Happy Halloween!

Uncle Paul

Josh had a poetry section in his English class this trimester. Every time we are with Lon's family, Josh makes sure that his Uncle Paul is going to be with us. One day, he brought home all of the poems he had written and I found this one.

Uncle Paul

My uncle's name is Paul.
He is very tall and always happy.
When I think of him
I think of a basketball court in Wyoming.
I picture a basketball and the court.
When I thin of you, I think of the
black court, the bouncing of a ball.
I smell the dirt on my hands
after bouncing the ball.
We play with cousins and other uncles.
We play basketball.
He says, "Atta boy!"
I say "what up?"
I am always excited when with him.
He is a nice person.
I am glad he likes to play basketball.
I am glad we get together as families.

Uncle Paul holding Dillon

Dillon

Dillon (Rebecca & Paul's) was born on September 23rd. He joins 2 brothers and a sister. He is a snuggler and so adorable!

Dillon

Brianna holding Dillon

Fun visitors!

From the evening of Tuesday, October 5th to the morning of Friday, October 8th, we had some fun visitors! While Shirley (here 1 night), Megan, Sarah, Rachel, Douglas & Mariah were here, we celebrated Sarah's 14th birthday, dipped our hands in wax, rode the 4 wheeler, played games, played outside, and went to Tyler's football game. Fun memories! Thank you for visiting. Please come again SOON!

For a YW project, Tiffany made Sarah a book for her birthday

wax

Justin & Douglas wax hands

wax hands

worms

Footbal game: Tyler (#19), Tiffany, Sarah, Megan

Lindsey & Rachel

Sarah & Brianna

Douglas & Justin

Hospital

My parents & Ashley came to visit on August 31st - September 6th on their way to take Ashley back to BYUI. The day they arrived (Tuesday), my Dad was weak, tired and very sick, so he went downstairs and slept. He was not getting any better, so I convinced my Mom to take him to the ER. Two weeks prior to this, he had "lithotripsy", which is the non-invasive treatment of kidney stones using shock wave pressure pulses. After all of the blood tests, they determined that the cause was "sepsis", which is a condition in which the body is fighting a severe infection that has spread via the bloodstream, possibly from the stent that was put in after the lithotripsy. Anyway, he was in the hospital from Wednesday until Saturday. He was feeling a little bit better after they released him but still very weak & tired. He ended up spending more time in the hospital in AZ, after they got home, because the infection did not completely clear and he started getting sick again. On October 19th, he had surgery where the urologist went in and took out the kidney stones in one of his kidneys so that kidney is now "stone free". In Lon's words, he is no longer "stoned". Anyway, my Dad has been dealing with kidney stones, off and on, since 1975, so is glad they are gone in one kidney. And, I am thankful he is doing better and healing!

tests in the ER

visitors

My Dad now calls me "nurse" Melanie

neat TV screens

New hospital in Gooding that opened March 2010

Duct tape

September 29th: For Young Womens, Tiffany made a neat purse out of duct tape. She really enjoyed the activity. The next day in seminary, Tyler was given a tie also made out of duct tape. I knew that duct tape had a lot of uses, but now I know of 2 more!

Tie from Makayla. Thanks!

Football tackles

Tyler enjoyed playing football. This year, he was the team leader for the most tackles. He had 91 tackles in 8 games.

Donate

Lon donates blood every time there is a blood drive in town. Tyler really wanted to donate this time, so made sure he was able to get out of football practice early to donate. He enjoyed the experience and is planning on donating next time.

Tired.....

Idol

Most of us have people we look up to, who hopefully inspire us to be a better person. One of Josh's idols is his uncle, Jared Johnson. Jared is an incredible piano player and has released 3 CDs of his piano music. Josh is musically talented and enjoys listening to music and playing the piano. Jared can play the piano without looking. Josh tried playing like his Uncle Jared this weekend and did a great job! Click on the link to see video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1I0vpbHkbCU. Thanks for being a great example to my son, Jared.