A Winter Paradise!

Neil and I just returned from a wonderful trip to Puerto Penasco, Mexico staying at beautiful Las Palomas Resort in a condo owned by our good friends from Wisconsin's daughter. If you want a great place to go just ask me and I will connect you with her. It is in the Sea of Cortez.

Besides the beautiful white sandy beach we had multiple hot tubs with different degrees of heat, swimming pool and lazy river.

Each evening we would eat dinner on the deck and watch the beautiful sunsets.

In the morning the beach would be raked in front of the condos, things were always so clean and neat.

Buying from the beach venders was interesting. Neil actually asked me to buy something from the young mother in the photo, he either felt sorry for her or liked her beauty!

If you look just out from Rocky Point in the first photo, you can see a shrimp boat. We loved buying fresh shrimp, cooking it up and eating it!

In front of the LDS church we attended on Sunday.

Celebrating the Christmas Holiday

Kelli as Mary at our Christmas Eve Nativity with her family.

We had a wonderful Christmas celebration with family, friends and lots of partying!

Four wheeling the first of the year with the Kirkpatrick's (my sister, Marged's family)

Kim Kirkpatrick and friend Merlynne in Hurricane.

We had a wonderful journey finding the Dinosaur tracks in Hurricane.

New Years Eve day in Las Vegas.

We met up with Jeff, Tonya and boys in Mesquite for breakfast, then caravaned to Las Vegas.

Nora Washburn with Redberry at the Ashton Party.

Dan and Allyson Chard as Mary and Joseph at the Ashton party.

Bob Van Orman as one of the kings at the Ashton party.

The shepherds (Owen and Kay Ashton) showed us the way to the manager.

We had food made of flat bread sandwhiches and other foods representing Bethlehem.

Beduins (Haley Olsen, Sara Jensen, Spencer Olsen) singing "Silent Night" in their tent.

Wendy read "The Night Before Christmas" to grandchildren on Christmas Eve.

Our Christmas Eve nativity with the Washburn family.

Brody Washburn as a king.

Joseph (Brian Washburn) with his little angel Nora.

Neil reading the Christmas story from the Bible.

Christmas with the Washburn kids.

Christmas Season with Grandchildren

This has been a fun Christmas season with grandchildren.

First Photo is Ashlynne at her Dance recital Christmas Program. She takes after her older sister, Haley, and is a natural ballerina.
Second Photo is Amanda McKowen (Ron and Lisa's daughter) who did a great job in her school play "Oklahoma". We were so impressed with the production which included a live horse on stage.
Next photos are of Eric and Lori's daughters, Rylee and Hanna at their dance recital, also a family photo. Rylee and Hanna are both excellent dancers.
The next three photos are taken at "This is the Place" Heritage Park enjoying activities with Tiffany Partridge (now living with us again), Ashlynne Olsen (Justin and Julie's daughter), Zach and Aiden Olsen (Jeff and Tonya's sons)
The last photo is of Rachael and Brody (Kelli and Brian's kids) helping decorate our children's tree.

Grandchildren

We are proud of our grandchildren and their accoumplishments. I hope you will send me more photos so I can post them. These are ones I received this week.

We really enjoyed watching Jake bulldog and team rope this last weekend in Washington County, he did a great job.

On November 8th Zach won in a Karate tournament, we are sorry we were not there.

Heidi and Ashley celebrated their birthdays this month with their family, we were invited to join in the celebration.

Happy Halloween
Our family members were so supportive of the Ashton Halloween Party we hosted on Saturday! We had 45 people come. For those of you who unable to attend, we had spaghetti, salad, breads, and yummy desserts. We did a readers theater of the "Twilight" book series. We had some great readers! We went into the woods behind our home after to see how the vampires and werewolves were doing on their hunt; they tried to frighten us but we remained strong! A pumpkin carving contest followed. What a creative family we have!













Here are a few pictures taken at the party.

Heidi, Kay and Laura Ashton


Mike, Kim and Marged Kirkpatrick








DeeDee, Steve, Paul, Houston and Sheriff Tyler Christiansen
Aiden and Zach Olsen
















Trent, Sophie and Ellie Hansen


















Amanda and Jennifer McKowen as Rosalie and Alice Cullen from "Twilight"


Hanna Christiansen

Ashlynne Olsen

Hazel VanOrman




Leif VanOrman





Stacie and Devin Orvin















Aubrey and Seth Shaner