Findarle Reception August 19th Labor Day Weekend

It was a busy weekend with all of the Birthday festivities and Eric's visit. Along with those festivities my friend Terri Findarle came to Oakdale and we had fun putting together a wedding reception for her son Michael Findarle and new bride Audrey. It was fun hanging out with Terri for a long weekend. We got to shop for wedding decor and catch up on each others lives. We resurrected Mindi's centerpieces from her wedding and they ended up being perfect with Audrey's colors. I had a blast working with friends I've known for years. We got to work together and create a beautiful reception. What good friends we have! The rest of the month has been rather quiet. I've been working on a website for Mark's office and we had the missionaries for dinner. Of course I have Seminary everyday and lessons to prepare. We actually had no plans for the Labor Day weekend but we worked hard in the yard and felt good about the work we got done. It was very hot so the kids came to swim and we BBQed on Labor Day. I actually got to go swimming with the grandchildren and I really enjoyed that. Today we will be walking to let people know about Proposition 8. We also walked on Saturday the 23rd and it was an interesting but suprisingly enjoyable task talking with neighbors in our community.

August 18th Jen and Eric Celebrate With the Family

On August 18th every year Jenn and Eric share their birthday. The weekend before the 18th we were all excited because Uncle Eric was coming to town. That always means we are going to have fun and the music will roll. We love it when Eric brings out the guitar and we listen to him sing. We laugh and sing and have a great time. It was a short visit but we packed in as much fun and family time as we could!

Aug 16th Ward Temple Day

August 16th was our Ward Temple Day. We met at the church building to car pool up to the Oakland Temple. My friend Val Reynolds and I toured the Visitors Center and visited the most beautiful exhibit of sculptures of the Savior I had ever seen. They were done by a woman who had had no formal training in sculpting. There was a life size sculpture of Christ and the artist finished it in five months. The detail was unbelievable. Each piece told a story and I was so awe struck that I was overcome by emotion and the reality of my Savior, Friend and Redeemer. It was truly a sight to behold! We had a nice bag lunch with our ward family and got home in time to welcome Eric home for a birthday weekend.

Birthday Lunch with Grammy!

Tyce and Corbin had a birthay on the 29th of July. I take the grandchildren out to lunch for their birthdays and they get to choose the place. So far the hot spot is Del Taco because it has a play area that is fun for the kids. The tube slide was the hit of the day as you can see by the pictures. We can't always go right on their birthdays so I usually try to see when their moms can use a break and take them as close to their birthdays as I can. The boys had fun but the interesting memory for me was when we walked into Del Taco, Tyce immediately put a nickel in the gumball machine. That wouldn't have been a problem but the gumball machine only takes quarters and so when I explained to Tyce that he needed to ask before doing things like that he was not very happy with me. He pouted for a few minutes and wouldn't acknowledge me. It took a while but he finally warm up again. The boys had a great time playing in the play area. It was a fun time for Grammy to get to know the twins a little better.

AUGUST 11TH FIRST DAY OF SEMINARY

WOW! Where did the summer go. It seems like we just had our year end Seminary Breakfast and here we are starting another year of Seminary. This is my 4th year and I love teaching the youth so much. My class last year was what I call a "Zion" class. One of our scripture mastery scriptures was Moses 7:18 which say "And the Lord call his people Zion and they were of one heart and one mind and they dwelt in righteousness and there were no poor among them." It was a choice experience for me to meet with these amazing young people. They got along, they were never disrespectful. They did what they were asked to do. I also believe they learned to love one another and become better friends. I know I came to love them very much.

Because I had such a good class last year I was a little afraid that this year might be hard. I couldn't possibly have a class I love as much. The night before Seminary started I had a really hard time going to sleep. Remember how you felt on Christmas Eve and you were just so excited and nervous about Christmas morning that you couldn't sleep. Well that was me. I finally fell asleep about 12:30 a.m and then woke up again at 3:30 a.m. There was no need to try and go back to sleep because I could just feel that it wasn't going to happen.

Well I got to Seminary and we had our morning prayer as teachers. My stomach was doing flip flops. Then they started arriving. It was so exciting. What a great bunch of kids. They arrived on time and all but one student came. I'm so excited! It is going to be a great year!

AUGUST 2nd A BEAUTIFUL WEDDING

A great day for the Miguel Family.
It was so fun to see everyone. The wedding was so beautiful. Every detail was addressed. We had a delicious sit down dinner and it was so fun visiting with everyone.


We tried to find Uncle Jim but couldn't find him to get in the picture with his other siblings. We finally found him with Tony and snapped this picture. They all look wonderful and never seem to get any older. My camera battery died as I tried to get a picture of my cousin Ann and JB Holloway and Jeff and Diana Bentz. It was so fun to visit with them and catch up on what they are doing.
It was a beautiful day at Jenn and Chris' wedding. It was held at the St Paul's Catholic Church on Church and California Street.

Silly me, I left my camera in my car during the wedding. It took us 2 hours and 45 mins to find the church. We got lost because Army Street in San Francisco has been changed to Caesar Chavez. How were we to know? I guess we had an old map and we had left our map quest print outs at home. Mark informed me Saturday morning that we needed to leave at 10:30 a.m. to get there in time. I was feeling a little annoyed because that was a hour before I thought we had to leave. It meant I was going to have to move faster than I wanted to. We got on the road and got lost because of the name change. Instead of getting stressed I told Mark we should just consider the trip and adventure and if we didn't make the wedding we could at least make the reception. We finally reached the church and then had to park three blocks up hill on the steepest driving hill I've ever been on. It was so steep that we had to park our car horizontally and when Mark went to get out of the car he said he felt like he was going to roll down the hill. We made it to the church but then were surprised to see our relatives standing waiting to go in to the cathedral. I thought it was rather strange that a wedding would start 45 minutes late. After a while I realized that the wedding started at 2:00 p.m not 1:00 p.m. and I we were 15 minutes early not 45 minutes late

Oh! Happy Day. We got to see the wedding.

JULY 29TH ITS HARD TO SAY GOODBYE SOMETIMES.

It's Tuesday already! Where did the time go. It seems like we wait so long for them to come and then before you know it it's time for them to go back home. With the guys either at work or back home the girls got together one last time at the park for a little more time together before the trip to the airport.

All of the grandchildren in one place. Have you ever tried to get ten children together to take a picture when they are playing at the park? Well it isn't easy. I told them all I wanted to show them a magic tree. Believe it or not it worked. Brayden was the only one that was a little skeptical. He gave me that look like, "You can't fool me Grammy." I really didn't lie. It was a special tree because of all the little trees growing around it. London was the only one that wasn't to keen on cooperating. I had to whisper in her ear and then you can see by the picture she wasn't completely convinced she wanted to be a part of it all.
One last hug before Aunt Kristin takes off for the airport. What a wonderful week it's been. The next time we see her hopefully she will be holding her own baby boy in her arms.

JULY 24th EXTENDED FAMILY GATHERING

Mindi & Brooke Jenn & Jason

COBY HANGING WITH THE KIDS

On July 24th we had a little family BBQ, Jesse and Carissa were suppose to come but Carissa had the blessing of being with one of her friends when she had her baby. My brother Jim, my nephews Adam and Zachary joined us. Mindi, Amerik and their two little girls Brooke and Kennedy came. Coby and Kristin came from Utah which was very wonderful. Johnny and Tara are busy getting ready to have their new baby and couldn't be there. I didn't hear back from John and Kelly but they were missed. We had a great time. The kids swam and the adults visited and enjoyed being together. I thought sure I had a picture of Zach but I guess in all my running around I didn't get one. What a sweet young man he is!

It was a great day and we enjoyed catching up on everyone.

JULY 28th More Birthdays to Celebrate

Uncle Coby headed home on Sunday but Kristin was able to stay for the birthday festivities. I was a lot like Christmas around here. Tyce and Corbin got Power Ranger costumes, Chloe got all kinds of art supplies and more. Brooke got a Barbie Computer which she called her "Puter" Aunt Kristin isn't always able to be here for birthdays so all the nieces and nephews got gifts from her.
Brooke opening her computer

Tyce and Corbin in costume
Let's play catch
Chloe opening her art supplies
GOOD MEMORIES

JULY 26 KRISTIN"S BABY SHOWER AND GOLF

We got the opportunity to get together to have a baby shower for Kristin. It was fun to see friends and family. Jenn and Deana did a great job with all the festivities. The prepared a lunch for us and we had fun listening to Kristin try to guess Coby's answers to questions they had asked him. Kristin got to see friends she hadn't see in a while and received some wonderful gifts for her new baby.



The men in the family all went up to Sonora to play golf. I wished I'd sent them with a camera but I'm afraid I didn't think about it. They came home with some funny stories. My favorite was that Jason missed the ball after swinging to hit it with all of his might. Then he swung again and missed only this time Mark just couldn't hold it in. He completely ignored any golf etiquette and laughed out loud till he was almost rolling on the ground. It must have been a sight to behold. Coby was the winner and they all came back tired.

OUR TRIP HOME

Our trip home from Idaho was a long one. We hit a horrible storm going across Nevada. It literally felt like someone was standing on the roof of the car pouring water from a bucket. Then there was lightning and thunder. When is started to get dark the visibility went way down and it was dangerous to be on the road any more. To make matters worse they had repaved much of the highway but hadn't repainted the lines so it was even harder to tell where you were going. We stopped in Battle Mountain and the first hotel we stopped at was full. Fortunately we did find a comfortable room we just had to drive into town a ways. We got a good night sleep and then got on the road hoping to be home about 3:00 P.M. I'm not sure what was happening as we went through Reno but we were in bumper to bumper traffic for two hours. I finally reminded Mark that we didn't have to be home at any particular time and I suggested that maybe we should pull off the highway and go to a movie or something until the traffic clear. All you have to do is mention "movie" to Mark and he is all for it. So we stopped in Reno and went to see Wall-E. We must have been tired because we slept through most of the movie. After the movie was over we got back on the road and got home around 8:30 P.M. glad to sleep in our own bed.

JULY 21 ORIENTATION BYU IDAHO

On Monday we headed to the John Taylor building to meet Sarah for parent and student orientation. When we arrived we were greeted by our good friend Alan Williams from Oakdale. We got big hugs and exchanged greetings with each other. Alan just recently returned home from service a full time mission for two years in Florida. He was only home a few days be for heading out to BYU Idaho so it was great to see him. Sarah finally arrived and it was time for the orientation to begin.

The orientation was a spiritually uplifting experience for me. Sarah had prayed hard about where she should continue her education. Some may think she went there because many LDS kids go to LDS schools but it originally was not her first choice. We asked her to pray about it and when she did she was sure she was suppose to go to BYU Idaho. As the Assistant to the President of the college spoke he told the students that is was no coincidence that they were there. He also told them that attending BYU Idaho was privilege not a right. We heard a talk by President Eyring who said that the students of BYU Idaho would influence the world for good. He then said, "The day will come that that capacity to influence people around you for good will have you singled out as one of the great leaders in whatever place you're in. They will not quite know why, but you will know that the reason you are being singled out is not because of your innate gifts as a leader but because you have done what the Savior would do—learned how to, and did, reach out to those around you to try to lift them, to help them to be better even when it might be a little bit difficult and you might not have been received very well." I left the college that day very grateful that my daughter has to opportunity to further her education is such a wonderful place.

JULY 20th THE EMPTY NESTERS

It was Sunday, July 20th. We were officially empty nesters! After 33 years it felt really weird.
We had made arrangements to meet Sarah for church but the schedule was changed for the student ward (we were told Sacrament was last and it ended up being first) and we weren't going to be able to get there in time



We got ready quickly and set out to find a ward to attend. We arrived about 11:10 a.m. hoping to find an 11:30 Sacrament service. The ward we found started at 11:00 a.m. so we were afraid we weren't going to make it for the Sacrament. We peeked in the back door of the overflow in the chapel and right there were two empty seats. We slipped in and only missed the announcements. It was a wonderful service and we felt blessed to be there. We thought maybe we would visit the campus with Sarah but we didn't hear from her all day. She was too busy taking in all of the new friends and activities. I want you to know I recognized this as an answer to my prayers because Sarah is a home body and I really prayed that she would enjoy, quickly get involved and enjoy college life. I guess I just didn't think my prayers would be answered so perfectly! LOL! Soooooo Mark and I spent the day enjoying the beautiful gardens on campus, walking around the Temple and resting. We especially enjoyed looking at the gardens because our son Eric graduated from BYU Idaho with a degree in horticulture and I know that each class contributes to the beauty of the campus. There must have been 5 or 6 different amazing water falls.