Super Blue Blood Moon

After all of the holiday, travel and wedding adventures, we quickly finished packing up our lives in Las Vegas and moved to Arizona.  Tom got a job working in network security in the Phoenix area.  We've all been adjusting to our lives here.  It's amazing how much it feels like home here and that we really are meant to be here.  God moves in mysterious ways.

At the end of January there was the super blue blood moon.  I had originally wanted to drive somewhere where I would have a nice good view of the moon and even try and take pictures of it.  However, Tom and I both agreed it would be best for me to just try and watch it from home.  Fortunately, I was still able to see everything from our backyard.  I was glad that the moon was still visible above our neighbor's house in the morning just as Ann and Ian were getting up for the day.  I took them both outside and showed them the faint, red moon in the sky (I had to hold them both up so they would be able to see it).  I did take pictures too, though they are definitely not professional quality by any means.

I woke up around 4:45 am just as the eclipse was starting

I set a little lawn chair up on the patio and watched the moon for a while

It was chilly so I decided to go back inside for a little bit until the eclipse was closer to being complete.

It was really funny because when I first went back inside, the moon was still shining quite brightly in the living room (I mean, it was a full super moon).  After a while, I noticed it wasn't as bright in the room anymore.  My first initial thought was that the moon had already set too low for me to see any more (which was a worry that I'd had).  It wasn't until I looked out the window, saw the moon looking closer like this, and went "duh, it's an eclipse, of course it's getting darker."

Almost completely eclipsed

It's hard to see, but that is a red, fully eclipsed moon

This is what it looked like at about 6:45 when I took the kids outside (I actually woke them up a little early so they'd still be able to see it).  The picture makes it look darker than it was outside.

It was really cool to get to share a little bit of this fun celestial event with the kids, especially Ann since she is old enough to comprehend well enough what was going on.

David and Anna's Wedding

The weekend before we moved to Arizona, Tom's younger brother David got married.  (Did I mention on here that we were moving?  Yeah, Tom got a job and we moved to the Phoenix area!)  It made for a crazy pre-move weekend, but it was tons of fun seeing family and celebrating David and Anna!

The pool was filled with little water-proof LED lights.  We let the kids throw them in after we'd turned them on.

Tanner helping Kinley throw in more lights

Kreed, Brian and Amanda and I helped turn on the lights

The reception was held at the Polley home

The sign outside the front door

The couple welcomed guests inside the house

And outside was set up for mingling

Ian was checking out the pool

It did look pretty cool having everything lit up

Ann and Kaybri dancing around on the dance floor

Awwww

Time for the couple to have a first dance!

The guest book was a "date night ideas" book.  They asked guests to come up with a date idea and stick it in the book (there were some interesting ideas).

Ann wanted to put a card in the book (but I didn't make her come up with a date idea :)

She just wrote "I love you" to Anna and David and signed her name.  She's a sweet one, that girl.

Minnesota Visit

The day after Christmas we flew out to Minnesota for a week to spend some time with my parents.  It was freezing the entire time we were there (I'm not sure the high temperatures got out of the single digits, and there were many below zero temperatures).  We still had a fantastic time though.  Ann and Ian absolutely loved playing in the snow.  Ian just today was telling me about how fun it was to go and feed the geese in the snow :)

One of the first things we did after getting to Minnesota was visit Lark Toy Store in Kellogg, MN.  It's about 45 minutes away from my parents' house.  It is an awesome toy store with tons of fun things.

A nice book area and a place where you can sit and look at books too.  Ann was reading this book to Janelle.

There is a beautiful carousel there too

Ian didn't want to be by himself, so I would stand with by him

Both of my parents even rode the carousel!

Ann had a blast (she always enthusiastically rides the carousel whenever we've visited)

Ian really did have a fun time, he just doesn't show it :)

How is she growing up??

We were excited that it actually snowed some while we were there (when the temperatures get as low as they were while we were there, it tends to not snow).  Ann and Ian loved coming out to help shovel the snow.

We took care of shoveling for my parents while they went up to do a shift at the temple that night.

Ian actually did a really good job of scooping up the snow and dumping it on the side

I think this was on New Years Day - we went again to go feed the geese at Silver Lake.

Hello Giant Canadian Goose (they hang out in Rochester because it's "warmer" there...ha!)

There was a good sized little flock in the parking lot that we fed.

The kids did a little sledding in my parents front yard.  My dad was so nice to go out often with the kids to play in the snow despite the cold.

They enjoyed making snow angels too

Hopefully the neighbors didn't might that we were sledding into their front yard

We had such a fun trip and are so glad we had the chance to go out to visit and play!