Check it out!

My super star sister Ciera is in a band in Provo: Book on Tape Worm. Talk about livin' up your college experience! She plays the cello and the two other members sing and play guitar and keyboard. The singers asked Ciera to help them do a show. They liked her so much they asked her to be a permanent member of the group. They have been in the process of recording their first album. Check them out here!

Congrats Kayla

In June Kayla graduated high school! Woo Hoo! Of all the adorable pictures of Kayla that we took, this is the only one I managed to have on my camera. So this is an I-just-got-out-of-the-pool cute.

It was fun to go and be with all the family that was there. Her graduating class was over 1300-the largest one in Texas which is saying something. Because it was so big all the seniors were actually allotted only 6 tickets. Meaning only 6 people could attend the graduation. So that meant all the family that came into town would not all be able to attend the ceremony. Some were bummed, some were relieved. Cole happily volunteered to stay home and watch the kids. I was happy to go and have time to sit by myself with no kids. ;) We had a big swim party with everyone to celebrate. That is where most of my pictures are from. Although we did take tons of pictures with Kayla in her cap and gown, of making cake pops, and just hanging out, most of them are on my dad's camera.

This was Rylee's first time swimming. She spent most of her time like this.

She soon warmed up and allowed herself to enjoy being tossed into the air a bit. Whenever she is tossed she immediaetly clasps both hands and crosses her feet. It is too funny.

Cade jumped into the pool a few too many times. 

Here is the whole gang (minus the Trowbridges) that came to celebrate. This is after church on Sunday.

Our Birthday

My birthday has always been an 'our birthday'. I have a hard time referring to it as just my birthday when I have always shared it!! Cole asked me today if I was ever annoyed that we had to share a birthday and I don't think I ever have. Just all the more fun! I thought since today we are sharing a birthday again I would post random twin pictures over the years.

 BYU-Hawaii-our favorite place for a cold drink

 On a date with our then boyfriends

 Being spazes. Us and the husbands drove home for New Years to surprise mom one year.

 Shan's wedding

 BYU football game freshman year

 Driving around. Since we turned 16 it was mostly like this. Us driving around doing what we did but always together.

 Shan and Matthew came over one night to play games when Cade was a baby and we looked remarkably similar. 

 First day of senior year of high school. About to drive the jetta to school.

 Random guy at BYU-H who wanted a picture with us since we were twins. Him and two of his buddies all got one. We have had tons of little instances like this over the years!

 Arches National Park the year after graduating high school. If you can't tell, we are being arches.

 On the dance team for the Nauvoo Pageant

 Ballroom competition at BYU

 My Wedding- Shan had gotten married 3 months before.

 Frist day of school at BYU-H. We tried to out walk the storm on our way home. We lost.

 High school graduation

 18th birthday

At the beach in Hawaii. I think it is funny how even our eyebrows are super bright in the sun! Yay for red hair.

Doesn't being a twin look so much fun! Happy Birthday Shan!

Handcart Trek

I don't think I will ever look at a handcart the same. Our stake youth did the handcart trek reenactment this past week. About 80-90 youth were organized into 'families' that pushed handcarts and camped, dressed, acted, and cooked like pioneers. Cole and I were asked to be a Ma and Pa of a family. Tons of planning, lots of stress, a little too much heat but a great experience. The trek was at the Sooner Cattle Ranch (owned by the church) in Oklahoma. Maybe easier said in-the-middle-of-nowhere. Cole and I felt extremely under qualified because the other 8 Ma and Pa couples were former bishops, branch/stake/mission presidents, super duper scout people, girls camp goo roo's and all sorts of other super qualified things. We don't even own a tent. Much less 3 of them plus 3 dutch ovens and a whole slew of other things.  (Thanks to my dad we were able to borrow most of them!)

We were the only Ma and Pa that had young kids or was even under 40. Before we even started walking the trek I had to point out to different people that I was the Ma of the family since I blended in too well with the youth. Multiple times everyday of the trek I was mistaken for a youth, or someone didn't recognize me, or they couldn't point out who the Ma was. As we were loading up the buses to leave, another one of the Ma's came up to me and asked if I really did have two kids. Yup!

Family Ratcliffe

 

 

The cows were hilarious. I have never seen cows with so much personality. They would literally stop and watch us. They would line up and just watch. Most of the time there were no fences that separated us. They would run in circles around us. Then stop in front of the first wagon. When we would get closer they would get skittish again and run some more. They would repeat this over and over.

  We had a live band (that is me on the flute). We played a few songs to start the evening. Then it was dancing time. Cole and I were in charge of sqaure dancing. Cole kind of accidentaly got asked to call for sqaure dancing which he agreed to before he even knew what it was! Good thing he married someone with a dance background! We prepared for it by practicing on the youth in our ward and with my family before we left the kids there. I taught the group the steps and then played in the band while Cole called the steps with the music. It was so much fun! I think everyone enjoyed it. Cole can now officially call square dancing. And if you have never square danced- you need to! So much fun and a small learning curve!

 Our family cart. We had a great group of youth. It really strengthened my testimony of the youth of our church. Those that were really strong and knew what was important really stood out. It made me as a parent more determined to raise my kids so that one day they will 'stand out' as someone who really cares for and lives the gospel.

Dutch oven cooking. After the first day, the longest and hardest day, we still had to set up tents, cook our dinner, have family devotional and get your kids to bed. Can you say overwhelmed? To think back on our cooking is quite funny. We had no idea what we were doing. We would be one of the first to start and one of the last families to eat. But by the last meal we had gotten it down. We were so proud of ourselves.

Thanks to my parents and Alyssa. They watched the kids for us while we were gone. Of all the things we could do for a 3 day date without the kids, trekking it up was not my top choice. But I am so glad we were able to do it. I have such a greater appreciation and understanding for the pioneers, their sacrifices, and the way the gospel is set up. We did a lot of reading and researching in preparation for this. It would have not been the same had we not. I am really excited to go back to our temple (Winter Quarters) because they have a pioneer center and graveyard there. We have walked through it before but now it means a whole lot more.

In part of our preparation we read The Price We Paid by Andrew D. Olsen (highly recommended!) We would talk about it together and decide on certain stories to share with our youth. As part of our preparation, Cole did some research on his family history. He started by looking up his family on familysearch.org and through some miracioulus turns we found out that he has some pioneer ancestors (William and Jane James family) that traveled with the Willie Handcart company. Some of their experiences were some of our favorite stories we read in the book, even before we discovered our connection to them. Here is an abbreviated version of their story:

William and his family were devout members of the Church of England as had been their forbears before them for many generations so it was a disturbing thing when missionaries from America brought the message of the restored gospel to them.  The principles of apostasy and restoration were new to them but of great concern so they took the matter to the Lord in prayer.  The answer came in such a forceful way that the entire family accepted the gospel and were baptized.  The James home became a gathering place for the Saints in the area and a home away from home for the missionaries.  It didn’t take long for the ministers of the Church of England to turn their friends and relatives away from them and it was little wonder that they began to think of gathering to Zion.

William was reluctant to leave immediately.  He knew that he couldn’t take the full responsibility for the family because of his poor health.  He reasoned that one or even two of the family could find passage and the others could follow.  It might be possible for the immigrant to find work in Utah and send money home for the rest of the family to come.  In that way a few years would have them all in Zion.  Jane vetoed the idea.  She was a strong willed person and she had a better idea.  She meant to keep her family together at all costs.  It would be easy for the family separated to go its several ways and if some were in one place and some in another place they might even forget family and the church.  There would be some better way and of that she was sure.  As if an answer to her prayers there came a solution.

…On 3 May 1856 the James family with a large group of Saints from all over Europe embarked on the ship “Thornton” at Liverpool bound for America.  They had been on the ocean for about 5 weeks when Jane noticed that her baby was becoming listless and for a day or two refusing to eat.  The child was 11 months old and it could have been most any illness that would come to one of this age but she grew steadily worse.  Her temperature shot up and the parents spent all of their time with her while kind friends cared for the rest of the family.  On the first of June the sorrowing parents were forced to see the tiny body wrapped in a bit of canvas slide from a board over the side of the ship and disappear into the ocean. ..

Sara James (18) recounted the following: “The day that we reached the last crossing of the Sweetwater River I will never forget as long as I live.  It was a bitter cold morning in October as we broke camp.  As usual there was the dead to bury before we went on.  Father and Rueben were with the burial detail.  Mother was helping to pull the heaviest cart, waiting to come on with Father.  She sent the rest of us on ahead with the light cart, with the main company.  After the burial Father seemed so tired that he asked her to go on.  As soon as he felt stronger he and Rueben would come after us.  Mother was sick at heart for she knew that Father had given out.  She urged him to try but he collapsed.  Feeling that with some rest he would be better she hurried on to the rest of us.

“She found us on the river bank too tired and frightened to cross alone.  We had waded this river before but it had never looked so far across before.  With her encouragement and help we waded the icy waters.  Our wet clothing was soon covered with ice and the rags on our feet were frozen to them.  We reached the main company, put on dry clothing and proceeded on our way.  When we stopped for the night we inquired about our folks but nothing had been heard of them.

“Since there were many stragglers we felt that Father and Rueben would soon catch up with us.  All night we waited for word.  Toward morning one of the captains who had gone hunting for the stragglers came into camp with the dead body of our Father and the badly frozen body of Rueben.  Our brother was to suffer from this incident all of his life.  He was unconscious for some time and it took some time for him to recover.  Father’s body along with others who had died in the night were buried in a deep hole.  Brush was thrown over the grave and a fire built on it to cover the scent from the wolves.  I can see my Mother’s face as she sat quietly holding a sleeping child.  Her eyes looked dead and I was frightened.  She didn’t sit long however for my Mother was never one to cry.  When it was time to move on Mother with her family was ready.  She put the invalid son Rueben in the cart with the baby and joined the train.  We felt that she would see us through anything.  My Mother was a strong woman.”

On 24 October 1856 the Willie Handcart Company stayed in camp to bury the dead. One of the dead to be buried was William James, aged 46. He was buried in a mass grave with twelve others who had died. Four days later on 28 October 1856, the rescue party under George Grant met with the Willie Company at the sixth crossing of the Sweetwater River.

(From “Combined Histories By Henry Thomas)

Birthdays

We celebrated two birthdays this week. Cole's on the 24th and Rylee's was yesterday on the 26th. I managed to get zero pictures of Cole's birthday but he kind of prefers that. But he had a good, yet quite stormy birthday so that changed some of our plans. He happily turned 28.

On the other hand, I took a ton of Rylee. I cannot believe she is 1 already. I feel like I was just pregnant. She has been a joy to our family. I love how much Cade loves her. She is nowhere near a proficient crawler but is kind of getting the hang of scooting-if you could call it that. But she is a proficient waver. She waves all the time. She has two little teeth on the bottom. She is a fantastic sleeper and eater. She loves to be held by momma and only momma. She loves balls and cars mainly because that is what she sees her brother plays with. She also loves books. She will sit and look through one all on her own. She especially likes ones that have pictures of real babies and things rather than illustrations.

We started the morning with birthday pancakes-Black family tradition. She had pancakes for the first time and loved them.

Then we opened presents. Cade helped-or rather opened them for her. He could hardly contain himself. She opened a pink truck so she can play cars with her brother and a bracelet. She also got a homemade card with money in it (She got other gifts early)

Later we went on a birthday picnic. The weather was beautiful. We packed a lunch and ate on a blanket in the grass. Then Cole and Cade played baseball and threw the Frisbee (Cade is way better at the Frisbee than I am!) Both kids swung on the swings for a while which they really enjoy.

We ended the day with cake. Rylee got to have her first piece. At first she would just touch the frosting and spread it around. She was not quite sure what to do with it. Then Cole showed her that she could eat it. She was so excited. She could not get it in her mouth fast enough. She ate her whole piece. It was really cute.

Happy 1st Birthday Rylee!!

Graduation!

We can officially call Cole "Master Ratcliffe." OK not really, but if after your PhD you are Dr. Ratcliffe then for now he is Master Ratcliffe. Cole got his graduate degree in Marriage and Family Therapy. He has worked so hard and I am so proud of him. Both our parents came out as well as Cole's sister and grandma. After the ceremony I told Cade we were having a purple party (K-State colors) where we had purple balloons, purple streamers, a purple congrats sign, purple drinks, and purple cake pops. And of course Rylee was complete in a purple tutu.

We really enjoyed the chance to spend time with family. Here are some things we did.

 Girly things like making cake pops

 

Manly things like playing with guns (Cole got it for his birthday)

 

Little boy things like playing outside and reading books.

Early birthday things.

As well as playing games and hanging out! Thanks to our families for traveling to come show us love and support.