Family, Fun and Some Intense Bottling!!!
September 3 - September 15th

We had family stay in town for a few days after the Higginson Family Reunion, so it gave us more time to catch up on fun! On Monday, September 3rd, we all gathered over at Mom and Dad Higginson's house. Vaughn really enjoyed playing with all his cousins there. I really wanted a picture of Vaughn and his cousin Dallin, but Vaughn kept looking towards the kitchen and not at me! Finally Dallin got a little impatient and put his arm around Vaughn's next to try to get him to look up at me. It was so cute!!! In all the other pictures Dallin was really smiling, but I had to put this one in to show him getting a little tense! What a cutie!!!

Dad Higginson was so busy helping everyone else during the two talent shows that weekend, that he didn't get the chance to perform for anyone. He is a VERY accomplished pianist, and it would have been tragic for us not to hear the piece he'd been working on. So as a final performance we all gathered in to listen to Dad Higginson play Chopin's Etude in A Flat Major!
If you've never heard this song before, you need to listen to it. But in just listening you can't see how difficult it is to play. I was totally impressed by Dad's abilities, especially since I had heard him working on the piece for so many weeks. He is truly a inspiration to me!

All of the grand kids did such a great job of listening while Dad played. Below is our nephew Leif. We snapped this shot of him and showed it to him after the performance. He told us that he had "just been so bored!" I think he may have been the only bored person there because we enjoyed listening to Dad so much! Isn't Leif great?!?!!

Later on in the week, Brian's sister Linda came over with her three kids to visit for a little while. I didn't get a good picture of Linda because they all turned out too dark. But let me just say she is a supermodel. She is so gorgeous, and she looks fantastic after having three kids. So above is a picture of her youngest Alvin. He loves to suck in his top lip, and it is adorable to watch! WHAT A CUTIE!!!!

Here he is "Nearly Naked" as I like to say. I love how much chub he has! And his little angelic expression was too much to take. He is such a little angel! I also need to quickly draw your attention to the rings on his neck....yep...that's more baby fat! I love it!

Laura's expression here is what we were all feeling at the time...so much love, with a touch of spazzing!

Linda's little girl Lorna was asleep, but her oldest, Kal was having the time of his life playing Brian's Mario Brother's Arcade. It is of course coin operated, so when Kal would run out of lives and realized he needed more quarters to play, he would say over and over, "I need more money. I need more money!" until we heard him. It was hilarious!

Next Monday, September 10th, Linda brought her two oldest over to our house so I could watch them while she had an appointment. It was SO CUTE to watch Vaughn interact with Lorna and Kal. Vaughn was so excited to play with more kids! In this picture I can't tell if he's spazzing from excitement, or trying to show Lorna his food. Gross, huh?

After lunch I put in a show for the kids, but Lorna didn't much like it. Then I asked her if she wanted to watch Sleeping Beauty. She immediately perked up and repeated, "Seeping Booty." I think I'll take a moment now to spazz myself! (If you'll notice, Lorna moved close to Kal. I think it was to avoid any more unpleasant glimpses at Vaughn's chewed up food!)

Later on that afternoon, we all loaded up and went to a really nice Chinese Restaurant called China Bowl to celebrate Julie's birthday, which was the next day. They have AWESOME food there! Here Julie and Linda are getting advice on what to order. P.S....HAPPY BIRTHDAY JULIE!!! And you looked great in the outfit you wore to China Bowl!!!

Brian had been to China Bowl several times with his previous boss, and Robert had been with Brian a few times, so they had a lot of good advice on what was best to order.

Here is Mom Higginson trying to decide what to order. I think in the end we were all very pleased with what we got!

Vaughn had a hard time waiting for the food to come. I think he was really hungry and very tired. Here he is staring off into space.

Later that evening I decided to get Vaughn to bed early so I went home with him while Brian stayed out with his family a little longer. Laura stopped by to say "Hi" and really wanted to take some pictures of me reading to Vaughn. So here we are!

I think the real reason Laura wanted to take pictures was so she could get this one put up on the blog. I think she looks really nice, don't you?

On Friday the 14th, Laura called us to tell us there was a party outside a local grocery store. I had been bottling that day, so I really wanted to get out, and so did Brian and Vaughn. So here I am with Laura at the party. Isn't Laura a hottie?





There were several live bands that played there that night. Vaughn loved the music!


















Once he got started, he was really rocking out!













It was very hard to get him to leave because he was having so much fun. I felt bad for him, especially after he'd been so patient that day with all my bottling.
















Speaking of bottling, I had spent most of the day Thursday picking white grapes from a neighbor's yard while Vaughn spent the day with "Grandpa Kuhni." He is the nice man down the road who is like a Grandpa to me. He said he would watch Vaughn while I picked the grapes. I then spent all day Friday and Saturday bottling the grapes. Vaughn had had it by Friday night, so that's why he'd put up a fuss. I was so grateful for Brian being willing to take Vaughn all day Saturday, because I was able to get all the bottling finished, and there was a TON of it to do! Above is a picture of what the stove looked like when I was through with all the bottling.





Here is a closer shot of the left burners. Yes, it was a nightmare to clean up. But in order to get the bottling all done, I didn't want to stop to clean between batches. I guess next time I won't take on so much at once!!!











I didn't take any pictures of the bushels of grapes I picked, but here are more pictures of the aftermath. These were part of the dishes I had to do.







And here's more of the dishes! This doesn't include all of the buckets and big Rubbermaid containers I used to gather and hold the grapes. It was a lot of cleaning! Do you feel sorry for me yet?






Here is a picture of about two-thirds of the bottles I finished.

And here's the rest of the bottles. All together I processed 122 quarts of juice! It was nuts!!!
Of course half of the juice was for "Grandpa Kuhni." He provided all the jars as well as the lids and rings. He was also very generous and bought me a processor that extracts more juice and pulp from the grapes once they have been steamed. Melvin loves very pulpy juice, so it was perfect for getting the most out of our grapes. Melvin is a very generous and kind person. He is always trying to help me, so it was the least I could do to bottle some juice for him. We love you Grandpa Kuhni!!!

What a few couple of weeks! It only got more crazy after this, so stay tuned for the next blog!

Love, Lisa