We enjoyed a week in the sun at the end of December. We stayed in a rental home with the Texas Porters and ate Thanksgiving at a church with all of the Porters.
We played in the park behind our rental house as often as possible!
The rental home didn't have enough couches and chairs for everyone, but did have a big pool table in the middle of the family room, which the boys loved.
We stocked up on just about everything for Thanksgiving Dinner for 40 people and filled the freezer and fridge!
Sadly, our plans to swim every day in our awesome heated pool went awry when, on the FIRST full day of our trip Jeffrey split his head open while playing with cousins (and required staples in the head) and Joseph got a nasty spider bite at the same time. By the morning after the bite, Joseph's ankle was blistering, oozing, and swelling. He wasn't really in pain, but wasn't able to wear shoes the entire week, including for family pictures. Good thing we were in warm Arizona!
We looked up info on spider bites and determined that we would take the "watch and wait" approach. As the week went on, the leg continued to swell and look quite terrible.
We finally took him to Instacare on Thanksgiving Day after we decided that a bacterial cellulitis had set it. We were right, and he was put on a very strong antibiotic, which finally turned the tide.
We had Dave take some pictures of our family. We used the small hill behind the rental house as our backdrop and timed it for the perfect light, an hour before sunset.
Sadly, most of the pictures are like this, where everyone is in focus except for Aubrey.
But some worked out.
(click to see more)
We just pretend to be normal. This is us showing our true colors.
The girls
The boys
Me and my honey
Joseph, with one of his signature looks
Sisters!
Pictures of walking back home through the park. This is the real life version: Joseph acting out a Studio C skit.
And this is the pretend normal version!
After photo shoot pictures in the park.
Matchy matchy.
And now, the very important topic of Tia Rosa's! We ate there twice and had good Mexican food innumerable times during the week.
We also enjoyed the Hawaiian shaved ice (or is it Arizonan shaved ice?) Bahama Bucks. Here we are on our way to get a treat after family pictures, with Nate wedged between two seats because we were out of seatbelts.
Dan felt very strongly that we should gather everyone together and interview his parents. We did this the day before Thanksgiving at Rich and Lindsey's house. It went very well and was a great experience! Brandon was the videographer.
The big kids visiting after the interviews of their grandparents. From left: Sydney, Paij, Bailey, Nate, Sarah, Megan (who came home from her mission during our time in AZ!), and Brooke.
Thanksgiving Dinner
Visiting after dinner.
and pictures of ALL the grandkids and the entire Porter family. This may be the only time we get everyone together . . . everyone was able to attend and no one was gone on a mission!
The entire group
The crazy version
Grandma and Grandpa and all the grandkids
The older cousins: Spencer, Brandon, Dallin (Brandon, who is 6'2", looks positively tiny between his very tall cousins), Brooke, Megan, Logan, Kristin, Nate, Bailey, Aaron, Nancy, Paij, Harley, Katie, Alyssa, Aubrey, Sydney, Sarah, Cole, Samantha, Taya, Kiley
All of the original Porters.
Bailey said "these are my people." She has some VERY tall cousins on the Porter side, including everyone standing on her row: Dallin and Spencer, Katie, Kristen, Alyssa, Aaron.
All the grandkids in order of age.
Pictures after the dinner.
After cleaning up the tables, Bailey and Aubrey took turns carrying each other and racing Nate and Sarah across the gym.
The day after Thanksgiving we visited the beautiful Mesa LDS Temple lights.
Saying goodbye to cousins and to Arizona
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