THE BEST Thanksgiving!!

A week or so before we received our call to serve in the Family and Church History Headquarters Mission we found out that our daughter Stephanie Lund and husband, Darrell were going to have a baby!!!!!! This was a wonderful surprise--their first and long awaited by their Grandma. The day after we received our call we found out that they were having TWINS!!!!! Yes, two babies. Something I had always wanted. A couple of weeks later we found out the twins were a boy and a girl--one of each flavor!! (Sorry about all the !!!! My kids always tease me about how many I use when I write anything. Hey, this was exciting and I couldn't decide where not to put a !).

Since Stephanie was already 3 months along when she found out, the waiting time was really cut and the due date was 2 December. The doctors told Stephanie that they would induce labor at 38 weeks instead of 40 weeks which meant the new date was 20 November--the Tuesday before Thanksgiving.

We were given permission by our mission president to be in Chandler, AZ the week the babies were born. Such a wonderful Thanksgiving it was going to be.

We decided to drive, since flying standby at Thanksgiving is a pretty risky proposition. We spent the first night in St. George, UT with my Mom. We had an extra special blessing because our second daughter, Jennilyn Ball, and her family were also visiting "Nana". We were able to see our only grandchild, Malena, that night and for a few hours the next morning. That was a wonderful time. Here is a picture of the 4 generations!!!

It is hard to believe that Malena is growing up so fast! She will be eight (27 July) the day after our release. We planned it that way so that we would be able to attend her baptism, although the mission does allow missionaries to leave and attend special family events. We were not quite sure when we put in our papers to serve if that was still possible.

The babies were born 20 November right before 10 pm. The 20 November is very special because that was Len's dad's 108th birthday--Carl Frederick Gunner Ingermanson.

Drew Robert Lund came first and weighed 6 lbs. 1 oz. and was 19 inches long. Three minutes later, Harper Kayla Lund made her entrance at 5 lbs. 11 ozs. and was 18.5 inches long. They were very healthy and had all their important parts!! Mom didn't even have a c-section which was a wonderful blessing!

They came home on Thanksgiving Day which really made the day even more "thankful". Len left a couple of days later, on Saturday and I stayed until the next Thursday.

Twins are a lot more than twice as much work. They have got to be 50 times more work. I can only imagine the next few years. Good luck to Stephanie and Darrell. They are not having these kids when they are in their 20s. They are in their 40s!!!!! They are doing an incredible job. These sweet babies are really blessed to have such awesome parents.

The day before I left, our youngest daughter, Emily Hawken, flew in from Bellevue, WA to help for a week. This was a double blessing because she was a great help with 2 more hands but she is expecting her first baby in March 2013 and this was the best prenatal class she could ever take---she got to learn first hand with TWO babies. She did say that things were not as hectic as she had envisioned and that one would surely be easier than two. She is a photographer and took over 370 pictures while she was there.

Our daughter, Julie, flew in from St. Louis, MO while Emily was there to also help. That's right--FOUR adults and TWO babies. Julie was able to do a 10 day transfer with her company, so she did work during the day at the Tempe, AZ office. That was an awesome thing her company did since she had no vacation to use.

Here are some of my favorite photos of THE BABIES as they are known in the family. There are several posted on Emily's blog--NOT 370+! Take a look, you will not be disappointed. Just click on the colored link and it will take you to the pictures.

This is a pretty new Drew.

Here is new little Harper.

Here are some of Aunt Emily's pictures.

Here are the ones Stephanie sent showing how their going home outfits now fit--almost don't fit in Drew's case. He has really filled out.

I can hardly believe they will be 8 months old the next time we see them.
Yup, I think you can see why it was THE BEST Thanksgiving!