Flooding in East TN

Idaho 2007 - Squirrel Meadows

Marilyn looks great no matter what!

Update: David here...I found some pictures.

Boy, it really has been raining a lot around here—I am prepared for the floods!

I have long legs and have always had a hard time finding pants that fit good and are long enough. I don’t have a full length mirror, so I never know what I look like from the waist down—and especially now, since I can’t see beyond my big round belly! Well, my wardrobe is VERY limited right now and when I don’t do laundry every few days a have to resort to some other options. I was very excited when my friend, April gave me some cute khaki maternity pants. She had a baby a few months ago and we’ve been trading clothes—it’s great to have something “new” to wear! I pulled on the pants, they fit and were comfortable and I thought I looked pretty good in them—that is until I went to run errands and saw my reflection in the glass doors at Little Caesar’s—oh boy, am I ever ready for the floods—they were TOTAL highwaters! (Sorry—no photo with this!—I’m sure that most of you have seen me wearing “floods” anyway!) At least I wasn’t in my pajamas--which has been my choice of attire as of late!

Everything Relates Back to Star Wars

I love having church at 9AM! At 8:30 it is a bit crazy, but it is all worth it when you are home at noon and have the rest of the day together—to rest, make desserts, visit people, and play games. Lately, we have put KK to bed early and had some VERY wonderful evenings of really studying the scriptures with the older kids. We usually just pick a topic, or a story and read and learn. Last night we did Adam and Eve and then it led to their posterity, including Enoch and his righteous city. We got talking about how old they lived many over 900 years! The kids were amazed that someone could live that long—“that is older than YODA!” They were also impressed with the prophets’ abilities to command mountains to move and rivers to turn in the course. Parker thought that would be like using the “force”—only better. Hopefully, they are gaining something from these discussions!

Best friends

Since these two are home from school without the other kids, they have become best friends. Being best friends also means you are worst enemies, but those times are few and far between.
Here is a picture of them together out in the mountains of North Carolina. It is actually two pictures that I put together, but who's counting?
Thanks to Cheryl Kiss for taking these pictures!

A Man in the Kitchen

I wish I had photo to go with this blog--just picture David in your mind hunched in the corner of the kitchen trying to "hide something". A while back David and I were in the kitchen making dinner together. He was doing the green beans--I usually put a beef bouillon cube and some dried onions in to add some flavor. Well, he was working on that portion of the meal and he was VERY quiet, hunched in a corner, with his back to me--obviously trying to hide something. Well, I of course, wondered what he was up to and went to investigate.

He was definitely trying to hide something. I peeked over his shoulder and saw him busily pulverizing the bouillon cube with a pair of needle nose pliers. I could not stop laughing—throughout the day, I would have the visual image come to my mind of him hunched in the corner! The funniest part was that he was trying to hide—he did say that he wiped them off before he used them!

Christmas vacation

We had a great 3 week vacation out West and loved the snow. Thanks to family for hosting us, and for Terri and Julia letting us use their van and snowmobiles.

When we first arrived. Only 9 inches of snow.

Parker snowmobiling throught the drifts.

More to come...

Gold Gorilla II - May You Rest In Peace

When I was a teenager, I had a gold 1972 Pontiac Grand Ville (grandma car) with a 455 in it. We named it the Gold Gorilla. When we bought our gold Chevy Express earlier this year, the kids dubbed it the Gold Gorilla II. Right before we went on vacation, someone hit Marilyn, forcing her off the road into a large brick mailbox. The impact caused $17,600 in damage, so our insurance totaled the van. No one was hurt (Marilyn said it was like busting through a snowbank), but the person who hit us drove off. Luckily the insurance covered it. We are sad, but will make another trip to Missouri to get the same van, only we have to get a white one because that is all they have left. It is quite the pain to get everything worked out, but we will have many great memories in our new van. Following are some of our grandest memories from the Gold Gorilla II:

1. David taking 13 kids sledding to Roan Mountain
2. Trip to Kirtland, OH for Thankful Halsey Pratt's (PP Pratt's first wife) grave dedication
3. Trips to Savannah, GA to meet Heimdals
4. Trip to Alma, AK for the excavation of PP Pratt's grave
5. 4500 mile trip across US for our July 2008 vacation (including sleeping in the van for 2 nights while David drove)
6. Temple trips, with stops at Denny's and CiCis pizza afterward
7. Mulitple hiking and biking trips.
8. Saving Marilyn and Grace's life in the accident
9. Taking out all the seats and hauling over 7000 lbs of food storage for the ward from the Knoxville cannery (over a number of trips)
10. Getting 10-11 mpg in the city, and 14-16 mpg on the highway. It is well worth it for the room and sanity.

What memories do some of you have?

Christmas Carols, FHE, and Swearing

No better place to learn how to cuss than in Family Home Evening! This is one of those classic stories.

Our Christmas party for church this year has an International theme. There are several people who are bringing food, decor, and sharing Christmas traditions from other countries. We are going to do some German Christmas carols and have been practicing. The kids are all great sports (for the most part) and for FHE we decided to go over the words to the song and try to sing it.

Here are the lyrics:
Still, still, still,
Weil's Kindlein schlafen will.
Die Englein tun schön jubilieren,
Bei dem Kripplein musizieren.
Still, still, still,
Weil's Kindlein schlafen will.


The pronunciation for the "st" is more like an "scht" or "sh" if you can't get all those letters in. Well, we are progressing quite well--David was teaching us how to say the words, we'd repeat, and then eventually sing. We sounded pretty good. Than Michael starts to get confused with the words--(notice there are lots of "scht" sounds. He says, "I don't get this Schitlein stuff" (instead of Kindlein or Kripplein). David and I laughed a bit and went on--until it came up again. "What is this Schitline"--he kept asking and we could not quit laughing. Eliza was the only other one who caught on to his cussing and we were laughing so hard, we couldn't stop. Sweet innocent Michael cussing up a storm about this sweet German Christmas carol.

It was quite the memory. I just hope that we can make it through our performance without losing it.