Count Your Many Blessings

So things get crazy, and sometimes I forget to stop and breathe and remember how blessed I really am.  Life is too short to hurry through it, even when things don't seem to be going the way I think they should! So, here's my top ten list of blessings. Nothing out of the ordinary, but I just felt the need to put it in black and white, so here they are in no particular order:

• Faith.  It doesn't come easy to some, and I'm thankful that's not my burden. My faith has helped me through some pretty hard times, and I don't know where I'd be without it.
  
• Health. I can't remember the last time I was really, really sick.
  
• A good husband who loves me despite my many shortcomings, and encourages me to be better without nagging.
  
• Happy children who really do try to do what's right..
  
• Good friends that I don't thank often enough for being good friends. Thank you!
• Extended family that are always there when we need them, and are counted as good friends. (See previous!)
  
• Our home--it seems a little small at times, but it provides a refuge from the world and it's filled with love and that's what counts.
• Freedom. Even with all the outrageous stuff happening in our country, we still live in the most amazing place in the world.  I hope we can keep it that way.
• Good books. The Scriptures, classics, biographies, sci-fi, children's literature--there are sooooo many good stories in which to immerse myself and my family that we can learn and grow from.
• Good music.  When I need a kick to get going, there's music for that.  And when I need to calm down, there's something for that, too.  Or, when I just feel like dancing. . .well, you get the idea.

There you have it.  And I could go on.  But I think I'll savor the quiet of this Sabbath morning, in my refuge from the world, with some good reading and music together with my family in this wonderful country that allows me to enjoy all these blessings.

Life in Lots of Pictures and Links

DANCE FESTIVAL- Rehearsals took place over the course of several months.  The performances were fabulous, and took place Friday and Saturday July 25 & 26.  Brooke, Dallin, and John were in three different dance numbers--Disney Waltz Medley, Footloose, and Getcha Head in the Game, respectively. The following pictures show Brooke at practice with her awesome partner Alex, along with the costume pictures, and the performance.  I wasn't able to get good shots of Dallin and John during the performance, which is a bummer, because they did great.  The last picture shows the choir part of the performance, which Chris and I were both a part of.  (They really didn't need my voice, but Chris can sing, and they asked for 1 couple from each of the wards in the 12 stakes that were participating, so it was a package deal.)

SUMMER VACATION-  We had a great time visiting friends and family in Utah as part of getting Brooke to Provo, Utah to take the bus to Rexburg, Idaho so she could attend Especially For Youth at BYU-Idaho.  She had a blast, and made some great friends, and even reacquainted herself with her first
friend, Rachel.  Chris, Jared, Noah and I got to visit my fabulous BYU-Provo roomie Teresa and her family in Tooele for a couple of days, where Chris went mountain biking with Teresa's hubbie Jesse, and the kids (Jared, Noah, Jaret and Kaysen-Bryant, their middle son, decided to stay home and pack for Scout camp) Teresa, Chris and I went to the Kennecott Copper Mine--fascinating!  I regret to say that I failed to get a picture of their entire family together.  I had such a wonderfully refreshing time with them, and I wish we lived closer--they are an awesome family!   From the Wilson's, we went on to Salt Lake City for a few hours, since Jared and Noah are too young to remember Temple Square.  They especially liked the view from the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, where Noah took a great picture of the temple.  On the way back the car, we saw some gorgeous flowers with huge bee flitting from blossom to blossom.  From Salt Lake, we went on to South Weber to visit the Morgan clan for a couple of days.  We had a blast with them, as always.  Jared and Noah got wet a lot--there's a great park with all these sprinkler toys, and we also went to the water slides at Cherry Hill.  We also celebrated a birthday while we were there, and all the Morgan brothers had  a  photo op together.  Unfortunately, it wasn't all fun and games.  Chris had homework to do almost every day, as he has to take classes in order to be certified to teach English language learners. (Don't get me started. THAT'S a topic for another post!)  He found a great spot outside the Morgans home to get a good wireless connection.  Also, we tried to sleep outside one night, but it was SUPER windy (we found out the next day that records had been broken) and we ended up taking the kids inside at around 2 in the morning. All in all, we it was great to see everyone and to let all of our kids play together.  From South Weber, we went back to Provo to pick up Brooke, and then down to Cedar City to visit with my parents.  Actually, they live just north of there, in a place called Enoch.  The boys got a chance to get a little wet in the splash pool, and Brooke and I went to see Shakespeare's The Two Gentlemen of Verona at the extraordinary Utah Shakespearean Festival.  We've seen several of Shakepeare's comedies there over the years, and always thoroughly enjoy the experience.

BAND CAMP- As you can tell by now, John and Dallin did not accompany us to Utah.  John was at Scout camp (where he didn't take any pictures, but I'm going to try to get some from his leaders) and Dallin spent his time at get-ahead summer school and band camp.  The pictures below show him playing at the culmination of camp for all us proud parents.

FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL- Brooke, Dallin, John, and Chris started school on August 25.  As usual, Dallin wasn't too thrilled to have his picture taken, Brooke's a ham, and John likes the tree pose.  Chris had to include his emergency lunch stash in his picture.  Jared and Noah started school last Thursday the 4th here at home again this year (I didn't take pictures--bad me.) We're going through California Virtual Academies this year, and it's taking some getting used to on all of our parts. Much more rigorous and structured than what we did last year, but hopefully not tediously so. We're still waiting for some materials to come in, and sometimes the online stuff doesn't always work right,so that's a little frustrating, but to be fair, they've had a huge enrollment leap from about 6,500 students statewide last year to almost 10,000 this year.

Anyway, that about sums up what we've been doing the last month and a half.  I have been very blog-shy as of late, just feeling not much inspiration or creativity.  So, this post is the result.  Not very exciting or creative or funny, but at least it's something new to look at!

Yeah, We're Still Here. . . .

OK, I know.  I can hear it now.  "Where have you been?"  One answer to that is, "Chauffeuring!"   I've driven more miles in the last month than I did all last year, or it feels like it at least.  Cub Scout day camp, the beach, the Getty museum, the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, Upland High at least twice a day, at least one of the three church buildings in our stake at least twice a week, Target several times a week, the grocery store several times a week, one of three malls in the area at least once a week, and CRAZY every day!  (In a good way, of course!)  The last four weeks have flown by, and the in the last post you were introduced to Marleen, our fabulous German student.  Sad to say, she left on Saturday.  She became like one of our own, and we hope she comes back soon, or that we can go visit her in Germany!!  Oh, and also sad to say, my favorite camera bit the dust, or I should say, swallowed the river.  Brooke took it with her to Magic Mountain and it got deluged on the water ride, never to recover.  Soooo, the quality of my pictures is definitely not as good with our little Nikon.  Oh well, at least we still have a camera. Which leads to these pictures from Independence Day.

We had flag raising and pancake breakfast sponsored by the Boy Scouts.  This is actually one of my favorite events of the year because to me it is a great way to start the day--really thinking about what it means to live in this land of freedom, and the responsibilities that come with that freedom.  Then comes really good food donated by businesses in the community and cooked and served by the Boy Scouts to raise money for Scout camp.  John did a great job serving eggs, and Ryan did great with the pancakes.  We had a really good turnout, too.




The pictures below are from the Ontario parade that Dallin has marched in for the past two years with Upland High School Regiment.  

Marleen watches with some interest as the mostly cars and horses, with the occasional marching band comes by.  She commented later that she likes how Americans take pride in our country, and not in a bad kind of way that she said some Germans do.

The one and only float in the whole parade.

The boys thought these jeeps were the coolest--climbing up one another and then slowly coming back down.  They were pretty cool!

Dallin's in one of these lines somewhere, but he's on the opposite end, so it was hard to get a good picture of him. He's playing the big trumpet looking thing called a mellophone.  The band sounded great, and was by far the best band in the parade. They should be, considering how many hours they've already put in this summer.

This was very moving--soldiers in uniform rode in the front. . . .

And this re-enactment was done by real men--at first I thought they were mannikins, they stood so still.  This brought me to tears and cheers, along with the rest of the crowd.

This is a blurry picture, I know, but it's the best I've got.  We always watch fireworks to top off the day, and had a great vantage point. . .

As evidenced by this shot of Noah enjoying the display.

Anyway, that about sums it up for us for the past month.  Now it's on to Dance Festival.

(Look for a post about that next week!)

Say Hello to Marleen!

The day after Brooke and I got back from girls' camp, we picked up our German foreign exchange student, Marleen.  She's a sweetheart, and it's been very fun to have her here with us.  We look forward to getting to know her more as she is with us until July 21st.  The program she's with keeps her and the other 26 kids in her group pretty busy--they are in class in the mornings 3 or 4 days a week, have activities most afternoons, go on an all day excursion once a week, and have other optional activities to choose from scattered throughout the time they're here.  Today they went to Universal Studios, and earlier this week, after class, they went on a tour of the Los Angeles area, including the Walk of Fame, the Chinese Theatre, the Hollywood sign, Rodeo Drive, and the like.  As a host family, we have the option of joining students on their outings, which we plan to do--Magic Mountain, and Wicked, the beach, and possibly Disneyland.  Fun times!