Smart Family Reunion - July 15-16, 2009

Photos:

Daran & LoriAnn (the "navy blue" family)

Whitnee, Savannah, Scotty, Morgan

Daralyn & Shane (the "black" family)

Brooke, Rylee, Jordan, Amber, Kamryn

Kelly & Bob (the "maroon" family)

Matthew, Kori, Brenden, Ammon

Jaime & Brandon (the "gray" family)

Hadlee, Jessica, Miles

Jeff & Nicole (the "forest green" family)

Michael

We met at Moose Spring Lodge in Oxford and started our "Family Olympics" games. This was a combined Cousin's Camp and Family Reunion with a Family Olympics theme. We played lots of games - kids games and older people games. Many of the games for the older folk had a family history theme. We included Jeff & Nicole over the cell phone because we didn't want to leave them out. WE MISSED THEM!!!

Daran and LoriAnn fixed a delicious dutch oven dinner and a wonderful breakfast the next morning. After cleaning of the lodge, we headed to Twin Lakes for a day in Shane and Daralyn's boat.

Lots of fun!!! Our family gets along so good and everyone is so close. We took family pictures in their shirts. The guys weren't too thrilled to have to wear the shirts, but they did it for mom! Grandpa and I had "aquatic blue" shirts.....we just didn't get our photo taken.

I plan to do "Cousin's Camp" like this again.....lots of adult help, parents watched their kids, and parents bedded them down, too. We have actually 14 kids who qualify for Cousin's Camp now and that is a lot of kids for grandma and grandpa to watch and to trash our house!

The Hershey Kisses

This has been a busy summer for our singing group, "The Hershey Kisses". (We named ourselves that because of the addiction of all of our group to CHOCOLATE!!!) Our group has been together for about 4 years now, and we have a blast! The members are: Sopranos, Roxane Beutler and Lisa Sears; Second Sopranos, Katie Mumford, Janis Buttars (and Corliss Whitehead who is currently serving a mission); Altos, Kelly Ballif (my daughter!), Carol Beutler, and ME! Accompanists are myself, Kelly, and Lisa. Lisa also plays guitar and Kelly has done some accompanying on her clarinet.

We had a neat experience on July 10th. We were invited to sing at the "Noon Music in the Tabernacle" at the Logan Tabernacle. We put on a 50 minute program to lots of people who really enjoyed our music. It was so fun to sing in that special building. The accoustics were awesome. We got tons of compliments.....in fact we were invited back to perform on the "Encore" program on August 14th. What an honor! The tabernacle was packed full that evening. We performed "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" and had a blast.

These ladies are the best singers from our area and I am just thrilled to be able to sing with them. We are all good friends and have such fun at our practices. We also perform for various Relief Society groups, Book Club groups, DUP Conventions, and we do lots of performing at Christmas time, also making sure to sing for the elderly at the Nursing Home and Heritage Homes. We have to turn down requests to sing sometimes which I feel badly about.

Yes, singing (and accompanying) the Hershey Kisses is definitely a highlight of my life! Our theme song is called "Chocolate" which audiences really love!