Four Grandkids Have Come To Town

They have arrived. Got here this morning. Ate French toast breakfast.

Tore off a chain link.

Waiting for Ben's arrival.

Looking cute and happy to be here.

Girls Doing What Girls Do

This is what Glen's countdown chain looks like now--only FIVE more days until Ben gets home from his mission!!!

The girls sprang into action getting posters made to take to the airport to greet our returning missionary.

Brooke's inspiration for her poster came from the invitation that was sent out inviting friends and family to listen to Ben speak in church. There was a picture of Ben standing in very deep rain water in the street and then Ben's favorite picture of him holding his hand out to touch a monkey.

If you look closely, you'll see on the right side of her poster there's Ben standing in water. In the middle of the poster is Ben holding out his right hand touching the monkey, which you'll recognize has a curly tail. To the left of the poster is the tree that is behind the monkey in the picture.

It's a great likeness to the photos, I must admit!

Sarah got busy making a sign for the garage. Look for a future post on how that turns out.

Rebecca made the following posters, written in Malay, which she hopes say what she thinks they say...

"Welcome home!"

and "Watch out ladies, Ben's home!"

When I went to get Caroline after her nap, I found she had wrapped the sheet up all around her baby that she carries everywhere she goes. She was taking such good care of that little doll and had her wrapped up just like she's seen her mommy wrap up Spencer.

So precious! She's going to do a great job raising a future missionary some day.

A Chain From the Past and a Few Links In the Present

This is Ben with the countdown-to-Abe-coming-home-from-his-mission chain 7 years ago.

This is what Ben's countdown chain looks like now.

It's gotten sooooooo short...finally...!!!

Way back when Glen had that thing winding all up and down and all around the family room, I felt like the time would never come when it would be whittled down to just a couple of weeks' worth of links donning the top of the fireplace mantle.

Ben has certainly grown a foot or more since that picture was taken.

He turned 19 in the MTC. He turned 20 on his mission. And he turns 21 today while still on his mission. Here's a big shout-out to our birthday boy who will be coming home a full-fledged man.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BEN!!!

Our Stadium Of Fire 4th of July Celebration

Even though we had a birthday dinner celebration at our home earlier in the week for Caroline's 2nd birthday...

...we thought it would be fun to continue celebrating her birthday at the end of her birthday week when we hooked up at Texas Roadhouse in Provo--

on the day our long 4th of July weekend began!

Brooke loves to crack open the peanuts by trying to crack them like you would an egg. The more difficult the peanut, the higher she raises her arm to try to get a better crack on the table.

Caroline loves to eat the peanuts after someone else cracks open the shell for her.

Spencer likes to hold the peanut bucket.

The birthday saddle was not such a big hit with Caroline. Brooke remembered how much fun she had sitting on the saddle and was happy to take over the saddle when Caroline got rescued from it.

Brooke also enjoyed eating Caroline's free birthday ice cream sundae.

Caroline did not walk away unhappy, though. She had a great time playing with the rocks in the landscaping around the restaurant following dinner.

After bidding farewell to everyone, we checked into our hotel and relaxed a bit before it was time for us to go to Stadium of Fire!

We were so excited!!

This was our second year in a row to do this. What a great idea Glen had last year of getting a hotel within walking distance of the stadium so we had somewhere to park our car and so we didn't have to deal with the traffic both before and after the show.

Glen took advantage of his Cougar Club membership to get hooked up with some excellent seats located on the field just a few rows away from the stage. Perfect seats if not for the man wearing the obnoxious cowboy hat that was blocking my view of the performers on stage.

Unlike the camera which had the ability to be held high above everyone's head to get a good picture of what was going on, I did not have that luxury. Thank goodness for the jumbo tron located right in front of us that helped us not miss a thing.

Here we are just a couple of people in a huge sea of people all anxiously waiting for the show to begin.

Chad Lewis was the announcer that evening. We really enjoyed reading his book Surround Yourself With Greatness.

The parachuters were dropped and landed on the back half of the field where we were not sitting.

The jets flew over us.

The national anthem began with a video performance of a much younger David Archuleta singing at a previous Stadium of Fire. One line into the song, David Archuleta appeared on stage to finish the anthem. It was pretty awesome. He was happy to perform several other songs in his own hometown.

Small groups of people kept going up close to the front to have their picture taken with David performing in the background. All the young people were giddy to be in his presence.

Jimmer made an appearance--not in person, just on the jumbo tron--wishing us all a Happy Independence Day.

Brad Paisley is one of our favorite country singers and we were so excited to see him in person. He sang some of our most favorite songs and it was a fun mini concert.

As if the previous line-up wasn't enough entertainment, there was more...

FIREWORKS!!!

Yes, by the time all the fireworks had been shot off and the stadium had been all lit up, you felt like you were in a stadium of fire. Fantastic stuff!! This is definitely a fun thing that we have done two years in a row.

Does doing something twice make it a tradition?

If so, I think I've got to say I LOVE our new tradition!!!