Happy birthday to Christine, Glenn and Orianthi Bay

January 08, 2023

Christine turned 60 on January 2nd. Steve (who turned 60 in December) threw a party to celebrate. We all brought our memories--one memory per decade--to share about Christine. She is much loved by her family and by Steve's family. A great woman who has sacrificed a lot to bring 10 children into a world that has mostly rejected having more than one or two. It was a great evening. After most of Steve's family left, the Cook's sat down to reminisce and enjoy each other's company. It was a snowy evening, so Dave and Becky made a wise decision and stayed home. Of course, we also missed Bruce, and Glenn who was hopefully celebrating his birthday, too as he shares the day with Christine.

Nan and Bruce

Char and Phil (sorry Phil, this is not the best picture).

James; Roy with some Christensens in the background including Eliza who helped throw the party.

Mykael and Peter

Even in our 60's and 70's we really enjoy being together. Nan shared a memory of our grandparents. She said that we almost never had the opportunity to stay the night at our grandparent's home. She was very excited when she and I were able to stay overnight one night. I didn't ask her if we had moved to Salt Lake by then, so I'm not sure if I was under 5 or over 5, but apparently I did the usual little girl thing asking for a glass of water, another trip to the bathroom, etc. Nan said she was so disappointed when the next thing she knew, my parents were there to pick us up and take us home. It's interesting talking to my cousins about memories of our grandparents. They are all quite similar and usually include eating a meal with them or working in their garden. I think the expectations of the time were different because I never remember going there without my parents. With my parents it was always just a visit of an hour or so. I vaguely remember Christmas parties when I was really young, and we had a fabulous Clyde reunion every summer, even into the years when Nick, Dan and Elise were small.

Ori's birthday was on the 3rd and we'd arranged to go on our birthday date on Friday. She was a good sport when our plans had to change. We won't forget, Ori.

As a general rule, I don't do overnight babysitting. However, I agreed to help Crista and Matt out for two nights so Crista could help Matt with his new business at a convention in Las Vegas. The convention was for the whole week, but we were planning on splitting the babysitting (which started Tuesday afternoon) with the Vances. Due to problems with Jana's father and Reagen's mother (who passed away Tuesday), it became obvious that we would be extending our babysitting to the whole week. It was both a blessing and a curse (just kidding about the curse part). We could feel our age as we attended to every need of four small children. Ruby told me, "Grandma, your house is always messy." No, Ruby, my house is Always clean, except when my grandchildren are visiting!

Grandpa, reading to Ruby--even though she's an excellent reader
and can easily read her own stories. She told me she'll never outgrow
picture books.

Todd; Roy, Catharine, Todd, Bridget, Greta and Ruby

On Thursday we took the kids to see grandpa Verl in Santaquin. The plan was to drop them off at the Vances on the way back (they live in Mapleton). We decided just outside of Santaquin that dropping them off at the Vances would overload them this week, so we stopped at Chuck A Rama to feed hungry kids. Let's just say that a Chick-Fil-A drive-through would have been a better choice!

On Saturday, we decided to divide and conquer. Roy took Greta and Ruby to the aquarium to get them out of the house and away from the TV. I kept Todd and Bridget (Chuck A Rama had been kind of a zoo--we couldn't imagine trying to handle them all at the aquarium).