Provo Trip

We were all dying to go to a BYU game especially since it was Kyle Collinsworth's senior year.  We've really enjoyed watching the Collinsworth guys play basketball. So we got some tickets and headed up. It was incredibly hard finding a weekend we could make it happen but we finally just had to miss a few things to make it work. We took Hayden & Megan with us and stayed at Chateau Christina so that made it all super fun. Once we arrived we started looking online for an extra ticket so all five of us could go.

 Mendis and I headed to Waffle Luv to score us some waffles for breakfast and it didn't disappoint. I was excited to try them after watching them on the great food truck race last summer. After our waffle brunch we headed to the new Provo Temple open house. Megan had gotten us tickets so that really helped.

 The Temple was just gorgeous. It was freezing outside so luckily we didn't have to wait outside too long for anything. Adam Pulsipher, Hayden's companion, met up with us since we had an extra ticket for the open house and it was great to see him again.

 We grabbed a quick bit at the Kneaders drivethru and then we went to the Provo Beach Club since Hayden hadn't ever been there before. We watched the surfers for awhile and then went in and watched Hayden & Megan do the ropes course.

 By this time it was nice and snowy!

 That night we had dinner at Tucahno's another first for Hayden.

 Jeff Collinsworth ended up getting us really great seats for the game so we gave our tickets to Christina's friend to use. It was fun going in through the bottom of the Marriott center and sitting so close was pretty awesome too. Kyle had an amazing game and broke the round record while we were there so that was pretty awesome!

 After the game we headed down and met up with Kyle and visited for a few minutes.

 It was a super fun weekend and we were so glad to be able to pull it off.  Thanks to Ashley for not having her baby that weekend too!! We drove home in the snow but right behind us it got super bad. They closed the freeways the next day so thank goodness we missed the worst of it.

Gold Butte

 On MLK day we decided to just take a break and do something fun for a change. We loaded up the truck with lunch and snacks and went out into the hills. We have always wanted to go see Gold Butte so this was the perfect time to do it before it got hot and miserable. It was quite a long trip taking most of the day but it was fun to get out and do something we wanted to do.

 The rocks out there were amazing.

 

We discovered the place was just full of old mines. Kind of creepy so I'm glad they were fenced off. Unfortunately that was just a suggestion for one of us.

 Luckily no one died in this adventure lol!

 

 It was a beautiful drive.

 Looking out to Lake Mead in the distance.

 

Cooper Reunion

Just when we thought life might slow down a bit it was time for the reunion. Mendis and I had "volunteered" to put it on during Aunt Alzina's funeral. The second the holidays were over we hit it hard! Luckily for us lots of people volunteered to help us so we spread out the assignments. We started at noon officially. We had lunch ready to go in no time. We had hot dogs and hamburgers. I made a couple of salads, there was chips, fruit and tons of cookies. I had just made those ahead of time and frozen them. So we certainly didn't starve. Alisha and Terri had organized a ton of activities for the kids to do so they were happy all afternoon.

 

Balloon bball and then snowball fights and bball!

 We had set up tables along the wall for people to set up displays of Cooper pictures and amazing artifacts and geneology stuff. It was amazing to see all the stuff people brought to contribute. This is just our portion. Mendis got to play host and announced our itinerary and kept things moving along. Stacy had some fun Cooper trivia and I handed out prizes for longest traveled etc.

 We set up a bunch of props for an impromptu photo booth that we thought was fun to take advantage of.

 After lunch we did a local tour of the things Coopers would be interested in. We went to Joe's barn where some people told stories of things that happened there.There was even a family meeting to plan the next one and we had a question time for Ivan, Marietta and Mary Jane so we could hear some more stories.

We spent some time together up at the cemetery as well.

That evening we had a fabulous Mexican dinner catered by LaFonda. That was awesome not having to cook that too! During dinner we had Ken Marshall come do some cowboy poetry for us which was awesome.

 We visited a bit more and wrapped it all up by about 8pm. It was a long day but it went so smoothly I think. It was a good thing to have over but we sure enjoyed doing and getting to see family. Some of the cousins hadn't gotten together since the sixties so it was much needed!

The original cousins!

Rockets! Who Knew??

We had procrastinated and now it was time to face the music. G & G Cooper bought every in the family a rocket with Stacey's help. The idea was to make them and go out together and launch them during the holidays. We got busy and didn't get around to building them until the day before the big launch party. You should have heard the grumbling. They were a little more complicated than we anticipated and we had left them to the last minute so we were under the gun.

We had done some when our kids were little but it had been a long time since we'd done it. 

So we were a little sketchy on the details and the instructions left a little to be desired.

 Well the big day finally came and ready or not we hit the desert. Who knew it was going to be so fun.

 Our champion rocket retrievers! Bear and Josh were there too so that made it extra fun for the boys.

 

 

 Just a few of the amazing rockets we launched that day.

 

 

 We had hot chocolate and chili and hot dogs while we were out there. Oh and s'mores, can't forget those!

 

 

 

 

 

I have to say when it was all said and done we had a BLAST!!

Sadly this was the last of the festivities of Christmas. Hayden & Megan went home that evening and Jeff & Rachel flew home the every next day. 

:(

It was so sad to see everyone go home because we feel like we had an amazing time together. 

We have such a great family!!