USU (bittersweet)

You want your kids to grow up and fly the coop at some point but it comes a little sooner than you want sometimes. Monday the 19th is upon us and Teesh is moving to Logan. We had spent the last few weeks packing, dejunking, and purchasing necessary items to live in the dorms of Davis Hall. Teesh worked that morning and we prepared to leave as a family to take her up at 3. Like all good plans we did not leave until closer to 4 but it all worked out.
I drove so Corby could study for his exam the following morning. I don't know if it is at a conscious or unconscious level, but Corby has this awesome talent of scheduling all his exams around really busy times for our family. Awesomeness!!!!!

Teesh filled up our Yukon!

We first arrived at Davis Hall, Teesh and Corby registered Teesh and she became the proud owner of her keys, which she promptly misplaced the following day and had to pay $10 to get a new one! Poor Teesh.

Teesh lucked out big time and her roommate changed her mind. So guess who gets her own room? Lucky! We were a bit surprised to find bunk beds in here though. That wasn't how this dorm was sold to us. Kind of disappointing. Teesh, being the look on the bright side girl that she is, brushed it off like a champion.

I thought it would be fun to get to know Teesh's roommates by taking them out to dinner. We found a great local restaurant and went to dinner. Teesh only has three roommates and one is the RA, which means she is never around so it was just Teesh, Jessica and Akyra and our family.
We went to dinner at "Angies" where if you "clean the sink" (eat the entire ice cream dessert out of a kitchen sink) you earn a bumper sticker. We opted to just eat dinner and go get Aggie ice cream from the creamery. 

 Teesh, Akyra, and Jessica

 Sierra, Malia, Bria and Ada

 Look at my beautiful girls, they are my life....love to all of them.

 After dinner, we headed to the creamery. Most everyone in the city of Logan had the same idea, it was one hopping joint.

 While everyone was enjoying their ice cream, Akyra was explaining, in detail, how one can only eat one scoop of ice cream with getting sick due to the high content of fat located in the ice cream. This girl was cracking me up most of the evening. Smart little cookie Akyra is.

 Ada was in quite the mood tonight. Every time we took a picture, she had some silly pose.  Quite the character my little Ada Rae.

 Hasn't Malia blossomed into such a beautiful butterfly?

 Sierra Jane, you are one pretty ice cream lover.

As the evening went on, the realization that we wouldn't be taking Teesh with us grew more and more real. It was hard to leave her there. We helped her unpack and organize her room, took her grocery shopping, and visited for a bit but the inevitable happened and we had to leave. I was so sad to leave Teesh and apparently so was Bria. While we were driving away, Bria said it best, "It doesn't feel very good leaving Teesh Momma." I couldn't agree more Breeta. To help soften the blow, a friend Teesh met at work over the summer showed up at the door so when we left, Teesh was with her. Tender mercy from the Lord to me right there. College is the best time of life. I know Teesh will find her wings and fly but in the beginning it might be a little scary, overwhelming and down right hard. You are always welcome home on the weekends Teesh.

Go Aggies!

Movie in the Park

Jaren and Cindy are always great to include us in their city funness. They do movies in the park on huge screens and best part, movie is free. Hello! Movie begins at dusk so we found a way cool park to entertain ourselves until show time. We had Sady and Ryli with us this evening. Fun for all.

Sady a little intimidated with this contraption, can't say I blame the girl.

Swinging monkey's or maybe just Ada's

Ryli and Bria climbing the fake log

Cheese little girlies

Talia and Gelsey showed us where the fantastic park was located and enjoyed themselves on the baby swings. Girls, when your legs touch you might be a tad too big.

The movie was so fun. We were given popcorn and drinks by Grandma Linda, Cindy's mom. Linda is one of the sweetest ladies I know. She loves to cook and we love to eat, perfect pair. Thanks for the invite to the movie. Good fun. Good company and girls fell asleep on the 30 drive home, perfection once again.

Elder Mitchell Dahl

 wait

 wait

 wait

 wait

 Almost there

 He's here. 

Mitch has returned home from the Sacramento, California Mission today. The embrace lasted so long, which rightfully so. Momma's have a hard time not seeing their offspring especially for two long, wonderful years.

 Pure happiness, can you see it in his face. His father, Kevin is in the blue shirt mom, Pam in black.

 Mitch with his nephew, Jaxon and neice, Lexi

 Dallas was born while Mitch was gone so she wasn't so sure about sitting on his knee. We did bribe her with some candy that helped with the photo shoot.

 Nichole is Mitch's big sister. She is married to Jason(white hat) and then their three cute babies. Nichole is due with another boy in December. Such a darling little family.

 

 Mitch with his Harlem, jk Brooklyn, Kim, Stacey, Mitch, Nichole, and Heather. Poor Mitchy,  only boy in his family, but I think he turned out just fine.

Welcome Home Elder Dahl! 

I have to say I was so impressed with Mitch before he left, but wow he is sharper than before. Such a kind, loving, gentlemen. He served as assistant to the Pres, pretty amazing opportunity, which gives you a little glimpse into his character and love for the Lord. There were 7 other missionaries returning with Mitch and several of them came up and thanked Mitch for his service and example. 

Well done thou good and faithful servant. 

Welcome Home Mitchy! Now on to real life, good luck with that.

Going away

About a week before Teesh left for Logan, Jaren wanted to throw Teesh a party. Jaren is the fun uncle who is always up for a party. We love hanging out with his family.
Jaren had us over after church for home made chicken noodle soup. Even home made noodles, Yummy!

 

 Jaren making such yummy brownies. What a great host you are bro-in-law!

 Kaylen helped make the homemade noodles.

 

 
Home made noodles are so delicious. They are a lot of work but so worth it.
 

Poor tuckered out Corby. He is turning into his father. Sit down, relax, fall asleep.

Rest in Peace Earnest.

 

Sierra and Natasha hanging out

 

 Teesh we are going to miss seeing your beautiful face everyday in our home

 The evening was gorgeous,  we went out side to play games and let the little ones climb trees.

Kylar is such a fun cousin. He is so good to play with Bria and Ada. We are lucky to have such great family close enough to hang out. Thanks for the going away party Jaren, you are amazing.

Windows

Our house has become quite drafty these past few winters. When you sit on the couch, underneath the window, you can feel a breeze. It doesn't help that our sofa is leather to make it even colder. We also noticed black mold growing in more than one place in our home. Hello, dangerous stuff that black mold is. It wasn't really in our budget but we were given a deal that we just couldn't pass up so we decided to replace our old gross windows. 

Oh, how nice they look.

 I opted for the plain look, no lines or graphs on the windows. I like a clean simple look. I am debating putting up blinds, I just love the nice simple clean look.