Family letter September 30 2007

It is the end of September already and I don’t know where the time is going. I think we are doing a lot and accomplishing things, but I don’t know where the time goes. I measure how fast the week goes by my Sundays and Thursdays. Sundays because it is a completely different day and I get my batteries charged and Thursdays because it is Temple day. Those are my stakes in the ground to measure things. Unfortunately they are coming too close together. I don’t quite understand it but there are fewer days in between. So here we are babbling, making no sense of something I have no control over and will never figure it out. That was a great beginning to our letter for this week.

I have been working on some ordinance research on our family genealogy. I mentioned some time ago that I downloaded my genealogy that was on church records and it included over 5500 names. I have been pecking away at the list to determine if ordinances that are not showing were actually done. I got through the first 500 about 2 years ago and then got lazy. I started again a couple of months ago and have completed another 200 (I work on it about 30 per day 3-4 days a week). Anyway I ran a temple ready list for these 200 names and I have about 20 ordinances that need to be done. The next step is to take the list to the library and them checked against the temple files which will find a few more but when I am through there will be some ordinances to be done. I hope to get that done this week. When I do I will send some to each of my brothers and sister for them to do alone with myself. Tomorrow I start on #715 on the list of 5500. My brothers have indicated a desire to help but I have not gotten to them the lists to work on. My fault and I will get that done. Anyway we are trying to make a stab at searching to make sure all the ordinances are done. The sad part of it is that because of the diligence of the members and the church not being able to coordinate the efforts of people all over the world, many of the ordinances have been done several times.

We had Family Home Evening last night and everyone in town was here. We missed Sheena, Eric’s wife because she is in North Carolina with her mother searching gravestones for her genealogy. She will return on Tuesday and then Eric will be functioning again. He has been coming to dinner each night so he at least gets one good meal each day.

Anyway we had FHE. We met at Scott and Carries house for dinner and a lesson. We had soft tacos and they were great. Afterward Mandie had made some cinnamon apple tortillas which were really good. Scott and Carrie led a discussion on how to get the most out of General Conference. It was a really good discussion on tips to maximize the learning and enjoy conference. With conference being next week it was a timely subject and interesting to discuss. After dinner the girls all went to our house and watched the Women’s conference. Us MEN stayed and watched the little ones. We had a great time. There is a nice park with all kinds of equipment within 2 blocks of Scott’s house so we packed the kids in the car and went to the park. They ran, slide, swung, climbed and chased until they were tired and we had to go. When we got home Scot had a game we could all enjoy and we played the game. By then it was time for all to go home. We had a great time. We look forward to next month when Jill and Randy are here and they will join us.

Jill and Randy start their trek south on Wednesday or Thursday. Randy starts work with the new firm in Dallas on Monday the 8th and we are excited to have them here. They have not had lots of activity on their home so include them in your prayers to have the Lord bless them to sell their home. They are doing really well, but we want the home sold. They will be staying with us until the house sells, so we have rearranged some of the bedrooms so the kids can have their rooms and mom and dad can have their room. They will be leaving most of their furniture in the home for showing until the house sells. Then they will have the movers move the furniture one time to the new home here. Mom has been looking into Mother’s day out programs for Jill and Randy’s kids so they can have activities to go to. I think she has located 2-3 in the area so it will not be far.

Jeff was in Denver all this week with his work. They are trying to complete a series of games in order to have the games on the store shelves for the Christmas season. Their original completion and ship time was this week but it has been delayed one week. If that goes well they will have the games in the stores and it should be a wonderful opportunity for them. Jeff’s responsibility has been significant in the development of these games and he is excited to have them out. We are excited for him. Heather, Kristine and Jeff’s daughter is in her first year of middle school and that is a real adjustment for her. Kids at that age have so much changing in their bodies and the emotions and pressures are really interesting. So she has had really good days and there have been some other days. This will be an interesting experience for her and her parents to experience 12-18 year old girls.

Brian has been traveling some also, and when he has been home he has worked late some days. Mandie is not sure which is better or worse. They are doing well and their little Carter and Abby are growing. Still working with Abby’s speech but they are doing well with her.

Mark is well into his studies now and making good progress. It is hard on him working full time and going to nursing school. It extends them both to the limit, but they are working well together. He has lots of on the hospital floor time learning and then he has classes. He really enjoys it. Their little Tava is rolling all over the place but in only one direction. She is sitting up some and when she smiles at you it is really cute. Michelle is being a really good mother.

All our mothers are doing a wonderful job.

We had a great letter from Kevin this week. He thinks his current companion will be transferred this week but who knows. He enjoys this companion and they are working really hard with the members of the ward he is in. There are 4 elders and 2 sisters in his ward so they are working together and seem to be making some progress. His letter this week was particularly good and I am so happy for him. They are teaching a few people but most of the time is with the members for reactivation and encouraging them to be member missionaries.

Scott and I played in a Chamber of Commerce golf tournament this past Friday and it was really fun. We invited two clients to come with us and we had a great time. We did not win anything but it was the event that was good not the winning. We are trying to be more involved in the Chamber because we think it is a good place to grow our business.

Our canopy is going up in the back yard. We have had some complications with electrical pipes and now some of the measurements don’t seem to be correct. I hope this week we can get is resolved and have it completed. We will see. It is a project evolving. The end result will be really nice and we are excited but construction work and construction contracting is a difficult. We are working with a really nice contractor and he is doing his part but it is just complicated.

Marianne and Kimball are doing really well. They had a distressful situation with Aubrey and Chance. They have a baby-sitter who lives a few doors down who is also in their ward at church. The sitter had left something at Marianne and Kimball’s house. One Sunday morning Aubrey decided she needed to return it, so she and Chance left the house and went to return the item. However, they did not tell mom and dad they were going, etc. That morning Marianne and Kimball had slept in a little and when they got up the front door was open and Aubrey and Chance were gone. Panic!!!!!!! They look all over and during the process went to the sitter’s house to see if they knew anything. There were Aubrey and Chance. “We were just returning the item mommy.” Anyway they had a worrisome time and an opportunity to teach the kids.

They are doing well; canning and storing up everything they can and doing fun family activities. We are looking forward to seeing them for Christmas.

Other than that our family is doing well and all are healthy. The gospel is true and Heavenly Father truly loves us and knows who we are. We love you all and look forward to hearing from you.