RE: Nate

Oh, my goodness, Nate! That is such an amazing honor! And a really great poem. Congratulations!

Congrats Nate!

Nate recently entered a poem in the Reflections Contest at school. It is a nation wide program to enter orignal works of art and literature. Children compete on a school level first... then there are 5 winners which go on to Council level... five winners go on to Region... then to state... then to nationals. Nate's poem was one selected from his school to go on to Council. This is the poem....

My Favorite Place

There once was a place,
Where there was only kindness.
It was wonderful, spectacular, yes indeed,
There were beautiful plants and never a weed.
People danced, people skipped,
Frowning faces soon were flipped.
Grandparents were sweet even though they were old,
Gossip was something that never was told.
People said "Hi" and never had hate,
No one would get mad even though you were late.
But then one day everything went wrong,
People didn't sing any more happy songs.
Now everyone was rude and never nice,
Disgusting things roamed the streets such as mice.
Everyone was grumpy and never showed smiles,
Instead they showed disrespect for miles.
This way of life was dying and everyone knew,
All of the wonderful places were closed, even the zoo.
I wonder if their posterity will ever conclude,
That being nice is better than being rude.

Friendly Reminder

Hi everyone! With Thanksgiving right around the bend, I just wanted to remind everyone to get their cousin gifts. With lots of us traveling here and there for the holiday, hopefully we can get that checked off the to-do list. Our kids are having so much fun as they are trying to come up with just the right gift. I love that it keeps giving on their minds and makes them feel closer to their family members they don't get to see as often.
Lauren, I am not sure if you could be any cuter! Ty, you rock the rock.
As for us and our holiday plans, I believe we will just be staying home for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Hopefully, we'll be able to come up to SLC to meet Brad and Keryn's newest one closer to New Years. Theo's brother, Donavan is coming with his wife, Ellie, son Josh, and mother-in-law, Bjorka, all the way from Germany. They will be arriving around Dec. 7th and are staying until Jan.1st. This will be the first time we've seen Josh(age 3 1/2) and Ellie in 3 years, and Donnie in almost 4! How time flies!! We are really excited they are coming home for a good long visit.
Skip and family, good luck with your upcoming move. What a big and exciting change!
We love you all and of course, we thank Heavenly Father for putting us all together in this big, crazy, happy, wonderful family!

Awesome grandchildren

I have awesome grandchildren!
I am sure none of you knew that. It is exciting to hear about Lauren and Ty, way to go both of you! Lauren, you look awesome in your dress. Ty, what an all round athlete.
We were in Durango visiting the Gillelands last weekend. It was fun to go to Gabe's parade and concert at the BFW hall. He sang his heart out along with the rest of the 4th grades in the program honoring Veteran's Day. Seth is working on mastering one of grandpa's card tricks. He and Elise are awesome at concentration.
We are looking forward to being in Salt Lake for Thanksgiving.
We will be thinking about Skip and Laurene as they start their move to Virginia. The boys are going to love the plane flight. Laurene is loving not doing the packing, how would it be!

Where we're at

Congratulations Ty! That is fun news! Hey-who's the dude with our Lauren? I hope you ran a thorough background check on him Steve! ;) You sure look beautiful Lauren-pretty dress too! John is currently in Mexico on the Baja penninsula and we are meeting him this weekend in Phx so we can all go to Rocky Point for Thanksgiving. We are currntly planning to be in SLC the week before Christmas so we can ski, see the lights, and most importantly, meet the new Ross addition coming on the 21st (yeah!)--but you know how we are with our plans! We are excited for the gift exchange and hopefully we will be able to deliver our gifts in person. Hope everyone is doing well!

Big news for Ty

108 kids (largest number Bingham has ever seen) tried out for 12 spots on the basketball team. Ty made the sophmore team. He was one of 6 freshmen to make it. We are so proud of him!

Pretty in Pink

Lauren -
Bingham Ball
November 2006.

Christmas is coming

Oh, I'm so excited about Christmas! Thanks for figuring out the cousin gift exchange, Nicole.

So what is everyone doing for Christmas and Thanksgiving? We're going to Kim's for Thanksgiving, and I know Mom and Dad will be there...anyone else? And of course, we're going to have a baby and hang out at the hospital for Christmas. So we'll be here from now until who knows when.

Fun Gift Giving

The Hannay's are so excited to do a gift exchange with our Ross cousins! We have been exchanging with our Hannay cousins for years. The $5 limit makes it fun. Take time and get the kids involved. We actually started this tradition to teach our kids the joy of GIVING. It is so fun to make or hunt for the perfect cousin gift. It is so great to see them thinking just what that cousin would love to receive. My favorite is seeing them come up with the perfect plan to make someone else have a great holiday!
Best of luck...

Checkin the List

Here it is all you happy shoppers! Everyone has agreed to participate in the gift exchange. Just a reminder, the gifts should not exceed $5! Have fun with it! And please try to complete your purchases soon, so they can get to their destination in time for Christmas! (:

Giver... Receiver...
Lauren to Elise
Tyler to Bowen
Eric to Drake
Nate to Jack
Jack to Jackson
Sam to Corbin
Blake to Seth
Claire to Mercy
Gabe to Tyler
Seth to Blake
Elise to Lauren
Jackson to Rex
Jebb to Claire
Drake to Gabe
Corbin to Eric
Bowen to Ezra
Rex to Nate
Ezra to Sam
Mercy to Jebb

We're In

Count the Gillelands in. The sooner the better. Although I won't be done by Turkey Day, it's nice to get a headstart.

Christmas Cheer

Hi again! I see Keryn has responded to my question of gift exchange. As for the rest of you who may be in the dark, I had made a post that seems to have been wiped out. To reiterate, our family would like to do a cousin gift exchange, and we want it to be totally random rather than families this year. Kim has also made the suggestion that we set a $5 limit to get our creative juices flowing, and to keep the costs down. I would be happy to spearhead the effort of name assignment. I just need to know who is in and who is out. I'll look for your answers by Thursday Nov. 9. Thanks everyone!

Gift exchange

I love this idea, Nicole! My only concern is: can we do it ASAP? I'm trying to get all my Christmas stuff done before Thanksgiving (that would be a first for me, but I'm trying!).

Halloween Gilly Style

We were planning to go to Page this Halloween but kristine got in a car accident the Friday before. We have moved her into our house until she is better (she fractured a vertibrae) so we decided to regroup and hit the Bayfield holiday happentings. We went to the Bayfield ward trunk-or-treat and got a sickening amount of candy in a very short time before we hit a Bayfield neighborhood that our friends the Kennedys call home. We went door-to-door for a while then enjoyed hanging out with several families at the Kennedy's. It was a lot of fun although we missed Page. Our costumes were: Gabe-football guy, Seth-army guy, Elise-monkey, Jackson-alligator, Jebb-dragon, and Mom-desperate housewife ;)

Unscheduled Landing

This was the view out of our front door this morning. Every year, Page hosts a hot air balloon regatta. For three days, they lift off in the morning and give us a great show. Then, to our delight, we had a balloon land right in front of our house this morning! The crew said they misjudged a little, as they had been aiming for the golf course. They even had some of our neigbors help them bundle the balloon to get it back in their trailer. On Saturday night they will have what is called a glow. All of the ballons will be tethered on main street, and then they light up the balloons with their fire after dark. It looks so cool! And who doesn't love looking at hot air balloons?!

Halloween in Page

Any one of our boys could have been called upon this year to help those in distress. We had a crowd full of heroes of various sizes and genres. All of them got into character and hauled in the loot!
Drake was the valiant Harry Potter with a wand on loan from a generous Grandpa Ross. Corbin was the man of steel, yes Superman was there to save the day! Bowen was the swashbuckling Jack Sparrow, complete with a dreadlock hairpiece, and of course a pirate's sword. Finally, Rex was none other than Buzz Lightyear (the only other costume he even considered was Woody, but that will have to wait until next year as the size isn't quite right yet).
We hope you will all show off your costumes for us on the blog! We can't wait to see you!

Halloween Photos

Let's see all your scary Halloween Pics!

News you can use

Duct tape no substitute for a babysitter, police say

Ya think?

Hannay Halloween

Happy Halloween from the North Pole!

Calendar

I added a calendar to the front page. Hopefully it will be filled with all the upcoming birthdays, anniversaries, and other family events. You must have a gmail account to add stuff to the calendar. If you want me to add you to the calendar so you can add items (which I'd love!), just send me an email. For those of you without a gmail account, let me know if you want one. If you don't want one (they are handy for sending photos and stuff) then just send me an email with any dates you want me to add. And thanks to Google Calendar for making it all work! Man, I love free stuff.

Last game

The high school volleyball season is over.
Lauren played her last game Thursday night. She had a great season!

Now she can get back to schoolwork. She is taking some tough classes, including concurrent enrollment for college/high school credit, so she will enjoy the extra study time.

She is also looking forward to "Bingham Ball" her first formal dance in Nov. photos to be posted soon ;)


HAPPY FALL TO ALL

Couldn't resist

I just couldn't resist posting this picture. I mean, have you ever seen a cuter little girl?

Wrestling

I watched the cutest wrestling match today. You can see it for yourself here if you have a recent version of QuickTime. If you don't watch the video, trust me; my kids are cute.

Of course, the whole scene ended in tears moments after the video clip ends, but that's about par for the course, right?

Happy Birthday Elise!

(This is the easiest birthday for me to remember, since it's our anniversary too.)

I hope you are having a WONDERFUL birthday, Elise! We love you very much.

re: Quotable Quotes

When Michelle put up her post soliciting great quotes, Keryn and I both thought of the same thing. James Taranto, of the Wall Street Journal editorial page, likes to rib Democrats with his "Great Orators of the Democratic Party" item in his column Best of the Web Today. Here is a sample:

Great Orators of the Democratic Party

• "One man with courage makes a majority."--Andrew Jackson
  
  
• "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."--Franklin D. Roosevelt
  
  
• "The buck stops here."--Harry S. Truman
  
  
• "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."--John F. Kennedy
  
  
• "It is long past time to change course in Iraq and start to end the president's open-ended commitment."--Harry Reid

Great movie

The kids are out of school for UEA weekend and we have been enjoying hanging out together. Our family watched an amazing movie last night. Akeela & the Bee. It is rated PG (the story is set in a rough part of LA and they do swear 3-4 times). Michelle if you want a life changing quote... then watch this movie. One of the best and most inspirational quotes I have ever heard is in this movie. The man who coaches Akeela in her preparation for the spelling bee shares a quote with her that is life changing.
We loved it!! I would suggest parents watch it first... then judge if kids are old enough. I think it is a must see family movie for families with middle school kids! It is more inspirational than many sports movies I have seen.

A great quote

Michelle,

I have a great quote for you.

True happiness comes not in seeking to be appreciated by others, rather it comes in seeking to appreciate others.

Published in the "soon to win Pulitzer," Forever Resorts E-Newsletter, Arpil, 2006. Author: Michelle Gilleland

Here's another:

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

And another:

Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.

George Patton

quotable quotes

I am looking for some good quotes-preferably one liners. Life, love, family, character, joy, faith, home. What have you got for me?
Here's one: 'Circumstance doesn't make the man, it reveals him to himself'
You get the idea! : )

Brad-don't tell anyone in Durango that we are related to Bush because they would not want to give me gifts....

Hanging With the Bushes

I just posted an item over at my political blog that explains that I'm related to George W. Bush. I thought that maybe all of you would appreciate knowing so that you can send me better Christmas gifts this year. ;-)

For the curious, the relationship is:
George W. BUSH's FFMMFMMMMFMFMF = Brad's FMMFMMFFMMFF = C. DAMEN (1585,NY)
(F=father, M=mother)

Apparently, at least one line of our geneaology on FamilySearch has been tied into some other work so that it goes way back. Originally, I think mom only submitted the four generation charts for her and dad.

Of course, the downside of my extensive research is that I now know that I'm also related to Martin van Buren, the president that didn't help Joseph Smith when he asked.

Martin VanBuren's FMFF = Brad's FMMFMMFMFF = J. VAN ALSTYNE (1623,)

Conference tradition

Each fall, on Conference Sunday, we head up the canyon to our favorite campground. We listen to the first session as we drive up and then cook a yummy dutch oven lunch between sessions. We walk and talk and then listen to the second session under the beautiful pines. It is something we do each fall and we LOVE it.


PS....

Happy 13th Eric!

I now have 3 teenagers !!! (They're not as bad as everyone says:)