So Great

My Grandfather, Gerald Blau, passed away November 15, 2013. He was 87 years old, married to my grandma for 63 years, father of 8, grandfather of 30, and great grandfather of 19 (with 5 on the way!). He was a hard worker and a man of the highest integrity, He  loved his family, the Church, and serving others.

I found myself not being able to be very sad about his passing. He was quite healthy right up to the end of his life, and then he went quickly. I was grateful he didn't have to suffer through a long illness. And I know there is life after this one. I can  so clearly picture him, on the other side of the veil, hugging his parents, siblings, and friends who preceded him in death and then saying, "OK, what do you need me to do? Let's get to work!"

I was grateful to get to go to his funeral, and had so much fun seeing Aunts, Uncles, and cousins--some of whom I hand't seen since I was a teenager--and meeting spouses and children of cousins I had seen pictures of and heard stories about but never met. I got to fly out and back with my brother JD, and we got to spent time with one of our other brothers Michael while we were there. I got to be with my mom and dad, and visit with my grandma. It was a wonderful trip!

Here are a few pictures of my wonderful, handsome Grandpa:

Until I see you again, Grandpa. I love you.

Thankful

This Thanksgiving we were so grateful for Todd and Crystal bringing their families here from out of town so the whole Eldredge family could be together--all 23 of us! It was the first time we were all together in many years, and honestly with missions, college, and marriages looming in the near future for our oldest nieces and nephews it may be the last time we will ALL be able to be under one roof at the same time.

We had lots of fun playing with the cousins, including a trip to the Jelly Belly Factory:

And bowling:

Eli was taking a nap during the fun, but he is the only cousin missing from this shot!

It was so fun to see these four together:

And once again I found myself so thankful for big cousins who were so fun with my little guys:

My brother JD, his wife Lianna and their daughter Korrali got to join us for Thanksgiving dinner bringing the total to 26 and it was so much fun! It was surely a Thanksgiving to remember!

Mind Sets

I don't know if it is because he's a boy, an artist, or a five-year-old, but Logan's mind sure works in different ways than mine. Look at these cool elevated tracks! In all my hours of building train tracks, the concept of making them elevated has never occurred to me. I am learning to ask lots of "why" questions in my communications with my wonderful boy to try and avoid the hurt feelings and frustrations for both of us when I assume that he sees the world they way I do...and thank goodness he doesn't! It is much more fun this way!

Stables

The farm wasn't big enough to house all the animals, so Ali added some more "stables", known to other children as the Bat Jail.

General Logan

Have you ever seen such a handsome General? 

Friends

Eli has not seemed to mind playing by himself when the big kids are at school, and he is never at a loss for friends. This day he told me, "My friends and me are ready to watch a show!"

Pay Off

It's moments like this when that all the time working with the kids on letters, sight words, and sentence structure pay off: Ali was writing by herself and calls out to me, "Look Mom!"

I like you too Ali:)

Paw Patrol

This picture is obviously from a couple of months ago, but I still wanted to post it. The kids are playing on our neighbor's swing set...they may not have realized quite what they were committing themselves to when they invited our kids to play on it "whenever they want to" which turned out to be just about every single day. But I don't think their 14 and 16 year old boys really mind...

They are playing "Paw Patrol" here, which is a cute new show they've been loving to watch about these dogs that help their friends out of binds. They play "Paw Patrol" ALL THE TIME; Ali always pretends to be Ryder and Logan is always Chase. They will even refer to each other by those names sometimes randomly (Like Ali was telling me how she saw Chase at school, and I asked her if that was a friend, and she laughs and says, "No! Chase!" pointing to Logan). I thought it was funny that they never pretended to be the other dogs occasionally, like Eli does (he plays all the time too, but changes from Rubble, to Sky, to, Marshall, etc), but then I finally watched the show: Ryder is the one who is in charge, and Chase always has new cool gadgets to use. Suddenly their choices made a lot more sense:) There is also a character named Katie and they always want me to play her, and I can tell they think they are so cleaver at finding a legitimate reason to call me by my name!

A Grandma for Halloween

Did I mention Grandma was here for Halloween? Did I mention how much we love her and how fun she is? 

Armor

Logan took this box and made a helmet to go with his huge knife, and then decided he needed some more armor. He used paper, scissors, markers, and tape to make a sword, a shield, and a cape.

Falling

Eli fell out of his bed three times this particular night. This last time, it didn't even wake him up, poor thing!

In other sleep adventures...two mornings in a row I found him downstairs at 3:45am watching TV with a blanket, lovey, and a sippy of water. A few other mornings around that time I found him in bed with Ali. There is a reason his baby lock is back on the inside of his door...But that started him banging on the door all hours of the night. I wanted to be tough and just let him cry, but then I would see his light on and hear him playing with toys, or worse hear him saying he needed to go potty; and even though I was about 99% sure he didn't really need to go, I wouldn't put it past him to pee himself just to spite me. So, one day I got really tough: I took the light bulbs out of his light, I took all the toys out of his room, and I put a little potty in his room. With the lock on the door, it was a bit like a prison cell. I pointed out all the changes and told him I WAS NOT going to open his door FOR ANY REASON. I got out the big box fan to put in Logan's room and put ear plugs by mine and Jason's pillows expecting at least a night or two of door banging temper-tantrums....but none came. Not even a peep. Oh, how I love sleep.

School

Not surprisingly, Ali loves to play "school." On this particular day, she was Principle Eldredge, and I would bring misbehaving students to her office (ie the closet) for discipline. I made up infractions and found some of her solutions downright genius: one student was in trouble for stealing, and Principle Eldredge said, "Sweety, you know you shouldn't steal. I am going to give you this special eraser so you have something wonderful and don't feel like you need to take anything else." Love her.

Cousins

Conference

In hopes of inspiring reverence and enjoyment during General Conference I spent quite a while putting together binders for each of the kids with quite activities (hidden pictures, mazes, coloring, etc), and a conference bingo game. They were a hit, especially with Ali and Logan. In truth, I think them being used to sitting and working quietly at school had a lot to do with it, but they all were so reverent Jason and I felt like we got to hear most of all the sessions--a first in about 5.5 years:)

I only asked them to sit with us for one session each day, but they chose to stay by us during the other ones too. I think part of that was that I told them they could only have their folders if they were watching conference:) But I also really believe that part of it is that even though they don't really get most of what is being said, they do feel the good Spirit and want to be part of it. I love being a member of our church!