Taking Kaylee to BYU I

Well the much awaited trip has came and gone. It started out with a little turmoil, and a lot of prayer and Shelly not being able to go at the last minute. So at 9AM Thursday the 2nd of Sept we were off. First stop Grand Parents Ron and Pat Spradlin.
Kaylee got to feed the ducks.




We drove all day and all night and stopped for gas, Rock Star's, and a little gaming.







we got so so tired but finally made it to our favorite place in Utah. That's where ever Kevin,Carli,Sam,Jess and Tyler are.








As always we had a lot of fun with the Utah Spradlin's







We got to see our favorite Nevada Spradlin's. I was even privileged to stand in in the blessing of Danny and Jaci new baby.





After the blessing he headed for Idaho the land of my love. This is a sacred place to Shelly and I it's where we met dated and got ingaged. So many great memories came flooding in to my mind. The closer we got the more I missed the love of my life Shelly Denise Spradlin. I could not stop the tears from flowing like they are now as I write this post. As we entered Rexburg the thoughts of our park our Pizza Hut our Circle K our first appartment. The time we flew a kite together. The first slow dance. The hospital where our first child was born. So many great memories that I hope my mind holds for ever and ever. I wanted Shelly there so bad to hold her in all those places to tell her I would do all over again. I love you Shelly!



We made it wish I was there now.

Family fun. PCB 2010

Florida Tides and Breezes

The Duke Family is in Florida, sort of. Kaylee is officially on a trip with her high school friends. Sweet girls, but growing up girls. We beg for her to come down for a picture. Shayna was with her , a rare sister moment. Dallin had to be rounded up from walking way down the beach talking to a girlfriend on the cell phone ...again. And Cody...well we look toward the northeast, our minds and hearts traveling the miles and miles across the ocean to a foreign land, Burton upon Trent, England. He's gone for a wonderful cause, but it is evidence still of time passing us by. The sands in the hourglass keeps pouring without regard to our feelings. The tides keep coming , and the winds keep blowing, and we are realizing our family is a rare precious thing that will forever be changing. We love these people so much and yet they keep growing up and silently threatening to create their own lives. (I knew this would happen when I was rocking these babies! Darn!!) But we will cling and hang onto them as tight as we can until the TIME comes. I'm so thankful for the promise of ETERNITY with these special people, but TIME ....time is fleeting.
I'm thankful for this snapshot that I can hang onto. I can still feel the breeze, and can hear the crashing waves, and I hope to feel them in my arms for a long time. Well... other than that, Vacation has been GREAT! Wish you were here! See you when we get home!

TEENAGERS AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH !!!!!

Hello everyone look at this picture. Do you see the scowl? Do you see the wrinkles under the eyes? Do you see the gray beard? Do you see the pale skin? Do you see the crooked teeth from caused from grinding? Do you want to know what caused this? Well I'll tell you. Teenagers that think you don't know what your talking about. Teenagers that try to bend the rules thinking there tricking you. Teenagers that think your dumb. Teenagers that say I'm 15 I should be able to do what I want. Teenagers that think you should buy them what they want when they want it. Teenagers that get detention for anything and everything.

Then there's the 19 year olds who have jobs. That have more money in there bank account than there parents because they can save every penny, because they some how get there parents to still pay for there cell phone, give them a car, and pay for the insurance. They don't pay rent or utilities and when they buy a loaf of bread they come home with it and come through the door with there hand opened wanting the 2 dollars that they paid for it. Then they think there an adult, pay for a plane ticket, to go on vacation, and think the rules don't apply. Even tho they are with good people in an awesome place doing good things. They still apply!!!!!!

I love these teenagers unconditionally and I always will and one day they will say. Now I know why my mom and dad said and did what they did. The only thing I can hope for is that they will look a little like the picture above.

AAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHH !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

P.S. Come on yall its not that hard. Help and old man out. Ok I'm gonna go take my happy pill now.

Cody's third E-Mail. We love that Boy!!

Hey guys sorry I can’t reply to everybody I don’t even have time to read all the e-mails now ill have to print them off, thanks so much! The packages you guys sent were freaking awesome thank you. I really liked the Corvette ZR1!! And the yoyo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Thanks dad) but the letters were the best! You can’t get any of the candy you sent here everybody was like what the heck is this! And the other package was great too! Good idea. The candy (sweets as they say) here is really good.


I leave the MTC tomorrow! And it’s a couple of hours by bus. I can’t wait to get there and get started. We just did another finding activity last Thursday where we went tracting door to door. We ran into some really weird people one Satanist she was creepy but we managed to give out 2 Book of Mormons. One guy was riding a mini bike and he seemed pretty interested. The MTC is so great! The spirit is thick enough to cut with a knife almost. I loved Elder Holland’s talk. It was so powerful. Well IV got to get off the computer now. Talk to ya later.


ps. mom fix all my misspellings before you send this to people. Lol

Happy Birthday Elder Cody Duke

Cody's 20th birthday in England! His Mission President's wife Sister Clegg sent us this picture of him. We also sent him a candy/chocolate basket from a local bakery there in England. Hope it was a wonderful day for him!

Cody's first e-mail from England

Ello Mum,.
Just kidding this is Cody over in the UK. Sorry for not writing, this is my first chance to E-mail at all ,and I only have a few min, so excuse the misspellings.I'm doing great here though so far. my comps. name is Elder Foong, he's pretty cool he's actually from Malaysia but he speaks great English. we have been studding a lot like every little bit of free time we have. as soon as I got here they called me to be district leader over the Nephi district, so that's been kinda tuff. I'm not really used to being a leader I guess. It seems to stay pretty cold here when I landed it was like 50 and it only goes down from there, and its always cloudy but it doesn't rain very often. the Preston temple is beautiful. its all made out of granite. and it has some of the nicest grounds I've ever seen, with lots of strait hedges, bushes, lily pad ponds, and trees. we actually just got back from there. Well i've only got 5 min. left so I apologize for the sloppiness of this E-mail. How are you guys doing? What's going on in church, and school, and stuff. write me back.