visiting family

Last Thursday night, we drove to my sister's in Vegas and spent the night. Friday we drove to Mesa to visit Andrew, Heather, Henry, and Joy. We had a great time over the weekend visiting and playing a ton of games (most of which were won by Alex, but not all). And some of us didn't get much sleep. (Andrew, I hope you've recovered!). Andrew introduced us to a new game, The Quacks of Quedlinburg, which we loved so much, we bought it for ourselves.

Andrew also posted about our weekend. To read his post, go here:
https://agamedesignersblog.blogspot.com/2019/10/the-post-where-we-play-games-for-2.html

We mostly stayed inside playing games, though Glen and I had a lovely walk through Andrew's neighborhood on Saturday morning. Saturday night we went out for pizza at Organ Stop Pizza. They have the world's biggest Wurlitzer organ there and while you eat you get to listen to live organ music. It was quite unique!

Sunday we went to church and then stopped by the grounds of the Gilbert Arizona Temple to get a few pictures in. Sunday afternoon, Heather's parents, a sister, and a brother joined us for dinner (homemade enchiladas).

After we returned home, I saw a meme on my facebook page that said, "My hands have held many things, but nothing quite as sweet as the hand of my grandchild." It truly is a sweet thing to be with your grandchildren. Henry (4 1/2) is a ball of energy and Joy (almost 2) is kind of a quiet child, but she wasn't afraid of us and enjoyed having grandpa read to her.

the world's largest Wurlitzer at Organ Stop Pizza Mesa, AZ

Andrew, Alex, Eric, and me playing games (Caverna) in Andrew's kitchen

Alex, Eric, Andrew, Henry, Heather, Joy, Beth, and Glen after church

outside the Gilbert, Arizona Temple

this was so funny--Eric was explaining some deep plot to Henry (Book? Movie? Game?)

Story time! Glen is such a good grandpa.

Joy trying to brush her teeth

What a cutie!

On the way back to Vegas, we dropped in for a quick visit with Glen's Uncle Jim and Aunt Marilyn (Nancy's sister). It was so good to see them again and catch up on their news.

We spent Monday night at Deni and Pat's playing games there as well. We laughed so hard playing "What Do You Meme?" (edited version). We also got to see two of our nephews, Cory and Danny. I'm so glad that they took the time to stop by.

While there, I was able to pick up an old family Bible that belonged to my 3rd great-grandfather, Joel Jervis. It does have some family dates in it, but it's about 150 years old, so it's a bit scary to touch. So cool, though. I also was able to pick up a photo of the man himself. I hope to make smaller copies of the picture so others can have a copy, too.

hard to take a photo because of the glare

Yesterday was Dad's turn to host dominoes. Alex and I helped out setting up the snacks (yum!) and then got to play as well. It's always girls against the guys and the guys won this time (4th time in a row apparently). It was a lot of fun.

And fall has arrived here. The trees are turning yellow and the lawn can hardly be seen for the fallen leaves. Beautiful.

And more games are being played. Alex, Eric, and I just finished an 8 game campaign with an expansion pack to Scythe. Guess how many I won? If you said 0, you'd be right. Eric managed to win one, but Alex won 7 of them.  It was a blast, even it I lost.

And lastly, I sent the facebook link of this video to my children, then I looked it up on youtube. This is a wonderful Brad Wilcox 5 Minute Fireside where he's talking about us finding our personal mission. Great stuff.