We just got Wessers’ portraits back from his preschool session. Of course, we basically forgot that it was picture day, so his outfit is a little haphazard, but it helps you see how cute he is, even when we aren’t trying 🙂
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| From 2009 school portraits |
We’ve had a fun couple of months, with Wesley’s 5th birthday, a fun trip to the NC Zoo in Asheboro, and Halloween.
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
And here’s a pic of Aubrey from Sept. 29 when she was 20 weeks along:
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| From Fall '09 – Wesley's 5th, Zoo, Halloween |
In my humble opinion, my boys are very handsome. If I get pics from Wesley’s pre-school or some candid shots of Grady, I’ll add them here too, but for now I’ll just post the official school portraits for Collin (3rd grade) and Owen (2nd grade):
Collin – 3rd grade:
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| From 2009 school portraits |
Owen – 2nd grade:
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| From 2009 school portraits |
Taken with my Palm Pre
After what turned out to be a very tight race between three or four designs, the results are in for the 2009 family reunion t-shirt contest.
1st place, with 31 points (21.67% of total points), the Jet Skier design by Seth:
2nd place, with 29 points (19.33% of total points), the Rays of the Sun design by Aubrey:
3rd place, with 25 points (16.67% of total points), the Stylized Family Tree design by Amanda:
And in case you were wondering, here are the designers of the other entries:
Design 1: “Campfire kids”, by Matt
Design 2: “Grizzly bear and a colorful mountain sunset”, by Drew
Design 3: “Minimalist bear paw”, by Tara
Design 4: “Bear Lake Bash”, by Diane
Design 5: “Papa Packhams: Better Reunions”, by Sara/David
All t-shirts were listed on multiple ballots, so you are all to be congratulated. And my sincere apologies to Jake who submitted a very cool entry a long time ago, but I forgot about it and didn’t find it until after the voting process was complete (I owe Jake big time):
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Other interesting stats:
We had a great trip to San Antonio, Texas for Aubrey’s grandpa’s 90th birthday (surprise) party. You never know what’s going to happen when you shock a 90-year-old, but everything turned out really great. They had maybe 100 friends there and we were even entertained by Grandma Smailes’ kitchen band, singing patriotic and religious tunes.
I’ve posted all the pictures from our trip on my Google Web albums.
We had a great time at the Alamo:
I had a good conversation with Grandma Folsom last night. I told her that we had ordered a copy of her book (Golden Harvest in Ghana: Gospel Beginnings in West Africa, by Marjorie Folsom) from Amazon.com, and she was quite amazed that it was out there for sale. I told her that we’d try to read it with the boys. Then she told me that I needed to call Horizon Publishers in Bountiful, Utah to make sure that she got the royalties for the sale. I thought that was pretty funny. It’s amazing that she is still hanging on, with only a few ounces of liquid a day. We keep praying that she will be relieved.
My wife is looking beautiful, at 30 weeks. See her post here.
Here she is:
And here is the bridge that Drew and I built for his new backyard faux river:
They say his Mormon religion could be used against him, but that argument would look ridiculous and hypocritical to everyone but the most evangelical Christian.
Still, I think I’d vote for him, and it would be a pretty cool thing to see a guy with good Mormon values in the White House.
He doesn’t have the name recognition of a John McCain or Rudy Giuliani, but maybe with some good debates and face time, he’ll get more noticed.