Steve's Birthday Celebration

We celebrated Steve's birthday this year with a pool party. We invited 3 families over for swimming and a BBQ on Friday night.

The birthday boy doing a back flip off the rock wall...impressive Steve!

One...Two...Three...

Jump!

Our funny friend Howie! Check out that goofy pose!

Happy Birthday Steve!

Saturday was Steve's actual birthday so we celebrated out by the pool as a family.

One of our good friends (Kim) brought this yummy Cold Stone birthday cake to the party on Friday. We had so many goodies that night we decided to keep it and have it on Saturday. Thanks Kim! It was delicious!

Saturday night while Mackenzie and Brooklyn were off having fun at a church youth dance Steve and I went to one of our favorite restaurants (Daniel's Broiler) for dinner to celebrate Steve's Birthday and our 26th Wedding Anniversary. 26 years...Wow! We sure have been blessed and look forward to many more years of celebrating together.

Steve and the 787

Hi. Steve here. Just thought I would jump on our family blog and share some of the fun from the past number of weeks. I have been working on the 787 program and with its launch customer, ANA, since 2004. It has been quite a ride and it has been a rewarding past few weeks as we have had a few exciting events as we get closer to delivery. The first exciting event was a big media event where we rolled out ANA's special livery (paint scheme) that they will have on their first two 787s. We also opened up the interior of a completed 787 for the first time. We had media there from all over the U.S. and Japan.

Here's the airplane soon after we rolled it out of the paint hangar to the awaiting media. We had 6 or so executives and representatives that did most of the talking with the media, but I was asked to talk with a few of them. It was a lot of fun. I even had a few seconds of fame on our local news as well as CNN and some flight blogger video clips. None of me speaking - just one of me demonstrating the cool economy class seat that I talked to the reporter about and of me taking pictures or walking inside the airplane. I don't plan to quit my day job and go to Hollywood anytime soon. :) Here's a few links if you want to suffer through them.

Here I am on the local news demonstrating the economy class seat that has a sliding seat bottom and the back stays in place - keeps the passenger in front of you from reclining into your space. It was fun to have friends come up and say, "We saw you on the news, Steve." Oh, it has been rough signing autographs.. :)

http://www.king5.com/news/slideshows/Boeing-rolls-out-first-787-to-127073518.html

Here CNN captured me as I was taking pictures of the ANA team I work with.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/08/07/boeing.dreamliner/index.html?iref=allsearch

This video of the entire airplane cabin was uploaded to YouTube by one of the reporters and captures my smiling face as I was in the cabin.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7P8SWP2B_Gs&feature=player_embedded

After most of the reporters were gone I took the opportunity to get a picture in the flight deck.

Then on August 14 we had a test flight to test out the air conditioning and In-Flight Entertainment with a full airplane of passengers. I got to go this flight as did my customers who had to witness some of the tests. It was soooo cool to finally get to fly on this airplane and see first hand in flight many of the things I have been involved in. Way cool airplane!

Cynthia and the girls came over before church and watched the airplane take off. They even made a sign to cheer on their Dad. Thanks girls. ILY.

Here I am taking off on my first flight on a 787 - an airplane I have been with since it was first defined. Way long journey...

Here I am in the door 2 entry area with my senior manger - he has also been on the program from the beginning. Check out the cool blue ceiling - the LED lighting is completely programable - you can do some way cool things with the lighting.

Here's a picture of the wing as you look out the window in the lavatory - yes, you read it right - the lavatory has a window - great view at 35,000 feet. :) Don't worry - if you are concerned about high flying birds peeking in, you can dim the window electronically (just like the rest of the passenger windows in the airplane) - another cool thing on this airplane.

We flew for about 6 hours and 45 minutes - here's the route we took - out towards Montana, down to Boise, Idaho, over to the Washington coast and down to around Los Angeles and then back home. It was one of those great days when you feel the reward of years of work. Needless to say my face was smiling the entire flight.

Here we are as we are coming in to land. You can see the Boeing Everett plant and runway in the upper right corner of the picture. Now it is on towards delivery and seeing my customer fly this airplane home to Japan. With that in mind, here's a cool story I want to share.

In mid October of 1981 as a recently turned 19 year old and a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, I boarded a Pan Am flight from Los Angeles, California to Tokyo, Japan. I stayed overnight at a hotel near Narita airport and the next day I took a bus to Haneda airport - where I boarded what I believe was a YS-11 (turbo-prop airplane designed and built in Japan) and flew to Okayama on the south end of the main island of Japan. My boarding pass, which I kept in my journal, is pictured above. Check out the name of the airline on the boarding pass - All Nippon Airways (ANA) - yes, a little less than 31 years ago I flew on ANA - my first domestic flight in Japan. It was an exciting ride back then and it has been exciting ride these past few years on the 787 as the Customer Engineer for ANA.

It is also a thrill to know that the first few cities that the ANA 787 will fly to are cities I lived in while in Japan - Okayama and Hiroshima. I hope to board an ANA 787 someday and fly from Haneda to Okayama again - that will be another boarding pass that I will plan to hold on to. Maybe I can get seat 14B on the 787 and then frame the two tickets together....

Brooklyn's Pool Party

Brooklyn had a bunch of friends over yesterday for a swim party. These kids are fish and were in the pool for 3 hours straight!

Getting ready to jump at the same time.

We lost about 2 inches of water during this swim party yesterday.

Elijah's surfing jump off the diving board.

Nice backflip Elijah!

It was fun to see Brooklyn and her friends having so much fun. Part 2 swim party will be this evening with Mackenzie and her friends! We love all these parties and the noise of happy teenagers!

Homemade Ice Cream - Yum-my

Summer wouldn't be summer without homemade ice cream!

Grandpa and Grandma Smith are in town visiting so we decided to make homemade ice cream Sunday night.

We have an old fashioned hand crank ice cream maker so we all took a turn cranking!

Mackenzie and Grandma playing on their phones while waiting for the ice cream.

AK Smith Reunion - 2011

While we were in Utah we got to go up to Heber City, Utah for my dad's family reunion. We stayed at the beautiful church property called "Heber Valley Girl's Camp". They use this property for church girl's camps during the week and then they rent it out on the weekend for family reunions.

When we arrived we unloaded our cars and threw our sleeping bags out on the the bunk beds inside the cabins. We had 4 cabins - one for all the kids - one for my dad's family, one for my uncle Kirk's family and one for my aunt Karleen's family.

My cousin Tyra came with a craft for all the ladies and girls. We made darling glass charm necklaces. We also made really cute rosebud hair bows and bracelets. It was fun to sit and visit with my cousins and aunts and uncles that we don't see too often.

My aunt Marilyn had a service project for us to work on too. It was tying tiny balloons to flip flops to decorate them. These flip flops are going to be sent over to Africa.

Saturday morning after a delicious breakfast we headed out to the challenge course. We divided up into teams and went on 6 different challenge courses. Here is Steve and Mackenzie on one of the challenge courses.

Brooklyn zip lining.

Another challenge course.

Heidi and Mackenzie waiting to do the zip line.

Mackenzie climbing up the rope ladder to do the zip line.

Steve letting out a "Wa-hooo" during his zip line ride.

My cousin Noelle was in charge of the reunion this year and she did a fabulous job organizing it. We had delicious meals, fun crafts, games, a service project and a campfire where we shared memories of our grandpa and grandma Smith. It was sure a lot of fun to see everyone again. We look forward to the next AK Smith reunion in 2013.

LeBaron Family Reunion - 2011

We just got back from 10 fun filled days with our families in Utah. We spent the first part of our trip with Steve's family.

Steve got in a couple early morning rounds of golf with his brothers and had a great time.

One night we met three of Steve's brothers and their families down in Spanish Fork for the "Fiesta Day's Rodeo". It was blazing hot but we sure enjoyed the rodeo. One night we met up with Shane and Kristin and went and saw the new Harry Potter movie too. That was a lot of fun.

On Sunday we drove up to Weber and went to church with Steve's brother Jeff and his family. After church they treated us to dinner at their home. We had the most delicious spinach salad with fresh spinach from their garden. Yum Yum!

After dinner Jeff treated us to a "shocking" good time as he brought his old crank telephone generator and we all join hands while the two persons on the ends hold a metal handle that is connected to the generator and then Jeff slowly cranks up the voltage - it starts out as a tingle and then it really becomes a shocking good time!

It's always fun for me to put Steve's mom's hair in rollers. Since she had her stroke last September she isn't able to do her own hair - so anytime she gets someone to curl her hair it's a real treat for her. And I always enjoy doing it.

One day we took Mackenzie, Brooklyn and two of their cousins, Maddie and McCall out shopping with us. Before we left we took this picture with Grandma and Grandpa.

While we were at the mall the girls went to try on prom dresses.

Silly girls!

One night the adults went out to dinner. The restaurant we went to gave us our own private room - they had probably heard how loud we are! It was a fun evening out together.

One day the four of us went to Seven Peaks water park in Provo. It was a blast - the hot sun and water felt soooo good.

Mackenzie and Steve heading up for another ride.

Grandpa found out that Mackenzie likes archery and so he gave her his old long bow. She was pumped.

For part of our reunion we all headed up the American Fork canyon to go camping. Here we are after we set up camp playing scrabble.

Just as we were setting up camp a big rain storm rolled in. Steve and Mackenzie grabbed some rain poncho's from Grandpa and cooked our steak on a stick over the fire while the rest of us stayed dry underneath the pop up. Yes, for those that have been to Niagara Falls, the blue poncho is from the falls.

One afternoon we went up repelling. Steve's brother Chad had all the gear and taught each of the kids that wanted to do it how too. Here is Brooklyn with her first repel.

Mackenzie's first repel.

Chad helping Steve get ready to go.

Wow...check out how tall that rock was!! Yes, we all practiced first on the 10 foot rock and then...

Once the kids learned on the short rock they moved up to the big rock...an 86 foot cliff - now that is a great ride down...

Brooklyn coming down off the big cliff.

Steve just starting off the top of the cliff...

Steve about half way down... Steve loved it!

We had fun sitting around the campfire at night listening to uncle Brad play his guitar and singing Beatles songs.

It was sure fun to be with the family again. Grandma and Grandpa LeBaron were troopers to come up camping with us. We all had a great time and look forward to our next reunion.