My Kind of Science Project!

On Earth Day this past April our local newspaper had a list of ideas for celebrating Earth Day.   One of them caught my eye because along with camels, moose, bears, and spiders, I also like bees!

It was called The Great Sunflower Project.  I signed up online.  Then I planted some Lemon Queen sunflowers and lots of other flowers too.  Then all I have to do is whenever I feel like it, go out into my garden, sit in a comfortable chair for 15 minutes and watch for bees!  Then I log on and record how many and the kinds of bees I see.  That's it!  And I'm helping to make our earth a better place!!

There's one!

This is my kind of science project!

P.S. Did you know that bees are responsible for every third bite of food?!!

"You Have No Idea...

...how truly wonderful and capable you are!"

(In honor of some of my favorite people!)

“A most effective and diabolical approach of Satan is to demean the role of wife and mother in the home. This is an attack at the very heart of God’s plan to foster love between husband and wife and to nurture children in an atmosphere of understanding, peace, appreciation, and support. Much of the violence that is rampant in the world today is the harvest of weakened homes. Government and social plans will not effectively correct that deficiency. The best efforts of schools and churches cannot adequately compensate for the absence of the tender care of a compassionate wife and mother in the home.

As a mother guided by the Lord, you weave a fabric of character in your children using the threads of truth given through careful instruction and worthy example. You imbue the traits of honesty, faith in God, duty, respect for others, kindness, self-confidence, and the desire to contribute, to learn, and to give in your trusting children’s minds and hearts. No day-care center can do that. It is your sacred right and privilege. It is also your sacred responsibility.

Of course, as a woman you can do exceptionally well in the workplace; but is that the best use of your divinely appointed talents and feminine traits? The prophets have declared that to the extent possible, with the help of the Lord, the husband and wife are to work together to keep mother in the home…

I humbly thank our Father in Heaven for His daughters, you who were willing to come to earth to live under certain circumstances. Most men could not handle the uncertainties you are asked to live with. Social customs require that you wait to be asked for marriage. You are expected to go with your husband wherever his employment or a calling will take him. Your environment and neighborhood are determined by his ability to provide, meager or not. You place your life in the Lord’s hands each time you bear a child. A man makes no such sacrifice. The blessing of nurturing children and caring for a husband often is intermingled with many routine tasks. You do all of these things willingly because you are a woman, a daughter of our Father in Heaven. Generally you have no idea of how truly wonderful and capable you are, how very much appreciated and loved, and how desperately needed, for most men don’t tell you as completely and as often as needed.”

Elder Richard G. Scott

“Finding Peace, Happiness and Joy” pp. 23, 25

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Highlights!

Lunch at Fisherman's Wharf: the view out the restaurant window.  Notice that you can see Alcatraz!

We did a lot of people watching!  And there were some interesting people to watch!  Didn't take any pictures but snapped this from the car window:

Loved, loved, loved the Impressionist exhibit at the De Young!  No pictures allowed there.  But photos can't do justice to the amazing paintings we saw!  Monet, Manet, Renoir, Pissarro, Degas, Cezanne--I love them all!!  (The Musee D'Orsay is undergoing rennovation in Paris and loaned over 100 paintings  for this exhibit)

And the big event:

Here's what we thought about it:

Not sure why one of these is required, but EVERYONE was getting their picture taken outside the theatre.  I, myself, took photos for three different families and Dan took some too.  

There were way too  many people in that theatre who had seen the show multiple times!  I felt like I was with my family watching "The Princess Bride" when they quote everything along with the show.   It actually made it kind of fun, but feel like I need to see it again to get everything.

Celebrating In Style!

I guess if you have been married for 38 years you should 

celebrate in style by:

1) Going to this city

2) Going to an art museum

3) Going to the theatre

Happy Anniversary to Us!

Remember This Picture???

Well, it's already out of date!

(#21 is on the way!)

Puzzling 1, 2, 3!

We're not too much for buying souvenirs, but we did buy this puzzle in Yosemite.

And Dan put in every piece!

1) It's relaxing for Dan to work on in his few spare minutes (Notice this puzzle is at our kitchen table--so those few minutes were often connected to a meal or a snack.)

2) A man in our stake took this photograph that was used for the puzzle

3) Another man in our stake owns the company that makes these puzzles and distributes them to National Parks

My Buddies!

I noticed that I don't have as many pictures of Hannah and Joshua as I do of some of the other grandkids.  And I realized that's because when I am visiting grandkids I try to take lots of pictures so I can remember them!   But I see Hannah and Joshua often and after each time I see them I know I will see them again soon, so I'm not always grabbing for the camera.

Today we had fun with Play Doh!  

We were at it for a full hour and a half.

In Honor of My Mom and Her Family!

It has been four years today since my Mom passed away.  Since then we have lost my Aunt Doris and now recently my Uncle Harlan.

I love my Mom's family!  We got to see most of our aunts and uncles and cousins quite often while I was growing up.  They were a close family. 

As the years passed and our families grew it became harder and harder to get everyone together.  But we tried it a few times!    And we called them "Spjunions!"

Here was one at Lake Tahoe when all the cousins went out to dinner:

These next two were held in Salt Lake/Bountiful:

Recently I attended a Memorial for my Uncle Harlan at this beautiful spot in Murray, Utah.

Aunt Maida had everything decorated with a Swedish touch.

I discovered this photo of my parents with Doris and Keith from their trip to Hawaii.

The relatives started arriving:

There was a very nice dinner and then a very nice program!

Uncle Phil and Aunt Maida did the introductions and then Maida read several tributes from Harlan's colleagues. (I didn't realize how famous my Uncle was in the medical field.  He was very humble and modest and sometimes didn't even tell his wife and family when he won awards and such.  They would find out about them from other people.  He was known all over the world for his efforts in the field of Pathology.  I heard some good stories about him from some of his kids who also spoke.)

Cousin Roy Spjut told the story of the Spjut side of the family:

Cousin Ed Pierson told the story of the Jacobson side of the family:

Then people gave rememberances of Uncle Harlan.  My Dad gave him a wonderful tribute telling how much my Mom looked up to her older brother.  My Dad had to get his permission to marry her! (Well, almost!)  I know my Mom always spoke VERY highly of her brother!

Thoughts for a Sunday Afternoon!

I've often reflected on the fact that I did not get much training in the Book of Mormon when I was growing up--at least not like the children and youth get today.  I am finding that I was not alone!

Several months ago I heard Richard Bushman speak and he mentioned that most early members of the Church did not own a Book of Mormon.  I thought that was very interesting.  Then I read this book:

By The Hand of Mormon by Terryl L. Givens

I was especially interested in these quotes at the end of the book:

"Indeed, except for its abiding centrality in the conversion experience of Proselytes, the Book of Mormon has been virtually invisible throughout  most of the Church's history...Two studies that review church speeches and publications in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries reveal the unmistakable fact that a very low percentage of early LDS speeches and writings overtly encouraged the study or distribution of the book... Brigham Young University would not require that students study the Book of Mormon until 1961, and only in 1972 did church wide study of that scripture become institutionalized in the Sunday School curriculum.  In the latter half of the century (until 1986), church authorities cited the Book of Mormon a paltry 12 percent of the time when drawing upon scriptural support for their general conference addresses."   He mentions that even in our current hymnbook, only 6 hymns out of approx. 400 have reference to the Book of Mormon.

"This situation began to change dramatically with the inaugural sermon of President Ezra Taft Benson to the church in April of 1986.  On that occasion he warned that the 1832 condemnation (see D.and C 84:54-57) was still in force, sounding a theme that would become the hallmark of his ministry."   Such phrases and quotes as "a lifelong pursuit," "keystone of the church," "massive flooding of the earth with the Book of Mormon,"   "read daily from the pages" "will get a man nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book" were heard almost every Sunday.

"Today... the Book of Mormon is now the focus of vigorous scholarly research by Mormon academics that is unprecedented in scope, professionalism, and church support...An army of over 60,000 missionaries continues to use the Book of Mormon as the centerpiece of a proselytizing effort that was bringing in over a quarter of a million converts a year by the new century.  In LDS worship services and Sunday schools, the Book of Mormon is now absolutely central rather than peripheral...Every participant in Seminary spends one full year immersed in the keystone of their religion.  And perhaps most tellingly, Benson's prophetic promises keyed specifically to Book of Mormon attentiveness mean that in countless LDS homes throughout the world, devout families meet together every day for a devotional in which they read together from the Book of Mormon.  Ironically, then, though Latter-day Saints tend to be extremely Bible-literate, the rising generation of children are more likely to associate scripture reading with stories of Nephi and Alma than of Matthew and Mark, and to bask imaginatively in the courage of Captain Moroni than of Samson or Daniel."

All's Well That End Well!

All through the 1980's the kids in my family went through a lot of pairs of jeans and cords! 

I got the idea to cut out the salvageable pieces from the holey pants and make them into a quilt!  Great idea, right?  Well, I diligently cut up the pants over the years and had a great pile of squares going. I thought making them into a quilt would be a great memory.   Eventually, I finally did get around to making the quilt!

The quilt was really durable made from all that good fabric.  I loved it!  And we used it for camping trips and picnics and for lots of other things.   So no surprise when we headed to our family reunion this year that I put the quilt in the trunk of our car and took it in with us to Heritage Park where we would be having a picnic.

Here are some grandkids enjoying  lunch on the quilt.  I put an "apple" motif fabric on the back in memory of our many great trips to Apple Hill. 

But then I did a really dumb thing!   I didn't feel like hauling the quilt around and left it on the porch of the Smoot building, forgot about it and off we went.   The next day when we were going to a park, I went to get it and remembered that I had last seen it the day before.   I called the Park and it hadn't been turned in and it wasn't on the porch.   Now I started realizing how much that quilt meant to me!  I called again the next day and still no quilt.  But they told me to stop by and maybe I could find it.  Stop by?   We were heading home to California and it would mean 1 more hour added to our already long trip.  But we did stop by and I talked to a lot of different people.  Nobody had seen it.  Finally I talked to the head guy who seemed to take an interest.  He gave me his card and told me to email him with a picture of it when I got home.  Then we headed to California.  The next day I emailed some photos and (drum roll), they found the quilt a short time later!

I told them I would be in Utah in two weeks and would come by and pick it up.  So I took an extra suitcase with me on my recent trip and made a detour to finally get my quilt back.  I know it's just a "thing" but I'm so glad I have it back!