bye bye justin

this weekend was a busy one! and we are getting ready to go to san diego, so this post is going to be a short one. our busy weekend started on saturday when we had a going away party for chris' older brother, justin, who is giong back into the army to be a helicopter pilot of sorts. justin was actually in the army straight out of high school, and was in for a few years. he recently became a helicopter pilot, and joining the army to be a helicopter pilot was the next step in the right direction. he should actually be in alabama by now as he left some time this morning, leaving behind his beautiful wife and almost-9-month-old daugher. for eight weeks. or something like that. i should text my sister-in-law after i finish this post.

anyhow, we had a lovely little shindig at barb's house. i tried to make an army cake, with camouflage siding... i'll have to try that again another time. hopefully it'll turn out better. but i was happy enough with how my fondant family turned out (except for justin's arm falling off. oops....)

this is our family up in heber, at a mexican restaurant (yes, real authentic mexican food up in the middle of nowhere near chris' dad's cabin. i love arizona.) justin, jen and zoe are at the front of the pic. kim, wes, and the rest of us are in the back, peeking around a tree that was in the middle of our table:

anyhoo, so sunday after church all these people in this picture headed up to heber to have a great time hanging out in 75 degree weather. so incredible! it was so great getting to hang out as a big happy family. we are so blessed!

oh yeah, leaving the mexican restaurant, we saw an suv that had a 'lakers' sticker on it. it was chris' dad's idea to take a picture of chris urinating on said vehicle. (don't call the cops. cause 1. it'll go straight to chris' cell phone. just joking. and 2. he's not really urinating.) as you can see, the watson family is still not over the tragic end to the suns' season. and we don't deal with loss very well. at all.

and i added this picture because i caught lily mid-jump! this is lily and her cousin zoe and lovely aunt jen. they are all dressed warm and toasty-like. my favorite!

and i love this picture of lily and gabe with grandma kim. they had been throwing rocks and pine cones into the lake to see if they sink or float. so cute watching the kids learn/not learn new things. they never made the connection that all the pine cones floated and all the rocks sank. that's ok though. and in this picture, lily is getting ready to throw a pine cone, but because of my INCREDIBLE photography skills, it looks like she is about to throw a huge boulder that is actually on the hillside behind her. but it also kind of looks like a hat made of rock that is shaped like poo.

and now i am off to pack and prepare for our san diego trip. look out for some pretty ecstatic posts-

sans enfants! (no kids.) we are leaving tomorrow and will be back sunday after chris a) dominates the marathon or b) gets dominated by the marathon. (i've got my money on a. you can do it chris!)

pictures and stories to follow...