Week of August 22 - 28, 2016

Highlights:

Spiritual
Dad attended a session at the Idaho Falls Temple on Tuesday evening. Dad finished work early and we both attended a wonderful session at the temple on Friday evening.

Church on Sunday was wonderful and inspiring. We were told about an upcoming stake realignment in October. They will take our stake, Glendale North Stake, and Peoria North Stake and create a third stake. Nano had similar changes occur in her area last week. We had a wonderful message in Relief Society that was from  the April 2016 General Conference message by Jeffrey R. Holland entitled "Tomorrow The Lord Will Do Wonders Among You."https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2016/04/tomorrow-the-lord-will-do-wonders-among-you?lang=eng  
Elder Holland is a kind and loving apostle in our church. In this talk, he shared words of comfort and encouragement. I have included some here that particularly touched my heart

Please remember tomorrow, and all the days after that, that the Lord blesses those who want to improve, who accept the need for commandments and try to keep them, who cherish Christlike virtues and strive to the best of their ability to acquire them. If you stumble in that pursuit, so does everyone; the Savior is there to help you keep going. If you fall, summon His strength. Call out like Alma, “O Jesus, … have mercy on me.”⁷ He will help you get back up. He will help you repent, repair, fix whatever you have to fix, and keep going. Soon enough you will have the success you seek.

“As you desire of me so it shall be done unto you,” the Lord has declared.

“… Put your trust in that Spirit which leadeth to do good—yea, to do justly, to walk humbly, to judge righteously. …

“… [Then] whatsoever you desire of me [in] righteousness, … you shall receive.”

I love that doctrine! It says again and again that we are going to be blessed for our desire to do good, even as we actually strive to be so. And it reminds us that to qualify for those blessings, we must make certain we do not deny them to others: we are to deal justly, never unjustly, never unfairly; we are to walk humbly, never arrogantly, never pridefully; we are to judge righteously, never self-righteously, never unrighteously.

I had lots of time to read, so I read the entire September Ensign Magazine this week. It was very beneficial to me, and some things that had been part of my prayers were answered.

President George Q. Cannon once taught: “No matter how serious the trial, how deep the distress, how great the affliction, [God] will never desert us. He never has, and He never will. He cannot do it. It is not His character [to do so]. … He will [always] stand by us. We may pass through the fiery furnace; we may pass through deep waters; but we shall not be consumed nor overwhelmed. We shall emerge from all these trials and difficulties the better and purer for them.”⁹

Now, with that majestic devotion ringing from heaven as the great constant in our lives, manifested most purely and perfectly in the life, death, and Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ, we can escape the consequences of both sin and stupidity—our own or that of others—in whatever form they may come to us in the course of daily living. If we give our heart to God, if we love the Lord Jesus Christ, if we do the best we can to live the gospel, then tomorrow—and every other day—is ultimately going to be magnificent, even if we don’t always recognize it as such. Why? Because our Heavenly Father wants it to be! He wants to bless us. A rewarding, abundant, and eternal life is the very object of His merciful plan for His children! It is a plan predicated on the truth “that all things work together for good to them that love God.”¹⁰ So keep loving. Keep trying. Keep trusting. Keep believing. Keep growing. Heaven is cheering you on today, tomorrow, and forever.

A sister shared an experience where she literally felt many cheering her on, both on this side of the veil and on the other side of the veil, supporting her and sustaining her through her difficult times. It happens to each of us, whether we realize it or not.

I am so thankful for this knowledge.

I am in 2 Nephi 14  in the Book of Mormon.

I have indexed 25932  records so far this year. 

Family

The Wilkins Family
Good last week of Summer for this family! Grace again was an awesome Cub Reporter! On Wednesday, they enjoyed early morning bowling and then McDonalds. The new curtains for her room are being hung and she is so excited! She's is also excited for her birthday next week!

There was a youth Pokemon Go activity at mutual on Thursday that the whole family was invited to. Grace wasn't so happy because her friend wanted to play Pokemon Go rather than with her.

They are preparing for school to begin on Monday and Grace is so excited: School starting and her birthday all in one week!! And they hope for a family trip to St. George Utah next Friday.


The Ethan Rice Family
Cameo and Kaylee held down the fort and worked...

Ethan traveled to and from Phoenix during the week for a brief business trip. He and his associates attended a Diamondback game on Thursday night. They played against the Atlanta Braves. Not sure who Ethan was cheering for. He stopped by for a visit on Thursday morning before he picked up his work associate at the hotel and headed to the airport to go home.So very nice to see him!

Cameo met up with a cousin of hers on Wednesday...
 
And also made a new friend who was at their front door...


 It was fun to hear Kaylee's voice as she waited for Mommy to get done working. I bet she is so enjoying being home with her Mommy all the time!!!

Some other fun Southern experiences for the week:

Kaylee's grilled cheese sandwich came in this cool car box!

The family's first trip to a Publix grocery store.

The Doran Rice Family
This family is good. I received this on Tuesday

I truly think the detainees at Sheriff Joe's Jail are happier about their punishment "loaf" thank he was about this hot dog!

Morgan
No news from Morgan and Christy this week. Must be very busy working!

Kayty
Kayty had a good week, though her Monday started out pretty bad. Her endocrinologist wanted her to use a Continuous Glucose Monitor for a week to see what's going on. It was a very painful installation, with a large needle poked into her abdomen to insert a sensor. By the time she got home, the sensor had quit working, so she returned the next day to have the thing removed and wait till another one comes in. Other than that, Bachelor In Paradise was good, work went well.

Total saves this week: 1

The Nathan Rice Family
A picture from their trip to Utah

They spent the days after dad left just enjoying the last days of this break from school before it begins on September 12.

Work

Dad worked through his vacation, and had a full work day on Friday, full of meetings. He learned that the layoff that was to happen weeks ago had not happened yet. So much for feeling a bit of relief!

My work for the week included emptying a/c water buckets, feeding, watering, and cleaning up chicken bowls, gathering eggs, cooking, shopping, dusting, vacuuming, laundry, made visiting teaching appointment, mailed a package and two letters at the post office, kept the cat happy, searched for the unhappy cat, went through the games on the playroom shelf and tossed the incomplete, got some ready to sell and some ready to donate to d.i. , sold things from the playroom that I am not keeping on the swip swap, did a phone visit when the sister had to cancel our visiting teaching appointment, scooped a dead mouse from the bottom of the pool, scooped out gallons of water from the boat cover, took the trash cans down the road and brought them back, installed gutter drains, LOTS of weed pulling.


Dad's Garden
I harvested basil and kept peppers flourishing.

Dad's Truck
No truck work this week.

Year of the House
We found out what router bit is needed and dad ordered it.

Other highlights
Dad's Idaho Vacation continued on Monday

Dad and Nathan grocery shopped: a scary thing for those who might have to ingest what they bring home. He had menudo for brunch and a Korean dish for lunch and he made Chinese Kung Pao for them for dinner.

During the day, they toured BYU I

This is the entire Book of Mormon printed on one page. The magnifying glass is at the side.

A copy of the Rosetta Stone

Dad and Nathan had a good trip to and from Twin Falls on Tuesday. They visited a supplier of Dads and even were taken out to some pretty good Mexican food. They found an Asian market that had all the sauces Nate needs to make Chinese like Dad does. Dad went to the Pocatello Temple on Tuesday night.

They went fishing after enjoying the morning on the front porch of the apartment. Nathan has some beautiful tomatoes and basil growing on his porch! Annalee loves to help harvest...tomatoes as well
as leaves.

Fishing was great...

Idaho also has very brave cats!

On Thursday, they all ate breakfast out, had an adventure at Mesa Falls...

Look how beautiful this is!

And then on the airplane

We picked prickly pears from our front yard...

Jelly to come next week. 

Dad scored big at the yard sales this week. A neighbor is moving...selling his house (Sonny, the one that lives in Ernie Bunch's old house) sold dad a ton of tools, brand new boxes of nails, etc. for a great price.He also got an old war movie and a western. We watched part of the war movie about Rommell, one of Hitler's generals in World War II. It was interesting that the German officer spoke with a very British accent! It was a very old movie...black and white.

Kayty brought home "Zootopia" and we enjoyed watching that. Or, rather I liked it until I fell asleep and woke up at the very end. I "see" lots of movies that way!

Not so highlights

Week of August 15 - 21, 2016

Highlights:

Spiritual
My Wednesday began at the Phoenix temple. A wonderful session and an opportunity to create forever families. Dad ended the day in his regular temple session.

Cub scouts went well on Wednesday evening and the boys completed their Coin adventure. I spent hours during the week preparing for our next adventure: paws on the path.

We had great meetings at church today. I learned and grew so much!! The speakers in Sacrament Meeting were great. Joy Black spoke on Christ and the atonement and shared her testimony. Brother Greg Dawson of the high council shared a wonderful message on Prayer. He spoke about Alma 34 and 37 and referred to the Faith Cycle. He also challenged every one to double the time you spend in prayer. In Relief Society, we talked about the Sacrament and it's symbolic ties to both Passover and Easter. We talked a lot about spiritual preparation before attending church and partaking of the Sacrament. Sister Call, the teacher, had us select our favorite Sacrament hymn and then she would point and sisters would read a phrase from that hymn. It was such a spiritual time. I decided that to help me prepare better for partaking of the Sacrament, I will have Sacrament hymns playing as I get ready for church.

I am in 2 Nephi 3  in the Book of Mormon. I have so enjoyed taking my time reading. or listening to one chapter, or sometimes two chapters, at a time. I especially enjoy reading while I am in the chapel at the temple waiting for the session to begin.

I have currently indexed 24388 records so far this year. 

Family

The Wilkins Family
This family had a good week. Here are some of the messages Grace, the Wilkins Family Ace Reporter, shared:
   I love you, Grammy.
   Look at my new shoes.
   "redr3e2egyuilf8kuiyhtrftgvh45uj6tgfrghj8jhytgrf805ghtyuj" from Sam
   Tomorrow we are having a tea party with mini pancakes. We made them. (On Tuesday)
   "I luv yow  Luv Josh"
   It was so much fun. I went to calabunga bay and had pizza and lemonade. It is a bg pool with crazy huge water slides and a cute toddler area which is so much fun!!! It was with my best school friends Adelaide and Julia.
   Nobody knows their school teacher yet!!! 
   I am sad Katelyn (her best friend ) is moving 20 minutes away!!! The house is in henderson so we have to do everything like sleepovers and my birthday and we are doing the pinata with her.
   We are going to have a lot of play dates.
   We are going (to the library) on Saturday instead!!! Adam is going on a campout!!! One night of no Adam!!! We are going to Sam's Club now. 
   I went to the store. I got hot Cheetos.

   Sam is a major hunk!!! That is what his shirt says.

   Sam said "Gammy?" every time you texte and when I say yes he says "Gammy!"  

   It is leftovers night!!! Make anything you can find. (I found) tilapia and blueberries and josh is having enchiladas. I found the dish first.
Allison shared a beautiful piano solo by Adam on Facebook. He has come so far in such a short time and is an amazing pianist!!


The Ethan Rice Family
Cameo and Kaylee headed to visit Cameo's new doctor on Monday. Baby boy Rice is doing well, and Kaylee enjoyed getting to use an umbrella and wear rain boots: foreign things here!

Another storm that included thunder allowed us to see this joyous face

Cameo messaged me early Friday morning, which ended up being during her lunch break there! Oh, the time zone craziness.She saw a deer behind their home today...

And she and Kaylee took a lovely walk. It looks lovely there!

They are slowly emptying boxes and getting used to the different time. Since Cameo's work hours are Phoenix hours, she says she feels sometimes like she is living in two worlds!

On Saturday, they enjoyed more rainy weather and went to their new favorite ice cream spot...Brusters Real Ice Cream


The Doran Rice Family
Kooper enjoyed an awesome day of daycare/preschool on Tuesday! He got to paint a fish with celery!

Tamara moved into her own place with a couple of friends and that was a big transition time for this household. 

I received this on Sunday afternoon

What is on my grandson's head? Is that a University of Arizona hat??? NO WAY!! We are ASU devil fans!!! Fear the Fork you stinky kittys!!!
Morgan
Morgan and Christy must be very busy. No news from them this week.

Kayty
Kayty went all pink on Monday.
 
She managed to do so without making my bathroom all pink, so that is quite a score! She had to redo some color on Wednesday and was deemed sufficiently pink by Thursday.


 She is loving her new job and, according to Barb Pell, they like her. It might even turn full time, which would be awesome since she has to get her own health insurance come February.

Total saves this week: 1 major

The Nathan Rice Family
Nathan, Jessica and Annalee had a good week before they got to have Papa come for a visit. Annalee is really loving books...

Or loving their many uses. Here, a book is also an entertaining floor mat. 

More on this family is shared under Dad's Idaho vacation below.


Work
Dad was super busy at work He is working with suppliers here and scheduling visits in Utah when he and Nathan drove there Friday. His boss sent an email late Monday night informing the group he would be retiring on September 1st. Dad has lost his second boss in a row to early retirement due to a reduction.

My work week included the normal cleaning, vacuuming, dusting, laundry, plus I trimmed and hauled branches, cleaned up around our lime tree and trimmed off dead branches, cleaned some of the refrigerator shelves, cleaned out some kitchen drawers, baked muffins for dad using up the leftover strawberries from last week and incorporating some jojoba flour into them. It ended up I exchanged one third of the regular flour for jojoba flour. He really liked them! Then, I hauled off trash and boxes, more leaves and branches, lugged buckets of water (the water from the a/c drips into a bucket and with the high humidity, it gets too heavy to lift once a day), cleaned the front porch, cleaned out the pool filters and brushed the pool after the wind storms dumped every leaf in Phoenix into our pool, fed, watered chickens, gathered eggs, recovered date palm dates with bird netting, cleaned up pool toys, marketed some extra playroom toys,grocery shopped, stocking stuffer shopped,cleaned out more gunk from the pool skimmer baskets, resupplied chlorine to the pool, changed the water in all the chickens dishes and bowls (we have larger containers they stand in on hot days and the water has to be changed), hauled wood bits to the pizza oven, hauled tools to the shed, cooked, replaced two more times the bird netting on date palm tree, put water on big pine tree,


Dad's Garden
I worked to keep it alive. I watered the peppers on Thursday that looked extremely wilted.

Dad's Truck
No truck work

Year of the House
We had a very productive appointment at Floor and Decor on Monday. At first, the drawing we left for them on Saturday was virtually untouched when we arrived, but after some conversation, we were able to get a good design with plenty of what we both wanted. We were trying to fit in a tub, so we would have a full bath, but there wasn't any way, so we will go from tub to shower only in the master bedroom. Now, all we need it two strong sons to help us demo the old tub and tear down walls. Hint hint, Doran and Morgan.

He got a lot of work done on the cabinet doors but is still trying to locate the correct router bit to finish the door edges. 

Other highlights
I jogged Tuesday with Orions Belt behind me and an errant meteor shooting across the sky at my side. Pretty awesome!

Saw this on Facebook: pics of cousin Marissa's kids first day of school   Britton - 5th grade, Matilda - 8th grade, Killian - High School Senior



I attended a Multi Stake preparedness class on Thursday night to take notes for dad. It was on medicinal plants and essential oils. The essential oils part was somewhat of a reminder but the medicinal plant part was fascinating. It was taught by Trey Matson, MD...the dr. that delivered Kayty and Nathan. He retired from medicine years ago but is pursuing certification as an herbologist. His knowledge is amazing. He always tempered his information with caution, but it was fascinating what he had learned to do with plants and herbs.

 Dad headed to Idaho on Thursday to visit Nathan and get a vacation doing what he loves to do: fish. Here he is on the plane...

And after waiting in the wrong line for his rental car, waiting in the right line for his rental car, and waiting for his suitcase, he picked up Nate, Jess and Annalee and headed out for dinner and looking around.

At the machine shop at BYU-I

In Utah on Friday...

 They decided to return to Rexburg that night, rather than stay in a hotel, so Dad went to visit Jeff and Mardene Smith, and Nate, Jess and Annalee attended a wedding reception for one of Jessica's friends.

Dad took a more "scenic " route home (it might have been scenic if the sun had been up. ) He ended up on the wrong road and took longer to return to Idaho than he had planned. They all finally arrived home safely about midnight.

Dad called me early Saturday morning. I will share the account from Nate and Jess's facebook

We woke up in a panic this morning because we had slept through our alarm and the house was freezing, and we hadn't heard the baby at all. Nathan gets up to find Doran Rice had pulled baby out of bed, had been playing together with her toys and feeding her breakfast. 😌 It was the sweetest thing ever! And we got to sleep in! Go grandpa!

He did really well. Found a bottle, cleaned it out, made new formula, changed her wet diaper, and then let me talk to her as she happily drank her bottle and played with her toys. Truly an epic score for Papa!!! He is always amazing me!!!

Once everyone was up and ready, they went fishing. The weather was beautiful for them!!

Sunday, they all attended church. Great meetings, he said. Annalee started coming down with a cold so, after lunch, Papa stayed with her while Nate and Jess attended meetings.

From a Sunday drive...

Not so highlights
There was a storm Saturday...coming from the northeast. It was perfect conditions for us...except we only got a few drops of rain. People near us got hailed on and deluged. The Rainless Rice House remains. I did get some awesome cloud pics though...