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.