The Greats

I have been blessed to have all four grandparents for most of my life. My paternal grandma passed away shortly after we moved back to Denver and the other three have continued to be a big part of our lives.  FFM is particularly close to his great-grandparents, or greats, and we try to see them as often as our schedule allows. We recently celebrated Great Grandpa Moore's 90th birthday.

My Uncle captured this picture, I love that they are deep in conversation and not paying any attention to the rest of us at the table.

 Soon after the party we heard my Great Grandpa Minnick wasn't as sprightly as he usually is. FFM and I both had a couple of days off mid-October and took advantage of some frequent flier miles to fly out to Kansas to visit my maternal grandparents.

The flight out and back was on a good sized prop plane. We walked on the tarmac once (a huge thrill), sat next to the propeller once (explodes your mind kind of thrill), and directly in front of it once (a tiny let down after sitting right next to it). I never knew a window seat could be so entertaining.

The Greats with FFM. He's so excited to be nearly as tall as Great Ma. It was a nice quiet visit, he taught them all about Lego Technic and Perler beads.

 Another highlight of the visit was staying with Katie and her parents. These two kiddos both have SO much personality and love each other SO much that it's like electrifying the room when they are together. Trying to take this picture FFM would squat down to be closer to Katie's height, Katie would immediately squat down, too. F would stand up to get her to stand, and she'd stand up, too. It was a comic scene with lots of photographic outtakes. FFM was busy watching Katie, Katie was busy watching FFM and I finally had to ask them to point at the camera to get their attention.

When you are nearly two you call people by their name and identifier. Thus "Cousin Finn." Although it very quickly got shortened to "CuFinn" or "CuzFinn." And never just once, always multiple times in rapid succession. You can tell exactly what she means by the way she changes the emphasis!