October 2nd was Happy #40, Gabe!!!

This is where Gabe was born on 

October 2, 1978

We were living up in Prospect, about 1.5 hours away.  I wanted to have him naturally and in a birthing room, and this is the only hospital that would take me!

Fast forward to 1987...8 and 9 years old, about the same age as Emerson is now.

Gabrial has always loved baseball!  

Here he is catching...and his buddy, Jimmy Cloud, was batting.

 Again he was catching, with Brian Johnson batting.

 This is May 14, 1987, Joshua's 11th birthday. 

Gabrial was a bit excited!

 I had forgotten that Gabe was on a swim team!

Mom and Aunt Terry had come to visit and we were out seeing northern California and Oregon.

We went to Redding on June 21, 1987 to watch Gabe in a swim meet!

Sports...any sport...Gabe played, watched, read about sports!

After we moved to the coast, he also played football!

 We were renting a house while we built ours.  Gabe and Joshua would play football in the front yard with the Gildea boys.  This picture was in August, 1987, not too long after we moved.

 This was Bear...Gabe's best buddy in Weaverville.

We were packing up for our big move.

I've always loved this picture.

This was our last day at our home in Weaverville.  These guys really couldn't remember living 

anywhere but here.  They were excited for the move, but probably a little sad, too.

  

July 25, 1987

We hadn't been on the coast long, when we went out on a yacht called the Dow Jones II.  

It was a beautiful day, a bit deceptive for what the weather was going to be like!

Gabe loved the boat and drove it a bit.  He now has a painting hanging in his home of this boat that I renamed 'The Emerson King'!

August 22, 1987

 Going to the beach was a new thing for us.

 A little later in the summer, friends came to visit.

Here, Gabe and Jimmy Cloud are dancing on a dead whale.

Playing and climbing on driftwood on Clam Beach was fun for the group.

Here it's Lindsey, Emily Cloud, Jimmy Cloud, and Gabe!

This is also the summer of 1987.  We were in Texas.  Gabe's Aunt Becky had been in the hospital and here he is with his Uncle John...and Becky's teddy bear!

 In June, 1987, my mom and Aunt Terry came for a visit.  For part of our sightseeing, we took Gabe and Lindsey.  Here we were at a place called 'Mammoth Pine' off Highway 62 in southern Oregon.

 Heading northeast on Highway 62, we came to Crater Lake.

I laugh at Gabe's expression here!

 Sitting on the wall around the lake, Gabrial was trying to feed the chipmunks.

 This was June, but there was still snow.

Gabe skied...without skis!

 He also found a patch of snow to hide under.

 After leaving Crater Lake and heading back toward California, we stopped in Ashland,

the town where Gabrial was born.

 This is Lithia Park.

This picture....oh my goodness...I'll never forget!  Mom and I have laughed about this so many times, but it was actually VERY scary to me at the time.

We were at the summit of Highway 3 in California.  We obviously stopped to take a picture...and Gabe being Gabe was climbing around.  He had actually fallen BETWEEN these two big pieces of wood.  There was one on the other side also saying Klamath National Forest.  You can see how large they are...and after I took the picture and told Gabe to 'come on' since we were getting back in the car...he told me he couldn't.

That's when we realized he was STUCK.  We were pushing him up from below and I was up pulling him out the top...it wasn't easy...but that was such a typical Gabe story!

Gabrial...he was named to be my angel.

and he was...and he is...and he always will be.

Happy #40 birthday!

I love you, Gabe!