It's A Wonderful Life

All of us go through hard things in life. Some go through more difficult experiences than others and some are placed in situations and have emotions that we can't imagine. Several of our children fit into this last group of people. So many of their most vulnerable years were spent in situations that damaged them emotionally. Have given them burdens to bear and scars to heal. Today we witnessed a glimmer of the pain that comes with hard things. I only reveal these things so others may learn and become aware of our responsibility to love, nurture and heal as our Savior would. Scott and I were reading in his book when he said something about being slapped in the face. I asked him to explain what happened. His pent up hurt exploded out of his body. He raised his voice, tears flowed, body tensed and he became very animated as he began to tell me the story. When he was 8 one of the orphanage staff poured him a glass of hot water. It is customary in China to drink hot water no matter

As the saying goes, "The third time is a charm."  This was especially true with our attempts at a successful zip-line in our back yard.  Our nephew Kurt made it happen...  1st attempt: On Labor day we cemented in a steel pole for our 90 foot zip line.  That bent enough to put slack in the cable as soon as Creed went down it.  We subsequently dug the pole and about 3 bags worth of cement out with it.  2nd attempt: We then went to a wood post, but the largest I found was a 4x6 at Home Depot.  I wanted an 8x8 or larger, but couldn't find one readily available. The lumber post was much better than the steel, but with the zip line attached 10 feet up the pole, there was still a lot of leverage and it still flexed too much. 3rd attempt: Master Builder, brother-in-law, David, suggested a dead man anchor to add tension in the opposite direction.  Nephew Kurt was here for a couple of days with Kayla and the girls and he had extra time on his hands.  He said he loves project

  4   That's the number of geysers we have had in our back yard in the last 6 years. If you remember, it was just this spring that we had our last water pipe break. Olivia ran it over with the lawn mower. This time however was not our fault. Pierce, Hannah and cousin Jacob were preparing to do the Ice Bucket Challenge. They got out the 50 gallon cooler and Pierce turned the spigot on in the backyard. He turned the handle and noticed the water felt sluggish. He couldn't figure out what was wrong.  A very short moment later a gush of water shot up and sprayed him right in the face. Kids came running in the house where I was preparing for dinner and to have friends come over to watch a movie outside. The kids were screaming "There's another geyser!" My thought was, "Who did it this time?"  And "How embarrassing!" I knew the firemen came out to take care of situations like this after hours and I wasn't r

This is the first of 3 flooring projects.  The entry first, then the kitchen, then the family room.  We broke out the tile by the door and ripped out the carpet to all the doorways leading from the entry.  Now we can replace all the carpet separately in each room as needed instead of all at once.   Wonderboard first.... I had to do it right, or my brother-in-law the temple builder would have had me tear it all out and start over. Travertine with a marble inlay around the perimeter.  I think we saved about $2,000 doing this ourselves, but I won't count up the hours I spent doing it...it may not work out to be minumum wage.  At least, I didn't give up many hours from my day job, just a bit of sleep, and those hours are pretty inexpensive.  I only hit 4:00 AM once....  Deanne helped when she could, but most of it was a one-man job.  She felt guilty to go to bed without me so she either stayed up doing stuff or fell asleep on the couch waiting for me.     We

Q: What is better than sleeping out in the backyard?  A: Watching a movie, then falling asleep in the backyard.  This is the morning after a movie night. Most of the kids are still in their sleeping bags in this picture.  It's always tempting to turn on the sprinklers to wake them up...

Nothing like a baseball game under the lights!  I took 10 kids to the minor league Salt Lake Bees game a few weeks ago and a few things made it memorable, besides the score...our team got slaughtered 13-2.  First of all, we had my Niece Chloe with us and it was her first baseball game ever.  It was also the first time she found out that I played baseball in my younger days.  I was already her favorite uncle, but that sealed the deal. Another memorable moment came when I bought $17 worth of cotton candy and passed it down the row for everyone to share.  The lady in back of me said to her husband, loud enough for me to hear, "That is such a nice man in front of us to buy a treat for everyone in his row."  I didn't spoil her "moment" and let her believe what she wanted. Besides, it would have sounded awkward to turn around and say, "They are all mine and it was my parental responsibility to overpay for colored sugar so my kids would endulge their fath