Sweetheart's Dinner

This past weekend Justin and I hosted a sweetheart's dinner for a few couples.  

We folded up the ping pong table and set up tables in our living room for the dinner.  (excuse the vacuum in the picture, it's the only one I have of everything set up)

I found a neat way to fold the napkins on Pinterest.

One guest guessed the exact amount of kisses in jar one! (127)  

For the dinner I went with an Italian theme.

Lasagna Rollups

Shrimp Fettuccine Alfredo

Salad & Bread

The desserts were set up on our kitchen table.

We had a few games for the couples to work on together.

We gave them 5 minutes to finish the poem, "Roses are red, violets are blue..." in their own words.  The winning couple was Cesar and Karen... 

Roses are red,

Violets are blue.

If you do the dishes,

I'll make the food.

Each couple had 3 minutes to come up with a list of as many Bible couples they could think of, (example; Adam & Eve) The winning couple of that game was Uncle Sheldon and Aunt Sharon.  They came up with 17 couples.

"And we should never forget to honor each other;

always be sweethearts; never let it cease."

57-0818 - Rev. William Branham

Puppy Pictures

Sweet Lexi trying to sniff my phone as I was trying to take a picture of her :)

They really wanted to get in the hammock with me!

They love to ride in the back of the truck whenever we take them places with us.

Relaxing in the awesome "winter" weather we've been having. 

14 guests leave, 2 come for a visit...

Our Indiana and Ohio friends left early Tuesday morning and then my family left late Tuesday night.  It was sad to see all our company go--all in one day at that!  But having Roseanna and Joanna come for a visit made it easier!  They were here for a short time so we packed the day very full!!

First, we went to Turkey Creek.  

We saw this little whitetail buck as we drove in...

The creek is running pretty good from all the snowmelt.

What do you know, we saw some turkeys while we were at "turkey" creek! :)

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Hannah invited us over for a yummy lunch before we went to the Chiricahua National Monument.

The blue sky made a beautiful backdrop for the rock formations as we made our way up the road.

Roseanna and Joanna in the grottos.

Chiricahua National Monument - Echo Canyon Trail

For one last "hurrah" with all of our company, we decided to go hiking at the Chiricahua National Monument on Monday after Harmony.

Our tour guide showing us the trail we would be taking.

We all hiked the one mile to the grottos and enjoyed taking pictures and climbing on the rocks there. Then Daddy took part of the group and hiked the rest of the way down to the Visitors Center.  Mommy and those who didn't wish to continue hiking drove the van down and met everyone there.

Moriah (a friend from Indiana)

Benjamin was holding up the rock so it didn't fall on us :)

 It was a very cloudy day and later it even started snowing a bit!

Silas, Lillia, Elainah, and Daddy

Joshua and Ben

Joy in the grottos.

Silas

Lillia and David

Daddy :)

Continuing down the trail.

 Group photo!

Thanks for taking the picture, Dad.

The view is spectacular and "Echo" Canyon lives up to it's name.  

It was tested quite a few times by several of those in our group :)

Moriah & I

 Bethanny, Hope, and Moriah

 Silas & Moriah

 Snowy mist in the valley.  

Make your own pizza was on the menu for dinner when we arrived home from our hike!

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Harmony in the Desert

From Tonto Natural Bridge it was on to the ski trip!  I didn't ski this year but everyone who went to the slopes looked happy and tired by the end of each day!  My family has a post on their blog about the trip so here is a link to go see it.

  We got home from the ski trip late Wednesday night and then on Thursday Daddy took a van load to Turkey Creek for an afternoon of hiking and exploring.  Lillia posted about that as well, check it out here :)

Harmony in the Desert was every evening from Thursday through Sunday.  Some of our friends, the Durazo's, sang and played their instruments Saturday night.  I always enjoy listening to them play so here is the video of their song.