HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

     I know, I know.  I'm late again.  Guess you'll just have to deal with it! : )  We had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday!  (And we hope each of you did, too!)  We made plans to go spend our Thanksgiving weekend in Escalante (southern Utah) with Kris' grandparents and family.  (Except Kent and Justi who weren't able to make it because of work. : (  We missed you guys!)  Anyway, we wanted to go Thursday morning with the rest of the family, but Kennedy had been very sick for several days and wasn't quite ready to travel yet.  So we got to have Thanksgiving dinner with my family at my grandparents house, too!  Thanks for letting us crash your Thanksgiving and for feeding 5 more people!  : )  Kennedy was doing better by that evening, so we decided to leave at 4:00 Friday morning and drive as far as we could while the kiddos slept.  We did great!  No one was on the roads and we made great time!  Well, we were about 45 minutes to an hour away from Escalante when the "check guages" light came on in the car.  (This is at about 8:15 in the morning and it's 6--yep, 6--degrees outside!)  Kris checks the guages as instructed, but doesn't see anything amiss.  Then we start hearing a kind of ticking sound.  Obviously, we pull over.  When Kris opens the hood, steam and smoke come pouring out!  The car had overheated!  (Though neither the indicator nor the guage had shown any problem.)  There was coolant everywhere!  Luckily, we had passed a gas station about a mile before, so we turned around and slowly limped the car back.  We bought some anti-freeze and filled it up.  When the car was cool, we started it again.  And again we heard the ticking.  After looking at the engine, we found that the whole fan module at the front of the engine was loose and wobbling.  (That was the ticking sound: the fan blades hitting a bolt as they went around.)  Not good.  We called a tow truck and our family to come get us.  In the end, we found that the ball bearing that connects the fan's pulley system to the water pump had failed and damaged the water pump and it needed to be replaced.  How grateful we our for our circumstances!  If we had been--literally--anywhere else, we could have been in real trouble; we were in the middle of nowhere, early in the morning the day after a major holiday.  (Glad that it didn't go out about 45 minutes earlier as we passed through Panguich where it was -14 degrees!)  If we had been around town, it would likely have been just me and the kids!  We ended up being relatively close to a mechanic that was open, had a large enough tow truck to fit us all in, and was big enough that they could get the part in for us that weekend, instead of making us wait an extra 2-3 days!  Our kids were fantastic, despite the circumstances.  Our family responded quickly and was able to get us and take care of our transportation for the next few days until the car was done.   And we didn't even miss Thanksgiving dinner! 
     The next day we all went out and cut down our own Christmas trees!  It was a blast!  The kids loved trekking through the snow with their cousins and finding our tree!  (Did I take a single picture of any of the weekend?  Nope.  Dropped the ball.  Again.  Sorry!  Just trust us; it was fun!)  Afterward, we got to enjoy a quiet house while all 6 kids took naps and watch the BYU-Utah game.  That was the only downer.  Ugh!  Oh, well.  We can accept be happy about Utah's win.  : )  On Sunday, we attended church with "Grandpa and Grandma Great"--where Grandma and Grandpa and Kamille had been invited to speak!  It was a wonderful meeting!  We headed home after that.  And drove about 8 hours (on a trip that usually takes only 5 or so) through a snowstorm.  But we all made it home safely!  Yay!  We even had a whole foot of new snow at our house when we got here!  The kids were so excited! 
     We are grateful for the opportunity to remember, perhaps a bit more, the blessings in our lives!  We are so thankful for our incredible families!  You all make our lives so much better!  We love that everyone lives close so we can see them often!  We are grateful for our knowledge of our Savior's plan and our membership in His church.  We are grateful for the opportunities that are ours to share it!  (Shout out to Elder Dean who leaves in just a week to do it full-time!)  We are grateful for our callings that bring us closer to Him.  We are grateful to live in this beautiful country and to enjoy the freedoms we do.  We are grateful for a home and food and not only one, but two running cars!  We are grateful for our educations and that our children are able to receive one as well!  We are grateful for our three beautiful children, for our marriage, and for the eternity that we get to share with one another!  We are so blessed!  Really, can't complain! 
     So, a Happy Thanksgiving (a week late...yeah, yeah, yeah) to each of you!  I'm grateful that you tune in to our rather ordinary lives!  Please know that you are considered a blessing as well!