Merry Christmas!!! (well a little late, ah well!)

Merry Christmas everyone!!!

We had a wonderful time this year! Christmas eve day was spent with cookie making fun for everyone, all the McGrath beasties converged at Aunt Lisa's house for her yearly cookie making extravaganza. Makayla was a great help with the baking and cookie cutting (with a little assistance from her older cousins!) Then came the decorating. Mac was more interested in eating the sprinkles then putting them on cookies, but there was enough to go around. Lacey's friend Tessa joined in the fun this year, and was a joy to have around. Makayla had quite a bit of fun with the frosting, sometimes ending up with more frosting then cookie! After the cookie making fun (at which point it looked like Christmas exploded in Lisa's kitchen!) the beasties gathered in the front room where Nathan and Zack took turns giving pony rides. After much giggling and wacky fun, the day was at end and everyone went home with plates full of cookies!

This year Christmas Day was hosted by Mike and Mandy, so all of us living in Clovis had a lovely drive up to Tollhouse. This was the first time I've been to Mike and Mandy's new house, which is quite nice =). Some of Tricia's family also joined us this year, familiar faces from last year when Matt and Tricia hosted Christmas Day, which made for a nice group of family. Christmas Dinner was wonderful (thanks Mandy!! You are an awesome cook!!) and dessert (eaten quite a bit later) was also wonderful, thanks to Lisa and her yummy cheesecake and pies. (If I'm leaving out any dishes made by anyone else, sorry guys! All of you kitchen savvy types are my heroes!). I also plied my limited culinary skills and brought up a gingerbread house, which my nieces and nephews demolished with great zeal. Gifts were exchanged amid a flurry of wrapping paper and ribbons and the beasties all had fun. To everyone's delight, the evening storm brought with it a lovely dusting of snow, and of course we all had to go out and take pictures, catch snow flakes on our tongues, or toss a snowball. It was a exciting end to a wonderful day!

I'll be posting the photos from Christmas Eve and Christmas Day on flickr, but they can also be viewed from this site. The links are under "Photos" to the left.

Love you all!!! Happy Holidays!!

Morgan

Congratulations to new parents Sherry and Matt Schuld

I only have a minute or so, but I wanted to say congratulations to Sherry and Matt Schuld!! Sherry gave birth to a healthy baby boy weight 6 lbs 2 oz at about 8:00 this morning. Yaay! (I'll post more late - maybe even a picture if I can get one *hint hint*)

Memorial Service and Photos...

Uncle Jack's memorial held last Saturday at the Veterans Memorial Hall in Clovis drew quite a crowd of wonderful, loving people who were proud to be family or friend to Jack Sinor. There were wonderful and touching memories shared by those who stood up to speak, and many many more shared privately by those unable to stand up and share. It was a wonderful event to celebrate the life of an amazing man, thank you to everyone who made it possible and to all who attended!!

I've collected some of my photos of Uncle Jack, they can be viewed here: Photos!

~Morgan

In Memory of Jack Sinor

RALPH JACKSON SINOR, JR.

“Jack”

July 21, 1945

October 30, 2008

Ralph Jackson "Jack" Sinor, Jr. was born in Richmond, Ca. on July 21, 1945. He passed away in Clovis, Ca on Thursday October 30, 2008 at the age of 63.

At the age of two, Jack moved to Friant, Ca. He graduated from Sierra High School in 1963. While attending Sierra High, Jack was not only a 4.0 student, but also the captain of the varsity football team as a middle linebacker, and was also the shortstop for the varsity baseball team; earning all-league honors in both sports. After high school he worked on the California Aqueduct while attending college.

Jack joined the U.S. Army 82nd Airborne in 1968, and graduated from O.C.S. He served in Vietnam as a 2nd Lieutenant in the 1st Calvary and was highly decorated for valor, which included three bronze stars and a purple heart. Jack was a platoon leader for long range reconnaissance patrols in the jungles of Vietnam for over eight months.

After military service he completed his education at Fresno State College and became a civil engineer. He worked for KRCD for 23 years and retired as Assistant General Manager and Chief Engineer.

Jack was a strong member of the community and highly beloved by both family and friends. He had a great tenderness in his heart for children and animals, and was known to be overly giving and kindhearted.

Jack is preceded in death by his two sisters, Rita Sinor Gardner, and Renee Sinor Perez. He is survived by his wife of 36 years, Mary of Clovis; his daughters; Christine Sinor-Ballard and her partner Melanie of Fresno and Jaime Orosco and her husband Richard of Clovis, his son, Reid Sinor and his wife Jodi of Clovis, and sister, Rhonda Gardner of O'Neals. He was also blessed with four grandsons and five granddaughters. He is also survived by adoring cousins, nephews and nieces.

He is loved, honored and respected by a magnitude of close friends. His legacy and his love for living life to its fullest will be remembered and carried on by all those who were lucky enough to have had him in their lives. He will always be a hero, warrior, and a legend to his family and friends. The world is a better place for having had Jack Sinor in it.

A Memorial Service will be held at the Veterans Memorial Hall in Clovis on Saturday, November 15, 2008, at 2:00 p.m.

Remembrances in lieu of flowers may be made to Veterans Hospital or Valley Children’s Hospital.

Congratulations Lisa and Rich!!!

Last weekend, Saturday, October 18th, Rich and Lisa tied the knot in a lovely ceremony at Belmont country club. I'm hoping to get some pictures up at sometime tonight, but we'll see. The photos will be hosted in the McGrath Family Flickr account, but I will also be making a website for them, www.RichandLisa.net. I was the photographer, so let me know what you all think! (Well, unless you hate them - I am nervous enough about be the photographer as it is!)
Also I have officially switched the webpage graphics and layout. I have a few things left to change, but the bulk of it is done. If anyone has any comment or suggestions about the changes, please let me know!! You can email me or post a response to this blog.

Back to work on pictures and such!!
~Morgan

Working On Changes....

Well, I felt it was time for a change. Our current layout hasn't been changed for years! I wanted to make the site a little faster, cleaner, and readable - we'll see if I met my goal =). If you do want to still see the old site, its till around, I'll make sure to post a link to it soon. We'll I'm going to work on making sure the site works for different screen resolutions... talk to you all later!

~ Morgan

A Whole New Design

Well, we are trying something new today, a new layout, new graphics, new calendar, and now a new blog. Instead of posting directly to the site, I am going to try posting to a blog. I am hoping that having the ability to post from any computer, anywhere, will encourage me to update more often. I’m going to rely more on embedding other sites then creating the pages myself. Let me know what you all think!
~Morgan