A Happy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Day was marvelous in Morro Bay. We were able to sit out on the new deck in the sunshine and enjoy our breakfast. Brad's parents from Ohio joined the Ferguson Family and there was a total of 28 family members present.

Megan made her delicious apple pie for dessert. Shown here are Erin and Gavin in the "splash zone", with the juice from the apples spinning off when Meg was peeling them.

Most of us took a 5 mile walk from the house all the way down to the end of the Morro Strand Beach. Here was the "jump" picture.

We also had some of the kids do the traditional pyramid on the beach, complaining about it the whole time.

Finally, we all gathered for dinner, with family members coming from Chicago, Connecticut, Hawaii, Utah, and Ohio. It was a great day and a lot of fun to be with family. We have a lot to give thanks for.

Long Days in Orlando

On one day, did a lot at the conference. The last picture in this post of all of us in the park we helped build should be the first. Initially, we all worked at a KaBoom park project for the National League of Cities, making a park for children in an area that didn't have a park. When that was done about 2 p.m. we went to hear the session speaker, New York Times writer, Thomas Friedman, speak about the U.S. being a leader in green technology. Finally, late in the afternoon we went to Disney's Animal Kingdom to go on a couple of rides and have dinner.

On the Safari ride, we got to see plenty of animals up close and personal, like these rhinos. The vehicles that we rode around this huge jungle-brush area are shown below.


Gavin looks a little bit dubious about one of the Disney characters.

Michigan and Orlando

These pictures are posted backwards. . .the first one is the Gavin and Meg watching the EPCOT fireworks show at the end of the day.

Meg, Danny and Gavin are pictured in front of the Stave church in the Norway section of EPCOT. Danny found out that his memory of Norwegian was pretty good as he had no trouble talking with all of the Norwegian employees in this area.

Gavin found a remote-control car with McGruff. . .and he thought that he was pushing it but it was being controlled by the man behind a curtain.

When we were in Michigan, James, Megster, and Brielle went to the Rain Forest Cafe for the first time and had the utterly decadent Volcano for dessert. Brielle liked looking at the fish in the aquarium there.

Ian and Roxy Came to Town

This last weekend Evan and I were were lucky enough to have a visit from Ian and Roxy, my good friend that I met while we were both doing our internships in Brussels (she is from Logan, Utah). We had a weekend packed with good times, tons of laughs, and good memories.

We went to the Mount Timpanogas Temple on Saturday morning. Hillary Miller (a good friend from Southern California) joined us that early morning.

On Friday night we went to Cafe Rio and then played a really fun game - Loaded Questions. It was Roxy's first time at Cafe Rio - I think we converted her. Ian's friend Amy Stringer came with us and was the one who introduced us to the game.

Roxy brought her violin and she and Hillary played for us. We all really enjoyed the beautiful music.

Here is a picture of the three girls on the balcony at the Townhouse. It was a beautiful day - perfect for the BYU football game. We are excited for when Ian and Roxy can visit again!

How do you spend your 58th wedding anniversary?

Grammie and Grampie decided that spending 14 hours working the polls on Election Day 2008 would be a memorable way to spend their 58th wedding anniversary. Margaret worked with them, and Meg and Gavin stopped by to give all the poll workers freshly baked chocolate chip cookies and milk. We ended up having a great time as it was busy all day long, due to the record voter turnout in California.

Pumpkin Halloween

Gavin was a pumpkin for Halloween. He enjoyed dressing up much more than we thought he would. Dan was the Penguin from the Batman cartoon series. Each team in his office dressed up in a different theme. After dinner the three of us went to our church Halloween party and then did a little trick-or-treating. It was a fun evening.

Colorado Halloween

What better place to spend Halloween than in a town with plenty of ghosts in Colorado. I flew up to Denver to visit Ian and we drove up into the old mining town of Leadville. Shown in this picture is what remains of this "Cloud City" (elevation 10, 152) that once boasted a population of 60,000 people in the 1880's (due to mostly silver mining). Today only about 3000 residents remain.

Ian is standing on old rail boards that lead out of a mine shaft at one of the old abandoned mines. Behind him is Mosquito Pass, one of the roads used to haul the ore back down to Denver and Pueblo. The pass was dirt and closed for the winter so we thought it better to not try and go over it.

One of the great stories of wealth, made and lost, is that of the Tabor family. H.A.W. Tabor and the saloon girl, Baby Doe, made millions from this silver mine that Ian and I are standing near. When the U.S. government went on the gold standard in 1893, silver lost much of its value and the Matchless Mine of the Tabors became worthless.

This is a photo of Harrison Avenue (the main street) in Leadville. Halloween is huge here and people of all ages dress in costumes and cruise the streets.

Ian and I went to this haunted house which is called Stapleton Manor, later that night. It doesn't look nearly as scary in the daytime but let me tell you, it scared me a lot. The manor is behind this little blue house - scary masked people with chainsaws, people jumping out at you from bushes, blackened hallways, lasers, etc. It all made for a very memorable Halloween.