Back to school?

Charlotte and Philip graciously hosted a sibling dinner this past Monday evening.  All of my Utah siblings and their spouses were there.  We had a great time reminiscing about our parents.  Like Nephi, we were born of goodly parents who taught us the gospel and left us with a sure foundation upon which to build our lives.  We heard a little bit more about Nan and Bruce's mission, but not much as we were so busy talking about everything else.  Phil re-shared the story of Natalie having cousin Melissa (Cook White) over to spend the night when they were about 17 years old.  In the middle of the night, Melissa walked in her sleep--right into Phil and Charlotte's bedroom.  She walked in and stood over Charlotte.  "Are you okay?" Charlotte asked.  Melissa nodded and proceeded to the other side of the bed where she climbed in--right by Uncle Phil.  Phil and Char looked at each other and mouthed, "What do we do?"  Soon, Melissa woke up and wondered, "Why is Uncle Phil in my bed?" She didn't wonder long, as the bedroom in Phil and Char's house at the time had floral wallpaper all over it.  She quickly realized it was the other way around.  She was so embarrassed.  She has told them since that it is her most embarrassing experience. 

Dave and Becky also shared a story.  He had shared it in his letter for the week, but I hadn't read it yet, so they re-shared it.  In Becky's words: "A fourth-year hike for Girls camp was planned up Hobble Creek Canyon, close enough for it to be said, “It is like going for a walk in our own backyard.” Our hikes usually took us far from home, into the mountains. After dinner, at campfire, some of the young women were a bit boisterous. Someone said,” It would be so funny if cops showed up and said we were being too noisy.” Five minutes later, a police car turned on flashing lights, and we heard over the loudspeaker, “Dave and Becky Cook, if you are here, make yourselves visible.” It got quiet. Our daughter, barely three years old, had bitten into a glass ammonia vial from the first aid kit. Burned and cut she was rushed to the hospital. Our older daughter was watching our kids, so the police were dispatched, found us, and drove us home.

We believe the Lord had a hand in planning the hike that year. Being within the boundaries of the city of Springville, we were exactly where we were supposed to be. There are no coincidences when it comes to the Lord. This was one of those “Spiritually Defining Memories” Elder Neil L. Anderson spoke of in April 2020 General Conference. “...God knows and loves each of us... He eagerly desires to reveal Himself to us. These experiences may come at pivotal times in our lives or in what may at first seem as uneventful happenings, but they are always accompanied by an exceptionally strong spiritual confirmation of the love of God.” After a long night in the hospital, a Priesthood blessing, a trip to Primary Children’s Hospital, and a long nap, our daughter joyfully announced she was all better and going home." Becky had written all of this up as a spiritually defining memory. and encouraged her readers to write down their spiritually defining memories.  Becky also added a postscript: 

"The next year, we did the same hike, and it happened again. This time, after turning on lights and siren, and beckoning me to make myself visible, the officer held out a beautiful bouquet of roses and wished me Happy Anniversary from my loving companion."  I imagine she felt panicked as the police car drove up in exactly the same way it had the year before.  Needless to say, we laughed a lot during the evening.  It was so nice to see everyone--it's been so long since we've socialized with each other.  

I have to mention the delicious food we ate.  Phil had cooked pork and salmon outside--both were delicious.  Char had roasted potatoes, both sweet and regular and they were perfectly done.  Nan brought fruit and Christine had made a wonderful salad with fresh mozzarella balls and baby tomatoes.  We brought fresh beets from our garden.  To top all of this off, Char had made some gluten free chocolate cookies.  Both Dave and Charlotte are Celiac.  

Catharine, Christine, Steve, Dave, Becky, Nan, Bruce, Phil and Char.

Most of my grandchildren started school this week (Ruby and Max had already started, and Finn's, Beverly's, Effie's and Mav's preschool hasn't started yet).  I think it was a little bit hard because it was 1/2 day school, every other day.  Next week will be all day, but only two days a week, with online learning the other three days.  The kids were excited to return; but it's sad we're still not back to normal school days yet (especially for moms)  I've heard a little concern from my children that their kids may not learn much this year unless they step in with supplemental material. 

Gunnar and Oli 

Greta got to go to preschool, but she cried because she couldn't take the bus

Ori

It's really sad to cover up all their beautiful faces!

Hyeji, Doyeon, and Yuna set for school with
Facemasks

We went back to church today for the first time since March.  It was very different with only the L-Z portion of our ward.  Every other bench was blocked off and we had to wait to be seated.  The sacrament was passed by three men and one priest.  Each  piece of bread was in a separate water cup, placed every other one in the water tray.  Each passer had two trays, one for returning the empty cups.  I felt the spirit strongly, as it's been so long since participating in this setting, but I have to admit, I hated wearing a mask.  I definitely feel for the school kids that are being required to wear them all day.  We also got a new bishopric today.  Our bishop that was released was very emotional.  He has served almost, but not quite 5 years.  He lost his wife 2 or 3 years ago to cancer and being a bishop has kept him involved and busy.  

The rest  of my week has been fairly uneventful--you can tell that when I have to use other peoples letters to supplement mine.  😀 My siblings write great letters, though, so I'm always glad to share some of their thoughts with all of you.  

Back up to Flaming Gorge

 This week we tried to squeeze in camping with the families that haven't been up with us this year.  We have a big family, so we're lucky to get each family camping and on the boat one time each year.  Crista, Matt, Adrienne and AJ and their families, and also Jennie and Jordan accompanied us this time.  We were blessed with the best water we've ever had at Flaming Gorge.  Monday was fabulous, but Tuesday was even better.  It was hot and sunny, so the cold water just felt refreshing.  It was easy to jump in and even the little ones loved it.  

Bridget with grandma

Bridget with blueberries

In the trailer!Gunnar, Oli, Jennie, Jordan, Ruby, Ila, Roy, Finn and Greta

Gunnar, Greta, Oli and Ruby

Crista, Bridget and grandma (Bridget even liked getting
in the water which was a little surprising because it feels very cold--
at least initially.

Matt

Adrienne and AJ came up previous to everyone else.  They stayed the weekend in a rustic cabin in Dutch John and then joined us Sunday evening.  Crista and Matt arrived a little bit before the Greens.  Greta looked around the trailer and then asked us, "Why did you move?"  Greta also fell off the swing almost immediately after we arrived.  She was bleeding all over, but the scrape wasn't deep.  She did have a big bump behind her ear, but luckily that had mostly gone down by the next morning.  When Jordan asked her how her "owie" was doing, she asked, "What owie."  Later, Crista told her she needed to put more medicine on her head.  Greta said with emphasis, "Seriously!  It will Freak me out."  

When AJ and Adrienne come with us we have the added pleasure of two boats.  AJ's dad owns a Malibu and AJ has great access to it.  It's fun because you can surf on the Malibu, which you can't do on our boat.  We handled the wake boarders and tubers, and they handled the surfers and slalom skiers (only Adrienne and AJ did that this trip).  Oli also wake boarded on their boat.  He is very athletic.  He wanted all of us to see how he could wake board--even going over the wake.  We love having the extra boat and thus extra room and more activities, but it does mean we don't see as much of Adrienne's family--especially since they are die-hard skiers and love to stay out on the lake as long as possible.  I admit I was totally worn out Monday evening.  I went with the Green's for the last hour after everyone else got off and actually tried to surf, with very limited success (meaning I could get up but I couldn't figure out how to stay up).

I had tried wake boarding for the first time last week.  I was able to get up but I was using Dallin's wakeboard.  I found that our old wake boards were a lot harder for me (though I had some success with Nick's larger board).  I was finally able to get up and stay up for a couple of minutes, and then ran out of energy.  I love being in the water and being active.  I'm happy that at 60 I still have the strength to pull myself up.

I was able to stay up for about 30 seconds on
Dallin's board (This was last week).

We had some unfortunate news this week.  Caitlyn had an MRI last Thursday to check on her arthritis.  This is what the report said, "Your MRI shows some persistent inflammation and progressive damage.  I recommend continuing to take Humira.  "We were very disappointed with this news.  If things don't stabilize for her it could mean further surgeries and pain.  We will know more in a month after her doctor confers with another radiologist.  

It seems like many in our family are dealing with health issues and other concerns right now .  Roy and I spoke with Barbara and she is still struggling.  She said that everything has changed--even her voice.  And she can't walk without assistance.  All this started from her contracting shingles.  Dave Cook, too, has had some struggles.  He has a serious infection and has been on antibiotics for a couple of months.  He says if they don't work this time he's not sure what the doctors will have him do.  Even though he lacks energy, he still puts in a 40 hour missionary work load each week.  Also, Christine mentioned in her letter that her little granddaughter Lizzy worked her way out of her daddy's arms and fell on the concrete on her head.  Thankfully she was all right but had two black eyes.  Christine's letters are usually a little belated, so this may have been several weeks ago.  

  Gunnar came on our boat a lot of the time and demonstrated how much like his grandmother he is by keeping his head in book for much of the day.  He nearly finished the book "Hatchet" which I brought from home so he'd have something to read.  After boating on Monday, Gunnar returned to camp with Roy.  While in the truck he picked up our Bon Appetit magazine.  He was very interested in telling Roy all about the article he was reading about how they are genetically engineering the perfect size watermelon to fit in the small Japanese refrigerators.  He reminds me of Nick and Dan when they were that age--always willing to learn new things and curious about everything.  How many 10 year-olds would bother looking at a magazine article like that?

While Gunnar was reading in our boat, Oli was practicing his wake boarding skills.  He's very athletic.  He loves back rubs from grandma while sitting on my lap and I'm always amazed at his muscular arms.

Oli

    At the pond

The first evening we went on a walk to the Gorge overlook with a stop at the pond.  Kids sure know how to get dirty.

Catharine, Crista, Matt and Adrienne

Jordan, Jennie and Crista

Finn and Ila in one of the moments they were
choosing to get along.

AJ and Adrienne

Greta 

Finn

Jordan, Ruby and Ila

All the kids rode the tube sometime during our two boating days, except Finn, Ila and Bridget.  Jennie and Oli enjoyed a calm ride together, too.  

Boating

Gunnar

Crista, Matt, Greta, Jordan and Oli

Adrienne and Finn

AJ and Finn

Adrienne and Ila

All of our guests left the lake and the campground to go home at about 3:00 Tuesday afternoon.  Ruby didn't want to go, she wanted to go boating again, but she was scheduled to start kindergarten the next day and it was important for her to be present her first day.  We toyed with the idea of keeping Gunnar, but he decided he was ready to go home.  Adrienne would have preferred to leave Finn with us because he's been quite the trouble-maker for her lately, but that would probably have been too much for me.

Roy and I stayed in Flaming Gorge until Saturday.  Wednesday he had to work, so we didn't take the boat out.  He got some work done and I did some reading.  We called Ruby to see how her first day of school went--apparently not very well.  She got on the phone with us and told us that everyone on the bus was really noisy and she asked one girl to be her friend and the girl said no."  Hopefully kindergarten will improve for her.  Because she's just in kindergarten, she will go to school 1/2 day every day, which will be nice for Crista.

Thursday it was nice weather in the morning.  We took a hike on the Canyon Rim trail.  We've been going to Flaming Gorge for many years, but this was the first time we have taken this trail.  It was beautiful.  After about a mile we ran into four large, male, big horn sheep.  They were casually grazing on some bushes.  There was an overlook right by them, so we checked out the view and then I started back on the trail.  Roy called me back and said we needed to give the bighorn sheep a wider berth.  He said if they felt bothered they could probably be dangerous.  We walked off the trail a bit to get around them.  We really enjoyed the flora and fauna on the hike.  Along with many different plants, we saw chipmunks, turkey vultures and other birds, and even a couple of marmots.  The hike was about 5 miles round trip.  As we neared the end the storm started coming in and we got sprinkled on.  Since we were fairly hot, it was kind of nice.  We got a lot of rain a little bit later as we rested in the trailer.  We have always wanted to take an evening boat ride and have never done it, so, after the rain cleared up we took the boat out and puttered around perfectly glassy water.  We took a picnic on the boat and ate our dinner there.  

Friday was supposed to be beautiful, and it was great water for most of the day, but the smoke from the California fires made it seem like it was overcast.  It was so gray I couldn't believe it.  The haze stayed with us the whole day.  We rented a paddle board and boated to the Wyoming side of the lake and found a cove to paddle in.  It was fun but my shoulders are pretty sore today, though it could be the wake boarding I did on the way back that evening.  The water was so glassy that Roy stopped and asked if I wanted to try one more time, so I hopped in.  I had a couple of good falls, but finally I was able to stay up until I got tired (maybe 2 minutes 😊).

We were planning on going to the Firefighters Memorial Campground in the evening to hear from the rangers all about the Cart Creek Fire that occurred in the 80's, but we were both pretty exhausted so we just ate dinner and watched a movie in the trailer.  

It took us a little longer on Saturday morning to get everything ready to go home than usual, but we were on the road by about 11:30.   

 Caitlyn had invited Nick and Sara and their family to dinner on Sunday, so Caitlyn and I made lemon chicken together.  The girls always have to have snacks, etc. after dinner. 

Effie and Avie eating cheetos

Bridget wasn't with us Sunday evening, but here she
is enjoying her dinner--avocado.

More Boating Pictures

Greta, Matt and Ruby

Jennie

Crista

Ruby with grandma

Finn and Greta

Matt surfing

Greta, Jordan and Ruby

Adrienne on one ski

Jordan was the last skiier

After everyone else went home

 

After boating we saw this in the Marina.  It is a "hot tub boat."
You'd have to be pretty committed to store a boat in the marina to 
keep a hot tub full of water there.

Evening in the marina

Handsome Roy!!!  Notice the glassiness of the water.  It was gorgeous almost all week.

We rented a paddle board for our last day of boating.  It was a lot of fun
and good exercise.

Big horn sheep (males) that we saw on our hike along the canyon ridge

Overlooking the gorge

And That's the End!!!