What's better than General Conference?

General Conference on Easter...

...with cousins!

And missionaries.

(The aprons are to save their white shirts. They're so kind and humble, they humored me and allowed the picture.)

Conference food tradtions:

waffles with homemade syrup (no more Mrs. Buttersworth at our house), opt. peanut butter

Cave Creek Tacos

Breakfast Nachos

***This year we traded bagels and fruit for doughnuts and then chili for Ribs and hot dogs. I don't think any of the kids felt bad about that.

(Don't you love Jeff's hair? He doesn't like me to do it for him...he likes it this way better. Independence is hard...for the mom!)

Love the conference packets! Taylor got them ready for his pre-conference FHE lesson. Thanks Tay. They helped the kids stay a little quieter on Sunday-except they did most of it on Saturday before conference even started.

OK Jess, we did something different with the treats to prevent some of the getting up and down. This time, before it started everyone filled their own private bowl and kept it nearby. Dad gave some magic words to listen for. Worked much better!

(Couldn't resist, he's just so cute.)

RM's

Thanks for coming! We love you all. (Garrett-sorry we didn't get a picture, next time!)

Jessica-don't be too jealous, but Ceci and Steven made us dinner.
Adam-you're next! What's on the menu? Send me a shopping list, and I'll be the sous chef.

For my very own

Grandma made a southern breakfast for the whole family and the missionaries. Delicious!

But then, just because, she made me a chocolate pudding. MY favorite!

What does he do?

Grandma and Grandpa Bassett went with us to Snowflake

so they could see what zone conferences were like.
We made certain to start the day off right-with German babies!

But the best part of the day is always walking up

to the church and spotting the missionaries.

Gratefully, I still get that sense of awe when I pull into the parking lot and

see all those cars filled with the elders and sisters.

And what a gorgeous day!

Unfortunately, this was also good-bye. Grandma and Grandpa left from here to continue their road trip onto the Manti Temple. Since the Atlanta Temple has closed, they had some time to travel and visit. We're so glad you came-we love you!

Blind Taste Test

Which country offers the best tasting chocolate?

These 3 are the winners: Peru, Ecuador, & Venezuela

Grandma and Grandpa Duke it out!

I don't know who was having more fun:

Grandma and Grandpa or the kids cheering them on.
Can you tell who's winning?

Guess again!

Actually, I don't remember who won. I was watching them, not the 'game'.

Take down Taylor

This is one of my boys favorite sports, but it usually ends in a tear or two, so it's not one I encourage. But-as you can see from the pictures,
...the kids were all smiles. I think they could have gone on all night. They wrestle in such a small space, I was sure someone was going to eat a wall or a piano bench. I was wrong. Not one injury. The worst of the pain was when Joey went in for the sneak attack. You can see him cuddling up to Jeffrey (and later Brandon)...then boom! Up he'd come and smash back down on their stomach, face or neck. He's crazy.

Little People

Look at that face! I just love little guys like Joey. Joey is my brother's (John & Julie) son, and while he doesn't love me so much (he was a month old when we left and has no clue who I am), he seems to love my house.

It's the perfect place for little people. Everyone in our family is height challenged and can't easily stand under the citrus canopy to pick fruit-not Joey. He walked right under to pluck all the fruit....


(but his little arms weren't quite strong enough to pull it off the branches without a little help from his mom.)

Here's another plus our house has to offer little people....

ROCKS

He entertained himself for quite awhile bringing fist sized rocks to his mom and saying, "Hot." Like Jeffrey, he wasn't pleased when his mom said his collection had to go back to the rock pile. So then he started bringing handfuls of the small rocks to John. (Fortunately, we were able to convince him that throwing rocks into the grass wasn't as much fun as he thought it was.)



Joey seems to love all his cousins, but he wasn't too sure about the 'big' people. No worries-we have another lure for little people-a candy machine. Mark kept offering him m&m's coaxing him a little closer and a little closer all the time.

Can you see how fast he's shoveling them into his mouth? If you blow up the picture, you can see an orange m&m in his mouth as he's reaching out for the yellow and that was followed in quick succession by several more. But he would only get as close as arms length.

Lucky snuck in and tried to get part of the action, but Lucky forgets that though he's little, he's not a 'person'-so no chocolate for him (are you proud Matt?). Lucky was another plus for Joey. Toddlers love Lucky! He's just the right size for them, but Lucky doesn't quite love them back. He tried to stay about as far away from Joey as Joey stayed from us.

Mark tried one more time at dinner trying to get Joey to share his pistachios. Joey would start to share and then zoom the pistachio into his own mouth. That's OK, we still have another day to wear him down. Wish us luck!

Successful recipes

Are you ready for a great recipe? Last week we had a lunch with 10 of the Stake Presidents & their wives, President Clark and his wife from the Mesa Temple, Elder Wilford Anderson & his Wife, Elder Snow also from the seventy (he remembered being in Antelope last year and said great things!), and Elder & Sister Bednar. A family of 5 sisters in the hosting stake served a great meal. Here's the recipe for their adaptation of Chicken Rolls. You can find more great recipes from their cookbook, The Fat Sisters Cookbook.

Chicken Rolls

1 cup chopped chicken

3 oz. cream cheese

1 3oz. can mushrooms

2 Tbsp. butter

1 can refrigerator crescent rolls

1/3 c crushed seasoned croutons

1/2 tsp sage

1/4 c walnuts or pecans

3 Tbsp melted butter

Filling: Mix softened cream cheese and butter well, then stir in chicken & mushrooms. Separate crescent rolls. Spread each with 1/4 cup chicken mixture. Roll up; tuck sides and point under to seal.

Pulse croutons, nuts & sage in food processor. Dip each roll in melted butter, then crumb mixture. Put on cookie sheet and back 15-20 minutes at 375 degrees. Serve with a spoonful of gravy on top.

(Gravy-try cream of chicken soup thinned with 1/3 milk and add 2 Tbsp chopped chives.)

We liked the chicken rolls so much, we decided to make them for dinner tonight when Elder and Sister Perry came. They turned out great. They looked so good, I think they even would have made the list for those of my friends out there who only like to serve 'pretty' food.

Elder Perry is visiting several of the missions in the North America Southwest area; meeting with groups of missionaries and also with groups of leaders involved in missionary work (basically, everyone!). He gave the elders a 'recipe' for being successful teachers. They're very excited to work on the things he talked with them about. We're already planning how we can implement the things he taught into our trainings. The stake and ward leaders he met with were equally enthusiastic to come sit at the feet of an apostle and be instructed. I couldn't believe how crowded the building was! For some of our missionaries, it was their first full day in the mission field. What a way to start your mission!

Congratulations!

Time to catch up. I had to wait a little while, just to make sure we weren't spilling the beans for anyone. Last week was a big week for weddings and announcements. While Mark and I were in Snowflake visiting missionaries on Friday, we had two exciting phone calls/texts announcing engagements. First our nephew Josh finally proposed to his Brazilian 'goddess'....and she said yes. Way to go Josh! They'll be getting married sometime next summer. We're very excited for both of them-but Josh is going to have to figure out how to get her down here so we can meet her! The second announcement came in a series of texts and even a pic of an engagement ring from Steven (Hermann). So, technically, he's sent us a picture of Ceci, but I'm still waiting for a picture of them together. Actually, I just need to sit down with Jessica so she can show me some on facebook. (She did check his account to confirm our news, and indeed, his 'relationship status' has moved to engaged-and this time it's not a social experiment.) They'll be getting married in February and hopefully (fingers crossed) they'll be able to come down and see us, too.

The theme continued on Saturday at the Snowflake temple. President Tenney, one of Mark's counselors, was released and called as the new Snowflake Temple President. Saturday he performed his first sealing which happened to be one of his granddaughters and one of our missionaries-Nicholas Mallory. It was a beautiful experience. Nicholas was a fantastic missionary and his new bride belongs to one of the best families in Arizona. We love the Tenney's so much. We were so happy we could attend their sealing. We don't have that opportunity often. We didn't stay long, because we had an open house back in Phoenix that night for another returned missionary, Andrew Crozier. He and his new wife, Deonne, were married last week in the Idaho temple. Congratulations everyone! We wish you all the best.

OK, and since it IS fall, I took a walk around the city to try and capture some fall color. It was rough going, but I did find a little.

But Snowflake does boast about 46 of these beautiful historic homes. The one below is the inn that we stay in.

All this while Mark stayed busy working/reading all the missionaries letters.

Below is one of the little windows from our room.

And here is the view from that room....

and another view (this is the top of the first historic home pictured above)....

and another...

and another...

And I couldn't resist a few more pictures of chickens. These ones hang out in a pen between the museum and the inn. Fresh eggs for breakfast!

Moore visitors, yeah!

Last weekend Jen & Sherm came to visit. I couldn't believe how great it was to see them when they stepped out from the airport breezeway. It felt so good to have family close. We've been so lucky this last year and a half to have so many visitors.

They arrived Sunday afternoon, just in time to visit with the kids, eat {of course} and then go with us to one of our firesides. Even though it was in Spanish, I know they could feel the spirit-especially when the missionaries sang. There were some inspiring songs, including a duet with Elder Maxwell & Sister Lopez and a solo by Sister Lopez.

They liked it so much, that with a little 'nudge' we stopped by the LDS bookstore on Monday and bought the CD 'When You Believe' by Rebecca Lopez (Sister Lopez to us). [Was that plug too shameless? Hey-it's supporting a missionary!]

We had interviews all this week, so they met us at noon for lunch at Tortas and a trip to the Visitor's Center (and our stop at the bookstore). We met up at one of the church buildings, just in time for them to meet several of the missionaries and get an encore performance from Elder Pead [from Utah] and Elder Masima [from Tonga] of a song they sang to the missionaries. Here's a little video clip of their song [I don't know where they got the ukulele]. We spent the rest of the afternoon with the kids and eventually went back out to eat at the 5 & diner. Do all our events really evolve around food? There are some more pictures that Sherman took, but I still have to find them on the other computer so that post will come later. We debated the different 'themes' for a Christmas gift exchange and talked about all the great things that are going on in Georgia with their family and here with ours. Their visit was much too short-and we had to say goodbye Tuesday morning, but we hope to see them again soon.