Rasmania 101: Pioneer Day and Happy Birthday to Nick and Efi! Also, Uncle Dave, Grandpa Cook and Rosilene!

Happy Birthday to Nick this coming Friday and Happy Birthday to baby Efi this coming Friday, too. Sara is going in to have a scheduled C-Section and the baby will be born on her daddy's birthday. We're so excited. Happy Birthday to my brother David, on the 27th, and my dad on the 30th. (We sure miss him). Happy Birthday to Rosilene on the 31st.

Family History has been on my mind this week. It started with an email invitation to participate in a 72 hour indexing push (Kentucky Marriage Records). I accepted the invite, then promptly forgot because of all of our family activities. When I turned on my computer last week to begin my family newsletter, I saw a reminder email. I opened up the indexing page and did a couple of batches, then did a few more on Monday. The indexing "push" was over Sunday night, but there were still Kentucky Marriage records to be indexed so I felt that I at least made an effort on my commitment. Later, I got a call from Janet Porter, our Cook Family Organization Vice President of Genealogy. I had agreed to help her prepare a program for the Cook O Rama coming up on the last weekend of September (The Thursday night before General Conference). Her call was a reminder as I'm obviously very forgetful about my commitments. Our idea for the Cook O Rama is to center it around how we can teach our families about their ancestors. She had found an article in the New York Times called, The Family, Stories that Bind Us. The article states, "The single most important thing you can do for your family may be the simplest of all: develop a strong family narrative." It mentioned that among a group of disabled students, “The ones who know a lot about their families tend to do better when they face challenges,” The last paragraph of the article: "The bottom line: if you want a happier family, create, refine and retell the story of your family’s positive moments and your ability to bounce back from the difficult ones. That act alone may increase the odds that your family will thrive for many generations to come."

So, we are using that article, and also one by Quentin L Cook The Joy of Family History Work, to plan the Cook O Rama for September. We are going to invite families this year, and have a couple of skits that can be used in Family Nights, and some FHE lessons, etc. Then at the end, we'll probably spend a short time teaching everyone how they can get started on family history--especially for those of us who feel, "so much has been done, I'm overwhelmed, and I don't know where to start." (So, mark your calendars now because I think this will be an excellent way to spend your time on Sept. 1).

Anyway, reading these articles and thinking about these assignments led me to ask all my children for memories. Adrienne and Caitlyn responded.

Adrienne:Hey, so I was thinking about some of my favorite memories traveling. And I remembered Goblin Valley. That was SO much fun! We played hide and seek and lots of other games that I can't remember, but I do remember how much fun we all had as a family! Also, when we would drive to Florida dad would put that mattress in the back of our BMW, [Big Mormon Wagon] and we would bounce around and have a party the whole way there!

There was one time I was lucky enough to come to Utah with you and Tom before he passed and I remember walking out into the snow one of the mornings we were there and the snow being so deep that Tom just sunk right down in!

Caitlyn said that the memory she wanted to share was when we went to the Yurt:

When I was around 8 years old we went on the Yurt trip. It was around Christmas time. I remember the long drive and the long hike up to the Yurt. I wasn't a fan of the snow shoes. I remember pushing my feet up and down in the snow and beginning to get tired. I remember AJ and Adrienne were married and Elise was recently returned from her mission. Toby (Nick's friend) came along as well. When we got there, I fought Jennie for the top bunk, but we ended up sharing, which was a mistake.

It was a fun trip at the beginning. I remember the warmth of the small fire, the struggle to make clean water with snow. I remember the delicious scones and the warm hot chocolate. We played cards game, weird games, some other games I don't remember. And--I remember how cold it was. It took us forever to get warm. Then comes the bad part. During the night Jennie was trying to get into my sleeping bag because she was cold. I refused her entry like I usually do (although I think we are better friends now). And then I remember falling off the bed--that 6 foot high bed--onto the hard wood floor--stupid night terrors. I remember throwing up all night long. I felt bad for everyone else. I remember that most of my siblings were mad at me because they wanted to sleep. And I remember Toby making sure that I was all right, and concluding that I had a concussion. That night was one of the longest nights of my life. When everyone was awake the next morning, I remember the smell of French toast in the air and how I was not allowed to have any because I would throw it up. That was the worst part of the trip. But I remember there were funny parts, too. I remember seeing Toby's name in the snow the next morning--written in pee. I remember mom struggling to find a flashlight in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom [in the outhouse] and her panicky self. Then as we went back, I was lucky enough to ride on AJ's sled with the cooler. good thing he's strong. The car ride back was a little bit miserable because I was nauseous the whole way, but I had my coke and my saltines. We got back on Christmas Eve. I was worried our Christmas was ruined, but, it turned out to be one of the best Christmases yet.

I can't help but add my memories of that experience:

The hike in to the yurt was really fun. It was only about 1 1/2 miles but it was very cold and the snow was very deep. We had snowshoes, which were fun but a lot harder than I had thought they would be, so I didn't use them the whole time. We did have a great time in the evening, it was when we all went to bed that things changed. The Yurt had this large, insulated door that you were supposed to close to keep the heat in. We had the wood stove going but we never figured out what that insulated door was until we were leaving the next day--needless to say, it was freezing. We could not get warm. The bunk beds had pads--but they were a joke. I couldn't get warm--or comfortable. Sleep would never come for me. I also was the one who made the mistake of allowing Caitlyn to sleep on the top bunk. I don't know why I didn't think about her night terrors. I got up to go to the outhouse at about midnight. I had to go alone. It was 0 degrees outside. At regular intervals, Caitlyn would scream, then settle down again. At about 1:00, she sat up, screamed, and rolled out of bed. At least after that I had company in my sleeplessness. No one got much sleep after that. I told Roy he'd never get me back to a Yurt again, and I've been true to my word.

This week I went to a funeral of a man who was in our ward until about a year ago when his wife left him. He had been addicted to pain killers all of his adult life and as a result lost his health and his wife. He was one year older than I am. It was a sad funeral. The three children shared memories of their dad. The memories of the two sisters were not very complementary memories, in my opinion. The older daughter remembered when her dad had taken her to "Galaxy Diner" to get a chocolate coke and a cherry coke--it was a Sunday. She remembered thinking it was bad, but because it was her dad it would be okay. Walking out of the diner with their cokes, her dad tripped and spilled coke all over the both of them. He looked at her and said "Let this teach you that you should never break the Sabbath." Then he said, "What are we going to tell mom."

The other one was even less complementary--the younger sister remembered going hunting--just her and her dad. She was wearing big waders to protect her from the wet and cold, and while walking behind her dad, she got stuck in the mud. She knew she was supposed to be quiet, so she just waited several minutes until he noticed she wasn't with him. He came back and lifted her out of the mud and turned around and began walking again. She had so much muck and mud in her boots that she tipped right over. Again, her dad didn't notice for some time and she patiently waited for him to come back. When he did, he laughed and dumped all the muddy water out of her boots and put them back on her. She said her feet were cold all day, but they didn't go home because, "we haven't killed anything yet."

I'm not sure why she would share that memory. I hope at my funeral your memories are happier.

These stories did remind me of a couple of times that we did not keep the Sabbath as we had been taught. The first was when I was pregnant with Dan. We went over conference weekend down to the Sand Dunes. The plan was to play and enjoy Nick on Saturday, and then to listen to Conference on the radio on Sunday. Sunday morning, a neighboring camper offered Roy the use of his three-wheeler. The fact that it was Sunday was forgotten completely. We didn't even think about it. Roy took the three-wheeler for a ride on the dunes and came back to take me for a spin. I got on the back and we went off. As we headed up a hill, the three-wheeler started to tip and we went over. It landed on me. Roy was concerned about me because I was pregnant. He jumped up and pulled the bike off of me. I looked at him and blood was literally spurting out of his leg. He looked down and saw it and immediately sat down and put pressure on his leg. He told me, "If I pass out, continue to put pressure on the wound until you can get the bleeding stopped." Luckily for me, he didn't pass out. I had to drive the motor home (we were using my parent's motor home) and take him to the hospital. He had a lot of stitches. The first question my dad asked when we called him and told him what happened was, "Did it happen on a Sunday?" He had also learned his lessons of the Sabbath the hard way.

There was another time that we broke the Sabbath. We had been asked by Wendy Sharon (one of the actresses in some of our plays) to go to Road Atlanta. Her husband owned it, so we could go in with VIP tickets. Our first response was that we should say no. It was on a Sunday. But we kind of talked ourselves out of that option. Paul Newman was racing that day and we thought maybe it would be okay just this once. We didn't have anything terrible happen--but our kids were disappointed in us and the day was kind of miserable because of it. Paul Newman didn't even look up at all the people gathered to watch him get ready to race. Not even a wave. I remember being disappointed in him as a person, that he wouldn't acknowledge his fans.

No one else sent me a memory. You can all try again for next week :)

Other than thinking about family history and memories, we also made some new memories this week. Monday night Roy and I went with friends out to dinner and to the Hale Center theater to see Big River. It is amazing the talent they can get to act in the plays there. Roy left Tuesday to go on High Adventure with the young men. Yes, he's been released, but when you have a boat, you're never really released :) I spent 3 days sewing. It was great. I also was able to spend a lot of time with Caitlyn. We practiced violin, played a few games of Splendor, and watched Merlin as well as a movie or two.

Nick was also with Roy at the High Adventure Camp. He braved the cold water for a bit of wake boarding.

You'd think that Roy would've been tired and wanting a rest when he got back. However, he couldn't rest Friday afternoon/evening because he was helping with the Bountiful 24th of July parade. He helps every year as part of the Ham Radio Club. Their job is to keep the parade moving along and to minimize the gaps in between entries. This year he did that, but he also was in charge of getting a group of Young Single Adults there to pull handcarts. He took care of all of that Friday afternoon and evening, and then, as he is starting to realize how few weekends we have left to play this summer, he wanted to take the boat out. Crista, Matt and Ruby were our willing captives on Saturday. We went up to Strawberry to fish, Matt, Crista, Roy and Caitlyn threw their lines out. No success. When we pulled up the anchor to change locations, it was obvious why we had been so unlucky--all four lines had gotten caught in the anchor rope. I guess it was because it was so windy (or lack of skill???)