5

its hard to believe i only have 5 more days of high school left. i dont think it will hit me that i will no longer be going to Liberty until i dont go back january 4th and im, rather, in provo, utah at BYU starting my day off in the cold snow. i will miss bako, the people of bakersfield-not really the weather or the lack of scenery, and i hope its an awesome start of 2010!

in other news...everyone else is happy that the end is in sight and we have a 2 week break from school and the daycare kids and everything else that keeps us busy and stressed! we cant wait for garrick and brittni, zach and stacie, and rachel to come home for Christmas!! we're doing a gift exchange which will be fun and exciting and just being together will be great! :) we can sing christmas carols and make snow angels and eat sugar plums! haha and of course watch awesomme Christmas movies like Elf, It's a Wonderful Life, A Christmas Story, Polar Express and many more! Christmas is the best time of the year-everyone's a little more happy, we get to show people how much we love them, and we get to remember the reason for the season[sorry soo cliche]!

i dont know if anyone reads these blogs but if you do, We'd like to wish you all a Merry Christmas! May the Lord bless you and keep you!

The Smith Whanau

honor choir!

i can't even explain how wonderful it is to be in a choir that can sing beautifully and everyone can carry their own part without people pulling the choir down. last weekend i went to stockton california with other choir members from our school and from choir people from schools all over the central region of california. we were given 7 songs beforehand and had to know them for the most part before we went up. thursday and friday and saturday morning consisted of endless of hours preparing the music for the performance saturday afternoon. we had mostly contemporary music and i loved all the songs! i couldn't put any links up but if you search 'california central region mixed choir 2009' some videos would pop up and they're just sound with black background and the name and composer of each song in white. songs include 'i carry your heart with me' which is my favorite taken from a poem from ee cummings, ' the lady in the water', 'alleluia', 'tantum ergo', 'sure on this shining night', 'daemon irreppit callidus', and 'rejoice'. CHECK IT OUT. if you want too that ees. well i need to go pack for utah! thanksgiving is gon be lotsa fun! catch you on da chilly side! byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

halloween 2009!

rachel--i guess this is the easiest way to share pics and stuff since you dont use ur facebook often and i dont really wanna share family pics on my facebook...soo here goes! heres some pics of halloween stuff with the fam! ily! :) <3hannah

and if anyone else reads this blog, ENJOI!

and they lived happily ever after...

o





soo its been a long time since ive blogged. the last blog was about spring break and oh so much has happened since then, its hard to try now to fill everyone in. theres really no excuse for not blogging since i am on facebook for like, hours on end[hi, i'm hannah and i'm a facebook addict] and could blog if i wanted to. not that i dont want to. anyways im rambling so let me fill you[whoever you are or whoever you arent] in.
the school year ended and i got straight A's in my classes which i was really proud of. i also passed both of my ap tests but not with flying colors. just the bare minimum but thats okay because i wasnt expecting anything at all...i went to 3 weeks of summer school-i took health with all the sophomores-and got an a in that class too[whoopee].
then it was off to garrick and brittnis wedding in salt lake! june 26th 2009 they got married in the salt lake temple. it was beautiful! me and rachel were bridesmaids and zach and brittnis brothers were groomsmen. they were very happy and we had a lovely reception. great food. greater company. a beautiful setting[in the backyard of brittnis family friend] with a pond and a river and green growing everywhere. my aunty naomi from new zealand kind of surprised us and came over for the wedding so that was a wonderful surprise! there wasnt much of a program. just a little bit of our maori culture. all the kiwis that were there got up and sang an action song called karangatia ra and then the men did the haka-ka mate. then brittnis grandpa, who reminded me of frank sinatra, sang a lovely song for the married couple. classic voice. it rained at the end of the reception which was okay. cleaned up fast and then everybody parted. we left for bako the day later because we needed to get ready for the bako reception[which was also lovely]! will attach some photos.... :) well theyre up there and im too lazy to move em. but if you look at the bottom picture then go up thats in order. theres a lot of me and rachel[haha], one of the couple, my aunty and dad and me and rach, walking to tuccanos with zach and stacie[tucanos is amazing, btw], and the reception place, and the just married car.

utah!

ohhh spring break! much needed and always fun. me beth and dad went to utah to visit rach, zach, and garrick...and other ppl of course! saw lots of other ppl. our cousins hawea and junior were in town for conference and vacation so we saw them. as well as a lot of other family like the browers and the maryotts[basically family]. we just got back. i drove the camry the whole way home cuz dad brought the saturn home to sell. longest drive ever and im exhausted so im gonna just post pics. theyre out of order but im too tired to fix it.

me and beth on the way home
rumbi's. yummy

me and rach being cool. its what we do best

me and cousin luke-whadda cutie!

annelise

corin

corin, annelise, and beth

bethany

me and corin sledding

me and zach

bethany and our huge bucket of golf balls

kiara, garrick, and beth

cousin hawea, me, garrick, zach, beth, dad, cousin junior

Life

has been good. everything is settling down. zach is up at byu and back into the college life with both garrick and rachel. three byu students! wow.

this is zach. typical zach. what a try hard. he thinks hes gonna play rugby at byu, we'll see how that goes. hes already got his all blacks shirt so hes set!

good news-garrick is engaged! he proposed a couple weeks before zach came home and she[brittni] said yes, of course! they are to be married in the salt lake temple on june 26.

basketball season is over so dad is back to just teaching and not losing his voice. this pic is of him coaching at the game in fresno against garces[why we went all the way there to play against garces for the 4th time, idk] we lost this game, but after such a great record and season, it was okay. liberty wasnt even expected to get that far so it was good for the team and the school in general.

bethany had to have her tooth pulled yesterday because she had an absess. apparently, people have died from neglecting to go to the dentist or doctor to treat them and so the dentist cleared his schedule to see her yesterday and they decided they would just pull it out. she was not really prepared for that so it was a shock and bethany was crying a lot afterward. poor thing. shes fine now though so thats good.

we went to the beach a couple of weeks ago with my uncle, his wife and kid andmy moms cousin who was visiting from texas. that was nice. it was a beautiful day and we seem to be having more of those now-a-days. its getting closer and closer to summer[we usually get like 2 days of spring] so thats been nice.

moms still doing daycare and me and beth are still at school so nothings changed there. everyones doing well so all thats left to do on this blog is put some pics up!

dad coaching at the fresno arena-liberty vs garces[we lost but it was a great season so it was good]

santa monica

me and beth and mom

me and the pappi

no wonder she has to go to the dentist all the time...

my cousin carlitos

this is me and sis seaneys baby, sophia ann. isnt she darling?

btw, the pictures of zach and garrick &brittni were taken by emily waite. also, the one at the top of the blog.

guess who's back!? back again....

zach is back, tell your friends. haha no furealz though. zach got home last night at 9.25ish. it was originally supposed to be 3.20 but, he missed his flight in phoenix which as an apparently confusing airport so we forgave him. he ran after the place[no he didnt, but he barely missed it]. his luggage actually came without him so me and stacie went and picked it up at 3.20 and gave dirty looks to everyone who left him because we felt someone should be responsible.

soo last night, the plane landed and people started coming off the plane and we were waiting forevaaa and we didnt see him and soon enough, there were only like a couple people left who came through the doors. then the security guard[who was the only one i saw working the airport istself] closed the door. which really confused us because he hadnt come out yet. so of course a bunch of thoughts came into our minds like, maybe he is hiding or maybe he wants a grand entrance and wanted to be the last one off and then there was also this, maybe something happened but we doubted that one. anyways, the suspension was killing us, obviously, and then we see the security guard come to the door one last time, and he opens the door and a fine, young, STUDLY missionary walks through the door. and then the tears fell and the screams came and really long hugs followed and it was basically wonderful:)

then he got released at the stake center and we[our fam, stacie, and my aunt alma and her boys] came back to our house and ate and talked and talked and talked for a long time.

then today...we hung out in the morning and i missed a few of my classes and then went to skool for a bit and fell asleep and yada yada yada we had some close friends over for dinner and a reunion basically:) and that was fun. the kids were all really happy to see zach, especially the ones that he used to babysit. and here's some pictures from that.....enjoy!

this is from before...we were pretty excited!

we were pretty excited!

the grand entrance!

president slaughter, mom, zach, dad
the fam[-rachel and garrick who are coming home tomorrow]
aunty alma and her boys[rudy, nile, trevor & ziggy] and zach

rob seaney, our neighbor don and zach
he was amazed that mitch grew to be taller than him. haha

all the kids

zach and owen being zach and owen.

so thats all the news for right now.

el fin:)