29 July 2008

We're posting on Tuesday this week because we just returned from a guerilla (or gorilla?) style road trip to Utah for Grandma Beth's funeral (Brandan's dad's mother). Guerilla for the swiftness and intensity of the roadtrip -- gorilla for the way we looked and smelled at the end of it.

We love and admire Grandma Beth enormously. Farm wife. Mother of 11 children. Grandmother of 46. She knew each of us and kept track of the details of our lives. All 11 children spoke at her funeral, many of them revealing new aspects of her personality -- her courage, humor, toughness, sense of adventure, service and faith. We are proud to claim her as our grandmother.


The weekend provided an increasingly rare opportunity for all of Brandan's brothers and sister to gather together. It's hard to get the cousins to stand still for a photo, so this is the most of them we got at one time. From the left are Kaylee, Parker, Logan, Salem, Sophie and Abe.


After the other cousins hopped off the hammock, Salem pushed Logan and Abe so they could swing. Abe says Salem gives the best pushes.


Sunday night we helped celebrate Drue's birthday. Maggie made funnel cakes for his birthday cake. She poured batter from a pitcher into a ring mold that was in a pan of hot oil. True love is making funnel cakes for 22 people.

Here is Sophie taking her first bite. Delicious! Sweeter than scones but not as sweet as a doughnut. Sophie ate hers with a mound of whipped cream. Brandan and Becky had fruit and cream on theirs.