Brown Family Reunion...

Well, it finally arrived.  The long awaited Brown Family Reunion in Torrey, Utah at Aunt Lew's house.  June 28, 2014.  I think we doubled the population of Torrey!  We counted 105 people that were there! (We might have missed one or two that escaped the camera!)  It was so great to see everyone, eat yummy food and visit!  Some of those cousins, I can't remember the last time I saw them!  Some of them I even had to ask their names! (I knew which family they belonged to, just not which kid they were!)  I enjoyed meeting a couple of "new" cousins and one cousin's daughter whom we are friends on facebook, it was fun to meet her in person!  All 6 of my mom's living brothers and sisters were there.  I was so pleased to give them their copy of their parents' history that I have been working on.  They all seemed happy with it and will enjoy it I'm sure.  They all got a hard bound copy because they don't use computers!  I made it available online to any of the cousins, grandkids, etc that would want it, so hopefully everyone will be able to enjoy it.  A huge thanks to Eric for getting it printed for me at his work...that saved us a LOT of bucks.  It was a long, time-consuming project but I really loved it.  I know my grandparents would be happy with the outcome.  I am proud to be a member of the Alburn and Ellen Brown family!  Here are random pictures of the Brown posterity! Durran was our dutch oven chef and of course Aunt Lew and Aunt Bev put a lot of work into arranging everything and making tons of other food!  We all brought stuff, but they always seem to think they need to make MORE.  It was a wonderful day and I'm so happy we could be there!

 This is Anna Omps, the oldest (first born) Brown grandchild...she lives in Torrey and is 70+!  She's with Aunt Adona here...Dave and I had a nice visit with her. Adona has the dementia my mom and one of their other sisters had.  She is very healthy otherwise...and 84 years old!

 Cousin Denice and Aunt Pauline...

Herb and Joni...it's not a party without them!

 Cousin Phil and his family...they live on my street!

Cute little buckaroo! 

We got Herb and Joni to come back for a picture (they had just left!) so then Joni was ready to run right after we got Aunt Lew's family picture.  Thanks for letting us get a picture Joni!

 The traditional "spouse" picture...There are sure a lot missing and we miss them!  We know they are watching down from Heaven on our family gathering.  Out of 10 children and spouses this is what is left...

 The 6 Brown Bombers left...Valoy, Vanor, Cleon and Adona in front, Lew and Beverly in the back...Uncle Cleon sure looks like grandpa...especially when he puts his hat on!

 Bree...my facebook friend!

A green egg!

And we finally got a green egg!  It is so tiny!!  The picture doesn't do it justice to how tiny it is!  We are excited to see how many eggs we will start getting now.  We have two that are laying brown eggs...we get one in the morning and one in the afternoon.  And of course the green one came when I am home alone!  Dave is in California and the Stewarts are in Georgia.  Oh well, I sent them all a picture!  Oh, and I am truly enjoying eating fresh peas out of the garden!  YUM!

Finally pictures from Joel!

Loved Joel's email yesterday and especially since he sent pictures!!  He is so busy and so happy and missionary moms just love to hear that!!  His new favorite house is a "castle complete with moat" and has dragons in/on it.  Elder McKinney and Elder Williams (Joel is wearing his plan of salvation shirt we sent him!) and his district on a hiking p-day, and lastly they took an investigator named Cat to temple square and on the way they saw a car on fire.  yikes.  Temple square was awesome and as soon as Cat gets a job that's not on Sundays (so she can go to church - hasn't been yet!) she will be put on calendar for baptism.  Since she is a "she" there is a member family there with them.  She wants to be baptized!  Love my missionary!

We have eggs!

On June 19th we got our first egg!  It is brown and so teeny tiny!  I wish you could tell by the pictures how tiny they are!  The boys were so excited!  We have been getting a little brown egg each day.  We think it is one of the yellow chickens but not sure!  After 5 days Amanda cracked them and made breakfast for the boys. Egg in a hole and fried eggs.  They looked pretty and she said they tasted yummy! Anyway, it's very exciting and those are some darned expensive eggs!  ha ha...Can't wait for more!

A surprise text...or two...

Today I got a surprise text!  A very sweet person in Sandy sent me a picture!  The weather turned freakishly cold, rainy and even dumped 4 inches of snow in the canyon!  (Right where Eric and his scouts were camping!).  I was told in the text how they were still preaching in the 42 degree June weather!  They are fabulous missionaries and we should be proud!  :)  We are!  Great to see him and Elder Williams (from Florida).  I LOVE getting these surprise texts and emails.  They always make my day!  I think it's funny they had to get their jackets out again in the middle of June!!  Go get 'em Elder McKinney!  Love you! (the other picture was a surprise text on the 6th - with the first picture of his new companion.  Right after transfers and I didn't know yet if he had a new companion or if he got transferred)!  Fun to get the news from kind strangers! He was transferred a little further east in Sandy.  Love today's technology and how fast we can get the information and pictures and not have to wait until the P-day email!  Thank you sweet people for thinking of the missionary moms!  PS - This was Elder Williams last transfer and he will be heading home.  Joel says how wonderful he is and such a hard worker right up to the end and how that makes like for him as a missionary all the better! 

Last Day in Clovis

I knew Friday would come, but it got here too fast.  Sweet Teri picked me up again and we went to her house.  I helped her get her blog started for Logan's mission.  She took lots of notes and got a good start on it!  Then we went to Ann Winiecke's to work on projects and watch a movie.  We watched Parental Guidance and it was a cute and fun movie!  I want to watch it again sometime with Dave.  I should mention that this whole week I was working on cleaning up photos (photo shop!) for my grandparents' life histories that I am trying to get done in time for our reunion on the 28h!).  I had my laptop with me and took it everywhere I went so I could keep working!  I had fun doing it while watching movies with friends.  I also did a little crocheting, but mostly photo shop!  We ate lots of apricots and popcorn at Ann's.  Then Ashley picked me up and we went out to Yolanda Wilcox's for dinner!  Yolanda had invited a few other friends and tried to make it a surprise, but I had pretty much figured it out.  It was a delightful dinner and we had so much fun!  Kelly, Donna, Teri, Ann, Terry, Ashley and Yolanda!  I love my Clovis sisters!!!!  I am sad to leave them again, but Ann rode back with us on Saturday so that made it fun.  She was coming to Utah to ride back with her daughter Rachel when she finished her finals at BYU.  We had a fun drive home and even found some Dunkin Donuts!  It was a quick but fun week.  Also productive! I worked on pictures all the way home in the car and adding them into the history.  I got a lot done!  Thank you all my sweet friends in Clovis who took time out of their schedules for me!  We loved every minute spent with friends!  You could have kept the heat at bay until after we left, but I suppose it makes us appreciate the Utah climate.  Triple digits were a bit much for me! Thank you one and all!!!  I hope not to wait another year to come see you all again.  In the meantime, our house is always open for guests to come and visit us!

Still in Clovis...

Wednesday morning I kept the car so I could do some visiting at my old work.  I had to go check out their new building!  First I met Kristi Call for lunch at the Sequoia sandwich company.  It was so fun to visit with her.  And a good lunch too!  I had a trip tip sandwich.  Yum.  I have missed those too!  After our fun lunch I went to McCormick Barstow.  What fun to see my good friends who I sat next to for almost 10 years!  Their new building is really nice!  I was surprised at a few of the people that gave me hugs.  It's nice to know they remember me!  I loved visiting with James, Ruth and Nuri.  I really miss those guys! And my paycheck!  ha ha...but I don't miss working!  Betty and Angie were fun to see..I gave them all salt water taffy with a tag that said "Someone in Utah loves me.  A red painted heart in place of the word loves.  I had a nice time seeing everyone and felt happy that they are still my "family" and we keep in touch.  After the tour of the new facility and finishing up visiting, I went to visit some old friends.  Karen Madsen and Annette May.  Those two visits were just like old times!  I used to visit teach them and they are two very dear and sweet friends!  Then it was soon time to pick up Dave from work.  Can I just say that by this time I was so tired of eating out!  I never thought I could get tired of it, but boy, we were tired of it!  We went to Dai Ichi for some of their good rice and chicken.  (We have really missed that).  It felt a little healthy and we took it back to our hotel to eat and spend the evening.  

I wish I would have taken pictures with Karen and Annette.  Why do I not think of these things!?

Thursday sweet Donna sacrificed another day to spend with me!  She picked me up at the hotel and we went to her house for an Avonlea marathon!  We are on season 6, with one more season to go!  We will eventually finish them!  We of course ate puff corn and then we went to Deli Beans for lunch.  I had my first Italian Soda.  I am hooked!  I had a peach one and it was refreshing and delightful!  We also went to JoAnn's to get some stuff for one of Donna's projects, and guess who came in...Shelly Petty!  Twice in one week...thought that was funny!  Donna also took me to Kirklands (another new store that came after I left).  It was a fun, eclectic type of store.  I could like having one of those close by!  It was another fun day! 

 

  

Me and Kristi trying to make this selfie thing on the phone camera work...I guess we did it!