Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving all! We hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with love, laughter, and lots of good food. We sure did. This year was a "Buhrley year" so Brook's mom, Lola, put on a wonderful Thanksgiving meal. I hate to think about how long she labored on it! It was truly delicious. I hope it helps her out just a little bit that we are all old enough to bring a dish or two. I think we could have fed a small third-world country with all the food we had. There were 24 of us this year(including Aunt Jean and her husband Gene) and the party went all day. Thank goodness the weather was nice and that the grands got to go outside. They played in the "stream" and hunted for acorns and walnuts. Max and Lola have such a great yard and any corner of it can keep a child occupied for hours.
Later in the afternoon the girls (cousins and aunts) all went to see "Twilight". Hmmm, Twilight. Where do I go with this? Let's just say that movies like this one don't just come around every day. I think I watched half the movie through the yarn in my turtleneck. Some scenes were so embarrassing and ridiculously lame to watch. I really thought that the very serious people in front of us were at any moment going to turn around and tell us to be quiet. I was laughing so hard at some parts that I had tears in my eyes and Caitlyn would lean forward and mouth to me to "shut up.....please!" Oh Caitlyn, poor Caitlyn, just trying to watch her Edward in peace. I enjoyed that movie so dang much. Was it stupid? Absolutely. Will I see the second one? I'll be first in line. Fun like this is just too good to be true.
I wish everyone the very best this year.
Our crew after the movie.

Kara Comes A Calling

One of our favorite people in the world came back home yesterday. Brook's youngest sister Kara lives in Chicago, being fabulous and doing her thing. She originally left for Illinois to earn her graduate degree in theater and performing arts (or something along those lines). Unfortunate for us, she caught the bug and decided to stay in Chicago for good. She is ultra talented and wonderful and we're so proud of her and her many talents and gifts. BUT we've missed her terribly the past couple of years. Our little branch of the family hasn't seen her for almost two years and we were thrilled when she decided to make it back home for Thanksgiving.

Her plane touched down in the afternoon and the whole family came to our house for a little get together. We just loved being all together again and it was so much fun having Auntie Kara back in the mix. We had a wonderful dinner, funny stories, dancing contests, and 4-wheeler rides up in the foothills. Things are always a little more yellow when Kara's around. We're so glad she's ours!

Do You See What He Sees?

Last night Brook, Caitlyn and I had the opportunity to attend an Evening in Excellence program. The Young Women organization in our church not only teaches the young women the gospel and how it applies to them as young latter-day saints, but it also focuses on teaching seven values. These values are faith, divine nature, individual worth, knowledge, choice and accountability, good works, and integrity. We believe as we as learn about and bring these values into our individual lives that we can draw closer to our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.

Caitlyn's Evening in Excellence was such a great night for us. The theme was, "Do You See What He Sees?" The program was very simple but very special. Each parent was asked to briefly talk about their daughter and to talk about which value best represented her. Needless to say, many tears are shed when one is asked to talk about one's daughter! There are 27 young women in our ward, and we learned special things about each one.

Brook and I were very honored to stand there with Caitlyn and talk about how special she is to us and how important she is in our lives. We have truly been blessed with a wonderful daughter who strengthens our family with her sweet spirit. The day that Caitlyn was born marked a pivotol time in both our lives, when "I" became "we" and we began a family. The value I chose to talke about for Caitlyn was individual worth. Caitlyn has always been so steady, so sure. She has always been grounded and recognized her worth as a daughter of God. She has always gathered good friends around her and demonstrated that she is above certain things of the world. I hope, as she continues in her teenage years, that she continues to remember that she is extremely special, of infinite worth, that she is special and talented, and worthy of wonderful things in this life. I also greatly appreciate that she truly sees the worth of those around her. She is quick to point out the good in people and she won't allow bad things to be said about others. I especially value how loyal she is to those she cares about.

Brook said that he is always so impressed with how hard she works at things. He related the story of how, at age 5, she'd bug him and bug him until he'd come play soccer with her because she wanted to be the best. She's always been one to set her mind to things and accomplisth them.

We are lucky to have her in our lives. I look up to her in many ways and recognize what a wonderful young woman she is becoming. She has a wonderful road ahead of her and will do many great and marvelous things. I am honored to be her mother and friend. We all love her very much.

Riding Lessons

For the past week Grandma Lola has been telling Brynn that she had an early birthday present for her. "Ooooooooh," was all Brynn would reply. Really, who doesn't like early birthday presents? Brynn literally counted down the days.

Friday night we drove Brynn to Syracuse to meet her cousin Haley and Grandma and Grandpa Buhrley. For her birthday this year Brynn got horseback riding lessons! Boy, was she excited.

They both thought they were pretty cool. It was at a great place. Jay Fowler and his wife Marilyn have a huge stable and indoor riding area behind their house. You can tell Jay just loves it.

They were first taught how to give the horses directions and then they rode around until they felt comfortable.

After they felt comfortable on the horses, Jay had them try things at a quicker pace. Hailey really caught on quickly. Brynn took a little while. When she would get going she'd pull her hands back (pulling back on the reigns in the process) and slow down immediately so it was stop and go, stop and go............you get the picture. She eventually caught on and really liked it, too.

They had the two sweetest horses. Here they are, Barbie and Smoke

Caitlyn made a great cheerleader

Jay Fowler and his two best students. What a fun birthday present. Thank you Grandma and Grandpa!

Happy Halloween

You can take the girl out of Denver, but you can't quite take Denver out of the girl. When Brynn was asked what she wanted to be for Halloween this year, without hesitation she said a Denver Broncos Cheerleader. I think she just wanted an excuse to be any kind of cheerleader and she knew that if she said "Denver Bronco," she'd have a better chance at getting her wish.

Mason, a boy in her class, was a Denver Broncos football player, so they got a kick out of that.

Brynn ended up trick-or-treating with Brook, Sophie, and The Crew. The Crew is a loving nickname we've given to the many little girls in our neighborhood. Within three houses we have 6 little girls who basically pack around together like a family of wolves. After a neighborhood chili dinner, they trick-or-treated back up home.

You may be asking where pictures of Caitlyn and Zach are. Well, having outgrown the trick-or-treating tradition, they chose to hang out with friends Halloween night. It was a very quiet, almost boring night for me. We only got about 15 trick-or-treaters the entire night. Hopefully things will liven up next year.