Utah 2014: Day 13

Most of us went to church at James and Ann's ward. They both spoke in Sacrament meeting about the scriptures. James told about the time when he climbed Weaver's Needle. When he was climbing back down he realized he was slipping, but the Spirit prompted him to wrap the rope around his leg, and then as the rope spun he saw an iron rod in the rock that he was able to grab. He said that this experience taught him a powerful lesson about the power the scriptures can have in our lives. After Sacrament meeting we had to say goodbye to Alan and Tiffany and their kids.

Kevin and Heidi went to Primary and nursery and did just fine, although I had to sit with Kevin for quite a while. When we got back I asked Kevin if he had a nice time in Primary. He responded, "No, I didn't like it, because they were just putting rocks in the kids' shoes and I told them not to but they wouldn't stop, and I didn't like that." I asked Lucy (his cousin) for clarification since they had been in the same class, but she wouldn't elaborate, so I have no idea what the rocks in the shoes were about.

That evening Ryan gave Ann Marie a name and a blessing at Becky's house. We had a huge crowd. In addition to Ryan's family, my family, my grandparents, and many of my aunts and uncles and their children came. I think there were about 80 people. Ryan, James, my dad, Jared, some of my uncles, and some of our brothers-in-law were able to be in the circle. What a blessing it was to look around the room and feel the love and support of so many people.

Ryan gave Ann Marie a sweet blessing. In particular, he said that she has a special talent to be a calming influence in the lives of people around her.

After the blessing we had hoagie sandwiches and a variety of side dishes and desserts. It was great to have some time to talk to everybody. We don't get to see our family very often because we live so far away. We were especially grateful to Becky for hosting such a huge crowd. It was a very special day.

Utah 2014: Day 12

In the morning we met at the duck pond to have family pictures taken. We had pictures of the individual families, then we had pictures of the entire family. We haven't seen the pictures yet, but hopefully they turned out nice. Heidi was very sad and tired and refused to smile for any of the pictures, but I think she at least looked at the camera.

After pictures we all had yummy doughnuts and we played around the duck pond for a while. Then Ryan and I and the kids went over to Ann and James' house for a while. James digitized a book (The History of Mapleton) for me. It mentions several of my ancestors and has pictures of them in it.

Later in the afternoon we went to Becky's and the kids did water games and then we had dinner. After dinner we had a family home evening and Ryan's dad told about how he and Ann met and got married, and then he told the story about John Tanner. (It's a really incredible story and makes me feel very awed and blessed to have married into the Tanner family.) After family home evening we had a birthday party for all the summer birthdays. Since Kevin's fifth birthday would be in a few days, he got to have the dinosaur on top of the cake. He was very excited. Then we all enjoyed cake and several delicious flavors of homemade ice cream.

Here is a video of us singing happy birthday. I really enjoyed Kevin's little happy dance at the end.

Utah 2014: Day 11

In the morning we went to the Bean Museum.

Then we went to Grandma and Grandpa Tanners' house for lunch.

Some of the cousins were discussing genetic traits, like whether or not it's normal for a person's second toe to be longer than the big toe.

Alan and Paul (and maybe some others?) were installing a central vacuum system in Ann and James' new house.

In the evening we went to Becky's house for dinner, and then the adults talked while the cousins watched home videos that Ryan and his siblings had made years ago.

Utah 2014: Day 9 & 10

On Wednesday, the 9th, we packed up our things and headed south for the family reunion with Ryan's family. We had been debating about whether to stop at Temple Square or not on the way, but Ann Marie made our minds up for us by starting to cry for food just as we were coming to the right exit. So we stopped and found a place to park across from the Conference Center. I fed the baby, and then we took a tour of the conference center, guided by a very nice senior missionary who was very understanding of our active kids.

After the tour, we decided to hurry and see a couple of other things before going back to the car. Just as we were about to cross the street, Ryan heard a "Tch-tch" and turned to see his sister Amy looking out of the window of a van. (Ryan is hard-wired to hear that sound even in a noisy crowd, but I was still impressed that he heard it over all the traffic in Salt Lake.) So we said hi to them and then crossed the street to Temple Square. We took a look in the tabernacle and then decided the kids were more than done. Heidi was really disappointed because she had wanted to touch the temple (and she still keeps talking about how we didn't get to touch the temple--if I had realized how much she had been fixated on that idea maybe we would have made the effort to go touch the temple even though they were tired).

Once we had made it back to the car we headed to Ryan's sister Eliza's house. We stayed downstairs in her basement apartment, which was actually where we lived during the summer right after we got married, so that was cool. Even better, this time we got to sleep on a nice bed instead of leaky air mattresses (after we got married we replaced our air mattresses twice because they got tiny holes in them that liked to start leaking in the middle of the night). We brought things in and chatted for a while and then went to Becky's house for dinner with ice cream sundaes afterwards.

The next morning Ryan went and talked to some former professors at BYU. I had been hoping to go walk around on campus and say hello to the professor who was my supervisor when I TAed for Physical Science 100, but I was really tired and I opted to stay at Eliza's and take a nap instead. Between having a new baby and two active kids and being busy spending time with family, I never did get a chance to go on campus at all. Oh well.

In the afternoon a lot of people went to Thanksgiving Point, but we ended up staying so that Heidi could take a nap. We heard later that it was way too crowded, so it was probably better that we didn't go that day.

We had dinner at Becky's house most nights.

Utah 2014: Day 8

Melissa had gone back home on the 5th, Ian had left for Scout Camp on the 6th, and my dad left to join Ian at Scout Camp on the morning of the 7th, so the house was getting more empty. On the 7th we went to a park for a while.

Kevin drew this picture of our family on the sidewalk at my parents' house.

These trains at the park are supposed to be the Jupiter and the 119 from the Golden Spike monument.