September Weekend Three

It was two weekends down and two weekends to go in September. Our next big adventure involved grandparents, service, and football. 

My dad traveled from Wyoming to the east coast and spent time with all of us girls and our families that live on the other side of the Mississippi.  We were so excited when it was our turn for grandpa to visit us. I love that my dad is so easy going. Sometimes when company comes to stay, even when it's family, I get stressed out about how the house looks, how the kids behave, or what we're going to do during our time together. I never feel that way about my dad and it makes my life a million times easier. Mostly I think he's happy just to be around us as he can often be found contentedly reading a book as our family life continues moving forward as usual. As long as there's some sort of diner to eat at or a project he can help with, Dad is happy.  One thing Dad brought with him was old pictures that had been taken from slides and put onto a CD. It was so fun to sit with our girls and share a glimpse of the past.

Look at teeny me! That front door is from our Florida house so I know it was taken after we left Italy. But I look too small for kindergarten so I think I was maybe 4 in this picture?
We were lucky enough to have not one but TWO grandparents visiting for the weekend, as Jared's mom was able to come down for a few days as well.  Jared's mom loves our girls and is so sweet to them, really taking an interest in their lives and activities and trying to be involved in their lives. I love when Linda comes to visit because she appreciates my cooking! Just tonight everyone turned their noses up at the delicious baked sweet potato soup with maple bacon but I know Linda would have loved it.  Don't worry, once they tried the soup it was quickly added to the list of things to make again.  We've never been lucky enough to live as close to extended family as we did while living in Maryland, and sadly we didn't take advantage of that blessing nearly enough
We look like farmers, right?
Saturday morning was our Stake's annual Day to Serve at Serenity Farm. Last year we enjoyed harvesting potatoes, corn, and sweet potatoes. This year we harvested potatoes, sorted the good potatoes from the bad potatoes, picked peppers, sorted seeds, fed pigs, and generally had fun on the farm.

Saturday evening was the much-anticipated BYU vs WVU football game at FedEx Field. Our friends the Darrows, being BYU alums, were able to get great tickets and added us to their list of people from church to buy tickets for. I'm not sure they quite realized the extent of Jared's love for the Mountaineers. The reason we almost didn't make it to the Nutter Center in time to pick up our race bibs the previous weekend was because we stopped in Morgantown to buy WVU gear for the game. Still, they kindly let us crash their Cougar party and didn't look down on us too much for being non-BYU loving Mormons.

Emily helped me transition from farmer to "sporty cute" before we left for the game.
We did have a small hiccup in our football plans when, as we were almost to the stadium, Alecia mentioned having given us the tickets the previous Sunday at church. Our response was something along the lines of, "Um, we weren't at church that Sunday because we were in Pennsylvania. Wait, where are our tickets?" Sadly, our tickets were in their diaper bag which just happened to be at our house with their children!

At that point, I had consigned myself to tailgating as I was sure we could find some generous Mountaineer fans who would welcome us into their tailgating fold. Jared, the resourceful thinker that he is, had a better plan. We'd have Emily take really good pictures of the tickets, text them to us, and then we'd see if we couldn't use them as e-tickets to get in the stadium.  After some trouble  - Emily had to delete so much stuff from her phone before she even had room to take the pictures - we arrived at the stadium and headed toward the entrance with fingers crossed. I was nervous, but I followed Jared's lead and held out my phone as we walked up to the gate. Jared was immediately granted entry while I, on the other hand, stood there for what seemed an eternity as they tried unsuccessfully to scan my "ticket". Eventually it worked, I was able to breathe again, and we hurried away to find our seats before anyone could stop us! The game was so much fun, and not just because WVU won.

Jared with Josh and Alecia before the game

The next day was the Primary Program which is otherwise known as everyone's favorite Sunday of the year.  This is Samantha's last year participating in the program and it's crazy to think that soon we won't have any kids in Primary anymore. Luckily, they haven't done the program yet in our new ward so Samantha gets one more time to have her last Primary Program!


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