San Antone !!

Lloyd and I left for San Antonio on New Year's Day and we managed to pack a lot of things in while we were there. Llopyd returned home on January 8th but I stayed until the 15th. I am so lame at ordering these pix on the BLOG so you will just have to use your chronological imagination! We attended the Alamo Bowl on January 2nd. It was so much fun! You can see how high up were were. We were deep in the middle of TCU territory. This flad was carried in all folded up by lots of fols and they unfurled it on the field. Impressive!
Tyler's birthday on January 10th. By now, Becca and I were alone with all of the children since Mike had a pathology seminar in Orlando. we had also just wrangled them through their stake conference.

A little trip to the San Antonio Temple on the 9th. We also visited the Distribution Center there

Jaike and Indy being contained while Miek and Dad worked on a wood project in the garage

On January 2nd Emi was baptized and Kate was blessed in the Bishop's office after the baptism. what an eventful day~

The family pix with the Neilson's-Stan and Linda

Becca and Kate Eliza Neilson

Emi in her baptism dress

Emi and Mike just before the baptism. Mike was able to find this groovy~and I do mean Gro-o-o-o-vy jumpsuit in the baptism clothes closet. He modeled it for all of us there. Haivn the blet and not just the loops would have made it even groovier.

It was a wonderful visit and I was so glad to be able to go and stay long enough to be of some help to Becca.

we sewed 2 quilts and made numerous trips to the base for appointments, dr's visits, commisary stuff`ate some good Mexican food and just hung out and took care of kids.

Christmas Day 2009

This Christmas, I had the idea to rent Chuck's Cove to save myself cooking all day and to have a place where we could all be together and have fun.

Reed and Megan and family came down for the day and the rest of us spent Christmas night there and play our banana game well into the night.

Can anyone guess who this is?

whale watching at Depoe Bay~we saw several way out into the ocean
It was a beautiful day at the beach

The whole gang

Frozen Falls

In mid-December our plans to camp at Cape Lookout with the Gales were thwarted because of the frozed passes to the coast~so we took a day and drove to Multmonah Falls to see how they had frozen. We had more than a week when the temps did not get out of the 20's.

We took the hike up to the falls. This pix is the falls from the top looking donw at the parking lot!

Just beyond this point, the trail was thick with ice where the spray had frozen to the path. We had to hang on to the handrail for dear life and crawl past the ice for about 20 yards.
Only a tiniy stream could flow~the rest was frozen

Nutcracker!!

On December 22, all of the Bell girls who were here in Portland went to the Nutcracker Ballet at the Keller Auditorium.

It was actually Jim's idea that I kind of scoffed at because of money concerns but as I gave it some thought, it seemed like a good idea afterall.

The little girls did so very well. They both agreed that their favorite part was when the snow princesses danced~all on pointe with snow falling on the stage

Correction

Hi,
in the crab post, I need to add the word Joseph inforn of Nicholas Bell~so Joseph Lloyd Bell's father is Jospeh Nicholas Bell

Crab Bob~No Pants!

This lovely ceramic piece has been in the family for years and evidentally is destined to stay with us-for now anyway. It was made by Vernie who was the second wife to Nicholas Bell who is Joseph L. Bell's dad.

I can't remember when mom and dad gave it to us but it sat in our garage storage room for years until it was time to move and then a bunch of things happened that caused Tim and Susie Wright to borrow it for a ward function where they were serving seafood of some kind and needed to use it for a decoration.

We didn't see it until the next Christmas when we almost won it back in our yearly white elephant gift game for our Empty Nesters Evening with the Wrights, Hansens, Golds and Wrzesinskis. Due to Lloyd's clever strategy in the white elephant game, the Wright's wound up taking it home with them again.

For the next couple of years, it laid in hidiing in the Wright's barn until we all forgot about it and then, due to some clever strategy and secret alliances on Susie Wright's part that were not really needed in the end, I received it again in our white elephant game!

I am sure that the look on my face was priceless

and crab Bob is back gracing our home.

When I opened it, Lloyd noticed that the lid to the crab was gone so Susie did some quick sleuthing and it was on our porch the very next day!

It is always amazing how good motivation can make geezers do things in a very expedient way!

Barn Update

Laynie on the barn steps~she loves to explore

Above~you can see some of the windows in this pix. This was taken at the culmination of a Thanksgiving Day treasure hunt that ended in the barn with a box full of gold coins (chocolate) From Lto R: Jocy Bell. Mikeyla Bell, Nate Bell and Aaron Bell

Below~ Although this pix does not show it, the windows and doors are now in and siding will be in stalled on January 16

This is the day that the trench was dug for the electrical . The whole electrical system was approved after only one failed inspection. Lloyd was so happy to have that over and done!

It has been awhile since I have posted and a lot has happened on the barn so I will try to update