Happy Thanksgiving!!

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I love this little pilgrim girl, my daughter April, drew when she was in the second grade!!   She came home from school one day and brought me the paper and said that was her picture on the front page.  At first I didn't believe it.   How could her picture be on the front page and I didn't know about it first??  Anyway, I read the caption and had to apologize.  Then I went to go admire the real thing on the window front.  After a few weeks April brought home the original. It is one of my treasured possessions!  

I am thankful for so many blessings.  I just finished reading a book about a slave called "Someone Knows My Name".  It has really made me think deeply about all the modern conveniences I take for granted.  For instance running water, and electricity.  

Wishing you all a most Blessed Thanksgiving. 

Retirement Ahead

It is foggy this morning and still dark outside as my wonderful husband leaves to head out for his last day of work.  For the past 35 years he has worked for PG&E a local public utility, The last 31 years he has been at Diablo Canyon Power Plant.  The hours have many times been long and grueling.  The job is filled with tension and stress.  But, he did it to provide for our family.  Words can not express my gratitude for his sacrifice for our family.  I am especially glad that he was able to provide for our family so that I could stay home and raise our children.  In The Family: A Proclamation to the World it states:

"By divine design, fathers are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families."

 

What a blessing to have a husband and father who understood the importance of his role in Heavenly Father's plan.  

Thank you, Mike.  I hope you have an enjoyable retirement.  I am sure we have many wonderful adventures before us. 

Learning From Little Ones

 Earlier in the month Kyle and his baby brother Joshua and their parents came to visit us. Little ones don't get much cuter than this!! 

 Kyle is obsessed with stickers.  Can you see them on his shirt??  That is Kyle's favorite place to stick stickers!!   I liked the idea too!!  Much better than my curio cabinet!!  

 And this little one is just full of chubby cuteness!! 

 Kyle also loves to play chase. I almost caught him here!!  

When Kyle woke up, both mornings he was here, I was the only one up.  The house was still quiet and he let me cuddle him.  Oh, it feels so good to cuddle a little one!!  It was only for a minute or two at the most, but I loved it.  This first evening they were here, Katie and Brad went out for dinner to celebrate their anniversary.  About a half hour after they left Kyle started wondering around the house whimpering and crying.  I know he was looking for his mommy, but couldn't find her.  So, sad.  The next morning after our little cuddle,  he went down the hall and peeked into the bedroom.  Yep, mommy and daddy were still there, so he quietly closed the door and was happy as can be.  

What did I learn?  Well, we are here on Earth, away from our Heavenly Father. Somehow ,just knowing He is there can help us to have peace and comfort in this life.  Just like when we are little knowing Mommy and Daddy are nearby gives us comfort. 

 

 And this little one, well my oh my!!  He does babble so sweetly doesn't he?? He is adorable!  However, if he is away from his mommy and his tummy is grumbling. WATCH OUT!!  Joshua does NOT like to take a bottle.  I knew he was hungry, he cried and cried and cried and I tried and tried and tried to feed him a bottle. But to no avail. I know what he needed, but he had to take it himself.  I had no way help him.  Grandpa walked around with him and talked to him, and he took little cat naps, but he was NOT a happy camper, he was hungry!!  

Our Heavenly Father provides spiritual nourishment for us, through the Spirit, the scriptures and the words of Latter-Day Prophets.  But, we have to partake of these things.  He can not force them on us.  If we fill ourselves we are happy!!

Thank you, my little ones for teaching me. Came back often I miss you!!   

Heroic

MOM!!  Evan yelled as we were getting ready for church yesterday.  I calmly headed to his room and told him "my, it sounds urgent"!  He was on his bed putting on his pants (that is how you get dressed when your legs don't work).  Almost panicky he says, "a spider just crawled into my pant leg!!  Luckily, he hadn't put them on yet.  Oh, I guess I should tell you that Evan is extremely afraid of spiders!!  Well, anyway, I took the pants, turned the pant legs inside out and a cute little brown spider crawls out unto the bed.  I grabbed a tissue smushed the spider and flushed it down the toilet.  Now, I have to say that usually I just grab a spider catcher, and let it go outside.  Spiders don't really bug me (ha ha, pun intended) and I like the way they eat the nasty mosquitoes!  But, the spider catcher wasn't nearby and I didn't want Evan freaking out to bad.  When all was said and done I ask Evan, "Well, what kind of mom am I".  Thinking in my head he would say awesome or wonderful or something like that.  "Heroic!" he exclaims!!  So, there you go, if you squash an itsy bitsy spider that is so much smaller than you are and save the day you can be heroic too!! 

Faces really don't get any cuter than these two little ones, Thomas and Corbin do they? I love their big innocent brown eyes!

After a few days in the Redwoods, Mike and I spent some time with April and her family. 

We sure love her two little boys and enjoyed spending time with them.  We went to the park.  Can you believe little Corbin? He feel asleep on the way to the park and continued to sleep with all the noise around?  We played bocce ball, and went for walks.  We also went shopping and just hung out.  We realized a couple of things about Thomas.  He does NOT like to play Grandpa's game of wild footsies.  Mikes chases the little ones and tickles their feet.  Thomas would say "NO", if Mike pointed to his wild footsies. Then Thomas would point to his brother Corbin to let Grandpa know he had the wild footsies to chase.  Too funny!!

Early one morning Mike and I went for a walk around the Sacramento temple grounds.  We found these invaders within the temple gates.  Look at those antlers.  Those guys were hungry!!

Our July was busy and fun.  We enjoyed seeing family that we miss so much.  As they say "there is no place like home" and we were happy to come back to our home and the cool air of the Central Coast.

Flying Through the Redwood Forest

While Evan attend Camp Harmon in the Santa Cruz mountains, Mike and I were able to spend a couple of days by ourselves.

We decided to try the Redwood Canopy Tours. This is a zipline through the redwood forest.  Actually, it is several ziplines, six to be exact.  You go from platform to platform via zipline.  The highest platform is about only 146 feet above the ground. It sounded fun and scary all at the same time.  You can get a better feel for what we did by clicking on the Redwood Canopy Tour hyperlink.

First thing they do is get you set up in a harness, helmet and gloves.  You see it's all very safe.  Then you have a practice line where they teach you the correct way to zip.  You can see the practice line there in the background by our tour guide.   I volunteered to be the first to give it a try.  And I immediately had forgotten the instructions on how to brake myself.  Good thing we got to practice.  I had to do a lot of deep breathing and talk myself into not being scared to death. 

The first two zips were pretty scary. My biggest fear was being stuck out in the middle of the line and having to pull myself in with my arms.  I just didn't want to be hanging there. But, they teach you how to go fast and I didn't have a problem.  So, then I just decided to enjoy the ride!!

The trees were beautiful and there was a creek below.  At each platform our guides would teach about the amazing redwood forest. 

We even had this amazing rope bridge to cross at the same time there were people zipping by overhead!!

 

 I was actually sad to see the time end, and I definitely want to do this again next year. 

After the zipline we drove to Big Basin State Park to hike around. 

We found a pretty little waterfall to enjoy.

I love being in the redwood trees.  It was so relaxing.

 

The month of July was fun for us because we were able to see each of our children and grandchildren. We also were able to spend time in the Temple with each one of our adult children. Now, that was really special!! I think I broke my personal record for number of visits to the Temple in one month. The grand number was four. At four different Temples!!




We started in the Mount Timpanogos Temple in Utah. All three of our sons were there with us. What a special treat!




I was able to spend some time by myself in the Saint George Utah Temple. We have been on the grounds of this temple numerous times and toured the Visitors Center that is onsite. However, I had never entered in before. This historic temple is extremely beautiful inside and I had a wonderful uplifting time.



A few days later we met our two youngest daughters Katie and Rachel along with their husbands to attend the Redlands California Temple. I love the stained glass in this temple. (Thank you, Rachel and Joey for driving the long hours from Mesa to make this happen.)



Then the very next weekend we went with April to the Sacramento California Temple. It was wonderful sitting in the Celestial Room with her.


These four temples now have a special place in my heart. I love the Temple and the peace and Spirit I feel inside.

 

This short video explains the blessings of the temple. Enjoy!