Job decision

Well after week of going back and forth and back and forth and back and forth again, we have made a decision on our job. Decisions are always a good thing but this was a really hard one. Both jobs were so good for different reasons. But after a lot of talking, and more talking, and more talking (between Todd and myself as well as Todd and the two companies), and a trip to the temple we decided to go with Intel.

So if you are interested in the Tillamook cheese factory, the place where they filmed the Goonies, or just want to come hang out in the rain you can come visit us in Portland. We are very excited. When we got home last night and told Hailee she was so excited. She just squealed with delight. Now all that is left is to finish school and get excited about the big move and the next step in our little family.

My little Pirate

So for the last few months Hailee has had an interest in Pirates. She gets excited if she notices pirate toys in the store and seeing them on TV. Charlie and Lola has an episode with Pirates in it so that is where I think she is getting it from. She has yet to see Pirates of the Caribbean (and she won't for a good number of years), but she has seen all they toys in the stores. A few days ago while I was working and she ways playing by herself, I turned around and she had her doll tied to the leg of the table and little sounds like "RRRRR" and "oh no" coming from that side of the room. Wondering what she was doing I asked her why her doll was tied to the leg of the table. She responded that her doll had been taken by pirates and they had tied her to the ship and were taking her so far away from her family. Oh her little imagination.

Well yesterday we were at Costco and waiting to pick up a pizza for dinner. I noticed an older gentleman walking by slowly and he had a black patch over one eye. Not really thinking much of it I looked down to make sure Hailee was still by me and not running off. When I looked down I saw her happily by me and then I saw her see the man with the black patch over his eye. She stopped dead and just stared in wonder while he passed her. As he passed she whispered "ooooooh, pirate." I about died, she didn't say it very loud, she was just exclaiming it to herself. I wish I could explain the look on her face. It was pure amazement, like "Oh my gosh they really do exist. I never though I would see a pirate this close before...." I sure her mind was just racing. I bent down and told her he wasn't a pirate, but there was no convincing her. In her mind she had just seen a real life pirate. I don't know if the gentleman heard her or not, but I hope if he did he wasn't offended.

Thanksgiving 2007

Parents: 2

+
Children: 9 (+7 spouses)
+
Grandchildren: 28 (+4 spouses)
+
Great-grandchildren: 5
=
a lot of fun!

My mom's parents just recently returned from being Temple presidents in Tuxtla Gutierrez so the whole family got together for Thanksgiving in Mesa. We were only missing Mickelle who is serving a mission in California at the moment. It was a lot of fun and we had a great time. It's the first time in years that we've all been together.

Day 1 - Picnic in the Park

We left at 4:00 in the morning to drove down to Mesa. From St. George we traveled in 3 cars and had a great time caravaning down. The kids slept until almost 8:00 a.m. That evening we all met at the park and had a picnic and took lots of family pictures to get us ready for the next day family pictures. My sisters and are were the oldest so it's fun to see how much my cousins have grown. They other funny thing about my mom's side of the family is the girls way out number the boys. There are 7 girls and 2 boys in my mom's family and 19 girl grandchildren and only 9 boy grandchildren. The first boy was grandchild #10. So for a while it was all girls.

The boys.

The girls

Feeding the ducks. Hailee had such a great time playing at the park.

Baby Derek and grandpa. Derek was so much fun.

After the picnic at the park we got to go pick up Todd. He flew in that night. Hailee fell asleep on the way there. After stopping off at Paula's house she still didn't wake up. We were there for a while and then I decided she wasn't going to wake up and I should put her in bed. We went back to the hotel and when we got in to the room she finally woke up enough to see her dad. After that she talked non stop until she had told him everything she had done in the past few days. It was so cute to hear. She was really excited to see her dad.

Day 2 - Thanksgiving Day

We took family pictures in the morning.

The Wagner family. top row: Grandma, Mom, Paula, Tami, Brenda, Carla, Jana, Shauna bottom row:
Kevin, Grandpa, Ted

The Mortensen family top row: Dad, Emily, Kristen bottom row: Todd, Hailee, Nicole, Mom, Deneille, Pat, Ethan, Ernie, Derek, Stacie and Cambria

Just the girls. Mom, Stacie, Nicole, Deneille, Kristen and Emily.

Then we got together at Paulas. The boys played football and we helped get dinner ready. Paula and Carla did such a great job with all the food. It was truly amazing. We went to Carla's church building to eat. The food was so good. All the Wagner traditions from pickled beets to avocado, tomato, cucumber salad. So yummy! (It's funny how so many of my family's traditions revolve around food, but eating Thanksgiving dinner brought back so many memories of my childhood.)

The kids writing letters to Mickelle. Everyone took a minute to write a note to her.

The Wagner talent show.

Ethan, Cambria and Hailee singing "Love is Spoken Here" for the talent show. It was cute.

Playing Family Jeopardy. Every time we get together Paula comes up with a family jepoardy game. It's always really fun.

Day 3 - Castles and Coasters

The next day the young cousins went to the Mesa temple to do baptisms. When they got back we went to a little amusement park called Castles and Coasters. It was a lot of fun. Small enough that we kept running into people and not crowded at all. It had a good variety of rides for little kids and bigger kids and even family rides.

We started off with Go-Carts. Hailee's cousin Cambria loved it, Hailee was a little nervous. Here is a picture of her and Todd trying to catch me. They did pass me later and Hailee was quite pleased to have won the race.

They also had a miniature golf course and Hailee loved it. We played two rounds during the day.
Hailee and Cambria on the Merry-Go-Round. With Cambria's help Hailee wasn't scared of the Merry-Go-Round. It's so good for her to play with older cousins.
That evening we celebrated everyone's birthday that Grandpa and Grandma had missed for the last four years. We ate tacos (another food tradition) and had a pinata. Hailee loved it.

Hailee was more excited about getting this piece of the pinata then getting the candy that fell to the ground. She thought it was a perfect party hat!

Ballet Class

It's been a little while since we've posted and my only excuse is that we've been busy. Todd had two more fly back interviews (with Intel and ConAgra) last week. So far we've heard back from Intel with a job offer so now we have two offers we are excited about and now I get to loose sleep at night until we decided which is the best for our family and Todd's career. We have to let both companies know by Nov. 30 and Dec. 1st so at least my sleepless nights won't last long and we should know where we are going by then. We are both very excited for everything.

Today we had ballet class for Hailee. Usually there are three little girls in her class, but today she was the only one. Hailee of course loved it and I was able to snap a few pictures. I wish I could have gotten more, but I didn't want to be too much of a distraction. Since there weren't any other kids running around the waiting area I got to watch and listen better than I have in the past. It's so cute to see what she is learning and how cute her teacher is with her. Usually she has a couple of girls in her class with her, but today she was all alone. I got a few pictures, but I didn't want to distract the class too much.