50th Anniversary, cousins & the greatest SNOW on earth, SLC UT

At the end of January (2016) the Scoffield family met in Salt Lake City UT for a family reunion to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of GG and Papa (Ward and Sherry.)  My girls were BEYOND excited for a couple of reasons: They love to fly

On the shuttle to the airport

Daddy, Ani and Stella

  they LOVE their cousins

Kiely, Madison, Landon, Aniika and Elin

Landon and Ani (I love Ani's face)

and we promised there would be LOTS of snow.

Anikka

Elin

Scoffield's 50th Anniversary

We celebrated Ward and Sherry's 50th Wedding Anniversary most of the day (January 29).  We were fortunate enough to secure tickets to the open house of the new Prove City Temple.

It is an amazing, beautiful and holy place.  I was excited to share the inside of the Temple with my girls to help them understand it's importance.

Kiely and Elin (besties)

After the tour we had lunch at The Brick Oven.  I worked there for a couple of years when I went to BYU in the 90's.  It was just as good as I remembered.

That evening we had reservations for dinner at the Roof Top Restaurant in Salt Lake.

Handsome Tristan

Madison, Olivia and Hayden

The view was incredible,

The food was good  (they serve Lion House rolls) and amazingly my girls were perfect angel's in their first ever fancy restaurant.

It was a great way to celebrate the Scoffield's legacy of 50 years of marriage.

Happy 50th Anniversary!

View from our table

Scoffield Family: James, Ward, Russell, Julie, Sherry, Laurie

GG & Papa with all the grandkids

Beautiful ladies, Madison and Olivia

One of my favorite pictures from the weekend of Elin and GG

All the cousins

Cousins

I have so many fond memories of my cousins and I remember how much fun it was to visit my cousins who were also my friends.  It has been so fun to watch my girls establish these same lifelong friendships/relationships with their cousins.   There are few times that I see Elin as happy as when she is spending time with her cousins.  Anikka is the youngest of the Scoffield cousins and all the big kids help her and play with her.  The big kids take Elin under their wing and treat her like an equal. I can tell that she always feels much older (and cooler) when she is hanging out with her cousins. I just try to stay out of the way.

One evening, Trevor, Kiely and Elin put on a play for us (I remember doing this with my cousins).  They charged a quarter for admission and we all had to watch.  It was a funny play about a queen and a monster.

We were also able to also see my sister and her family for a few hours two afternoons while we were in Utah.  My girls loved playing at Aunt Leina's house.

Noah, Sylis, Ella, Marty, Anikka and Elin

Girls with Aunt Leina

Greatest Snow on Earth 

We promised the girls lots of snow time in Utah and they were not disappointed.  They played in the snow every single day that we were there.

Papa helped them build a snowman

Tristan built them a snow couch

Elin's perfect snow angel

They usually ended up in the hot tub after snow time.

We also got to celebrate Papa's 77th birthday while we were there.

We had such a fun filled family weekend celebrating 50 years of marriage, Papa's birthday and lots of family time. We can't wait until next time.

Maija

Harrison Hot Springs, BC - Dec 2015

A few days after Christmas we went on a quick two day trip to Harrison Hot Springs in British Columbia Canada. Have I mentioned how much we LOVE Canada.

View of Harrison Lake from our room

We stayed at Harrison Hot Springs Resort which is on the edge of beautiful Harrison Lake.  Plus, its only a 2 hour drive from Seattle.  It was cold and blustery the day we arrived. We had been talking to the girls about how we were going swimming at the hot springs (they are familiar with hot springs after our trip last summer).  As we drove up to the hotel and saw this beautiful view, with the wind blowing and the temperature at freezing, Elin said, in an exasperated voice "This is NOT what I was expecting!"  Apparently, she thought the lake was the hot springs and it did not look warm enough to swim in.    HA! HA!

The Resort has it's own set of 5 hot spring pools for their guest only.   For more info/pictures of the resort and hot springs click here:  www.harrisonresort.com

We checked in, changed and got right to swimming.

We had dinner in town that night, not worth mentioning (horrible food) then a second round of swimming before bed.  Funny story about bedtime:  The next morning James told me that just after we turned out the light I was shaking the bed like I was having a seizure so he looked over at me to make sure I was ok.  I don't remember having a seizure?  I also felt him shaking the bed, I just thought he was restless and not sleeping well. We learned later that day that about 8 minutes after we went to bed that night there was an earthquake near Victoria BC....which was why the bed was shaking.

The view from our room was just as beautiful in the morning.

Day 2 started out with a quick breakfast....and you guessed it.....more hot springs swimming.

Double trouble....

Elin started swimming, really swimming, on this trip.   I love having a water camera to capture all these interesting photos.  Her hair cracks me up.  She looks like a little mermaid.

We headed towards home that afternoon after doing a little shopping in Vancouver.  We will definitely going back. Elin has already asked when we can go there again.

Maija