Southern California and the Anderson Family!

Dinner at Macaroni Grill with the Anderson family!

While we were in Southern California this past weekend, we spent some time with our dear friends, Roger and Lisa Anderson and their family! We have been good friends for over 25 years when we met in the Sunset ward while Mark and Roger were both attending dental school in San Francisco. We have so many great memories attending church in that old Sunset building, going on outings together, exploring San Francisco (Lisa taught me how to drive in the city. She knew the fastest way to get to the Bay bridge going on the back roads through downtown!) and my favorite was driving all the way down to Pleasanton every Monday night to take tole painting lessons together while our husbands studied!

We have kept in touch all these years through phone calls, emails, and Christmas cards (The Anderson's Christmas card is by far, the most creative and most anticipated card that we receive each year!)

In the last few years, The Holt's and Anderson's have had a couple of other fun connections. While Rhett, Lisa and Roger's oldest son, was back at Yale on a basketball recruiting trip, he was trying to decide whether to attend Harvard or Yale. Roger, Lisa, and Rhett attended church at the little branch on the Yale campus and met Brett Crandall (Kimber's future husband.) Lisa recalls that Brett was so nice and was so positive about his experience at Yale that Rhett decided to sign with them. Rhett left on his mission immediately after high school and was planning on starting at Yale when he got back. During that time, Brett met Kimber and they decided to get married. So when Lisa opened up Kimber's wedding invitation, she surprised (and very pleased) to see that "little Kimber" (Lisa throw me the most amazing baby shower ever for Kimber in SF!) was marrying Brett, the young man that she and Rhett were so impressed with and influenced her son to choose to attend Yale! Rhett is now back from his mission and finishing his freshman year and loves it in New Haven. Brett and Kimber went to a football game and dinner with him this fall and had a good time getting to know him better.

The other connection that we have is that Haley, their oldest daughter, and my niece and nephew, Greg and Michelle Olson lived back in Virginia together, had their first babies about the same time and are dear friends. What a small world!

It was wonderful to reconnect with their family and realized that we haven't changed at all...we just have a lot more kids...and a little bit more money than we did back in our San Francisco days!

So good to visit with my dear friend, Lisa!
Haley and Brooke with Adorable Emma! Isn't she the cutest thing ever?!!