Kacie's Wedding

This last weekend was my cousin Kacie Talley Bertolloti's wedding. Her and Eric got married at our Aunt Tracie's house. This is a major picture overload post but I just loved so many of the pictures I couldn't pick just one of them! It goes pretty much from beginning to end of the wedding and my cousin Ashley took lots of them also. There is a picture of all three of us cousins at the bottom. The wedding turned out great and other than a little bit of wind towards the end, everything was perfect! Good luck to Kacie and Eric on their new beginnings!

Fruits of our Labors...

Some may ask what my sister and I are doing in this picture...Let me tell you a little story.

Every October we always go over to my Popa's house and pick the pomegranates off of his tree. This year was no different. I have been wanting to learn how to make pomegranate jam so I wanted to go and pick some. We woke up early this morning (conference morning) to go and pick some so we could juice them and stay awake during conference. We drove over to Popa's house with 4 five-gallon buckets and 3 containers to fill. We helped him completely clean one tree of all pomegranates on it (even the bad ones) to feed to the cows. The cows knew the fruit was coming to them so they lined up along the fence waiting for us to throw the fruit over for them to eat! It was pretty much hilarious. The cows started mooing when they were waiting for their fruit and I started making up dialoge for them and my grandpa just looked at me like I was crazy...and I almost got eaten by a big spider that my brother wouldn't kill for me! That was no fun!! We got all of our buckets full and we came home and started working. Here is how you make pomegranate jam. It's a pretty long process. First you pick the pomegranates. Then you put the pomegranate on the pan and cut it in half. Next you get the juicer. You put half the pomegranate on the juicer. You pull the handle on the juicer. Squeeze the juice into a measuring cup. Get a gallon bottle. Strain the juice into the bottle. Freeze the juice when bottle is full. When you're ready to make the jam, you get the recipe and jar it! We haven't gotten to that part yet. We had to many other things to get done during the day.

Erica and I were just starting. Little did we know that we had almost four hours of work in front of us!

We had this many pomegranates to juice plus two other containers as big as the one in the front overflowing with them. Altogether seven things of pomegranates!

Funny story. About halfway through juicing the pomegranates we heard this weird scratching sound outside our back door. My mom walked over and looked out the window and said, "oh my goodness, look at this you guys." So we went over and saw some quail sitting in our cat food moving it out of the bowl and on the ground so the other quail could eat it also. It was so funny! We had to take pictures of course! And they left a huge mess behind them!

My brother and I cutting and juicing the pomegranates!

All the juice we did. Ten and a half gallons which equals lots of jam! Yum Yum!!!

Why I Love October...

The weather starts cooling off

General Conference

School is halfway over

The cotton starts getting picked

It's okay to wear scarfs!

Picking Pomegranates

Juicing Pomegranates

Making Pomegranate Jam

County Fair

Start of the holiday rush

Christmas is almost here

My parents were married in October

The leaves start changing colors

The leaves start falling

Time for raking the yard then having a leaf fight

Winter clothes come out of the closet

Pumpkin carving

Homemade chicken noodle soup with potatoes the Monday before Halloween

Football Games

Pumpkin pie

The beginning of three months of family traditions (example, making cinnamon rolls on General Conference Sunday. yum!)

Pretty much it is just a great fantastic month. I could probably keep going but I will add as the month goes on....

PS Chris comes home in 9 weeks...

Football Games and Grandpas...

Lately after work I have been going over to my brother's football games. Bradley is in 8th grade and is like the 2nd biggest kid on his team and loves playing football. He is the one that kicks into the goalpost after they make a touchdown and does pretty much all the kicking anytime the ball has to be kicked and he is getting so good! Everytime I go to his game I drive up and this is how I can find my family...

My grandpa and his friend Steve Black sitting up on top of the bleachers so they can see better! Today while we were watching the game, my sister Erica and I were sitting in front of them listening to what they were saying and all of the sudden I hear Steve Black say, "They are slower than cold tar!" I was thinking, what is he talking about? Then he says, "Look at how slow they pass the ball to the quarterback. They need to be more like quicksand, not cold tar!" I was still thinking, Cold tar? Where did that even come from?! And it was so funny! I was laughing pretty hard! They were saying other stuff like, "Bradley only take one step. The blocker is going to get there first, I knew it, his legs are so long he needs to only take one step and then kick it." And other things like that. It's pretty much the most intertaining thing in the world to listen to these two old friends talking about middle school football! Here's my handsome brother in his football uniform! I know he looks older than me, but he's not!

A little background on my brother and my grandpa. Every Saturday they wake up really early and go to the "coffee shop" with my grandpa's friends and their grandsons. There are three friends that have grandsons that are in the exact same grade and they are all friends also, which is going to be a fun tradition if the grandsons stay in Thatcher and stay friends. Anyway, they are all really close and after the game Steve went up to Brad to give him some good "kicking" advice and all the other grandsons gathered around also! Such a neat sight to see!

Pretty much Thatcher creamed Morenci. Sorry Morenci, better luck next time! (Oh and Bradley kicked 4 our of 6 of his extra points...I don't know what they are called but they are the ones right after the touchdown!)

Then it was time for the team huddle and quick talk afterwards. My brother loves playing this sport and I love going to watch him play! It's going to be a great season!

Legally Blonde.

This weekend my roommate Jessica and I went to see Legally Blonde at Gammage Theatre in Tempe AZ and it was so great! I love going to see plays and this one was so fun! It followed the movie pretty much the same but it was better because it has music and dancing and fun stuff!! If anybody has seen it, my favorite person was the UPS man for sure! Pretty much great! Once the play was over I drove to Buckeye to stay at Anna's house and I couldn't remember what house was hers so I turned around and figured it out and parked my car. I went inside and we talked for a while and then I was so tired so I fell asleep on the couch and when I woke up to go to Chris's nephew little Jared's birthday party I had a ticket on my car for parking on the wrong side of the road...with a $40 fine. I didn't even know that was a bad thing! I just forgot which house was hers! At first I thought it was her husband Tracy playing a joke on me, but it wasn't his name on the ticket so it was a legit ticket. My first one and not even one I can brag about! That's what stinks! Oh well it's okay I guess.

Then we left Anna's house in Buckeye and drove to Glendale to go to little Jared's birthday party and I couldn't find Baseline! I drove north on the freeway instead of south. So I drove for twenty minutes out of the way then had to turn back and see where it was! Anyway, I ended up finding the Peter Piper Pizza and it was a good time. I loved seeing Chris's siblings that I haven't seen in a while and talk to them. After the birthday party it was Jared's fiancee's bridal shower...and I got lost going to that also!! I was looking for a stop light instead of a street sign so I drove about two miles down the road and then had to turn around. But I found it and it was great! I talked to Chris's mom and sister (Anna) and Jessica and we visited with some of the other ladies that were there also. It was fun. They are getting married in a few weeks which is exciting. I'm going back down for that also. After the bridal shower was over Jessica and I left and came home. And I didn't get lost coming home! So I came to the conclusion that I shouldn't drive in the city ever. Until after I learn where the streets are anyway.

Once we got home, we had a going away party for my friend Alyssa and her husband who are leaving to go to Oregon this week. It was fun to get everyone together and play some games and have dinner. I had a great time over there! It was a fun weekend, very eventful, and very fun!

The Angle Moroni

So yesterday, the Gila Valley Temple put up the Angle Moroni. It was such an exciting day! I didn't get to see it being put up but I was able to drive by later and see it and the valley is so excited with the temple being built. My institute teacher, Brother Wright, challenged us to write down in our journal what an exciting day it is. For a little bit of history about Angle Moroni, he first visited Joseph Smith on the evening of September 21, 1823 in his bedroom. He came 3 times during the night and twice the next day. The last visit was at the Hill Cumorah on September 22, 1823 where Joseph Smith saw the gold plates. Every year for the next three years Joseph went to the Hill Cumorah to receive instruction from Moroni. On the fourth year he was able to obtain the plates. It is very exciting for the Angle Moroni to go up on such an eventful day in church history. It will be remembered in our valley as a special day.

Photos courtesy of http://www.ldschurchtemples.com/gilavalley/construction/ and the people who put them on there for everyone to enjoy.