More June fun

The first collage just has some random photos - Nathan at CA Adventure, Owen with his FSY counselor, Alex working, and Nathan and Weston doing some planks.  They were pretty good about working out during the summer - weightlifting and core exercises.  

The second collage is some photos from Alex's 3-week business trip.

Nathan went with the Youth Single Adult Ward one weekend to the Newport Beach Temple.

The boys had some fun youth activities / beach days this summer.  Nathan got to hang out with his fellow Senior grad church friends.  One of the Young Men summer activities was kayaking.  It was pretty funny seeing the picture of the guys holding the entire kayak out of the water with Weston in it!  

We did a fun Family Night lesson on David and Goliath.  We talked about the "Goliaths" we fight in our lives, wrote those things on a white board, and then tried to hit them with a nerf gun.  (Amazing that David could hit his target with a rock and slingshot.)  

The collage with the pets:  Kai is good at giving 5's.  Savannah and I baby-sat for 5 hours one evening (we weren't there to watch the dog, but we did get a picture with the easy-going dog).  We watched a 1-year old boy that evening.  He was pretty easy-going too, but he had a hard time going to bed.  Savannah and I ended up singing about 5 or 6 songs to him - the lullabies put him to sleep!  It had been a while since I held a baby or changed a diaper.  

The boys broke the sugar bowl and attempted to put it back together - nice try... but it's not going to hold sugar anymore.  

One of the really fun and memorable things for Nathan, Jared, and Owen this summer was the For the Strength of Youth (FSY) week.  They got to stay in the dorms on a college campus for 5 nights.  During the day, they had devotionals, dances, exercise and music time, testimony meetings, and lots of uplifting spiritual activities.  They loved it!  They came back on a "spiritual high".  They liked their camp counselors and met a lot of new people from various surrounding areas.

All the boys got to go on a camping / hiking / rafting trip for a few days in June (25th-27th).  It was pretty hot where they went, but they survived their hike and kept cool on the rafting trip.  They also did a devotional and testimony meeting one evening, and even Weston shared his thoughts.  It was a good experience for them.    

One of Savannah's bi-annual hip hop performances was the end of June.  She had 2 dress rehearsals the weekends before the performance.  We had to go shopping one day to buy her costume shirt for the performance.  We ended up going to some other stores and smelled just about every scent in the Bath & Body Works store.  It was a fun girls' outing.  The boys were gone the weekend of her performance, so Savannah and I also went out to Chili's after her performance.  We weren't allowed to video during the actual performance, but I got some video during a rehearsal.  They danced to a song from "Encanto", and Savannah definitely knew the dance better than any of the other kids in her group.  She moved up to Hip Hop level 2 after that performance.  

(I'll do another post on things I was working on during the summer.) 

Belated Birthday and Early Father's Day

After graduation and the end of school, Jared and Owen got Covid...very mild, but the party we postponed for Jared had to be cancelled once again.  I decided to make a cake for Jared though, since he hadn't gotten one yet.  We had cake and Alex opened some early Father's Day gifts, since he wouldn't be here for Father's Day. Alex left for a 3 week business trip the following day.  One of the gifts I gave Alex was a shirt that says, "Not all who wander are lost."  He loves hiking, so wandering is a good thing for him!    

 

Nathan's Endowment

Nathan had several things to do in preparation for his mission.  After the doctor and dentist visits, interviews, paperwork, and receiving the mission call, he also needed to get the Melchizedek Priesthood and receive his Temple Endowment.  He received the Priesthood and went to the temple in the same week.  These experiences will go in our next book of spiritual experiences, as I want to remember the Spirit we felt during this time.  Again, Nathan and his friend Shawn went through the temple at the same time.  It was special to be there with his parents and a few other ward friends.  However, we almost didn't make it this night.  The opposition was strong in trying to keep us from being there.  We had planned to leave early, giving plenty of time to arrive at the temple and eat some dinner.  As we were about to leave, Nathan couldn't find his temple recommend, which is required to enter the temple.  We searched everywhere for about 1.5 hours.  Nathan called the temple and asked if he could use the photocopy that he had sent in the week prior.  They said he needed the actual recommend.  We frantically searched everywhere, but no luck.  We called one more time, asking what could be done.  With that 2nd call, the temple said to "just come" and they would allow the photocopy.  We were already far behind schedule though and still had to deal with traffic.  However, the normally slow spot on the freeway was moving well, which was a miracle.  The other side was crawling along.  We arrived just 30 minutes before the start of the Endowment session.  He was supposed to arrive an hour before, but they let him go through and held the session a short time.  He already had all his temple clothing and things he needed, so that helped.  We were a little stressed before the session, but it was a great experience and Nathan was eager to go again.  

While at the temple, Jared did find Nathan's recommend.  He was pulling off his bedding to wash it, and he found the recommend along the side of the bunk bed.  No wonder we couldn't find it!      

 

Graduation Gift

I knew last year what I wanted to give Nathan as a graduation gift.  I spent a lot of time writing a book to give him.  It's a compilation of our family's spiritual experiences (mostly mine and Alex's, but also includes things such as my parents' conversion story, which is a part of our story).  It was a very time-consuming project, with first going back through journals and searching my memory for the memorable spiritual experiences, organizing them into topics, finding some relevant photos, and then condensing and compiling it all in book form.  I even put in a Table of Contents and Index, for easily searching experiences by topic.  I started the book, but after the first chapter or so, I realized that the format would be too large for a book that Nathan would want to cart around and reference.  So I started a more condensed version, which turned out pretty well.  I'm still planning to go back and finish the full larger version for us to keep.  Anyway, I had almost finished it by the time I went to TX for Mother's Day.  I had some previewing to do before submitting and ended up waiting until Nathan got his mission call.  I ended up submitting it for publication on May 18th and it arrived just in time for graduation.  I didn't even think to take a photo of the book before I wrapped it up and gave to him or after he'd opened it, and now he has it on his mission... so here are some screenshots of the PDF.  I'm not sure you can see these pages that well, but it's called "Spiritual Treasures of Annie and Alex (last name)".  It ended up being 239 pages.  It's divided into sections:  Eternal Identity, The Purpose of Life, How to Return to Heavenly Father, and How to Show our Love for God.  I love how it turned out!

Here's the text of the Intro page:    

Welcome to the "Book of Annie and Alex"... This book isn't a book about our relationship; it's a compilation of spiritual experiences from our lives.  I wanted to have a place where I could easily find and look back on these experiences.  Many of these experiences are documented in journals, but they're not easy to find.  The goal of this book is to provide an easy reference for the spiritual experiences and blessings of our family, which hopefully will be a treasure and valuable resource for future generations.  Obviously this book is not an all-inclusive reference to the many spiritual experiences of our lives, but a selection of those recorded or most memorable.  In addition to experiences, I have included some favorite scriptures, insights, or other things that have helped in our journey.  I have chosen to organize the book into topics rather than by chronological order for ease in learning about and seeing things from the perspective of our experiences with different principles of the gospel.  In addition, this is a condensed version of experiences more fully documented in another book.  

In the Book of Mormon, Nephi talks about not writing the full history and account of his people, but that he desired to "...write of the things of God" (1 Nephi 6:3) and what would be of "...worth unto the children of men" (1 Nephi 6:6).  That's my desire as well with this book, to write about our experiences with God, which has been of great worth to our family.  Our other history and experiences are documented in other books, but this one is for documenting our spiritual treasures.    

The process of compiling the book was very valuable as well, looking back on so many experiences and times when we recognized the hand of the Lord in our lives.  We've been truly blessed! 

 

Graduation and such

Nathan and Jared consistently went to early morning seminary at 6:30am on Monday-Friday this year.  They had a family breakfast and awards on the last day of seminary.  We're really grateful for their teachers who so diligently taught them.  They both had great teachers.  We later went to Nathan's seminary graduation, where he was recognized for his 4 years participation and completion of seminary. Nathan was asked to speak at seminary graduation as well, so it was fun to hear his (and others) thoughts on their seminary experience.  

On to high school graduation... We had 6 graduates in our church ward, so the parents got together and planned a huge graduation party for them.  It turned out well - about 125-130 people came!  We fed them tri-tip, hot dogs, grilled veggies, garlic bread, salad, jello, chicken salad sandwiches, and the grads' favorite desserts.  We each brought desserts and drinks, and a few of the parents prepared the food.  I did most of the decorations.  We each decorated a table with some photos and things of our graduate.  It was pretty expensive for us (I think we personally spent $250 on it), but when we divided up the shared expenses, it came down to about $8/person.  So that's not too bad, considering we did a full dinner and desserts. I ended up making a grad hat card box for people to put cards and messages in.  It turned out pretty cute.  One of the grads had friends that played the bagpipes, so we even had the bagpipes make an appearance at the party.  It was fun, but I'm not sure we'll do the huge party again... I was originally thinking that just the families of the grads were going to get together for a BBQ, but that's not what some of them had in mind.  It was nice to chat with so many people that have been an influence on Nathan though.  We're grateful for so many good people in our lives.

My parents didn't make the graduation party, but they made it for graduation.  They ended up getting here just a few hours before graduation.  They were supposed to get in the night before, but their 2nd flight got cancelled.  Options weren't great for getting in by graduation, so my parents ended up flying early the next morning to another airport and renting a car to drive about 3 hours (through heavy traffic).  Crazy!  But they made it for graduation.  Graduation was right during dinnertime, at 5:00pm, so that made dinner a little tricky.  I ended up cooking dinner in the crockpot so that it was ready right after graduation.  We had our own little grad party, with roast & potatoes for dinner and cupcakes for dessert.  Jared almost started a fire in the microwave (apparently the star "paper" plates were a little bit metallic...good to know not to try those in the microwave again).  Nathan opened a few cards and presents, one of which I'll talk about in the next post.   

Nathan went on his grad trip the next day to California Adventure (which was all day and returning in the early morning hours the following day).  The rest of us went on an outing and enjoyed ice cream downtown.  We later went to dinner at Chili's and watched the new Top Gun movie in the theater.  

On Sunday June 5th, my parents went to church with us, followed by Nathan's ordination to the Melchizedek Priesthood (in preparation for going on a mission).  My dad got to participate in that, as well as other friends.  Nathan's friend Shawn was also ordained that same time - they again did one of the big milestones together.  Seminary graduation was Sunday evening.  

Monday was a beach day, with a picnic lunch.  We had dinner at our favorite Mexican restaurant and did s'mores in the firepit.  We had cinnamon rolls on Tuesday morning, and the kids played games for a little bit before my parents had to head out.  We loved spending time with them!  It was sad to know they were saying "bye" to Nathan for 2 years, but we're glad they made it out (and they even ending up getting Covid while they were here, so a little health sacrifice to be here). 

(This isn't the full junior / senior seminary class.)

My date

Alex and I are back to our monthly temple visits.  In May we went to the temple and planned on dinner and a movie on the way back home.  After the temple, we got to the mall and changed out of our dress clothes in the car.  The only problem was that Alex had somehow grabbed Weston's tennis shoes instead of his own... he didn't want to put his dress clothes back on, so he had to wear his dress shoes!  He was really stylin' with his Browning shirt, cargo shorts, and dress shoes.  He didn't care though.  I was a little embarrassed to be walking with him... but it wasn't a deal breaker on our date.  Guess that's what happens after you've been married for over 20 years. 

Sunbeams

 I did 6 or 7 primary lessons during February-May.  We had combined the Sunbeams and CTR 4 classes by then, so there were 3 other teachers besides me.  However, it was usually me and one other teacher there each week.  I wasn't having to teach every Sunday though.  By April and May, we were back down to 2 teachers for the combined class, rotating teaching every other week.  So out of the 14 possible Sundays to teach (we didn't teach on Stake Conference, General Conference, and Mother's Day), I did end up teaching about half the lessons.  I did a lesson on kindness and choices, but I must not have documented it anywhere.  I think I used some visuals and materials from a previous lesson for that one.  Anyway, here's the 6 lessons that I have documented.   

In February, I taught about Abraham and Sarah.  We talked about the scripture in Abraham 1:18 that says, "Behold, I will lead thee by my hand, and I will take thee, to put upon thee my name, even the Priesthood of thy Father, and my power shall be over thee."  We talked about how the Lord helped and protected Abraham, led him to safety, and made promises to him.  The promises made were a large family, a land of promise, the Priesthood, Gospel blessings, and that they would bless and serve others.  We talked about the promised we make at baptism and when we take the sacrament.  We talked about how we could serve others.

I spent a lot of time making visuals for the lesson on Joseph of Egypt.  We went through the story of Joseph and the coat of many colors, being thrown in a pit by his brothers, sold into slavery in Egypt, and eventually becoming a leader.  We talked about forgiveness with that story.  

I used the 11 brothers, sister, and other people from that story later as visuals for the children of Israel with Moses, so I got some use out of the little people I'd made.

We had several things to talk about with Moses - the plagues of Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea, finding manna in the wilderness, and the 10 commandments in another lesson.  I found these mini vanilla wafers that worked well as manna, which was a wafer-like food that tasted like honey.  The kids enjoyed "gathering manna" to eat, although it was more chaotic than I imagined.  They didn't take turns gathering the manna one by one.  It was more like handfuls, with a couple kids not getting any!  We had to re-distribute so that everyone got some "manna" (also a lesson on sharing I guess).  They also had fun saying, "Let my people go!", as we talked about each of the 10 plagues.  For the lesson on the 10 commandments, we did that as a matching game.  With each match made, we briefly discussed that commandment.  I found cute visuals on-line that had a simple way of explaining the commandments to kids.  I made a custom coloring page for that one as well.    

 

We did a lesson on keeping the Sabbath Day holy.  We talked about loving God and ways that we could keep the Sabbath Day holy, using 3 questions to help think about that:  Is it restful/relaxing?  Does it help us think of Jesus?  Does it help us do good / love / serve?  In a bag were various pictures of different activities.  The kids decided if it was good for Sunday or good to do on other days and placed it on the board. 

The end of May, I got called to be the 2nd counselor in the Young Women's, so my last lesson as a Sunbeam teacher was on May 29th.  We talked about Joshua and the tower of Jericho.  One of my favorite scriptures comes from Joshua 24:15: "Choose you this day whom ye will serve...but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord."  The Lord spoke to Joshua and said to be of good courage, meditate on the scriptures, and keep the commandments.  Joshua 1:9 says, "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee withersoever thou goest."  I like the faith and courage of Joshua.  

We then talked about the taking of the city of Jericho and the miracle of the walls coming down.  They had to obey specific instructions though - on the 7th day, walking around the city 7 times and then blowing their horns 7 times, shouting for the walls to come down.  I had constructed a simple block wall and given the kids cardboard "horns" (party hats) to blow into.  They had fun watching the walls come down after they blew on their horns 7 times.  We talked about how the Lord helps us too, and we need to obey with exactness.  (It was a little difficult keeping one little girl from messing with the block tower though.  I had to re-build it a couple of times and try to get her not to touch it...)

Being a Sunbeam teacher was a good creative outlet for me.  I had been in that calling since about April or May of 2019, so I'd been doing it for about 3 years.  We missed one whole year due to Covid though, so I was only preparing lessons for about 2 years.  I enjoyed teaching the kids.  They always said and did funny things.  I should have kept track of all the things they did and written a book on it!  Lots of fun.