Final visit with Papa

Lots of good news to report!

The sale of our Hazelwood house finalized today. Papa came back from his first days on the job reporting that he loves his new company and had a wonderful trip to Brussels to meet his new crew. The Williams are reporting that Natalie's pregnancy is going perfectly well. The Friesses have been able to rent their home and will be moving to their new place at the beginning of August. What miracles have happened this summer!

The only downside is that Papa will be moving to Spokane. We will miss him. Katherine truly gets a kick out of playing with him, as they try to make each other laugh. We will keep Nana company and she will need to come down often. Today we discovered the outlets at Anthem and I don't think it will be difficult to get her to come! But of course, we will continue our regular trips to Prescott during the week. We have to enjoy Nana while we have her!

We like our new ward. There are a lot of young families and they have generously included us in swimming and bbqs and we have enjoyed when we have been able to attend. We missed one outing at Bartlett Lake because we wanted to attend the temple. It was a good session but we came out to a flat tire! Geoff had it changed in no time. (We love strong men!)

I have been asked to teach RS on Sunday and the president hinted that she has submitted my name to have it as a calling. HOORAY!!! It will be my first time to have a calling as a teacher and I can't wait!!! Otherwise, much of my time is spent looking for ways to conserve money, since the dollar is not stretching as far as it used to, and I'm very excited for the latest recommendation to join a food co-op. I will get my first shipment of produce on Saturday, which I'm told will be about $50 worth for $15. Again, hooray!

Katherine remains the center of our joy. She is still on the edge of crawling, not in a hurry. Her latest thing is this power punch, "power-to-the-people" guesture that my grandmother Sarager got her to do... and then she gets everyone else to do it. It's hilarious!

We love you! Keep us posted on your lives!
Amanda aka Sludge

Alright, due to heavy requests for an encore, I am going to continue with this blog...

We are now settled into this new house which we LOVE! I only have pictures of it while we're moving. So here's a teaser because I refuse to take anymore until we get all the pictures hung up! I will say that when I go into Spud's room, it feels exactly the way I imagine a baby's room should feel and look. I'm very happy with this new place.

Eden, thanks for your comment because I think Katherine is the cutest kid, too! You give me an excuse to post more pictures of her.

This picture documents K's first time swimming on June 16th. She has since advanced to kicking like a mermaid and LOVES to chill in the shade of the floating device Nana & Papa bought - talk about high-tech! Our favorite swimming spot is at American Ranch, but we met some friends in our new ward who have invited us to go swimming at their pool any day... Talk about the life! (I tried to upload a video of her first swim, but it didn't work... Any recommendations??)




The shutter on our camera is turning out to be very slow. So some of the time we get pictures like this...








But most of the time we get this: a dazed and confused look on her face, mesmerized by the red light that holding forever until the flash goes off...





Let's compare again:

On a final note, it was Geoff's birthday and we decided it was time to cook on the new charcoal BBQ given to him by Nana and Papa (thank you again!) Guess what was the first item to go on the grill?? She was immediately followed by some very tender ribeye steak and turned out DELICIOUSLY.

Happy 30th, Geoff! We love you.