Sunday, August 31, 2008

Another two weeks have passed

Last week we attended the Twin Falls Temple Dedication. It was wonderful. That is the fifth temple dedication we have been able to attend. First the Palmyra Temple, then the Nauvoo Temple, then the Winter Quarter’s Temple, then the Rexburg Temple last January and now the Twin Falls Temple. The first three were dedicated by President Hinckley; the last two by President Monson. Altho’ Elder Quinton Cook read the dedicatory prayer (it was the fourth dedicatory service that day) President Monson was there and did speak. His daughter, Sister Dibb was there also. She is the 2nd counselor in the General Young Women’s Presidency. Elder Costas also spoke and President Eyring conducted. It was very special. They showed pictures of the temple and its rooms before the dedication started. I remember thinking, “I’m so glad that we saw it in person because altho’ it looked beautiful in the pictures it was so much more beautiful in real life.

Today is our #2 son’s birthday. It was 44 years ago he was born. He was born the first day of school for the teachers at Manti High School. We were living in an upstairs apartment at that time. And even being 7 months pregnant when we moved in the stairs didn’t bother me half as much as they would now. J We had lived in Ephraim for ten months then moved to Manti the first of June. The main thing we noticed there was that Ephraim was very friendly and accepting. Manti gave you the feeling that if you weren’t born there, you didn’t belong. We lived there just barely a year. Our oldest son and I were sooo close before Michael was born. My husband worked in the turkeys that summer, feeding them etc. So Bryan and I were together just the two of us most of the time. My parents went and got Bryan and he stayed with them about ten days or so while I was in the hospital and recuperating from the birth. I missed Bryan sooo much. When Mama and Daddy first brought him home, he wouldn’t have a thing to do with me for days. He seemed to hold me responsible for the presence of that intruder. We have a picture of my husband holding both babies (Bryan was only 13 months old) and Bryan is looking at his brother with such an ambivalent look on his face. He soon grew to love his brother tho’ but it took a year or two or 14 or 15 for him to learn to respect him.

Last Tuesday Henderson Cleaning and Restoring came and started tearing up our upstairs bathroom. The bathtub leaked down into the basement, the toilet leaked down into the basement, and we have lived here 14 years with no major changes so we went for it! The floor is still torn up, there is a big hole in the wall where Evan is going to put in a new outlet. We have to wait a week or two for our vanity since it is smaller than any we could find and it has to be custom built. But the tub and shower are in and workable which they weren’t for two days! Evan first told us that they would tear things out the first day and have everything put back together by the end of the second day. It’s going to be a “little” longer than that. But it will be soo nice when we get it finished. I guess I should say when they get it finished.

I finally got into see Dr. Brooke who is a dermatologist. I had an infection in my left index finger around the nail. It still looks really bad. He said it was fungus and that the acrylic nails must come off. So after 15 years with beautiful nails, I’ll have to go back to ugly nails. He said if I didn’t bet rid of them I could lose all of my nails. I’m not willing to risk that. This is the first time I’ve had really any problem with anything like this in the 15 years. I can keep track because I first had them done for Kim and Kimberly’s wedding.

We have had a two week vacation from the FHC because they are doing some much needed construction; they are building a computer lab room which will be very nice to be able to teach our classes in there and have people doing the same thing you are teaching them while you are teaching them instead of just showing them how. It is so easy to forget what you learned by the time you try to do it yourself. We also got to go to Heather’s (Joy’s Heather) wedding last Saturday. That was the first tho’t I had when they told us it would be closed. “I get to go to Heather’s wedding after all!” it was very nice. Heather and Blaine plan to go thro’ the temple in a year. I’m really glad we were able to be there. We got to see my mother and two sisters and their husbands and my brother and his wife and many nieces and a nephew and their sweethearts that we hadn’t seen for awhile.

Sunday, August 17, 2008

A Busy Two Weeks

Last week we went to the Twin Falls Temple Open House. We left on Thursday about 11:00 am and went via way of the I 15, I 86 and I 84. We stopped at a rest stop about half way there. It had signs and posters about Massacre Rocks and the story about it. We tho’t maybe that was where we were but…Massacre Rocks is a State Park and this turned out to be just a “rest stop” We ate lunch there and used the facilities and then decided to check out a trail head. The sign said that at the end of the trail were the authentic ruts from the Oregon Trail. We tho’t we’d go a little ways. We had no idea how long it would be. It turned out to be on the other side of the freeway. We went in two tunnels to go under the freeway. I’m sure it was at least a mile one way. I was a little disappointed because the trail was covered with vegetation and we could only see one “rut” so we weren’t sure we were there on the Oregon Trail. But there were signs that said we were. We had seen the wagon ruts at the supper club at Soda Springs where you could see two ruts in stone and the same above Cheyenne toward Fort Laramie. So it wasn’t quite what we expected. I was thrilled to learn that I could still walk that far and that my back didn’t bother me at all. My hip ached but my back didn’t. I haven’t done as much walking this summer as I have the last two. They changed the walking class to Monday and Wednesday at 8:30 am. It wore me out the last two years and with my big weekends on Saturday at the FHC and then Sundays it’s hard to get moving early on Mondays. And with working at the center on Wednesday afternoon, I haven’t felt like I could do both. At the beginning of the summer, I had good intentions of walking on Tuesday and Thursdays like I did last summer but…..

We got to Twin Falls and the motel about 5:00pm or so. We walked a little way to a steak and seafood restaurant. We split a steak and shrimp dinner. Oh, that shrimp was succulent. I don’t think I’ve ever tasted shrimp so good. We saw Jean and Scott Jenkins there who used to live in our ward before they moved to Washington. It was quite a coincidence and very pleasant.

We went to the extended complimentary breakfast the motel had. That meant they had scrambled eggs and waffles along with the juices, drinks and fruit. It was very good and filling. We met an older couple from Bounitful, Utah who had come up for the open house. My husband asked the man’s name just as they were leaving. He was a Call. I told him that my grandmother was a Call. It turns out that his ancestor was a brother to my great great grandfather. I glad that my husband asked his name. We also met his daughter.

We left for the open house about 11:00 am. I had on a dress and also my missionary name tag. We have been told we are supposed to wear them whenever we are in Sunday dress. One of the sisters there greeting people as they entered the chapel, asked me “Are you reporting for duty?” I told her we were from Idaho Falls. She looked closer and saw that we were not proselyting missionaries. We waited in the chapel about 20 minutes then we went to watch the video talking about temples in general and their purpose and the Twin Falls temple in particular. After watching the video we walked next door to the temple. It is definitely a small temple but also a very beautiful one. It reminds of the Rexburg temple but is much smaller. It has only one ordinance room and Rexburg has two. The TF temple has a mural by Leon Parsons of the Shoshone Falls. It is gorgeous. Our host told us that Leon Parson went down there and precisely measured the room then built one of the exact same size in his studio in Rexburg. He painted the mural there and then rolled up the canvas and took it to TF. He does such beautiful work. The temple has the syringe, the Idaho State Flower thro’out it. In the stained glass windows and in some of the carpets. It is indeed a beautiful building. The dedication will be next Sunday. We received our recommend/tickets today to be able to go.

The last two weeks at the center have been busy. I’ve been able to help quite a few people, both patrons and new missionaries. Yesterday, a family of six came in to use PAF Insight to update records they had received from a man in Canada on who sent them over 16,000 names. We discovered that most of the people had died too late to be able to do their work. If it has been within 95 years one should obtain permission from the direct descendants if they are not of the immediate family themselves. So we had to take the check marks out of many of the boxes as we were doing the temple ready part to take the names to the temple. They still had between 50 and 75 names to take thro’ tho’. They were getting them ready for a family reunion. I was on my feet a lot going back and forth among them helping them and giving them advice when asked. I also taught a PAF class (which went well with two patrons and two missionaries in it) on the Print menu and helped a few other people too. One patron had finally found proof of a marriage of one ancestor that her mother had told her about for years. It was in the third column on a page. When she printed it out, only the first two printed out. One of the missionaries came to me to see if I knew what to do. I right clicked a few times and tried a few things (I was led by the Spirit) and we were able to get to a page to be printed that printed off all three columns. I felt good about that too. I know the Spirit led me because I don’t do trouble shooting when it comes to the computer. I just don’t have enough knowledge in that area.

I was very tired when I got home. I enjoyed watching some of the Olympics. I had recorded the basketball game between the USA and Spain and slept thro’ the whole third quarter. But that’s OK. The USA was so far ahead by then that I knew they would win. It was neat to watch Michael Phelps and the USA 4 X 100 medley swim race. Michael Phelps earned, with the help of his team mates, his 8th Gold Medal. In his interviews afterwards and again today he is so humble and gives his mom much of the credit. He’s a neat young man. He was diagnosed with ADHD as a young boy and that was how his mother helped him channel his energy was thro’ swimming. He does have long arms and long fingers which definitely helped. He won one race by .01 of a second. It is something to me that they can have that precise of a measurement.

Oh, and I saw Karen Huffacker who last month told me she and her husband were leaving in September for the MTC for a mission in Chile. I asked her again which mission it was and it is the Chile Concepcion, South mission, the same one that Chris is in. I was ecstatic to learn that. I was afraid that it was just Concepcion. They will be working in the office. She is taking care of the books and he taking care of the fleet of cars. So they should see Chris. They won’t get to Chile until just before Christmas but Chris will see them as he leaves if at no other time. I think it is very exciting.

Sunday, August 03, 2008

The NewFamilySearch

I had typed a whole page about my classes that I taught at the Family History Center Wednesday and Saturday. I hit control and aimed for C and hit V so everything was erased “Family History Center” was in it’s place that I have been putting on top of each of my lessons. So I will try to summarize and get everything in just not so long. It’s not earth shattering but almost….. J

I taught two classes last week. The one on Wednesday was on World Vital Records, a website of database links to various websites that can aid patrons in looking up and finding information on their ancestors. Since I didn’t know anything about it I spent a lot of time preparing. In the summer not very many patrons come in to do research. So we missionaries spend the time teaching each other about different websites so we can be knowledgeable enough to help the patrons this fall and winter when they start coming in again. There are different missionaries who work different days. e.g. Grandpa and I work on Wednesday and Saturday only. Others work other days. So there was a different teacher each day to teach the missionaries that day. I went to the class on both Monday and Tuesday which really helped. I woke up at 5:00 am Wednesday morning and couldn’t go back to sleep so got up and started working more on my class. It went well. I was able to find pictures of Grandpa Wendel and Johnny’s headstones that are down in the Spanish Fork Cemetery that someone had photographed and put on the site. I had never seen Johnny’s so I was very excited to see it and was so pleased with it mainly I guess because of the manner in which he died. I’m sending them to you so you can see them too. The class went very well.

We had to be at the center by noon because they are starting to teach us about the NewFamilySearch that we hope to get by the end of this year or the first of next year at the latest. The Winter Quarter’s Temple District and the Mesa Temple District are already rolled out and using the program. We will be teaching the Stake and ward consultants in South East Idaho so they are now letting us have hands on on working on the NewFamilySearch site. We can’t type in anything new but can combine duplicates and search and add people that way so if they are already in the system we can add them to our profile. It is so exciting. Anyway at noon they go thro’ the e-learning lessons with us and then at 1:00 we have a class taught by Sister Freeman who is part of the Support group that answers questions about the NewFamilySearch from all over the United States and maybe even the world. By the end of August there will be 104 temples out of the 128 working temples that have rolled out. So we should be fairly soon we are hoping. The temples in Idaho and Utah are the last to be rolled out. That way hopefully all of the bugs will be rolled out.

On Saturday I taught the Beginning PAF class on GEDCOM files and Exporting and Importing files. It went very well. I was glad that I have taught this before and have used it often so I am familiar with it. There are some new missionaries that come to it. There were 8 there counting me which is a good size. I passed off all the questions on the sheet for the e-learning lessons for the NewFamilySearch that I found the answers to by going thro’ the lessons. I then got online with the NewFamilySearch and worked on my file. They told us last Wednesday that we can combine and search and add new people to our file but we can’t type in anything new because we are working under someone’s number. There is a lot that has to be done with it to make it right. I have been able to correct some of the things with combining and searching but there will be lots to do when I can get registered which won’t be until we are in the 90 day window of when our temple district will start using it. It is sooo exciting tho’. Both Bryan and Richard’s temple district has it. In a way I envy them. But it is getting closer.