Back from another vacation that I need another vacation.

Back from the 3rd annual family trip to Lake Powell in AZ. Again my oldest brother Mark, Nina and son Carsen couldn't come. We missed them but it was still crazy without them. It is wild trying to organize 22 people.
AZ was HOT!!! But we didn't have storms this year which was great. Only about a one day was windy. The lake was super high this year which was interesting because places looked so different. Apparently it was 40 ft higher than last year. Which made the walk to the beach much closer. AND you all must know my thoughts on that. YIPPEEE!!
This year my bro Dave and his wife Sabrina bought a inflatable for the beach called Caribbean Island. It was so much fun!! It was crazy huge.

And we did lots of boating. The kids all went crazy on the towable, "SUPER MABLE". They loved try to stand up and do tricks which was funny to watch. One nephew, who will remain nameless, fell off the tube but decided to hang on and poor guy lost his shorts. I sadly missed it, but still loved hearing about it and laughed while watching him in his towel for the rest of the boating trip. I hope it is laughing about it soon.
Sadly my Mom fell off a rock and was super hurt for most of the trip. I heard she was the one warning everyone to be careful!
This year I decided we were close to the Grand Canyon and we should make a side trip. Well it was a little further than I thought so the kids weren't too happy being in the car and not at the lake. But it was interesting, large canyon in the ground. WhooHOO!! To be honest I went to say I'd been. It was not that exciting. I love Bryce Canyon and thought Grand Canyon was a little boring. But you go through forest to get there and that was beautiful and made me miss Canada. But we got a patch to prove we went there and had an ok lunch. I think the highlight was seeing all the license plates from around the USA and Canada. We are sad little people.
So our final night we decided to go out for dinner in Page. It was late because we were out boating so long. Page resturants were crazy buzy and so we hit the Pizza Hut and took over the place. A Late night dinner with 22 people who have had too much sun, overtired, week long fun was pretty wild so it was definately time to come home. We are now tired out and need a vacation from our vacation!

The World is Ending???

Today is Sat.May 21-The world is supposely ending in one hour and eight minutes. Some people really, really believe it! I sadly don't...but doesn't it make you think?
My family has been grumpy, whiny and definately unhelpful today so not a good day for our last day. Let's just say we had a difficult morning doing Sat. chores.(they all took off and went to cousins to get away from me) But if this was my last day on earth what would I want to do with my family.
I think I would want to just love one another, just cuddle in bed watching a great family movie. Eating yummy snacks and laughing out loud. I remember days like that when we homeschooled and my kids were young. Now they argue about what's good t.v. and they don't like what the other wants to watch. Now they all seem to have plans and don't include me. Parties, babysitting, jobs, going to friends or cousins, school...they are just growing up. Each day they are older and getting closer to leaving the nest. Even though they drive me crazy daily I just want to love them and get a big hug. I realize our time on earth is short and to love even the crappy parts. Love ya kids!

Gotta Kindle

I was so loved on Mother's day and recieved a Kindle. I was so excited!! I am a huge reader and just can't ever get enough. I love books so much. I happily went to Amazon to check out books. It is so easy and fast to download books. It is the greatest thing for a book lover UNTIL you look at prices.
Buying online books is in my opinion the bestest SCAM going and all the "companies" are winning. I can't believe that ebooks cost the same as buying a hard paper book. Ebooks have no paper, no shipping, no storage, no salespeople, no ink, no fancy pictured, colored bookcover...so they only have to buy for advertising and paying the author. SO HOW CAN IT BE SO EXPENSIVE????
I can't even re-sell an ebook. And tons of the books I can buy cheaper at costco than the e version.
It is frustrating because it is unfair but then they don't want illegal downloads. I don't mind at all paying for a book but seriously let's be fair.
It shocks me that readers haven't united to stop buying books until the system changes. It seems like the world needs to gear up for the future and figure out better ways for movies, books and music. The future is here people...change to keep up! Personally I am reading the free classics...and enjoying them while I wait for the book world to grab a clue!

Feeling GREEN....finally!!

Yes, it is true. We finally got our green cards for the USA. It was a crazy, long, expensive, hard, annoying process. (fyi-apparently I say process wrong here in the USA. I say pro-cess not praaacess...weird!)
Anyway our immigration journey was a crazy one. I was on my parents papers when I was a child and aged off them. Then I got married which then made my husband my immediate family and kinda removed me from my parents..to a degree.(which makes the process longer) So my dear parents, little brother recieved their papers in about 1994ish. They followed my brother to Utah where he lived with his wife. My husband also has a brother and sister who lived in Utah with thier spouses. We wanted to follow but couldn't. So began the wait. I had to wait 5 years for my Mom to be a new immigrant then she could apply for citizenship. Once she had citizenship she could finally apply for me.(If I wasn't married she could have applied earlier...gov't stops many people from getting married I'd guess) So that took about a year to get all her paperwork worked out. Then finally my papers went in about Aug.2001. Then the wait came. When we started people's wait time was about 4 years in our catagory. Not bad we thought. So we kinda planned on about 4 years. That was a joke. The wait times just got longer and longer. Finally Aug.2010 we could start sending in the final visa papers. Each person in our family needed a thick stack of papers filled out. Truckloads of documents when there was 6 of us. We had to go to doctor's appointments, fingerprinting and the final interview. It was stressful. You hear horror stories of people's paperwork tossed because they are missing info. My husband was like a crazy man checking and rechecking them. And when we got to the interview we still had a problem...typical. They wouldn't except his birth certificate because it was a small one. They want one with his parents on it and full info. And after 17 years of marriage we found out that the certicate that we had for marrige was a church one not a "real" one. I was blown away. I am sure that is what I used to change my name and proved we were married in Canada. Well the immigration would not take it. So I was approved for a green card and so were the kids. But my dear hubby now had to prove that he was married to me. Haha!!
I had visions of my marriage not being registered and having to face that we in the eyes of the law have been *gasp* living together for 17 years!! But luckily that didn't happen. Apparently my husband still loves me and sent away to Washington state and got our marriage certificate. He also sent away for a new Canadian birth certificate. Boy they are fancy and I think they have fixed any prolems with fakes cause they are just amazing. Clear parts, holograms, plastic-y weird paper. Very cool.Oops sorry got off topic there!
So about a week later -Green cards came in the mail. Only took over 9 years from when our papers went in. Only over 16 since my parents came. Crazy!
All this time waiting...it's hard to believe that they are here. It's hard to know what we will do now. We finally are here when the economy tanks. Mortgages are hard to get. Jobs are really hard to get. But we are happy and know we should be here. Utah is home but we still miss our other home, Beautiful British Columbia.
To all my BC friend -please continue to complain about the rain frequently...it really helps me not miss there.