March 2019

03 March 2017

March – Home again!

Each time we have returned home from our wanderings, it takes an effort to remember our ward family again. Yet, our old brains are warming up and we have met with success.

Dedication is given again to continue our classes at the Family History Center with Dorothy and Dennis Croft teaching us. And yet, it seems that Dawn is “forever learning and never coming to an understanding,” because of her need to first take care of the years of pictures she has collected. Her goal is to organize them in binders for her children and return others to the givers. Blaine works steadfastly at F.H. and applies what he has learned.

Blaine has digitized the 1,200 slides with the help of a gadget that converts them to digital images. He then put many of the pictures of his family on a CD and gave one to each of his children. He also prepared pictures for Julia and Woody, giving them each a CD as well. Blaine was slowed down only a little by a nasty, combative cold which Dawn was happy to repel.

Dawn also spent many happy hours of scanning all of the family pictures from her ancient Treasures of Truth book with the hope of eventually converting these to the Family Search Gallery. Vickie Hurley, a Nauvoo missionary, has convinced her that she should also scan all of her children’s childhood pictures as well, and putting them on a CD. We enjoyed a meal with Neil and Vickie, a fun loving couple, who live in Rigby, only 20 minutes away.

Perhaps the most exciting part of this month has been preparing and enjoying the joys of a colonoscopy. The best part was having a partner to share the experience with, having two bathrooms and knowing that it’s over for 10 years.

When at Brady’s one day, Blaine admired the pool tables and expressed a yearning for one. Dawn, who had received no small sum for the sale of her brother’s home, thought she could afford one. The purchase was sweetened by getting a shuffle board and a ping pong table topper thrown in the deal. But the best deal of all is that Woody, Val and Julia are avid pool players and now enjoy visiting.

Dawn’s birthday unfolded by first going to a breakfast at Christine’s ward, hanging out with Blaine at home and attending “Extrava-dance” that evening put on by BYU-I dance teams. Sarah drove us to the event, Christine paid and we all loved it! The birthday girl also loved the two cakes given her – a chocolate cheese cake via the Crofts and a tiramisu cake, the most delicious ever, that Julia baked at great expense in time and effort. Rumor has it that Julia forgot Dawn’s birthday and, out of guilt, made her the best cake ever. Even with two cakes, no weight was gained. Amazing!

Second only to the colonoscopy in excitement came the selling of our home. The good news, James Elston, our realtor explained, was that the buyers didn’t ask for a price reduction, would pay in cash, and would close early – on April 10^th. It’s a good thing that the price was stable because we learned that we needed to put on a new roof which Blaine suspected in the first place. Drat! However, we are delighted that the house sold.

Our VW was taken out of obscurity in the depths of the garage when we had a need to use it while our Honda CRV’s dent was being obliterated. The VW is a heroic little car, starting the first time after two years in isolation. It is also admired by many such that Blaine is reconsidering its sale.

For Home Teaching, Blaine had the great idea of taking the Bailey family to the Idaho Museum and to Mickey D’s beforehand. We wanted to include Mason Hollingshead and while texting Jenny, I invited the entire family who met us at the museum. The display was fascinating and benefited Mason who was studying the Roman Empire in school.

Because Dawn didn’t make any R.S. birthday reminder calls nor any R.S. conference reminder calls, she felt a need to do something for General Conference and so put together notebooks with the apostles picture tabs to write notes in for many of the sisters that she visit teaches and home teaches with Blaine. After a few days effort, she and Blaine delivered all of the notebooks and candy that went with it. She knows that it has been appreciated as expressed by Sisters Kingsford, Brandon and Hollingshead.

Margaret Barfuss sent me an email announcement of her choir, the Chauntennettes, singing at a special fireside where Lloyd Newell, voice of the “Music and the Spoken Word,” is the guest speaker. I initially didn’t consider going since I knew Blaine wouldn’t want to drive. But then I thought, “I COULD drive!” That is, if Christine were to come with me. She agreed and we picked up Angie Bytheway and met Geri Brinley there. It was a sweet presentation and it was marvelous to meet with Margaret and Janean Godbold who also sang in the choir. Independent was how I felt!

Blaine and I feel extremely blessed for our kind ward family, for our good health, for our sweet families, the sale of our home and for the possibility or our next mission. We are also extremely grateful for each other and for the love of our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.