CRUISE INN - Lake Powell

Our neighbor's / our friends / our Bishop.... invited us to Lake Powell for fall break along with another family in our ward - The Peterson's. The kids had a great time of course and us adults enjoyed ourselves as well. It was pretty cold the first day but every day continued to get warmer & warmer, the cold water sure didn't stop any of the kids. Between all 3 families we had 17 kids on this house boat. It got a little crazy @ meal time but other than that it wasn't to bad! It was actually totally relaxing and so much fun. Thank you..... Erickson's for the invite - we had a great time!

Beware....there is quite a few pictures below

Our Bishop was so patient with all these kids & their needs - if only I could have a piece of that trait!?!

I wish

Baby Holland & Taylor

Holland was such a trooper. Considering all the kids and no naps.... I was amazed @ how happy she was the whole week.

Cannon - Talmage - Josh & Aaron

If you were ever looking for Cannon - this is where you would find him.

He loves the camp fire!

Cannon

Cooper

Daddy & kiddos

Blake & Cooper

BIG brother Austin & Sophie

Cooper & Blake - 2 peas in a pod!

Austin wake boarding

The sleeping arrangements were.... girls on one side

boys on the other!

Sophie hung right in there with all the boys!

Jacob - Josh - Sophie - Taft

Tanner - Audrey - Taylor - Cooper

The only picture of me. Thanks Christine - at least my kids will remember I came along.

The Gang

Scott & Aaron had to get their exercise in

Rock skipping contest - I think Scott won!

(of course!)

Hanging out watching movies

Taft & Sophie

Bishop - Cooper - Tanner

Christine & the girls

Captain Scottie driving the house boat

Baby Holland

Playing UNO was a highlight every night

Aaron & Melissa

"If ye are prepared, ye shall not fear"

The past couple of weeks I have been spending some of my extra free time canning. My friend let me borrow this nifty little machine called the "deni jar vac." It is so easy to use and actually really fun. I went to costco and bought some of our favorite snacks and dry packed them. Apparently it keeps most things good for 3 to 5 yrs.

My kids actually helped & had fun stuffing jars full of snacks!

I probably went a little crazy but this is obviously something you would do once you have most of your year supply. It is just a little added bonus and may taste really good after eating the cannery's food or my dehydrated stuff.

A few things that I chose were.... fishies - marsh mellows - licorice - snickers bars - M&Ms - trail mix - almonds - walnuts - pretzels - pistachios - fruit snacks - jolly ranchers - chocolate chips - turkey jerky - etc!

This past week we spent a few days @ one of my sister's house CANNING ALL day! It was a team effort and was really fun. Her poor kitchen was a total mess - we canned BUTTER - GROUND BEEF - SALSA & PINTO BEANS. Thanks Carrie for allowing us the use of your kitchen, next time it will be in mine or Tiff's!

The ground beef was so easy & I believe will be nice to have someday to add to different meals

Yummy Salsa

We borrowed my mom's food saver and stocked up @ costco again. We bagged and sealed lots of yummy dry snacks.

Our family loves popcorn and with my butter..... DELICIOUS!

Here is the salsa - ground beef - butter & pinto beans getting ready to be stored away

We also did granola bars - oreo's - ritz crackers & graham crackers. This is also a really cool machine to have @ your home. I like the use of the jars but this is probably better if you have limited space.

This is a part of my storage room down in my basement ( favorite room in my house) I try and use it as my little grocery store and just keep things rotating all the time.

I am just showing a part of my supply - on the other side are all the boxes of dehydrated and cannery food.

And then last but not least you gotta have your water! Scott buys a crate @ costco every few months and we just rotate thru it!

I do not believe you can ever have to much food and water. As scary as our world is becoming, I feel much more @ ease with anything that will come our way as long as I am doing my part to be prepared spiritually and temporally. Hopefully when the time comes and things start to fall apart... I can have the attitude "Bring it on" and will not fear what is to come. I guess that is why we are told to have our year supply. Any of you who have this hanging over your head..... just take baby steps & don't get over whelmed - it has actually been a little addicting for me!

General Conference 2008

We decided to kill 2 birds with 1 stone this past weekend... My little sister just started @ BYU this fall and I thought it would be a good way to get my kids motivated about school before "it counts!" We had a great time seeing her apartment, friends and to hear all the fun things she has been doing. She has grown into such an amazing young lady and I am so glad that my kids have another great example to look after.

The gang

Then of course General Conference was awesome as always and was so neat to be there in the presence of "Our Dear Prophet!"

Some of my family had the same idea we had - so it made it that much better!

It was such a nice change of weather - I love the rain.... EXCEPT when you are out trying to scalp tickets for a conference session! It was pretty funny that my little sister Ashlyn was the one that ended up with the MOST tickets - I guess it pays off to have a cute smile and a bubbly personality. She ended up with 11 tickets and everyone else came back with 2 or 3 a piece.

This is everyone comparing who got the MOST & the BEST!

Ashlyn wins!!!

Mason & Carrie

Isn't she cute? Baby Lundell #5 is due in just 4 short weeks!

Austin & Cooper

We took the 3 oldest kids on this trip

The guys on their way to Priesthood session

The girls.... of course shopping while the guys are being inspired and uplifted.

Dad & Tay

Ashlyn & Austin

Grandpa with the kiddos

We ran into Taylor's best friends - The Gilleland's! It was so fun to run into so many friends and people who we don't get to see very often! I loved conference and the messages I needed for my life right now. We are so lucky to have the Gospel and a Prophet - who receives divine revelation for us in this scary world. I cherish the words that are spoken at our conferences every 6 months!