Bringing home the tree

We went out today to find "the" Christmas tree. We figured being here in Alaska we would be able to find a great tree, and we weren't wrong!! We traveled about 8 miles out of town to a place called Anton Larson, which is where we went sledding last winter.

We looked around for a little while and couldn't decided on just one. In the mean time Dylan's boots kept coming off his feet and he had decided not to wear socks, so his feet were frozen! So I took him back to the truck to warm up his toes. Poor monkey!
Here is Cole attempting to cut down the tree, Ken let him try to do it this year. He got it cut through part way and then Ken finished it.

Here they are bringing it back to the truck.

And Cole hauled it all the way back! We got quite a bit of tree branches as well to make wreaths and garland etc. We will get it decorated tomorrow after church. The kids are excited and they have all decided that it is Quincy's year to put up the star. (Whew! No arguing over that one. That makes my job a little easier when they can all agree like that. ) We love going out and cutting our own tree each year, such a fun family tradition!

Happy Turkey Day!!!

Happy Thanksgiving to you all!! We have had a great day. It is so beautiful here today, we have had a white fluffy snow all day falling. We have been playing games, sitting around the fireplace, and cooking a great Thanksgiving dinner. Ken decided to smoke the turkey this year in our fish smoker. It was soooo yummy! We also got to share our dinner with our Elders today. The kids love having the missionaries over, which happens every week here. So great for the kids to know and love the Elders.

Crazy kid photo!

We just wanted to let you all know that we love you and are so THANKFUL for ALL OF YOU!!!!

Hugs and Kisses from Kodiak! XOXO

Heading Back

We are so sad to be seeing Del and Shannon leave today to head home, but we are hopeful that all goes well with this job offer here in Kodiak and that they will be moving up here in a couple of weeks. I know that is a huge decision to move a family that far away as we just did that last year. We had so much fun with them this past weekend while they were here. They got to meet our ward and a lot of our friends and see the sights here in Kodiak. So we are not saying goodbye, we are saying see ya later! Love ya guys!!!!

They're here!

Del and Shannon made it in safely this morning on the 8 am flight! Yeah! We are so excited to see them and to have them here in Kodiak for a little while this time and hopefully soon they will be up here for good with all of their family.

We have had so much fun with them tonight. Here is Ken and Shannon cooking dinner. It was great to get caught up on each others lives after not seeing each other for a year. I didn't realize how much we had missed seeing our friends until Ken walked into my work this morning with them behind him and I saw them! What a fun morning.

Welcome to the most beautiful place on earth!

Kodiak Surprise!!

Okay, so we were supposed to have visitors fly in today, but this Kodiak weather had other ideas! This morning it looked like it was going to be a nice clear day with no snow and then this blizzard blew in and we have had horizontal snow all day! Winds that are 30 mph with gusts up to 50 mph. So needless to say planes are not flying into Kodiak today and our friends are stuck in Anchorage for the night and will try again in the morning! (This one is for you Brandi, I'll bet you don't miss this aspect of Kodiak :) )

We had grass this morning and clear dry roads with no snow in sight. Not anymore! :)

We are having visitors!

We are soooo excited!! Tomorrow we are going to be able to share this beautiful land with some great friends from Washington, as they are flying in tomorrow afternoon to visit us and see if they "can live on this little rock in the ocean." They have a possible job here in Kodiak and have gone through the interviews and everything and the company is flying them up here to see if they like it here before they commit to a job. We are excited. So if it all goes well, they could be moving here. We will post pictures when they get here. Yeah!!!!

Hairdo's

Here is Quincy's new hairdo. We went to a friend's house to get my hair chopped off and when I was finished, Quincy said she wanted her hair cut like mine. So my friend hopped her up in her chair and cut her hair short like mine. Then we took her to see herself in the mirror and she got a sad look on her face and said, "But Mom I wanted my hair like yours!" I said, "Sis, your hair is short like mine." To which she replied with her hands waving around her head, "I wanted my hair to do this!" Refering to my curly hair! I told her that her hair didn't do that right now, but it might when she gets older. She seemed okay with that at the time. She now loves her hair and tells me that she looks like Tinkerbell.

We cut Myah's hair this short as well, but she wouldn't come down and let me take a pic of her hair do! Silly girl!

Bears, Bears, and even more Bears!!

We had a whale wash up on one of the local beaches and the bears came down and had a feast! I bet they were happy to fill their bellies before they went to hibernate. Crazy the amount of bears though! Ken tried to count from the photo and he got a lot!! If you click on the photo you can enlarge it and see a little better.

Myah!

Oh my! This morning I was down packing lunches for school when Myah comes down the stairs with the clothes on that I had laid out for Quincy!!! Yes, my 7 year old was in 3 T clothes and they fit her!! Such a sad state of affairs! I told her that she should have known when the pants look like short capris on her that they are not her's. She said I thought they were mine because they were closest to my bed. Another crazy morning at the Morrison's!

Discoveries of Dylan

This past week we were driving around doing our errands and such when Dylan chimes in with, "Mom, Heavenly Father sure loves me doesn't he?" I told him that he did love him very much and then asked him what made him think of that. He told me,"Just look around Mom. This place is so beautiful! He made the mountains over here with beautiful trees, and over here is the ocean that is beautiful too! It is just so lovely here. And he sent me here to live with a family that loves me too." WOW!!! I just about drove off the road when he hit me with that. I told him that he was right about all of it. What a special spirit I have living in my home!!! We sure love our Dylan!
(Just a side note about the word "lovely". I have no idea where he heard it, but he uses it all the time and at appropriate times as well. I love it when he is finished with his meals and as he is clearing his dishes, he always tells me,"Thanks Mom that was a lovely meal." Even if it was just mac and cheese or whatever, he always says it! It just melts my heart each time I hear it.)

Happy Voting Day!

Well we went out and voted and did our civic duty which I hope you all did the same. But much to our dismay, things are not looking too good for us. It does help to remember that the Lord in the one in charge and things will happen the way they are supposed to happen. So we shall see, but anyways, just a little song to go with it from REM that we love and we feel it is a little appropriate for the occasion. Love ya all!

Happy Halloween!

OH, What a fun Halloween we had!!! Downtown Kodiak does a trick or treating from store to store and the whole town goes down and participates. It was so fun to see all the kids' friends from school, people from church, kids from my preschool with their parents and friends from the community. What a great activity for the town. It ran from 3:30 til 5:30 and then everyone heads home to eat dinner and then everyone starts door to door trick or treating around 6:30. The weather was perfect AGAIN!!! The kids thought going door to door was pretty cool, but by the end they were getting tired. We got home and Dylan took himself up to bed and was out within 5 minutes of his head hitting the pillow and Quincy snuggled up with Ken and was out pretty quick as well.

Here is my Quincy "chicken".
Dylan with his spooky ooky mask with the glowing eyes!

Myah as Cleopatra, strike a pose girlfriend! She is all about the glam!!!

Cole as the archer. Get those bad guys!! Wait where is your arrow?!? (Mom didn't have time to create a place for his arrows to be held and he was pretty upset about that one! Oh, well, next time buddy!)

And all the monkeys together on the table in the front yard! They thought they had to stand up on the "stage" to get their photos done. So they pulled out their table from the porch area to stand on. Silly monkeys!

Well, a good time was had by all (for the most part :) ).

We hope you all had a great Halloween!

Love ya!!!