More Wedding Pictures

Gavin's 3rd Birthday Celebration

For Gavin's birthday this year, he wanted to have his cousins come over and swim in the spa.
Megan made a Thomas the Train cake for him, and put Toby, the square train car, on the track made of pretzels and red licorice.
Megan made Gavin's favorite dinner and we enjoyed it out by the pool.
Ethan, aka Fums, totally got into eating the chocolate cake and was covered with frosting.
Ellie, Stephanie and Elise helped Gavin open some of his presents. Gavin also got a call from a real train conductor on Amtrak that yelled for him "All Aboard. .. ." He loved hearing that on the phone.
Great grandma and grandpa from Ohio brought him some Thomas gifts and also a replica of an old Goodyear delivery truck.
What is a birthday without pushing your cousin around the house on his riding truck? Ethan liked the ride but held on for dear life.

The Wedding Weekend - Part 1

The first part of this weekend on Friday we made the obligatory stop to see Thomas the Train up in Heber. We even got to ride on one of the electric cars on the railroad track.
The big morning arrived and after Ian and Annie were married in the temple in Salt Lake City, we all waited outside for them to come out. Grandma and Grandpa Finlay from Ohio are shown here with Alana.
Helen, Stephanie, Gavin, Erin and Grammie waited outside for the bride and groom to come out also.
Finally, Ian and Annie appeared to cheers from our group.
Grampie is shown here with his newest granddaughter-in-law.
Annie's grandpa, Art Anderson, married Annie and Ian. Art and Jan Anderson are shown here in front of the temple doors with the newlyweds.
The grandparents and parents of Ian with his new bride.
Annie and Ian smiled a lot at the wedding luncheon, held in the Bonneville Room of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building.
The Crumps, Fergusons and Uncle Jim came from California for the wedding.

Just before the wedding reception at Thanksgiving Point that Saturday night, Ed and Helen Ferguson and the four Ferguson children, posed in front of their Parkview Drive home in Mt. Olympus Park that they lived in back in the 1960's.

One Last Morro Bay Trip Before the Summer Internship

Alana and Margaret took one last trip during the week up to Morro Bay before Alana starts her summer internship at a law firm in downtown Los Angeles. They walked on the beach, went to a movie, chowed down on some great fish and chips, did some rental property work and just relaxed for a couple of days. They waves were big when they walked on Morro Strand Beach, show above.
Alana is shown here with Morro Rock in the background. We had just finished walking 7 miles on the beach and around town. Now it's off to a challenging summer of work in the big city.

Cutter Commissioning

Last week in Alameda, Grammie, Grampie, Dan and Helen were able to attend the commissioning of the USCGC WAESCHE. This is the newest cutter to be commissioned in to the Coast Guard fleet. It is 418 ft. long with a range of 12,000 nautical miles. With speeds of 28 knots, the WAESCHE will join her sister ship BERTHOLF at its homeport of Alameda.

It is interesting to note that the WAESCHE has a crew of about 100. Jeannie's ship, HARRIET LANE which is 270 ft. long, has about the same number in their crew. The newer ships are more automated and don't require a larger crew. We all enjoyed the traditions and rituals behind the commissioning ceremony.

More Business is Conducted on the Golf Course. . .

As is usual, Margaret didn't play golf out at the Contract Cities Conference in Indian Wells but served as the course marshall. Gavin and Alana helped out this year. Gavin stopped by one of the holes and got some "golf lessons" from some friends.
Here Gavin is showing all of us his golfing technique. Not bad for a 2-year old.
Gavin, Lois and Margaret worked the course and encouraged the golfers. The weather was perfect. . .not too hot.
Alana helped Elise at the pool with her swimming.
It was a good day to relax in the pool for Gavin and Elise.

Biggest Losers Celebrate

Our Biggest Losers weight loss group just finished 16 weeks of joint weight loss. For the 10 of us, we lost a total about 150 pounds. We celebrated when Craig and Beth took us to one of their favorite restaurants, Tokyo Wako. Even though Ellie and Gavin weren't in the contest, they got to come. . .and they had a great time watching the chef prepare dinner at the table.
Gavin and Ellie are shown here learning how to eat with chopsticks.
Lisa, Craig and Beth were some of the "Biggest Losers".
Bailey, who is a chef at the Disneyland Hotel, came with us and enjoyed watching other people prepare the dinner.
Both Ellie and Gavin's eyes really got big when the chef started flaming up the grill and cooking the food.

Ragnar Photos - Another Great Race!!

Pictured here is Team Big Kahunas. The race started in Ventura at approx. 8 a.m. on Friday and 31 hours, 55 minutes, we ended with the whole team running through the finish line at Salt Creek State Beach in Dana Point. Great effort!
Since Nemo is the team mascot, we got a picture of him jumping out of the water at Huntington Beach. He didn't let us down this year.
The Christensen girls did a great job running their legs of the race. . .thanks to Nicky and Ashley (and Nathan) for making the trip from Utah.
Ellie is pictured here with Grammie and Grampie at the start of the race. Way to cheer us on!
The picnic at Salt Creek State Beach was a real highlight. . .the day was lovely and best of all, we were done running the 200.3 mile Southern California Ragnar Relay for 2010. We had the best team in the whole race. . .if not in time, then definitely in spirit.

Wilderness Walk

When Vulcan Materials shut down the City of Duarte's ability to take people up to Fish Canyon Falls on the Wilderness Walk (which had been allowed for many previous years), LA County Supervisor Mike Antonovich secured a helicopter to take Margaret, Congresswoman Judy Chu and Save Our Canyon reps. up to see the destruction caused to the mountains by the mining that has been allowed. We also were able to see all of the run off from Fish Canyon Falls from the air. One of the highlights of the day for Brielle and Gavin was to see the helicopter land and take off.
Gavin was pretty excited to see the "hullah" up close.
Gavin and Brielle watch with their moms as the helicopter was getting ready to take off from Encanto Park.
Margaret and Congresswoman Judy Chu prepare to take off to view the mining and the falls.
The beautiful Fish Canyon Falls from the air.

Easter Weekend, Volume 2

It was a beautiful Saturday before Easter when we went to the Ranch for the Easter Egg Hunt. Annie and Ian are shown here with Vov and Yogi just before the Easter Egg hunt.

All the girls got together for a picture - Nicky, Deirdre, Annie, Erin, Allison, Meg, Elise, Megster, Ellie and Stephanie.

We had a delicious lunch out on the lawn overlooking the ranch and the cattle.

On Easter Sunday, Brad and Margaret got up early to head over to Forest Lawn in West Covina, where the Southern California Mormon Choir sang for the Easter Sunrise Service. The music was beautiful, even though there wasn't much of a sunrise due to the cloud cover.
On our way home from the Ranch, we all stopped to see Bob and Julie Davey and their new home. They were as hospitable as ever and we loved seeing them. Their home is beautiful - just made us realize how much we miss them in Duarte.