQ and dug a fire pit out in the back yard for s'mores. As the night rolled on the party got bigger. Word spread that Gardner and his friends were in town and we had the Boyds come over and the spanish speaking missionaries come over and all of the neighborhood kids. We brought out the guitar and Gardner and his buddy Johnson entertained us with some singing. They would make up a tune and then make up the words on the spot. They came up with some doozies! One of our hispanic elders is a beatbox pro and so he would start a beat and then everyone would add a sound or their own beatbox to the beat. It was so hard not to laugh but it sounded awesome or as they would say "sick"! When it was time for the spanish elders to leave, they couldn't find their keys. I am sure one of my little ones swiped them and took off with them. We looked EVERYWHERE! Outside, inside, in couch cushions, we got out flashlights and combed the lawn. I was fine with the idea of them not finding their keys. It would just be a big slumber party! After a prayer, their investigator ended up finding them in the grass on the side of the house.

The party migrated to the front yard where the boys found Mike's skateboard. Yes, Michael has a skateboard! He came home with it one day. I couldn't be mad at him cause he brought me home an ipod. Smart guy huh!? Anyway... we all took turns doing tricks and skating in the culdesac. Some of those guys are REALLY good! We called it a night around one ish and slept in till nine the next morning. I seriously have been in absolute heaven! I love having people over and making tons of food and making sure they feel at home. I live for it! I made some killer french toast with french bread and homemade strawberry syrup and fresh strawberries and whip cream plus the traditional syrup and powdered sugar. It's not breakfast without sausage and bacon and a bowl of fresh fruit AND orange juice and milk! During breakfast, some more of the boy's friends came by. They were all meeting up to go to Frisco together so they ate with us too. The english speaking elders came by and joined us for breakfast too! The only bummer about the whole thing is that we were having too much fun that I forgot to take pictures. They just left and I hope that they don't wait too long for the next visit!

After Three Years, We Finally Got Family Photos

This was my Valentine's gift from Michael and my Christmas gift from My mother and father in law! Otherwise I would never get family pictures taken because I have so many excuses: Not enough money, I have to lose weight, Michael is a brat about getting his picture taken,ect...

I am glad to have them done. I have learned more about what I want in pictures and what I would do differently for the next time. I know that I will not wait so long for the next family photo.