#7 Precious Time

I met Arthur and Shirley, Alan's parents, at Costco this week. They arrived a little before me and were waiting by the front entrance just inside the doors for me and the little ones.

As Anna, Jake and I stepped onto the side walk Anna caught a glimpse of her Grandparents on the other side of the entrance waiting. She dashed off with her cute little blond hair bouncing up and down as she ran. Jake noticed what she was looking at and wriggled quickly from my arms to race towards them as well.

The two bounded into the arms of their Grandparents with such force that I thought they would knock them over. They were caught up with giant squeezing hugs and kisses. I thought my heart would burst from my chest at the beauty of the scene.



Alan's parents are 87 and 83. Even though they seem to be in good health, the clock is ticking and our time with them here on this earth is numbered. I wonder if Anna and Jake, who love them so much,will know them like Emily and Ruth know them. Will they know that Grandma loved doing puzzles with Anna and that Grandpa loved playing catch and tackle football with Jake (kind of scary when the 2 year old unexpectedly tackles Grandpa leaving him on the ground). Will they know that in their 80's their grandparents served as Primary teachers to 9 year olds and loved it! Will they know that everytime Grandpa sees something tender tears quietly trickle from his eyes? Will they know that Grandma made homemade cookies for them and never tasted them because she strictly followed her diabetic diet?

Hug your Grandparents, go visit them, tell your children stories, because time and memories will be the only thing of importance that we have when they are gone!

(this is Grandpa on his "tractor" with Jaden, Jake, Anna, and Jaxon all Bott's Jaden and Jaxon are Great Grandchildren, but cousins to play with the Anna and Jake!)

#7 on my top ten list for Summer has to be mowing Grandpa Bott's lawn! He was patient with us! Alan broke two sprinkler heads. But Em and Ruth did a good job of helping their Grandparents and each time we learned something new about them. We even pulled out Grandpa's old Navy uniform and Grandma's very stylish polyester sewing creations (they really were cute and I was impressed with her sewing capabilities!)

Ahhh the Days of Summer

It seems as if school just ended and here we are already a couple of weeks back into it. My goal this year was to post on my blog once a month. Well, I did pretty well till April, then life seemed to go a little crazy. Who knew that teenagers were going to be soooooo much fun and work!!!! So here is the Bott fam top 10.



#1 Ward marries Darnelle Earl. On May 28th Ward remarried. It has been such a great blessing to our entire family. The girls are so happy and I love hearing them call her mom. They now have 7 children and are selling and building a house. We had the privilege of watching the girls during the honeymoon. Em taught them all about "selfies"
#2 Girls Camp, basketball camp, Summer Fun!Well, that took our first 3 weeks of Summer! Summer fun is the girls entrepreneurial adventure where we had up to 30 kids ages 3-8 at our house for two hours of creative fun. This is a picture of what me and the kids did during girls camp-Overnighter in Rexburg with Daddy. Check out that lipstick job!














#3 Every time we sing Latter Day Prophets when we reach David O. McKay, Anna says "Hay, We went to his house!" That we did as we spent family and cousin time in Eden at a really fun cabin.


#4 Emily passes her AP test!!! After a year of hard sweat tears Em gets the long awaited letter that says she PASSED! Now all of a sudden the class has become her favorite all time class.

#5 Delta puts Jake (now 2) in a seat all by himself on our way to Orlando, Florida. I say why don't we try that, it would be a calmer flight for me. In the end Delta (who wouldn't change it until we were at the desk even though we tried 4 or 5 times)moved all of us together. We had the same problem on the way back except that Alan and I got upgraded to 1st class, my parents had a great flight while Alan and I sat with two little cuties by the back bathroom. Anna fell asleep as we landed in SLC. I will leave it up to you to imagine that plane ride. But I felt like I should give the stewardess a HUGE tip before leaving because it was such a mess. Em and Ruth gladly sat by themselves far towards the front of the plane.

#6 Orlando- we visited Orlando in 2004 for our Make a Wish trip.Even though the temperatures were in the upper 90's with 90-100% humidity and I have never sweat like that before, this trip was so different and wonderful compared to that difficult trip back in April of '04. My parents came with us which made it possible to do so much more. Mickey and Minnie came alive to our whole family and I must say it was "A Dream Come True" and a "Magical Adventure".








Well, too tired to write anymore so the end will have to come later, lets just hope it is before Christmas! Love Ya All Mary