Labor Day

We found this painting of a girl in the same dress as Evelyn's baptism dress... super cute

On Labor Day, I hadn't planned anything.  Just doing projects around the house and letting kids play.  Sylvia and I got talking and I realized that she would love it I took her to some local museums.  YES!  That's my favorite.  The kids usually enjoy it while they're there, but protest if you ask them first.  The only museum open on a Monday holiday was the Church History Museum.  I decided that it was perfect and off to Salt Lake we went.  She was more excited for it than I thought she'd be, but she said that she's been waiting for 20 years to go to temple square, so we inadvertently made her dream a reality.  (Literally a God sent accident.  I was just planning on walking past the temple and then to the museum.  The kids decided that they were so parched that they needed water and we stopped in at the visitors center with the Cristus.  She was so giddy.)

Sam loved the story of John Taylor being saved by his watch.  The Church History Museum had the watch on display as well as the cane that they used to try to knock the guns away from the door.

They had a replica of the gold plates.

This was the Moroni that was on top of a chapel in Washington DC.  It's 2 feet smaller than the ones on the temples, but they let you touch it with gloves on.

The kid's play area shrunk significantly since Diane introduced me to it, but they still had some fun activities for the kids to do.

I sent Sylvia off to take the Spanish tour and I took the kids on a tour of my own.  I told them about the acoustics, the organ, using only wooden pegs building the tabernacle, that this is where Conference used to be held, and that this is where the choir sings now.  They wanted to roll down the isles because they were steep and go up into the balcony.  Seth was climbing too much, so I said no.

Sam borrowed my phone and these are what I saw when I was looking at pictures later.

Being at temple square for me is something normal. We go as a family 1-2 times a year and I go often for weddings and other things.  I was just ready to skip through things, but this smile made me pause and remember that for some people this is a once in a lifetime opportunity.  I'm very happy that we got to share this experience with her.

The basement of the visitor's center is the exhibit on prophets, revelation and the Book of Mormon.  She said she'd never seen anything like it and loved it all.  She said that she's seen lots of exhibits about monks and priests of the catholic church but none about direct revelation from God.  Maybe in her job, she might be able to shift some of the exhibits in Quito from the people to the people's relationship with Heavenly Father.  The part of the Book of Mormon got changed from a table with all the different language translations to an interactive cubicle.  There were 4 sections where you could sit with about 4 people in each.  They had a short presentation on revelation and then had you pull out an already marked Book of Mormon from next to your seat and follow along with 5 different teachings taught in the Book of Mormon.  Sam LOVED it.  He sucked it all in very intently.  Seth was too busy jumping to really notice anything, and the girls sat and followed along as well.  

Part of Sunday, Sam invited Sylvia and I to play games with him.  We taught her three different games and she paid me a very kind complement.  She said that watching me with my kids, she's realized that she needs to let hers be more like kids.  She's always stressing about making sure that everything is in it's place or yelling that something needs to be done.  She said that she's enjoyed watching the happiness in my kids as they play and that they usually respond to me without me yelling at them.  That doesn't mean that I don't yell and that the kids are always perfect, but that's very neat that she would feel so peaceful and happy here. I think that a lot of moms learn from other moms and eventually we end up more or less where we want.  I have two challenges while she's here... She's celiac so I need to keep my kitchen clean and cook gluten free.  So far it's been okay (thanks to Janelle and Judy for years of unintentional training).  She LOVES that there is gluten free bread.  In Ecuador they don't sell specific Gluten free foods and she usually ends up with fruit, veggies, meat and rice.  The other challenge is to not let the basement get crazy messy.  The kids like to make messes down there and I usually save that as a weekly chore to pick up, but where she's down there I want them to keep it nicer for her.

This week

This week, the kids got in trouble for opening a new skein of yarn to tie each other up and then they cut it off instead of rolling it back up.  Now they are no longer allowed in my sewing room.

Friday, we went and mowed the lawn at the Robertson's (I'm listening to a lecture series about where the legend of King Arthur came from while we mow.  I'm loving it.  It's very interesting).  Then we went and put kids to bed before picking my friend, Sylvia Villareal, up from the train station.  She's staying with us for a month while she goes to one of the 5 English schools here in the valley.  She's a curator at the Contemporary Museum of Art in Quito, Ecuador. A lot of the shows that she want to bring in are from international places, so she's here to learn how to be a fluent English speaker.  She and I lived together as missionaries and having seen each other for 16 years.  She is a marvelous lady.  At the age of 19, she was baptized and disowned by her dad.  He still doesn't speak to her and refused to acknowledge her leaving or coming home from her mission.  She is still the only member in her family.  We went to temple square and she about cried being able to see it all.

We got to go to the temple with my parents on Saturday to do sealings.  It was so neat.  We walked in, handed our recommends to the desk, hugged my Great-Aunt Rosemary that was the greeter, walked into the lobby, hugged my Aunt Beth and Uncle Son that were just leaving the temple, walked 5 more steps and hugged my Aunt Margo that is a temple worker, walked passed the counter and hugged one of my Latina friends writing names for the prayer roll, dress and went upstairs where my parents were waiting at the sealing office, did the sealings (I love the new phrasing by the way), went back to the changing room and run into a lady that I grew up next to.  I kind of picture that this is what heaven will be like with family and friends.

My Evelyn has quite the imagination.  In one drawing she drew the temple, me her and my friend, an earth with an alien on it, and a marshmallow dying in a cocoa cup and the spirit flying away.

Sunday, Sylvia came to church with us. She is like most Ecuadorians.... super little.  She says I'm tall.  I'm average here.  Ada is taller than she is.

Sunday, Lia had her 15th birthday at our house.  Usually they would have done a quincenera, but between them having a baby 2 weeks ago, not having any money, and just having their reception for their temple sealing.... they settled for a backyard hangout.  I can't believe she's 15.  She's loving high school so much more than jr high.  I'm glad.  Jr High was hard on her.

Evelyn holding Thea

Sunday night, my brother Seth invited us to go stargazing with him and his really neat telescope.  My Mom and Dad brought glow sticks and the kids had a party.  We were able to see the texturing on the moon and 4 of the moons of Jupiter.  It was really cool.

My hard working and ever patient husband started re-venting our furnace, water heater and bathrooms.  Apparently that is one of the main causes of the leaks in our roof.  They were all vented improperly.  He worked on it all day for Saturday (except going to the temple and cleaning the church that morning), and Monday on Labor Dad while I took everyone else to Salt Lake City.   He's made good progress, but he's planning on working on it for the next three nights and probably this next Saturday too.  Then he's going to take down our solar panels and our roofing neighbor is going to replace our roof.  There are 3 layers of shingles up there.... so it's time to strip it all down, redo all the flashing and put on a fresh layer.  We can do most of that, but we've got so many things going on that I'm happy to pay someone else to do this one. Not so fun paying off the loan, but doable.

Pictures from posts past

Last visit to Thanksgiving Point before our pass expired

Ada painting out summer paint by numbers

Clean crazies

Bowling with the Laurels

Helping out at the hospital with Cristina and new baby Mia

Seth got a little toy glider for his birthday from his primary teacher.  He LOVES it.  He slept with it for several days even.  Too cute.

My dancer practicing the piano.  At 8 I would not have played as well as she does.

Seth and my paint by numbers for the summer

We got our van fixed... Look no extra lights.  That's a rarity.

Watching a movie after siblings go to school

His first day of school, he wanted a selfie with mom.

Tired hero kindergartener.

Link and his brother.

Okay, I'm not sure who did it, but I thought that whoever put the pencil in the goblins hand as a club was genius.  Seth has been leading a game/campaign with our kids and it's absolutely adorable.  They get super excited and animated.

Went out to lunch with my now 16 year old laurel, Zoe.

Evelyn insisted on a tea party.  I was making cookies for my stressed out Laurels to eat during homework and so I made extra for a tea party.

Jacob got his mission call to Atlanta, Georgia.

My parents and Sharon took Evelyn and Ada to tie quilts at the Humanitarian center.  I LOVE how much fun they had serving.  They loved that my grandpa did it 'backwards'.  He learned to tie quilts from his mom, and the lady at the center tried to make him do it another way.