Spring Break #5

While it doesn't quite fit her (it was made for a developed woman), this was a dress made and worn by her Great-Grandma Wilcox.  I had pulled it out to show my cousin, Eowyn, and noticed that it had a hole in the seam.  I fixed it and then had Ada put it on just for fun.  

On Friday we did our big Spring Break outing.  We went to eat lunch with Daddy at work.  That was fun.  The kids love his cafeteria, and honestly it's probably the only time that he actually eats in there, but the kids get a kick out of it. 

Then I drove the kids up to the University of Utah Natural History Museum.  Thanks to bounce back tickets from Seth and I accompanying the school field trip, it only cost us $15 to get in.... It would have been about $65 otherwise. I really like this museum.  It has all about Utah, gems and minerals, Indians, lake Bonneville, dinosaurs, and this time they had a special Mayan exhibit.  

This is a game that you build your city, power it, build entertainment to keep people happy and try to minimize the impact to the environment.  

This is a mold of a duckbill dinosaur foot print.  Sam fit in, just barely.

Ada not so much.  She's gotten so tall!

This was the beginning of the Mayan exhibit.  Did you know that there is at least one known Mayan city that they don't know where it is?  They have a piece of one of the walls with the city name on it that someone had taken and ended up in the museum... but now they can't find that city again.  Sam and I tried to lift one of the rubber balls that they would have used for their game.  They were very hard and heavy.  That would have been a very painful game.  I told the kids that this is what happened to the Lamanites after they killed off the Nephites in the Book of Mormon.  I showed them the altar that they would sacrifice animals and people on.  I told them about the kings making themselves bleed to show that they were saviors of the people.  I was sickened and amazed at the same time of doctrines that Christ had taught and how they'd been changed over time by the wickedness of their society.  They had a section on the Mayan gods.  A lot of them were similar to other societies... fertility god, cave god that controls the weather, etc... but one sounded very much like Christ.  The Maize God.  He was the one that created and continually carries the universe and created the earth.  He's also dies and is reborn to keep the people that he created alive.  I think it's interesting that no matter how hard Satan worked to destroy and corrupt the truth, you can still see a little bit of it there in the history.  

Evelyn's favorite part was a computer that you could put your birthday in and it would give you your birthday day, month and year in Mayan.  The kids also took turns making Mayan names.  I tried to get them to name Dad something like Butterfly Shark, but they all resisted that idea.

After we got home, our friends, the Komens came over for an impromptu game night.  It makes me happy to see the kids play together and I sure like the adults.  Madeline reminds me of a shy Margaret and Nick is like a Jewish Jeremy. 

Saturday, my parents and Janelle joined us for conference.  Conference was different for me this time.  Usually it's just overall peaceful with bits of personal revelation.  This time the first session had lots of admonitions to love and be patient.  Talks about people choosing to leave their beliefs.  Then in the middle of the sessions, I checked my facebook feed to see what some of my neighbors and friends enjoyed from the session.  Instead of inspiration, I came out with lots of negative feelings.  Several friends of mine being either angry or haughty about new policy changes and lots of my friends that have left the church over the years getting on and trying to support each other and prove that they are smarter than anyone that had chosen to stay in the church.  By the next session, I was agitated and unhappy.  I didn't focus on the unhappy feelings and tried to pay attention to the rest of conference, but it wasn't until the final session that I really felt peace again.  It's sad that outside influences can make you feel upset when what they are doing has nothing to do with you.  

Grandma put these guys out in a flash.

Sunday afternoon session we went to our Robertson Grandparents' house with the Hansens.  The kids played and we had a waffle dinner.  It's good to see how healthy Jon and Walter are looking.  Aubrey is walking straight and tall... I think just a few more months and she'll be cleared to be able to bend and lift again.  Her piano is sounding beautiful.

All in all, we wore this kid out.  Monday the kids went back to school and my parents went shoe shopping with Ada, Seth and I.  After taking Ada back to school and saying goodbye to my parents, Seth and I went on a bike ride and got a start on pulling weeds from the garden so that we can plant soon.  We got back in and Seth fell asleep sitting up while I was in the shower.  Cute thing.

Here's us at the movies with everyone.

I'm glad that Spring Break came along because this is my current week.  (Just my calendar, not Jer's).  I'm glad to get a break from this occasionally.