July and August 2009

We had a great end to our summer- 2 family reunions and a trip to Utah to take Riley to the MTC. The first reunion was the Bushman Family Reunion in Pinetop and Snowflake Arizona. We celebrated Grandpa Bushman's 80th birthday and had a great time visiting with brothers, sisters, inlaws, and cousins. I am so glad I am related to all these people and that my children have opportunities to get to know their relatives better and hear the family history stories and experience the many talents of their cousins. I loved all the late night talking sessions. The highlight for me was the temple session with Riley and my parents, and most of Ben's family and parents. A big thanks to all those who were there, it was an awesome night. It was wonderful to celebrate Grandpa's 80 years - he has lived an exemplary life so far. What great people they both are.

We got home and a few days later had Riley's farewell. Seven out of eight of my brothers and sisters and their families were there to support Riley. I volunteered all the men and teenage boys to sing "Ye elder's of Isreal" as part of the program. Riley gave a great talk and then we had a farewell party with family, school friends, and some friends from BYU later that night.

The next day we started shopping and packing the cars for our Gooch Reunion in Mexico. We had a fun time playing at the beach, swimming, eating, visiting, and having a Harry Potter fest at night watching 1 thru 5. The kids were exhausted at night!! We had quite the excitement this year and got to test out the mexican emergency clinic to get my mom's eye stitched- she had a tumble and a nice purple eye, my dad got in a small car accident- not his fault- we now know to not be nice and call the police no matter what, and a few minor car problems. All in all, it was a blast. All the big boys took Riley out one night to the beach and we don't know what took place!! We came back on Saturday night, Riley was set apart as an elder on Sunday night, and we headed for Utah on Monday morning. We were busy till the bitter end with Riley!! Let's just say when they say curb side drop off at the MTC, that's what it is. We had a few minutes to say goodbye and then he was hustled off.

There were so many other fun things we did at the reunions: the parade, rodeo, eating mangos and tacos at the pool, GOOD TIMES!!!!