Marriage Conference

Rick headed up a marriage conference at the Dixie State College cabin in Pine Valley.  We had about ten couples and had a great time!   We had a presenter who was a marriage counselor and who was also fluent in American Sign Language who had been scheduled to come down from Salt Lake to be our presenter for the weekend.  However, a friend of hers passed away and so she cancelled just days before the conference.  Rick was stressed wondering what to do. 

Luckily Brother and Sister Coombs were able to come at the last minute and they were wonderful!  I wish I had thought to get a picture of them while they were presenting.  They are currently service missionaries for  LDS Family Services.  He was a Seminary/Institute teacher and also a marriage counselor.  He and his sweet wife have 8 children and have served three missions.  They were extremely qualified to teach us!  They only drawback is that they don't know sign language and so Rick and I had to interpret everything.  It was still fun though! 

Friday night Brother Christensen prepared dutch oven chicken and cobbler.  After the presentation everyone wrote goals and then we played some fun games.  The cabin is really big and we each had our room room with a queen bed.  We are spoiled by our wonderful king bed at home though and Rick and I did not sleep well at all!  Rick was snoring and was not happy every time I nudged him.  He offered to go out and sleep on the couch but I didn't take him up on the offer.  I thought, "Won't that look good.  Here we are at a marriage conference and I am making my husband to sleep on the couch!" 

Saturday we had a wonderful breakfast of bacon and eggs and pancakes and then were taught again by Brother and Sister Coombs and then separated as couples to write out "I love you because..." and "I felt the most loved when..."   After everything was cleaned up we headed to a local park for lunch and then took a tour of the pine valley chapel. 

Kids...

Apparently Jenna fell asleep while playing the Wii....

Jaiden playing "Three Musketeers?"  

 I'm so glad that Josh is getting into puzzles again -- except for the constant mess of puzzles pieces everywhere.  This 1000 piece puzzle looks really impressive but when he pulled it out of the box much of the pieces were already hooked together.  He still asked me to take a picture of him with it though.

Janika Homecoming

Janika had a blast at Tuacahn's Homecoming today.  But I was sad that I didn't even get to see her off or take any pictures of anything though.   The kids were gone all day on their "day date."  Since many of the girls all live far away from each other, the girls decided to bring their dresses and other "getting ready" supplies at a central house to get ready and had all of the boys pick them up there.  I told Janika that I like to meet her date and also take pictures because it seems like the "group pictures" never make it into my hands until weeks after the dance is over -- and that is with me constantly bugging Janika to acquire them.  I like to take my own pictures and have them immediately!!!  I had to swipe these pictures off of Facebook.  Facebook pictures never work well for my blog books though because Facebook automatically re-sizes the pictures and so even though they look fine on the computer screen, they will come up blurry if you try to print out a decent sized one.  So now I am bugging Janika to get me the pictures!!  But she had a blast though and her date, Armando, is a fun guy with a lot of personality and she was excited to go with him.  I was impressed that he put together such an organized agenda for the day!  

Dike After The Flood

 This morning I walked up to the Dike to check it out and take some pictures...

The Salmon colored building with the green stripe is Snow Canyon Middle School where Jase attends.  The white domes are the Sand Hollow Swimming Pools.  The building showing above the bush in the picture below is the library.

 The street below is Canyon View Drive. 

   

 This is a track on top of the dike that the kids and I have often walked on.  I didn't realize that it was a dike and never saw much water below it that was anything more than a little stream.

Our garage (above).  Our street (below)...

  

9-11 Flooding in Santa Clara

We had our own 9-11 catastrophe today.  A dike near our home broke, sending a raging river right through our neighborhood.   We were evacuated from our homes, but I was off on an interpreting appointment and missed all of the excitement!  I had dropped Jenna off at my friend, Allison’s house, a few houses away at 12:30 and told her that there must be a car accident right by my house because on that exit from my house to Santa Clara Drive there were tons of police cars and police directing traffic.  If I had known what was going on, I wouldn’t have gone to my appointment.  There was no car accident – they were directing traffic because of the dike.  When I got out from my interpreting job two hours later there were 8 missed calls on my phone and so I knew something was wrong. 

Right then Rick called and said he had received an emergency call at work and was on his way home.   Allison had tried to call me a few times while I was gone and so I called her back and she said that while I was gone were there fire trucks going through the neighborhood with sirens on and they were banging on the doors telling everyone to evacuate immediately.  Allison said she ran down to my house to check on it and there was a huge river running right next to our backyard!  She said that tons of homes had been flooded but that ours looked okay.  Then Jared called me from school on my cell phone and said that the busses were not going to be able to take them home and could I come pick him up.  So I went to pick him up and then picked Janika up from Tuacahn.  I also got a call from the elementary school asking me to come pick up my kids early.   Jase had walked home (through water).  It took a while to get home with all of the detours and we had to park up the street and walk to our house.  By the time I got home the river was gone.  So I missed the whole thing!

It was truly a miracle that our house was completely spared – not one drop of water got inside.  Meanwhile, the Phillips (our neighbors just East of the empty lot adjacent to our backyard) received terrible damage in their house as well as their three rental houses on our street.  The water crashed right through the windows of their daughter’s house (across the street from their house).   The damage continued up the street for about 8 or 9 houses (each of them receiving several feet of water in their houses) and all of the houses below them on the street to the South (Vineyard Drive).  All of the houses are in our ward except for about three.   I walked through the neighborhood tonight and couldn’t believe the destruction to houses and property. There was mud everywhere, yards completely gone, several feet of water in basements, stuff all over.   It was SO sad!  But it was also really awe inspiring to see so many people answer the call for help.  There were hundreds of people walking the streets and working to remove water and belongings from the houses. 

Jaiden had come with me on the walk and I was nervous because it was so unsafe with service cars everywhere and so many people and people  getting around on four wheelers and SO much mud.  Rick, Janika, Jase, and Jared had immediately gone to help neighbors shovel water and mud and they all worked about six hours straight (Jared ended a little sooner because he was having allergies so bad).  All of them came home covered with mud.   We received so many calls and texts from friends asking us if we were okay and if our house was okay. 

This is what Rick posted on Facebook:

Thank you for all of your concern about the recent flooding damage in Santa Clara. It hit right next to our house, and miraculously went around it. I still can't believe it. I was first to arrive home and see the river bursting through our neighbors field. She told me she had 2 feet in her basement and I wasn't sure what to expect when I walked into my home. To my amazement, we were completely protected, however our neighbors were not!

I want to share with all of my close friends that Miracles do happen! Either they happen for our protection or they happen when disaster hits. The miracles I witnessed tonight while I was shoveling mud out of neighbor’s homes were enough to tell me that we are all being watched over by a loving Heavenly Father - whether your house was hit or not. Thank heavens for the Sons and Daughters of God, who were, in my mind, a manifestation of miracles tonight! You, my dear friends of Washington County, are absolutely AMAZING!

 

 

 

 Next:  My girls playing in the mud in our driveway between my garage and my neighbor's garage.

 

 (Below) Our piano teacher (Lisa Dunkley's) house -- there is water inside too. My kids were asking, do we have piano lessons today? Ummm...that would be a no.

Back to School

Well, school started on August 15th.  This is how everyone is doing so far..

Janika started Tuacahn as a Junior and is loving it. She auditioned for Hyperion (the advanced musical theatre class) and was excited to get into that.  She has already gone to several "friend outings" with kids from school.  Recently she was asked to go to Homecoming and is excited for that.  She is also WAY excited to start Carolers again!  Janika was asked by the Stake Presidency to speak in our Stake Conference this past weekend (which was held at the Stake center and broadcast to two other buildings).   She wasn’t exactly thrilled with that opportunity (I think she would have much rather sang a solo) but she did a great job and we are proud of her!

Jase is now in 9th grade and started Seminary.  He told me that he wishes he only took Math and Science Honors and not Language Arts and Geography Honors because he has WAY too much homework and way too many papers to write (and he hates writing).  I have yet to see him actually doing any of the vast amounts of homework, however, and he still seems to have plenty of time to play the Wii.   He is a lunch worker in order to get free school lunches but has complained everyday that the school lunches have changed and that the food portions are way too small (for a growing boy like himself) and that they now force you to eat fruit and changed the fries to "veggie fries" and on and on.  I told him that instead of whining to me perhaps he could put his writing skills to use by writing a letter to whoever might have some influence in the situation. 

Jared is in 7th grade.  He is excited that his good friends A.J. and Boots are now going to his school.  He came down with a bad cold a few days into school and has already missed a day and a half of school.  I went to back to school night and was impressed with his teachers.

Janelle started 4th grade with Katie Jones.  School comes easy for her and things seem to be going well! 

Jaiden started 3rd grade with Wendy Cox.  She made a new friend named Carolina and a new friend named Sydney.  Sydney told her she will make her clip on earrings that look real.  Both girls got glowing reports from their teachers from their SEP's.

Josh started 1st grade and is in the Chinese Dual Immersion Program.  This is a new program at our elementary school and we are really excited about it.  His teacher, Mrs. Chen, is from China and is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and also English.  She isn't allowed to speak any English in the classroom though so the kids met the day before school started with their other first grade teacher, Mrs. Thorton, so that she could explain how everything would work.  Josh starts out the day with Mrs. Chen.  The first day of school was pretty rough.  Josh had been sick with a cold for several days and still wasn't feeling well.

I think he was also nervous about starting off the day in a completely different language (which is understandable).  Before school he cried and refused to eat breakfast.  But he was fine by the time I brought him to his class and came home happy and even taught us a couple of words in Chinese.  The second day was a little rough too because he tripped on the way to class skinning both knees and was crying again.  But by day three everything was going well.  Josh now notices everything that says, "Made in China!"   There was an article and youtube video about it in our local newspaper (Josh is in it).  

The other kids are all doing well in school too.  I attended Jared and Jase’s back to school nights.  They were long because they have a general meeting and then have you follow your kids’ schedule going to every single class.  I like it though because I can see what kids are in their classes by their parents who are there (at least the ones I know).   I was impressed by their teachers overall. 

I have been busy too!   I am interpreting two college classes every week and also teaching my ASL class at Dixie State.  I love getting out and interpreting.  The college classes are fun because I am always learning something new.  But it does make it much more difficult to keep up with the house, laundry, meals, and so forth.  And I haven’t had any time to exercise and blog!  I am hoping to find a time to squeeze that in.

I've also been very busy helping Jase with his Eagle Scout Project heavily the past few weeks.  We will both be glad to get it finished!  I decided to pull Jase out of piano lessons – they are expensive and he has been begging to quit for a long time.  I finally agreed on the condition that he still practice 30 minutes a day learning the hymns, and if he would still walk the piano teacher’s dog (to help offset the other kids’ lessons).  He whole heartedly agreed! 

The next week he was called to be one of the pianists for our branch (he came home and said sarcastically, “thanks a lot, dad!”)    He will actually have more time to focus on the hymns now that he doesn't have to do all of the rest of his songs.  So now he will play the closing song in Sacrament meeting every week (he has done it three weeks so far).  This gives him a chance to work towards something specific as he works on the song for that week and reviews the others.  So know Janika and Jase both have “adult” callings in our branch.

This past weekend we had a family from our deaf branch stay overnight.  They live in Cedar City and had been asked to speak in Stake Conference Saturday night.   They didn’t want to drive an hour each way to come back to the Sunday session and so we offered our house.  They have four kids the same ages (and even two with the same names) as our younger kids and they have become good friends.  It is nice to have another strong family in the branch.  

We have been reading scriptures each morning as a family.  We did in the summer too but now it is an hour earlier.  Rick gets up early and fixes breakfast for everyone (I know, we are spoiled!)  Only the kids don’t seem to be hungry that early and so most of them don’t eat much.  We all meet at 6:40 a.m. around the table to eat and read (except for Josh and Jenna – we let them sleep).  Right now we are studying “The Strength of Youth.”  I really love having that time in the morning where we can “connect” and discuss the gospel.  

Everyone is doing very well and I feel extremely blessed!