Emily's birthday/spring break adventure

If you are a girl over age 10 in the Wells family then you are a very lucky girl indeed!

Jillyn planned a spring break trip to her current hometown of Folsom CA for the three oldest granddaughters during spring break and they did not let one minute pass without making a memory.  It was the first airplane ride that Emily remembers (as she took two when she was very little).  I let her take my camera and she did take tons of pictures but most of these I stole from Jillyn's blog because she is very nearly a professional photographer.  I really wish I could just refer you to her blog, but I need to do some preserving of my own.

 Their first day there they spent kayaking in Jillyn and Randy's favorite little lake near their home.  Emily said this was the funnest thing they did the whole time.

She fell in at one point and that is why she is sitting ON the kayak in the last pic, instead of inside with Laynee!

They went to church and visited the temple grounds and visited some other sites nearby on Sunday.

Coloma Jail and the Beer Garden

In this last picture, Emily had fallen in the water, AGAIN :) 

Monday they were off to San Fran

I was very jealous of all they got to do and see in Frisco,

Grandma really really spoiled these girls.

There was the aquarium,

Fisherman's Wharf and Pier 39

A boat trip under the Golden Gate Bridge and out to Alcatraz

and Lombard Street!

They also got to see a magician, have sundaes at Ghiradelli Square and lots lots more.

It was a quiet 4 days at our house and we were glad to have our Emily back, but also glad she got to have such a great experience with her cousins.  Thanks Jillyn and Randy!

Time Flies

I skipped a lot. The holidays happened and they were wonderful :)  We went to Lehi for Thanksgiving and again for New Year's Eve.  Both were very enjoyable trips and I felt renewed and ready for the new year.

Our Disney Christmas blog is there, just out of order, but apparently these are the only two pictures I took the entire time I was in Lehi.

Penny probably has some pictures I can steal of Thanksgiving....or not....
Well we had a baby shower for Ashley just after Thanksgiving and here are a few pictures of that and of Brad and his mustaches. He grew this crazy long mustache for Movember and he got so much attention from it that he wouldn't shave it off when December came.  Ashley is a very supportive and patient wife! :)

I made that fantastic diaper cake!  The theme was baby super heros, baby Superman had an H on his chest for SuperHenry and it was all SUPER cute.

Even grandma and grandpa got in on the shenanigans! 

This was one of us playing kickball on Christmas Day.  I hate kickball.  Spencer's idea.  He said I was the MVP for the other team!

CUT TO..February 12th

Henry David Shelton is born!!

He was in NICU for the first few days and their hospital had this fantastic 24 hr. web cam called NicView and we were constantly watching him.

Evan asked if he could do his homework with Henry!

We also took him to his first college basketball game!

CUT TO...March 2nd

Henry's blessing

We decided the day before the blessing that we should probably be there, and since Jillyn was in town, we took advantage of her help and left at 3 am with Joel and Penny to be in attendance at their 9 am Sacrament Mtg. in Fullerton CA.  The picture below is of all the Priesthood holders that participated, so we were very glad we decided to make the trip. 

Love this one.  Grandma made that blanket.

Henry is a perfect little angel.  He was telling me a story.

Of course Kyle could not let a road trip to SoCal pass without at least getting close enough to taste Disneyland, so we stopped by Downtown Disney for caramel apples and beignets before we jumped back in the van and headed for home.

Halloween: A journey through time for Evan

Halloween was a blast from the past in many ways, and a blast to the future in one!  Matty participated in Dixie State University's preschool this year and so just like the others, she got to dress up as the frog (just like the others) and parade around campus singing Halloween songs with Mrs. Provost.

 Lift my lid and hear me shout.....BOO!
I love college preschool, and all the kids have loved it too.  George is jealous he didn't get to go here.

We carved pumpkins, as is everyone's tradition, but this year I gave Kyle the idea of the power tools and he was in heaven!  and it made the cutest Mickey Mouse-o-lantern ever!

Emily was a very cute minion from Despicable Me movies.  The adults didn't do too much dressing up this year (Kyle wore his Indian pajamas to work-punjabis), and we told George he was too old,

 but he did wrap his pants in Smarties so he could be a Smarty pants.

Kyle has this amazing, yet unlikely idea of getting Evan to shave his head and go as a grandpa.  He wanted to do it himself but was afraid his hair wouldn't grow back, so after a few weeks of planting the idea and of bargaining ($20 bucks is not a bargain but was well worth it)  He agreed!

 One of the forces that swayed his decision was that his friend Hayden Wittwer agreed to be a grandma if Evan would be a grandpa.  When I texted the above photo to Hayden's mom Kari, she about died.

She pulled out all the stops on Hayden's costume, and every time he balked she just said, "Evan shaved his head.....you can at least do this!"

  They were the hit of the whole elementary school.  If there was a contest, they would have won!
Their teacher said perfect strangers were stopping them to take their picture.They stole the show everywhere they went, and their presence was requested quite a few places.  They went to Uncle Spencer's pain clinic, which was especially funny since 90% of his patients are grandparents.  They went to Kyle's work and Shayne's work and to Lorraine Johnson's house (our favorite ward grandma-this is where Hayden decided to take a rest on the bearskin rug and we about peed our pants). Evan got twice as much candy as the other kids too, we heard more than once "Wow you deserve double, that is real commitment".  My very favorite picture of them is this one:

It was a fantastic day.  Kari said okay, come up with something they can do together next year! 

These two are up for anything. They are hilarious, fearless little boys!

The start of a new journey for George

George has never been a very sporty boy. He liked gymnastics when he was littler. He is very strong and has great balance. He swims every summer, mostly at my insistance. He likes it okay, but doesn't consider himself a swimmer. So when he asked me if I could sign him up for a triathalon I jumped at the chance to get him involved in something new, but didn't really expect it to be anything spectacular. Just a fun experience, which it was, but it was also pretty spectacular.

We showed up with signs and were ready to cheer!

We knew he would be good at the swim. He chose to do the beginner tri, since it was his first! It is half the distance of a sprint, so his swim was just 200 meters. Easy Peezy Swimmer Geezy. He was the second one out of the water and we followed him out to the first transition.

He borrowed a road bike from Shana,

he and Kyle went on one ride before the race and Kyle said he did really well but we didn't know how he would do racing by himself, on a course he had never ridden on before...

without his hearing aids, 

since he was so wet still.

 Okay so I was a lot anxious about how it would go.

George just jumped on the bike and rode, and rode fast.

Beckstrands all raced in the races before and after George so they were all there to cheer with us. We watched George ride away and then we waited and waited and 6 miles later we saw a bike coming back and pretty soon I realized it was George....he was in first place! There were not age parameters, so he was racing grown men and women, and kids his own age, and he was in first place!

He had to run 1.5 miles and he doesn't love running, so this was the section I was most worried about, but he kept a good pace and only one very buff middle-aged man passed him (this guy looked like he should have been doing a half ironman, not a half sprint...but whatever)

I know I wasn't around then, but this could be 13 year old Kyle high fiving Lauri.

 We were very proud of George and he was very excited and had a great time.

That is one proud ironman dad.  I see many great bike rides in their future!

When they announced his name as 2nd place overall, he ran down to the stage and back up the hill to us like he was still full of energy!

Disney Christmas Memories

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