Family Extreme Home Makeover

This weekend was a wonderful one. A leave-your-laptop-at-home because the only multi-tasking I wanted to be doing was hanging with my wonderful family. Most of you know the story (if you read my blog) about my cousin Garrett. Pretty much, if I haven't reitterated this enough before, he's a stud. A good-looking, funny, stud. This weekend a lot of our family was able to make the trip to Arizona to help Garrett's mom (my beautiful cousin Jodie) put her house together. Because life likes to throw massive curve balls at our head, Jodie was smack in the middle of a remodel of her entire home when Garrett landed on his back at the local gym in November. She'd had pocket doors installed, had new paint and floorboards installed, and ripped out pretty much everything else. We're talking down to the concrete floors. Needless to say, when your son has a massive spinal injury, picking out countertops and sink fixtures kinda goes by the wayside. UNTIL you realize your insurance has run it's course and your son and his wheelchair will be needing to come home. To a home not ADA ready. Of course, being such a wonderful family has its perks, one being good friends who were able to open their home to Jodie and Garrett until Jodie's house gets all doned-up-right-perty for the official home-c0ming. Warren and Verna live right around the corner and are so great to not only have Jodie and Garrett, but when their crazy family congregates in Mesa, they opened their doors to us all, too.

Now, we're a close family, I think. It's one of the best blessings in my life (as opposed to those bad blessings, ya know!?) But living so far removed (physically) from Jodie and Garrett has been hard and frustrating, especially since, I think, most of us want to just fix it and make it all better for the Tanners. So, after Erin's plea to Oprah left us as runner-ups, and Jodie's home-builder of a boss flaked, we all were all too happy to come to Mesa and bust a little family action in their home. We knew a weekend would be short, but with a contractor, electrition, and home inspector/builder (in addition to other trades) in our family, we knew we'd be able to do something productive, something to get Jodie and Garrett into their own home. With the help of a financial grant for supplies, we were all too eager to supply the labor, and by "we" I mean mostly our men-folk. "We" (meaning most of the women folk) were also really ready for a visit to the entire Tanner bunch since Garrett's release from the hospital meant a time for celebration and good 'ol hanging out Garrard family style.

The entire weekend was great. Granted the trip from Vegas to the Phoenix area is not so great, but I loved every minute of being there (even the skeazy hotel we stayed in had a good breakfast.) The best part for me was seeing how GREAT Garrett looked and getting hugs from him since he can now lift his arms. It was fun laughing and telling stories, catching up a bit, eating yummy treats (thanks to Erin and the Tanner's ward Relief Society), and being together. I know my girls enjoyed playing with their cousins. Here's a few pictures, and a montage of all the weekend goodies.

The moral support team! (minus Stacy and Zoee and baby Gus and Kenna's girls)

And the actual work force (minus Garrett's good friend and his dad who worked on the plumbing.)

Just a funny sign.

Morgan's plumbing shot. Not that I was juvenile to take this picture, but imagine my surprise to lift my camera to capture the action and got this back on my screen. Wowzers!


Family Extreme Home Makeover