Aunt Mona

Just got word this evening that Aunt Mona passed away. It's almost midnight so we'll be calling family tomorrow. Thank you, Brenda, for taking such good care of your mom. We will miss you, Mona!

No longer a teenager

Happy birthday, Elder Price! Just a shout-out. We'll all be thinking of you on August 29th! ~ All of us

Update on Kenneth

Kenneth is in a new area. Here is his new address for now:

Elder Kenneth Price
619 Rollingbrook #2005
Baytown, TX 77521

In case you haven't been getting the emails he's been sending to mom, here's a brief "briefing" of our Elder:

*My new area is Baytown 1st Spanish.
*While we are spanish missionaries, we have to cover an english area and all the spanish people all the other elders can find.
*Right after I got to Baytown, Hurricane Edward came. It It was actually only a tropical storm.
*All of the mission, except one zone in Louisiana, got evacuated.
*My companion is now the District Leader up here, and he's great. He's hilarious
*I actually got like heat exhaustion the other day! (They are on bikes and it is HOT)
*As for our work, we're working with the members a lot more, and I got to get to know our ward.
*The members are nice, and the bishop is hilarious. We have some spanish members, so we have to translate for them! Thats tough stuff.
*All in all: The mission is going well!

He's such a trooper! Now if only we could get some pics of our little elder in action... ~Kendra

It's a...

GIRL!!!

~Tom and Kathryn are having a little girl. Due date is January 7, 2009. This makes 5 granddaughters in a row for the Price grandparents! "Now we're REAAALLY gonna out vote cha...ha ha ha."

Sisterly Love

We all love Daryn, but Claire may be her biggest fan - with a little prompting of course :D

Ah ha ha ha!

Kendra's reply

"Kathy!
Those fish look like a lot of fun! All you have to do is slice open the fishes' tummy, cut the throat and then PULL from the tounge and all the insides will come out! It's fun. And don't forget to cut open the stomach to find out what the fish have been eating. It'll be a good learning experience! And have Jared touch the eyeballs, they feel funny and squishy. I use to do it all the time and I turned out fine..."

Deep Sea

Tom went deep sea fishing last night to see what it was like. He caught a good bounty and came home very late exhausted from the physical nature of that trip. Staying within 5 miles or so of the coast off Huntington Beach, they used live bait to troll the bottom of the ocean. Tom kept 5 sand bass for us to experiment with at home. Sorry, Dad, I've never cleaned a fish! Kendra is the resident expert, but I must have missed that day of class... so now it's time to fillet! As Jared would say, "Eeeewww." I must admit, the smell isn't something I like in my kitchen. He was told they are quite tasty, so we'll try it!

Rockin' and Rollin'

All of us in Southern California felt the 5.8 earthquake this morning. Tom was at work (4th floor) and said his office shook like jello. Jared and I were outdoors at Mission Viejo Lake eating lunch with my visiting teacher. The ground was shaking for a LONG time before it stopped. Sherrie grabbed the picnic table and screamed, "Earthquake! It's an earthquaaaake!" at everyone standing nearby. That was unsettling - and a little funny. We were just talking about food storage and getting our water together, too... Kara, Chuck and the kids were in Mission Viejo and said it was pretty intense. Corbin wisely got his construction hardhat Aunt Marilyn gave to him during his trip to Nevada this week and wore he stood in the doorway. He worried about Rusty, their dog, but Rusty didn't mind the quake too much. Grandma Joyce said she felt it up in Lancaster and her house was shaking for about 10 seconds, but everything is fine (thank goodness!).

Yosemite

Tom, Kathryn and Jared enjoyed "camping" at Yosemite this past week with some of the Pearson/Welch relatives. Uncle Jim Welch had been to this particular place 2 years ago and vowed that the only thing missing was to have more family around to play with. So, last year he emailed everyone to see if anyone in the extended family wanted to go together in 2008...Tom and I signed up and I'm so glad we did! It was beautiful and fun and very special to be in such an amazing part of the country. The spot where we stayed was pretty awesome as we could walk down to a tributary of the Merced river to swim (shallow enough for Jared and small kids, deep enough for an amazing high dive rock), walk to a great waterfall, walk to the Wawona School for "playing", walk to the library, walk to each others' cabins, walk to get fresh towels at any time of day, and had every convenience and comfort while we were in the wilderness (including cell reception, free long-distance and fully-equipped kitchens). We were a little drive from the Yosemite Valley, which was nice for day trips. I would go back to The Redwoods at Yosemite anytime! Highly recommended.

Luckily, we left the day before the fires raged in the area. Evidently they have cut power to the whole valley now and have lost many homes in another part of the park. Everything was tinder-dry when we were there, I can see how it would go up quickly and intensely. Scary!