What a Wonderful Weekend!

Here are some photos of Karyn and Lafi's wedding. They were married in the St. Louis Temple on April 11, 2009. Congratulations, Best Wishes, and Much Love!!!!!

The cute couple: Introducing Lafi and Karyn Manumaleuna!!!!!!

Okay so these pics are in a pretty random order, but here are a few of my favorite sibling pictures. For those who don't know us I will go clockwise from me (I hope you know me if you are reading this): Linda Voelkel, Karyn Manumaleuna, Jeff Hamblin, Todd Hamblin, Dave Hamblin, Paula Hamblin Rice, John Hamblin . . . and not pictured is Chris Richards.

In order from tallest to shortest: Jeff, Dave, John, Todd, Paula, Chris, Linda, Karyn.

Age order was in another pic. It would be Todd, Paula, Karyn, John, Chris, Jeff, Linda, Dave. Who raised this silly bunch of Hams anyway?!!!
And here they are: Ted and LaWana Hamblin. :) I just love the live tropical flowers at Karyn's wedding. Especially the leis. Beautiful!

My lil bridesmaids. Aren't they sweet.
It meant a lot to my girls to be a part of Karyn and Lafi's special day.

Me and my sistahs. :)Da boyz. I bet this was the first shot. "Can someone tell the guys to take off their glasses?! They look like bouncers!" :)
Huge family gathering.

The reason for our huge family gathering. :) It was such a happy day. We love you guys!!!
Some of the other bridesmaids . . . we are missing Liz. They all looked sooo pretty. These are most of Karyn's nieces.

Okay this silly shoe shot actually means a lot to a few of us. Karyn, Chris, and I went to pick up Paula from the airport late Thursday night. And we were all excited and stayed up late talking and laughing. Well we wanted to see Karyn in her dress so we had a short fashion show. She has fabulous shoes and awesome pedicure and we knew that no one would really notice it so we decided to take a picture. Well no picture was doing the fabulous shoes justice, so we adjusted lighting and tried different poses and several shots later . . . this one was our favorite. Silly, I know. But don't come between a girl and her shoes. :)

What a wonderful day! Such sweet words were spoken at their sealing. And they spent the day surrounded by many many friends and family who were there to support them and celebrate the beginning of their journey together through eternity. And not pictured, but ever present, their Heavenly Father is watching over them and guiding them along their way with an umbrella of covenants to protect and bless them.

Zoo Trip

On the last day of our spring break, we met some friends at the St. Louis Zoo. The zoo here has free admission and on top of that, the first hour the zoo is open, the carousel and Children's Zoo are also free! Is St. Louis awesome, or what?!

Holy Hippo! Anna and Janae have been swallowed alive!!! The Children's Zoo has a great playground with a slide that goes underwater through the otter pond.

Daila kinda liked looking at the bugs with her cousin Corey in the Insectarium. She HATES bugs so I was a little surprised. But I guess the little glass wall between her and the insects makes a HUGE difference. She even looked at the giant Brazillian spider. She didn't get too close to that one, but she did look at it and pretend to scream. We all laughed. I texted Ben to tell her how great she did just as we passed from the Insectarium into the butterfly house. Well . . . I had to text him right back and say, "Nevermind." You see, the butterfly house has beautiful flowers and pleasant climate . . . and thousands of butterflies fluttering around . . . absolutely free of any glass partitions. As soon as we walked in a butterfly flew up to tell Daila hello and she freaked out, ran behind my legs, and tried to cover her face, all in one very awkward motion. So apparently butterflies can be more terrifying than a giant spider . . . sort of. We made it through by putting her in the stroller with her coat over her so her body was covered and it would be easy for her to cover her face. Silly girl. :)

Daila liked brushing the goats. She knew just what to do and she liked making them pretty. She would brush for a while and then say, "Okaaay . . . that's enough!" As if the goat wanted more and didn't realize he was gorgeous. :)

Anna is brushing a goat who was standing ready on a bench. I guess this one knew it was gorgeous because she just hopped down when she was done. It looked kinda funny so I chuckled and said, "Next!" And would you believe it?! . . . Another goat just hopped right up on the bench for his turn.

Daila got to ride the Carousel twice! She loved it. But it was a bit chilly that day. (So please ignore the slightly runny nose. ) :)Daila's favorite was the snake!

Anna is riding a leopard. :) What a pretty young lady.

And Janae . . . Janae is riding a baribusa. Yep . . . a baribusa. When she told me she was riding a baribusa, I thought, "What the heck is a baribusa?"

This is a baribusa. Ugly, huh. So I said, "Wow, Janae! How did you know that was a baribusa?!" (My girls are getting older and its not unusual for them to come home from school smarter than me, spouting off cool, amazing, and interesting facts.) But Janae said, "It says so right there." Yeah, apparently they wrote the names of the animals at the top of the pole. See . . . they are smarter than me.

Our Voelkel Zoo Trip Bunch! Pictured here are Daila (with her back to us), Anna, Corey, Lindsey, Janae, Josh, and Holland. We had such a fun day with Aunt Lindsey, Uncle Josh, and our cousins. Daila and Corey had a blast playing together at our house. We'll have to do it again soon. :)