Fall 2011

 September started out with a wonderful announcement of the forthcoming birth of a new grandchild.

This time it's our youngest son, Chris and his beautiful wife Emily expecting their first in March of 2012.  They surprised us with this news on labor day!  How appropriate.  We found out later in November that it is another precious grandson.  We are so happy and excited for them and us.

My temp job that I thought was going to turn into a permanant position at the eye doctors ended in August due to their financial burdens and the economy.  Then I got another temp position that was supposed to be for just 4 weeks as a medical records clerk for Santa Rosa Orthopaedics.  That was perfect because we had a vacation planned...

On October 14th Richard and I took a trip up to Lake Tahoe and stayed at one of our World Mark resorts.  The weather was perfect the whole time we were there.  We enjoyed finding beaches where we could see the gorgeous clear water of the lake and just walk along being together.  This was the celebration of our 32nd anniversary that happened in July. 

 There is a really fun miniature golf course in South Shore and we had fun playing their 28 hole course.  Richard beat me by one point!

 Our resort was at the summet of 7400 feet as you can see by the ski lift chair I am sitting on.  We loved just having relaxing time together playing games and watching movies in our beautiful resort room and sightseeing around the lake and in South shore.  It was a wonderful celebration.  On Wednesday of that week we left Tahoe and flew from Reno (leaving our car there) to Salt Lake City and gave the rest of the time at the resort to Chris and Em to celebrate their 5th anniversary.  They drove up from Sacramento.

 In Utah we stayed with Jeff and Rachelle in their new home that they are renting.  Much bigger and more fun for their boys with a yard and room to run and play with the cousins.  Better than a condo for a young family. The First day there (we got there around noon) we met John and Noelle and their children and all went up the canyon to Silver Lake.  One of their favorite places in Utah.  It was cold but lots of fun.  We got some great pictures so here is a sampling..

Above is the mirror effect of the lake and the fall colors.

 Jeff and Lucas (age 2) watching the ducks on the lake.

 Rachelle and little Ethan watching Daddy and Lucas.

 Grandma and Papa enjoying being with their Philpott Grandchildren

and Daddy John and Mommy Noelle.

 After we got back we went to the Philpott's new rented home just a block away from where they used to live.  It's a very nice, very large 6 bedroom home with lots of family space as well.  Now all the kids have a room of their own.  This is Jenna and Little Cousin Jude (10 months old).

 On Thursday night the girls did a surprise dinner with a halloween theme.  We had three courses that we got to choose what we received but all the items had halloween names so we didn't know what we were getting and the utensils and napkin were in the mix also.  After each course the table was cleared.  The long and short of it was that the food was good but I wound up eating all of it with my fingers because I got my spoon, fork, and napkin for my second course and nothing to eat at that point.  It was great fun!!!

The next morning we had Ghost Pancakes for breakfast (seen above) also very good!

 That Friday after the Pancakes, we all took off to a fun pumpkin patch.  There was a corn maze that the kids loved as you can see by the smiles on the faces of Michael and Isaiah above.  They ran through it in record time.

 We also took some family pictures with the country setting..

This is the Manns:

Brook, Jude, David and Carter

 The Philpotts

Emma, Jenna, Isaiah, Michael, Noelle, John, and Abigail

 These are the other Manns

Jeff, Ethan, Lucas, and Rachelle

We were behind the camera this time!
We all got pumpkins, even Richard and I and they let us bring them home on the airplane!  I was so happy about that.  They made a nice part of our fall centerpice on the dinning room table.

 We enjoyed watching our family play together. 

Here Uncle John is helping Nephew Carter do a slam dunk in his driveway. 

We love our time in Utah with our family but it always goes by too quickly. 

The weekend after our return was our Church ward Halloween party at a farm of some of our members.

We invited our Sebastopol Grandsons Joshua (left) a friend of his in the middle, and Lucas La Grave (right) 

with their parents Kathleen and Mark.  It is a wonderful fun event and we enjoyed sharing that with them.

After all of that I was extended in my Medical Records job so I was still working full time.

June and July 2011

This blog is sort of out of order.  Even though it is before August in the grand scheme of things I posted August intending to put the summer all together but my computer was slow so I ran out of time and had to do two posts to record the summer events.  So here we go with summer part 1.

 Our summer started out with a bang! My parents decided that they were going to sell their home of 10 years in Grants Pass Oregon and move home to California.  My brother, Larry and his wife Becky asked them to move in with them in their home in Brentwood California.  We are thrilled to have them so much closer so that we can have family events together and just get to see them often.  My Dad celebrated his 92 birthday shorly after their move down and we were there to have a great weekend.  I'm taking this picture of my parents (in the middle with two of their dogs) Richard to the right of my Dad, Larry next to him and Becky on the other end in the back.  There is Emily and Chris kneeling in the front. 

 On the 2nd of July, our son Dave and his beautiful family arrived for a weeks vacation.  This is Carter (age 3)on the day they arrived learning how to catch a ball.  See his hands ready to receive?

 On the 4th of July we joined Dave and Brook and the kids at their dear friends, Vince and Nancy's home with Brook's parents too.  We had a lovely afternoon and fabulous barbeque food with all the trimmings.  Makes me hungry just to remember... My contribution was this heart shaped cake with strawberries and blueberries decorating the whipped icing.  4th of July and family....you can't beat that!!

 In Santa Rosa during the summer they have what is called "Wednesday Night Market".  It takes up two full blocks of the downtown area and the side streets with all kinds of fun things to see, taste, and experience.  Dave and Brook and the boys met Richard and I there.  My job at that time was on 4th street smack in the middle of the market so I was already there and just walked out into the excitement.  We ate dinner together each selecting what sounded good to us.  There was a great selection to choose from.  It was a very enjoyable evening. This "hand" sculpture is at the entrance to the mall at the end of the downtown area.  Carter was fastinated with it.

 Carter loves the Peanuts comic characters so Dave and Brook did a Peanuts treasure hunt whenever they had a spare hour or so.  Because Charles Schultz lived in Santa Rosa for many years and was a big part of our community doing a lot for people here, we have decorated statues of Charlie Brown, Lucy, Woodstock, and Snoopy all around our fair city.  They are very individual in their design and fun to find.  After the "market" we went to Yogert Farm for an outstanding frozen yogurt dessert and there right in front was Snoopy all decorated as a dairy cow.  Carter is posing and saying "cheese" for his picture with Snoopy. 

 On Friday of that week I took a half day off work and i went with the boys (and family) to the beach.  It was Carter & Jude's first time at the ocean.  Carter loved the sand but didn't like the moving water and wouldn't venture anywhere near it.  I brought along some beach buckets and sand toys so, as you can see, he was happy playing in the sand.

 We also brought along our patio umbrella so the little guy, Jude, wouldn't get burned.  Dave is feeding him so he can take his nap.

 Grandma ventured out into the water and brought some ocean water back in a bucket to Carter and Daddy Dave so we could build a castle.  The toys were little molds of fish, a crab, and a seahorse.  Daddy filled them and Carter put them out on the sand.  He loved it!  We did make a castle tower with the bucket too but didn't get a picture of that one.

Speaking of pictures,  Carter loves to see them as they are taken.  Daddy is showing him the picture that is posted below.  Can you tell that Grandma Joy is having a great time?

After the Beach we all headed to Sebastopol ,which is on the way home from the beach, to meet up with Richard at Mark and Kathleen LaGrave's home.  They are our step children and grandsons Joshua and Lucas.   Here you see Joshua (age 10) meeting cousin Jude for the first time while Grandpa looks on.  We spent the evening together and enjoyed a fabulous meal and great conversation but most of all just being together.

Here are the other two cousins, Lucas and Carter.  Carter is exactly two weeks older than Lucas.  They had a great time playing together.

The parents of the cousins left to right: Kathleen, Mark, Brook, Dave.  What beautiful/handsome kids we have!

Here we are together with Brook and Jude and Dave and Carter.

It was an incredibly fun day.

Saturday the 9th of July they headed home to Utah.  We had a little birthday celebration that morning on their way out of town for our son Dave whose birthday was later in July.  Carter loved the ribbon that was around his daddy's birthday gift,  especially the fact that you could wear it and see through it.  Can't wait until we see them again.

Also in July near the end, our grandson, Shawn and his lovely wife, Karlena came over from Fairfield and had dinner with us.  We were happy to be able so share some time with them.  Karlena is expecting their first child in November near Thanksgiving.  This will be great- grandson number 2 and grandchild number 22.  We are very happy for them and for us.  A grandchild that is closer to home!

The rest of that month was just working at our jobs until the post below about August.

August 2011

 In August we were priviledged to have our friend Dorsey Willison and her three childlren stay with us for almost 3 weeks.  Her husband is a dentist in the Air Force just beginning his assignment in Mississippi and they needed to have Lincoln start school before Dorsey moved there to join him so they all lived with us so that could happen.  They were such fun and we miss them but wish them the best of life in their new adventure.

This is Lincoln watching "The Little Mermaid" before he has to go to bed.



This is their newest little one, Juliette.  Such a cutie. 
She cut one of her top teeth while she was with us.



This is Christian the two year old.  He is a very sweet little fellow. 
He was so polite as he would say, "Goodmorning Joy" every day when he got up.



On August 10th, Richard and I were thrilled to be able to use Gwen's Christmas gift
to Richard... two tickets to a sporting event of his choice.  He chose a Giants Game
as he knew I would love to attend with him more than a Warrior's Game or the 49er's.



They had the World Championship trophy on display so I got a picture of it.
Sure is a beauty.  We were about 10 feet from it.

Our seats were perfect... top tier, second row, seats 1 & 2 between 3rd base and home plate.

It was a  perfect day at AT&T park.  Sunny and clear with a light breeze.
You couldn't ask for better weather at a ball game.
All these "in the park" shots were taken from our seats!

With my zoom lens on our camera I got a pretty good shot of Cody Ross (one of my favorite players)
getting ready to take a swing.  It was fun being there and watching our Giant's players...
too bad they lost the game.  But we enjoyed ourselves anyway.

After the game we went to "Nick's" on Fishermans Wharf for dinner.
Good food, fun wharf atmosphere.  This was our anniversary celebration dinner.
32 years of happiness as of July 21.

After dinner we walked along the Wharf down to Ghirardelli Square for
some chocolate for my Dad's Birthday and samples for us.
Had to take a picture of the cable car on our way back to the car. 
There's nothing more San Fransisco than that.

On August 20th after our trip to the Oakland Temple, we went to my cousin Kathy's
home in the Oakland hills.  It was about 12 min. from the temple.  We had a wonderful
lunch with Kathy, her husband, Howard, and my Uncle Bob shown with me here.

We so enjoyed just visiting with each other and catching up.  We also went through pictures
from our past and pictures from my grandmother's life.  I was thrilled to get copies of some
great pictures of my grandparents, special documents from their lives, and my uncles story
from his service in WW II.  A wonderful time together with promise of more sharing of family
history to come.

2011 Spring Snipetts

I haven't blogged in a year and I have been told by some that I should blog again so I will give you little snipetts of our year so far. I started working full time at a Temp medical receptionist position last September and have had a second temp full time position after that one ended. I loved both of my jobs...first at the Cancer center and then at an Eye Doctor's office. Now I am looking for work again so that we can reach our goal of serving a mission in 2014. I know the job I'm seeking is out there somewhere so I just have to be diligent and patient.

On to the pictures and their descriptions...

Our son, Chris, graduated with honors from ITT tech in Sacramento this March. We are so proud of his accomplishments. He is now enrolled in the continuation of his education at Sacramento Institute of Art in pursuing his career as a Game Designer. He has tremendous skill and talent and really enjoys his classes.In May we traveled to Utah for a weeks vacation and some more wonderful family events. Our son, Jeff, graduated from University of Utah Law school and took his Bar exam in July. We are waiting for the results and he is enjoying being home with his two boys as Mr. Mom without having to study while looking for a job with a law firm. We are very proud of him too.

Some of our Idaho Grandchildren came down for the graduation and other family events and fun. This is Emeric Mann who turned 18 while we were together.

This is Emeric's Stepmom and our son, George's wife, Urasia, with her daughter Maycie and their daughter Brooklyn who is 2 years old. It was so much fun to have them there sharing in the family fun with us. We got to know them better this time. George was working in Arizona so he couldn't be there with us.

 This is our great grandson, Jordan. He is four and his mom, our granddaughter Beth, came up from Provo for the last weekend we were there to be at the reception for Jeff's graduation and his baby's blessing.
These two cute Utah Mann boys are Carter age 3 (above) and his new little brother Jude, (below, born on December 16, 2010). They belong to David and Brook. We had such fun meeting sweet little Jude and playing with him and Carter. Being a grandparent is one of lifes nicest blessings. We wish we lived closer so we could see all of them more often.

Next we see the two sons of Jeff and Rachelle, Lucas Mann (age 19 mos in this picture) and his new baby brother, Ethan James who was born on April 15, 2011. Ethan was just a couple of weeks old when we got there and it was so much fun to hold the newest Mann grandchild. He is a very good baby who sleeps really well.

Then on that incredible weekend of wonderful, very special family events, we witnessed the baptism of our granddaughter, Emma. She is the middle child of John and Noelle's family of 5 children. She was so excited to be baptized and I had the priviledge of giving the talk on Baptism at the service.

It was a wonderful vacation that we hated to see end. We look forward to being able to see these adorable, loving family members again in October when we go there again. We are grateful for modern technology that keeps up updated on all of them and helps us to see their growth and hear all the exciting things going on in their lives.

I will blog about our Summer next.