Week of May 20-26, 2018

Highlights:

Spiritual

Sunday was good. I had to arrive at church early to practice our song for Sacrament Meeting. Our choir director is great, because he selects music that makes us work. Now, on this particular one, it was easy for the Altos. The rest of the choir was really stretched. On the third verse, only the men sang...a capella...and broke into parts: two tenor and two bass. This is a group of young and older men that have little outside experience singing, and yet, their harmony was absolutely beautiful! Gave me goosebumps!! And on the fourth verse, while the rest sang unison, the sopranos sang a beautiful descant. Our choir includes many youth, and I am so glad they can come and learn so they can someday be part of a choir. Oh, in case you want to hear the Mormon Tabernacle Choir sing the song nearly as well as we did, look up |"Redeemer of Israel" by them on YouTube. Now, we could not have an orchestra, but one sister played the brass part on the organ and the other accompanist played the rest on the piano. Dad had Teaching in the Savior's Way class the second hour, while I stayed in Sunday school. Relief Society came out very well, though the teacher asked to substitute must have forgotten and no one showed up. We listened to and discussed a very good General Conference talk, though. Never can hear those too many times!

I had Cub Committee Meeting after church. It was long as they talked about Cub Camp, but it was very productive and the two sisters have a wonderful couple of days planned.

Temple remains on cleaning and repair shut down.

I had no cub scouts on Wednesday to due conflicts with graduations etc. Dad's scouts had a video game night and they also made plans to get those that are able to their Eagle Scout Rank before the church is no longer involved in Scouting BSA.

I am in Alma  in my Book of Mormon reading.

I have indexed 11576 records and reviewed 11271 records so far this year.

Family

The Wilkins Family

This was Adam's last week of school. Now a sophomore! Grace and Josh finish on June 15th. Good and busy week for this family.

The Ethan Rice Family

I spoke to Ethan, Morgan and the kids while Cameo worked upstairs early in the week. All are doing well, and Wade absolutely loves Ruger...or rather, Ruger's water dish...and loves spilling it. He and Kaylee are so cute when they play together. Kaylee sat and ate some yummy popcorn while she chatted with me via FaceTime. 

They headed out of town for Memorial Day on Friday.

The Doran Rice Family

It was a good work week for Doran and Amber. Kelsie enjoyed her last day of school. Kooper is well too.

Morgan

Morgan had a good work week. He joined Ethan and family on a Memorial Day Weekend Campout.

Kayty

Kayty had a good work week. She went out to dinner with some old friends from Jos A Bank on Thursday evening and had a good time.

The Nathan Rice Family

We found out Tuesday that Nathan did indeed get awarded the scholarship he had been trying for from the Society of Mechanical Engineering. Good news! He is very very  busy and we didn't speak with him much, only to see their Sunday dinner of Kimchii Stew, Pork Belly and strawberries. School is LOTS of work but he is keeping up. Annalee and Mommy got new haircuts this week...

On Friday, the town splash pad was opened, so they all had such a good time playing in the water and Anna loved jumping in the bounce house. Their garden is doing very well and the snow peas and broccoli are growing very tall. 

Dad's Garden

Tomatoes are slowing down...and I am glad! I chopped another gallon and a half of salsa on Monday, made two quarts of spaghetti sauce on Thursday. Looked for tomato recipes Friday and Saturday. Roasted, strained and canned another seven pints of tomato sauce.

Total tomatoes:1679

Other highlights

Dad worked on changing fluids in my car Monday night.

We did yard work on Tuesday evening. It was cool...for Phoenix...so Dad hauled wheelbarrows full of larger trash to our bulk trash pile while I went around the yard with my trowel and dug up these nasty Night Shade weeds. No matter how much we pull them up, they keep coming back. Beautiful purple blossoms, but the nastiest stickers all along the stem. Those stickers even get through my leather work gloves...and nothing gets through them!

Nano has been having some swelling problems so she is now eating little salt. Dad grilled up a bunch of chicken breasts and I packaged into individual portions and froze. This week included shopping at two stores and a trip to the bank and to Walgreens to pick up pictures. 

Dad started to work on the boat engine Saturday morning. The thermostat looked fine, but there were bits of rubber impeller blocking some of the water passageways. He is not sure about the water pump yet. Not sure if the boat is worth fixing. 

Week of May 13-19, 2018

Highlights:

Spiritual

Dad had a good day at church, though the boys were a bit on the antsy side during the lesson he presented in Deacons Quorum. Sunday he spent reading.

The temple is closed for two weeks, so no temple service this week. I had hoped to get out to the Mesa Temple this week, since it will close for renovations on May 19, but we didn't have the time. That temple was where I was sealed to my parents and family, where Dee and I were sealed, and where two of our children were sealed and where many in our family received their Endowment. It will always hold a special place in our hearts.

Scouts was...well, it was. We invited the new boys that will attend Cub Camp and are entering our dent this Summer. Well, one boy was crazy, plus our Denner didn't help, since he was nuts too! We were practicing our skit for the "campfire" and the boys did a good job rehearsing the two Sister Day had selected. Then we asked them to vote on which one they wanted to do. They said they wanted to make up their own. Hummm. So, we gave them ten minutes and they did make up a skit. They thought it was funny. Not sure what the rest of the audience will think...but then again, they did it themselves. It was an exhausting night, though, and we are going to talk to the Cub Committee. We have been enduring very active boys for over two years and we might just need some help. Dad's scouts didn't go as he had suggested to the Counselor, but the boys did cook and did well, though in a missionary prep situation, Dollar Store items would have been much more practical rather than a roast chicken, bacon, pasta, etc.

I am in Alma 47 in the Book of Mormon. I continue to listen to a General Conference talk every morning that I exercise.

I have indexed 11356 records and reviewed 8213 records so far this year.

Family

The Wilkins Family

The Wilkins family had a good and busy week, with school nearing an end for Adam, and ending in a few weeks for Grace and Josh. Sam worked on the letter J. Grace and Allison attended a special Mother Daughter Breakfast on Saturday morning.

The Ethan Rice Family

This was shared by Cameo on Sunday, Mother's Day...
I had a wonderful Mother’s Day. The day started with french toast, eggs, bacon, and sausage, 50 roses, a massage chair gift, church, FT with Mom, a visit from the sister missionaries, slip & slide fun with the kids, FT with MIL, steak and homemade mashed potato dinner, The Greatest Showman, and cheesecake for dessert. I felt so much love from my family and friends today. I have always wanted to be a Mother. I am blessed to be the Mother of these two. 💗💙😍 Happy Mother’s Day!!! Also, Happy 13 years to the hubs. What a very special day today.

Kaylee had a special day on Friday. She got to try out her new school she will be attending kindergarten at. She played with new friends, rode the bus, ate in the lunch room, and saw just what school will be like. 

Kaylee graduated from PreSchool on Friday. It was a special day for the family!

The Doran Rice Family

Kooper did some creative cooking on Sunday...

Morgan

Morgan is enjoying his new job and the new area of the United States.

Kayty

Kayty had a good week at work. A couple of near lows healthwise, but all were handle able. She stayed up late Friday and we both watched to see Prince Harry marry Meghan Markle. We just wanted to see the dress. We both were not impressed. You would think a dress that cost over 250,000 dollars would seem to fit. Anyway, it was fun. 

The Nathan Rice Family

Nathan's two paragraph paper that took over eight hours to complete last week.

Nathan Rice
Me 360
Shear stress in a fluid can be calculated using the viscosity of that fluid and the rate at which
the fluid is deforming, it occurs as a result of the no-slip condition that is present in fluids. In a
laminar flow, fluids are made up of an infinite number of thin layers. When a fluid is in contact with
a surface the fluid layer that is in direct contact or boundary layer is in a no-slip condition, which
means that it is not moving relative to that surface, in other words it sticks to that surface. When a
fluid in contact is trying to flow, this no-slip condition creates a force that acts tangent to the fluid
layers, and opposes motion. This opposition to flow creates a shear stress in the fluid. Viscous shear
stress in a fluid is defined as
=
du
dy
(1)
where is the shear stress, is the dynamic viscosity of a fluid, and du
dy is the strain rate. When
a shear stress is applied onto a fluid the fluid will deform continuously, the rate at which the fluid
deforms is the strain rate. Viscosity is a measure of a fluids resistance to deforming under a shear
stress. Equation 1. can be rewritten as
=

du
dy
(2)
Showing that viscosity is the constant of proportionality between shear stress and strain rate. The
viscosity of a fluid is specific to that fluid and can vary greatly Table 1 gives a list of several different
fluids and their dynamic viscosity’s. The shear force can be felt by placing a few drops of different
fluids on ones fingers and rubbing them against each other, noting that that the force it takes to move
ones fingers can be altered by varying the rate of motion, as well as by changing the fluid for one
with a different viscosity. Thus shear stress in a fluid is proportional to the viscosity, and the rate of
deformation in a fluid, which is caused by the no-slip condition.
In a pressure flow in a pipe, the viscous shear stress is greatest at the wall where the velocity is
zero, this can be shown by doing a force balance on the fluid flowing in a pipe with a fully developed
velocity profile. As discussed earlier, when a fluid that is in contact with a surface is flowing, a shear
force will be acting on the fluid. The magnitude of this shear force will vary as it acts on each layer
Table 1: The dynamic viscosity of a fluid is specific to that fluid at a given temperature. This table
lists several common fluids at 20°C to show how much the viscosity varies between them.
Fluid Dynamic Viscosity ; kg=m s
Ammonia 0.00015
Water 0.0010
SAE 30 Engine oil 0.29
Glycerin 1.52
of the flowing fluid. Note that because this fluid has a fully developed velocity profile, the velocity
at any given point is constant, thus there is no acceleration by newtons first law. Because this fluid
is not accelerating, a force balance can be performed to determine the shear force at any given point
in the fluid. Referring to figure 1 which shows a fluid with a fully developed velocity profile in a
laminar pipe flow. The forces acting in the positive x direction are the shear force of the fluid layer
at distance r and the force of pressure of the fluid at horizontal position x. The forces that are acting
in the negative x direction are the shear force of the fluid layer at position r + dr and the force of
the pressure at horizontal position x + dx. These forces sum to zero, then solving the equation for
yields
=
r
2
dP
dx
(3)
where r is the distance from the center of the pipe, and dP
dx is rate the of pressure change along
the pipe. Looking at the equation it can be seen that as r approaches R which is at the wall of the
pipe the shear stress will reach its maximum. This shows that the viscous shear stress is greatest at
the wall of the pipe.
Figure 1: Diagram showing the fully developed velocity profile for pressure driven flow, where u
is the velocity in the x direction, and longer lines indicate a greater velocity. Note that as distance
from the wall of the pipe increases so does the velocity of the fluid, indicating that there is a force
acting on the fluid that varies with distance from the wall.

(the equations did not copy well...)

Jessica is really enjoying school and has been assigned her first group project...service in the community. Nathan is really enjoying visiting their garden plot...a good break from hours of study. 

Happy 4th Anniversary on Thursday!!! The got a babysitter and actually had a date! They attended a session at the Rexburg Temple.

Nathan worked all night on another paper...planned on sleeping 30 minutes and then going to school early to work more...and then was awakened by Annalee three minutes before class was to start! They are enjoying their garden and watching it grow and taking fishing trips. This week, Anna caught 3 fish and Jessica caught two. 

Dad's Garden

I picked 220+ tomatoes on Monday morning and evening. On Thursday morning, the 1000th tomato was picked. Even with the mites, the dying plants, and the lack of sun cover, the garden did pretty well. Friday, we roasted tomatoes in the pizza oven, ran them through the strainer, and ended up canning 20 pints of tomato sauce.

 Kayty says our house has Too Many Tomatoes (like the book I have - Too Many Pumpkins)

Our tomato count this week as of now is 1326. 

Year of the House Part 2

Dad got me a new toilet seat last Saturday night so the bathroom is done till November at the earliest when we venture into the attic to try that exhaust fan again.

Other highlights

Mothers Day was good. Earlier last week, I received in the mail from Ethan, Cameo and family, a necklace that can have essential oils added as aromatherapy. I also received this bouquet of flowers.

I got all ready for church on Sunday, including all my "crown jewels" (the jewelry given to me by my kids that has survived the years) but when we were about to go, Kayty didn't look good...I am sure she was low but not low enough for seizures...so I stayed home. Doran, Amber, Kelsie and Kooper were surprising me and attending church with me, so dad sent them on to our house and we had a great visit, filled with fun, drawing and cutting paper, cinnamon toast, hugs, and some pretty awesome gifts.

Later, Annalee, Ellie and Jessica called while Nathan made them a pretty fantastic brunch (French toast, cream cheese frosting - you MUST try this! When I was in Idaho, a bunch of Nathan's engineer friends had a breakfast and they put this on French toast...it was to die for!!), eggs, hash brown potatoes, and I think sausage. Annalee showed me her jumps, her spins, her new Princess Sophia shoes, some more jumps, some drum playing, and her chocolate covered face from getting some of Mommy's gift from church thus the spins and jumps! Ellie is crawling and climbing everywhere, including inside the refrigerator, and loves to laugh when her big sister tries to scare her. Anna even had served herself her own breakfast: a plate full of chocolate chips...truly Grammy's girl! I then got the most wonderful message from the Wilkins family...love from Allison, and then they all sang the song to me that they sang in church for Mother's Day. It was a beautiful song, one I had never heard before. So wonderful. I later got to FaceTime with Ethan, Cameo, Morgan, Kaylee and Wade as Ethan worked on a steak dinner with home made mashed potatoes. Looked yummy and it was great being able to visit with everyone! So Mother's Day included calls, gifts and cards from all my beautiful children.

Now, to my children...YOU are my gift...you and those you married and your children bring me the greatest happiness and joy that I could possibly imagine and I would literally do anything for each and every one of you. Being a mom...being YOUR mom is the BEST thing in my life!!! I love you Allison, Mike, Adam, Grace, Joshua, Samuel, Ethan, Cameo, Kaylee, Wade, Doran, Amber, Kelsie, Kooper, Morgan, Kayty, Nathan, Jessica, Annalee, and Ellie!!!!!!!!!!

This outlet Dad put in on the kitchen island

Best thing ever!!!

On Thursday, I took Nano to one doctor for an injection, to the lab for bloodwork, shopping and then to Walgreens to pick up photos. 

Nights were still cool this week so we could have the windows open and my morning jogs were heavenly! Dad hiked many mornings too. 

Week of May 6-12, 2018

Highlights:

Spiritual

Sunday Church meetings were wonderful, as usual. I visited with one of my sisters I minister after Sacrament meeting. I have visited Yvonne for years, and I know it's hard for her to have me come with family obligations, so I have been just taking a few moments every week to talk with her. I discovered the sister that ministers to me, Karla Olofson, a friend and former visiting teacher. I told her how glad I was, and that I will just need a periodic text to see how I am. Living where I have lived and past experiences have given me the opportunity to grow in independence. Not many needs I have that others can meet.

I really enjoyed choir practice. We work very hard, laugh a lot, but I think the best part of it all is the spiritual experiences had as the emphasis moves to the words and message of the songs we are singing and the testimonies born. Really a great part of Sunday.

Dad attended another Self Reliance class.

I attended a very full session at the Phoenix Temple on Tuesday morning. Our temple shuts down for Maintenance on May 12th. The Mesa Temple shuts down for upgrades and extensive repairs on the 19th...a two year shut down. Ours might just be a bit busy after that. Dad attended a very full session on Thursday evening. 

Cub scouts went well. We talked about kite flying rules and made kites for the Air of the Wolf Adventure. This week, the Church announced they would no longer be a part of Boy Scouting by December 31, 2019. I admit I am looking forward to that. Seven times a den leader is exhausting. And if I have to hear that Watermelon Cheer just one more time.... Dad and the scouts were in charge of the joint activity for mutual. They brought games for Game Night and everyone really liked that. The evening ended with root beer floats.

I continue to listen to a General Conference Talk every morning as I exercise. I am now on my second time through, and started the Saturday afternoon session today.

I am in Alma 32 in my Book of Mormon reading.

I have indexed 11166 records so far this year, and have reviewed 5137 records so far this year.

Family

The Wilkins Family

This family had pics taken last Saturday...All turned out great!

Mom and Sam enjoyed a trip to a special Wax Museum and getting to meet Helen Keller...

The Ethan Rice Family

This family is doing well. I FaceTimed on Tuesday evening. Kaylee is excited for school to end next week...she will officially be a Kindergartener, and she has a loose tooth, which she is also excited about. Wade and Ruger are getting along really well! Ethan and Morgan dug and put in a couple of sprinklers in the back yard. Cameo is very busy with work and keeping Wade from dumping out Ruger's water dish all over the kitchen floor. I was surprised on Wednesday with a gift...or rather two gifts: a lovely silver necklace that has a piece of pumice in it that essential oils can be applied to for aromatherapy. So awesome! Then I got home from cub scouts and a big box containing these was on the counter...

The Doran Rice Family

Doran and Amber are doing well, though Amber is struggling through a cold. Kelsie and Kooper enjoyed their school week.

Morgan

Morgan is enjoying his new job and doing very well.

Kayty

After church on Sunday, Kayty went and visited with a couple of her friends from high school. She had a good time. Work went well all week.

1 major save this week. 

The Nathan Rice Family

I talked to Nathan and Annalee, or rather Princess Annie of .... (I don't remember now where she said). Busy hard week last week. He spent most of Saturday studying and doing homework, and got up early Monday to complete it. They love their fishing trips, and are enjoying working on their garden and community plot. Nathan had a sleep study Monday night. He said it was the best sleep he has had in years. Now comes the process to approve the c-pap through Cigna. Hopefully it gets approved fast. They had a very busy week, keeping up with school and trying not to take too much advantage of the beautiful weather. They continue to visit their garden plot and work on it as much as they can.

Dad's Garden

Picking tomatoes nearly every day. Our garden looks weak, but we have picked 539 tomatoes so far this year. We are racing the birds, the sun, and the damage from the mites. 

Other highlights

Dad taught 4th Grade at Painted Rock Academy on Wednesday.

Nano shopping included the Metrocenter WalMart, SAS and the bank. I also helped her figure out some mail items and her computer. I got her a pretty yellow corsage to wear on Sunday, a card, some fresh tomatoes, and black ink for her printer.

Lots of yard work: tree trimming, pollen blowing (the mesquites have dropped more this year than in any time Dad has seen), bagging, hauling. 

Saturday was a very good and very busy day. We canned 36 quarts and 1 pint of tomatoes. Grandma came for a visit and picked up Dad's card he made and gift cards for McDonalds. We also hauled limbs to the bulk trash pile, walked around and checked on the drip system and corrected a few leaks, dad repaired the back porch metal cabinet that I keep all the canning supplies and pots in, and hauled as much other stuff as we could to the pile.

News
It was announced by Salt Lake City that the church would no longer participate in the Boy Scouts of America or Scouting BSA as they call themselves now after inviting girls to also participate, as of December 31, 2019. While my boys loved scouts, it IS a very costly program. Awards for just our cub scouts...about 12 of them...come to roughly 7000 dollars, and that is not including Blue and Gold Banquet, Pinewood Derby, Cub Camp, etc. Scouting values seem to have changed, due to pressures from the outside. It is time for us to leave. Scouting has caved to outside forces, and it is a lesson. I am sure this was in the plan for the church for a long time. Last year, our districts here in Arizona were divided into LDS and Non LDS districts. This gives a chance for leaders to develop that aren't part of the church and will allow scouting strength when we leave. Personally, after being a den leader seven times, I am glad I can finally say THIS is my last time!