Well, a bit of time has gone by since I posted about my wonderful 80th birthday weekend. I have been waiting for the video Easton (Katie's new husband) recorded and to get everyone's pics in of the wonderful party. Though I wasn't able to get a pic of everything I wanted, here are some highlights of some of the happiest moments of my life!
I begin with the video that my darling daughter, Stacy, took just as the party was getting started.
Missy created this fun invitation.
Granddaughter, Becca, son, Ryan, Roger and granddaughter, Sarah
Roger brought me over to the Sunbrook Center about a half hour before the guests were to arrive, and I was completely blown away! The decorations were so striking in a black, white and gold motif. I was a bit embarrassed to see the huge pics of me hanging all over the walls, like I was a celebrity or something, but the girls do everything bigger than life, and they wanted to honor me this way. I felt so very honored at this party and throughout the weekend!
The food was catered by Outback Steakhouse, and they did an outstanding job! The menu included wedge salads, coconut shrimp with their yummy orange marmalade sauce, clam chowder (theirs is delicious!), potato soup, their brown bread and a big tray of lots of boiled shrimp and cocktail sauce from Costco was added.
Stacy blew up many photos taken in my past 80 years, framed them and hung them up throughout Sunbrook Center. Mindy and helpers blew up many balloons throughout, including these musical note balloons.
For centerpieces at each table, Nothing But Bundt cakes were placed, all in different flavors, and decorated on top.
When I arrived just before the party, I saw many grandkids helping set up. Here is Grandson, Max, pouring up the ice water.
This is a photo of my dear, wonderful parents and siblings and me, taken so long ago.
Grandson, Jared's, wife, McKenna, made a special gourmet cake for me. She is a great baker and has catered wedding cakes. It was so delicious!
The guests begin to arrive. The white-haired woman in the pic was my teacher at USU, Jackie Fullmer. She started the USU Aggiettes, our famous drill team. She was Miss Utah, among many other beauty titles and is a film actress. She teaches free exercise and dance classes to ladies in our ward.
Adorable grandkids, Sarah, Londyn, Ben and Sydney - I love this pic!
Here's the Smith family table - daughter, Missy, husband, Jedd, granddaughter, Ellie, grandson, Sam, fiancee, Nayeli, grandson, Jared's, wife, McKenna, grandson, Jared, and granddaughter, Claire.
Pics weren't taken while everyone was eating, but we took some pics off of a video to show some of the family and friends. The quality is sometimes a bit blurred, but I am glad to have a few pics.
I have to point out Sydney's twins, Rosie and Poppy.
Our grandson, Blake, who has Down Syndrome and whom all of the cousins adore, seemed to love the party!
We were so pleased that Roger's sisters, Chyrrl, with husband, Glynn and Susie, with husband, Craig, drove up from Ogden for the party. They are dear "sisters" to me. As luck would have it, all of my siblings and spouses, except my sister, Kay, and husband, Ken, who were sick, were on a cruise. We were invited to go on that cruise, which was planned before I knew that this party was, but it all worked out. I missed them being there, though.
I did know that my family was going to give me a party, but all I expected was a gathering where I got to blow out the candles on a birthday cake. Wow, did they surprise me! My daughters planned and put together the most fabulous party any mother ever had, I'm sure! Thank you, thank you, my darlings!
After everyone ate, they brought their chairs upstairs for a musical program. Each of my kid's families presented a musical number.
I so wish I had pics of the talent numbers that Mindy's, Missy's and Stacy's families performed. Granddaughter, Addie, has a strong, lovely voice. She has been Annie in a production of, "Annie," and sang the song, "Popular," when she was in the 3rd grade at an all- school talent show. Her rendition of, "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," was so sweet. I'll mention right here that Jeff, our daughter, Mindy's, husband, ran the sound system expertly, playing the accompanying music for Addie and Sydney. Mindy said she asked Addie to sing. "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," because her memory of going with Roger and I to get heart check-ups at Primary Children's Hospital before and after surgery for her tachycardia when she was a little girl. She remembered her and I singing on the way home each time, and her favorite one to sing was, "Somewhere Over the Rainbow."
I've brought my uke with me through the years when we have visited our grandkids, and Jared and Claire developed an interest in learning to play. Jared now plays guitar. One of their family's favorite folk songs that I taught them is, "Where Have All the Flowers Gone," and it was so cute to watch them sing and play, then have the audience sing along. All of their family love music and they feel the rhythm. Both Ellie and Claire are great dancers. It was so cute to see the youngest, Claire, and the oldest, Jared, play and sing together, then give each other a high five when they finished!
Stacy's daughter, Sydney, is such a special talent! Ever since she was a toddler, she has loved to sing. A cute memory I have is riding in the car with her and her mom while heading to NYC from Stratford, Connecticut, where their family lived while Tom did his medical residency at Yale. Stacy was playing Broadway show tunes on the tape player all of the way (Stacy and Tom went to see Broadway shows as often as they could and loved them), and Sydney sang along with every song, knowing most of the words, and she belted them out at the top of her voice! She went on to star in high school musicals and she was chosen to be in BYU's Young Ambassadors, a small group of talented students who travel the world performing and being just what their name implies. For all her talent, she is the sweetest, most humble darling and I adore her. She represented Stacy's family and sang, "I Dreamed A Dream," from Les Miserables. It brought down the house!
Ryan, who plays the piano exceptionally well, has been serving as Bishop (he was just released) in our church and he is also a busy surgeon of urogynecology. He hasn't had time to keep up on the piano. So, he and Emily wrote some clever words to the Beatle song, "Yesterday," which was one one of the songs in our Balladier USO tour show. It was fun to watch Ryan perform it with his daughter, Becca. He kept trying to push the microphone away from him, over to Becca's mouth!
I wasn't holding a program during the show, and each number was a surprise to me as it happened. So, after introducing his family, Rick explained that their best musician in the family is Josh, who is getting his MBA in upstate New York at Cornell and couldn't be there. Katie has a lovely singing voice, but she damaged her vocal cords with an infection. He then said he was going to play my favorite musical piece, "Claire du Lune," which he hadn't played since when he was in junior high school. My mouth dropped open, because I knew how difficult that piece is and what an effort it would take to work it up to perform. Just as a side note, my mom used to play that piece so exquisitely, so tenderly, that I still can't hear it without a tear coming to my eye. He said, so humbly, that he was sorry, that it may be a little rough in spots, but he would do his best. He played it with such lovely expression, and, though not perfect, it was perfect to my ears, because it spoke of his great determination, which he has always emulated, and of his love for me. The audience loved it!
To conclude the program, cousins Sydney and Addie sang a medley from, "Wicked." They had never sung together, so what a treat it was for them and all of us! They had both performed, "Popular," each so delightfully in their pasts, so what a treat it was to hear them trade lines back and forth throughout the song, each trying to get a one up on the other, as the song's clever words dictate. They then sang the duet, "For Good". Addie started it, and when she came to the lyrics,
"But I know I'm who I am today because I knew you," she looked at me and her voice got a little emotional. Then, when Syd began singing with the lyrics, "It well may be, that we will never meet again in this lifetime, so let me say before we part, so much of me, is made of what I learned from you, you'll be with me, like a handprint on my heart," she started choking up and stopped singing a bit and just saying the words. Addie said, "Don't look at her (me)!" They sang this beautiful song to the end, and when they came to the last words, they had changed them to, "because we knew you, we have been changed for good," looking at me, and they were both choked with emotion and then they just giggled and hugged each other.
Needless to say, I was so touched with their love, which I feel for them in spades! I failed to say, I hugged each performer after they finished and told them how much I loved them.
This party for me was such an emotional and beautiful experience!
After the program, many friends came forward to me with hugs and expressions of love of the wonderful program and for me and our family. And as I talked to each of them, I felt such a great love for them and how lucky we are to have such dear friends.
Stacy took this pic of these four grandsons, born within three months of each other. They are twins Max and Luke on the ends and Blake and Jack in the middle.
After friends left, every family member pitched in and helped to clean up. We left the Sunbrook Center better than we found it. The kids had so much fun popping all of the balloons!
Mindy placed this crown and banner on me just before our family began to play games together.
Roger and I posed under the balloon arch with our wonderful kids.
All of our children and their spouses were together with us.
Grandma is posing with two of my talented singers who sang beautifully together, Addie and Sydney.
None of all of this wonderfulness could have happened without this guy!
All 41 of us played fun games in the Sunbrook Center before we closed it down. Each of my kids brought one for us to play Saturday and Sunday night. I couldn't believe how much fun we all had together. My kids and the cousins just pick up where they left off from the last time together.
Syd's little Henry just adored Miss Claire!
On Sunday, the families came to church in our ward, then we headed up toward PineMountain to, The Ledge's, Fish Rock Grill.
That evening, we had more chatting, eating left-overs and playing fun games together.
Another one of my favorite moments was singing with Sydney. It was so thoughtful of her husband, Jake, to take their kids back over to where they were staying and put them to bed so Syd and I could talk and sing. It's so rare for us to be together and she had never been to our home in St. George.
I'll just sum up this very long post with this:
I absolutely could not be any more grateful than I am, for the 80 years I have been allowed to live with my precious loved ones, some gone now, but so many still here. Thank you, thank you, my dear Heavenly Father!
