Kelsey Family

Josh, experimenting with a slow shutter speed. Jack in Grandma Mary's cereal cupboard and the Kelsey Family at our family picnic on Thursday.

It has been a most wonderful
month of July. It began with a

trip to Branson with a most gracious host, Kristin, and included two missionary farewells , a trip to the temple, a fireside that was the best home evening we have every had, a visit to Beaver for the Randalls and Kelseys, & culminated with family dinner including the Lowe family from Cedar. We have most certainly been in Heaven this past month and want to thank our wonderful family for being the best people in the whole world. We love you so much and thank you from the bottom of our hearts. We love all of you and look forward to hearing from our missionaries as they progress and grow.

July, the time for Family

A picture of the Randall family taken at Big John's Flat on Thursday, July 23rd,

Expectations exceeded

Wow! What a wonderful time this past week has been. Prior to our trip, we spent a good deal of time planning and scheduling activities leading up to Elder Lowe's curb side drop off. Not only were we able to do everything we had planned, but the activities exceeded our expectations. I can't thank everyone enough for taking part in the various gatherings we had. Alison, we appreciate having your home available as the central gathering place. The farewell was great, the luncheon was great, the family FHE was terrific (Derek wrote three pages in his journal when we got home - he wanted to remember all the great counsel he and Josh received), the temple open house, the temple, the brunch - everthing was fantastic (I'm running out of superlitives). The only bump in the road was our scheduled ice cream trip to Sub-Zero. The place wasn't open yet, so we initiated Plan B - we went to the BYU creamery for ice cream. Not a bad alternative. Dropping off Elder Lowe wasn't as impersonal as I expected. Yes, we drove to the curb and parked while Elder Lowe departed. However, we were all able to get out of the van for a final hug and family picture. We were able to keep our tears to a minimum, but there were tears. We will miss Elder Lowe, but we know he is where the Lord wants him right now. Elder Lowe's address is:

Elder Derek Lowe

MTC Mailbox 121-1008

Armenia Yerevan Mission

2005 N 900 E

Provo, Utah 84604-1793

Family

Here is like the one somewhat good picture I got from the video. Hopefully grandma was able to get some good ones. Enjoy!

My Mom

For those of you who don't know this, my mom was diagnosed with colon cancer on June 8th. She has been having all sorts of tests run over the past month. On Monday this week, she was told she is in stage 4. The cancer has spread to her lungs and all they can do is manage it now. Yesterday she flew to Arizona to stay with her sister and to go to the different cancer centers there. She just wanted to get a second opinion and explore all the different treatment options she has before she makes a decision. Today my sister called me and said that when my mom went to one of the places today (of course I don't remember which one) they were really nice to her. There was also a cancellation while she was there so they were able to make an appointment for her on Tuesday to meet with the doctors there. She said now she really has some hope. I will do my best to keep posting on her progress. All I ask of now, is that you try to remember her and my family in your prayers. Thank you all for all your love and support!

checking in

Hey ho everyone,
We're off on a little vacation to Goblin Valley and Arches. We'll be back Friday night, in time to prepare for the busy few days after that. Just wanted to touch base with everyone and let you know what activities are planned.
Sunday, July 19th. Our sacrament meeting starts at 9:00 a.m. Josh will be speaking and possibly doing something musical--still up in the air. You are welcome to stay for the rest of our meetings, or not, it's up to you. We won't eat until about 1:00 pm, though, at our house. We'll have a luncheon from 1:00 to 3:30, or until the last of the visitors have left. After that we want to take a few family pictures for our missionaries. Then we'll have our fireside. We're hoping that all returned missionaries will share some type of experience at that time, so come prepared.
Monday July 20. We have plenty of tickets to the Oquirrh Mountain temple open house at 1:00 pm. Everyone who is able can meet us there.
Tuesday July 21. Josh will be going through the 7:00 pm temple session. All those going with him should be there at 6:30 pm, Mount Timpanogos temple.
That's what we have scheduled. If you have any questions, post a comment or send me a message on Facebook. I'll hopefully be able to check while we're out of town. If you'd like to contribute to the luncheon, either salads or chips or a vegetable tray would be great. Can't wait to see you all this weekend!

Lowe's home improvement

This past week we have been working on my room by taking off the popcorn ceiling and texturing it, wallpapering the walls, and installing carpet. It was a lot of work to take everything out of my room, but it has payed off. The carpet is really soft in between my toes, and I actually want to sleep on the floor tonight! The carpet was an ugly gray and the walls were just plain white before the improvement. Here are some after photos. I wish that we had some before pictures.
-Amanda Lowe

Michael and Siennah

Tyff, Jason and Siennah came over this afternoon and brought with them super cute outfits for the kids from their Grandma and Papa Lowe. So we dressed them up and headed outside to snap some shots. Have you ever tried to take pictures of two kids under the age of two, who can both walk? It's NOT very easy. Luckily we have a program that allows us to stop and pin point an exact picture from video. So here they are.

A New Tradition

For about the past month Brendon and I had been trying to decide what we should do for the 4th of July weekend. Camping was of course one of the first options we thought of, then perhaps going to Cedar. Last year while the whole family was staying with us, we went to Cascade Springs and had a really good time.

So we decided that would be our new family tradition, going to Cascade Springs on the 4th. My cousin Toni and her daughter Jessie came with us on our adventure. After walking around the whole park, and taking a few family pictures, we headed back home to have a little cook out. Burgers and fresh corn on the cob are the best choices for a holiday lunch. The kids took a little nap and us adults got a little shut eye as well. It was a nice break on our busy day.

When the kids woke up, we filled up Michael's blow up pool and they went for a little soak. It was the first time either of them had been in a pool, and the experience seemed to be enjoyable. Toni then had to head home so we loaded the truck up and headed into Provo to try to find a place to watch the fireworks. HAHAHA! Have any of you ever been in Provo on the 4th of July? It was a joke! People were everywhere, the stadium was packed. Our game plan was to keep heading towards the mountain. The more we climbed the east side the fewer people there were.

Finally, we got to our spot and it was AWESOME!!!!! 1500 North and 1500 East, there was an open lot and a perfect view of the stadium. When we arrived, we were the only ones there and by the time the show started there was about 5 other cars there. We put our camera on a fireworks setting and just hit record. I was able to get some pictures from the video but pictures never do the fireworks justice. After the show was over, we had to battle the traffic again to get home, but it wasn't really all that bad.

We would really like to hear how everyone else's weekend went, so lets see some more posts!!!