Great Wolf Lodge

We went to the Great Wolf Lodge for the second time this year. This time it was with Steven and Micah's family. The pictures are from the arcade, Wiley's Woods and the water park. Great time was had by all.

Proud Grandparents

Tonight we enjoyed a piano recital including 5 of our grandsons. The piano teacher made a point of acknowledging us and our grandsons. Gunnar, Qatar and Ezekiel Peters and Connett and Benjamin Bremner all did great - how fun to see our grandchildren excelling at one of my favorite accomplishments - I love piano music. Sorry for the poor photos.

Travel Documents Completed

When we arrived home last Friday we discovered a long list of items the Church Travel Office needs before we can go to Iceland. The list - Signed passports (we got those in September last year), 2 photocopies of the passport photo/ID page (easy), Residence Permit (easy to complete), 3 Passport type photos (just sent the ones we used for our passports to Walgreen's and walked over and picked them up), Notarized police letter (a challenge as the person who does them has been out. When I went to pick them up they were not notarized as requested. I was told to come back later as the person was busy. Same story when I came back later but the clerk at the window was very nice and somehow got them notarized for me), Application for sickness cost insurance (for Iceland) (not to difficult), Authorization form (easy) and finally 2 photocopies of marriage certificate (finding it was a question but found right away). So today with our police letter finally in hand I overnighted all to the Church Travel Department as requested. It is no wonder missionaries assigned to Iceland spend their entire mission in Iceland. Also an interesting day - Iceland experienced a 6.1 earthquake.

Another Blessing

Another blessing of babysitting our grandsons in Utah is the access to great books in their libraries. I checked one out and brought it with me to Oregon and what a great book. I highly recommend it to everyone. It is "I need Thee every hour - The joy of coming to Christ" by Blaine M Yorgason. Many years ago he wrote Spiritual Progression in the Last Days. Then after several years serving his Ward as Bishop he was asked by Sheri Dew to update and republish it. After rewriting the many chapter it came to him he had written an entirely new book and thus the new title. He strengthened my understanding of the Gospel more fulling. The following is taken from the last page of the book: "First that virtually any on of us, no matter our station in mortality, has the capacity to achieve all the spiritual possibilities and triumphs the Lord holds out to us through His scriptures and His prophets. And second, that Jesus Christ lives and stands waiting with outstretched arms to 'take up his abode with us,'and that He will do so as quickly as we are willing to put aside the world and surrender our hearts and lives wholly to Him." The book will open your eyes to the scriptures in ways that I never understood before.

Eileen will love the food in Iceland?

For those of you who know Eileen's dislike for fish you probably wonder what she is going to eat in Iceland. It even gets better when you read what I just found out is the cuisine of Iceland.

"Iceland offers wide varieties of traditional cuisine. Þorramatur (food of the þorri) is the Icelandic national food. Nowadays þorramatur is mostly eaten during the ancient Nordic month of þorri, in January and February, as a tribute to old culture. Þorramatur consists of many different types of food. These are mostly offal dishes like pickled ram's testicles, putrefied shark, singed sheep heads, singed sheep head jam, blood pudding, liver sausage (similar to Scottish haggis) and dried fish (often cod or haddock) with butter.

Much of the cuisine centres around Iceland's fishing industry. Traditional dishes include Hákarl (putrefied shark), graflax (salmon marinated in salt and dill), hangikjöt (smoked lamb), hrútspungar (pickled ram's testicles), and slátur (sausages made from sheep entrails). A popular food is skyr made of cultured skim milk, in the summer time it may be served with bilberries as a dessert."

We had a hard time with the food in Romania - this is going to be even more interesting.

Icleand Here We Come!

I got a call from the Senior MTC language training personnel to set up our language training plan. The surprise came when he told me we would be speaking Icelandic. I called the Senior Missionary Coordinator to ask if that was the language we are to learn since there was nothing about language in our call. Yes we have been called to the Denmark Copenhagen Mission submission Iceland. So for all those who have told us they want to visit us on our mission, you may have second thoughts now. I had already requested Danish language train materials so I guess that will have to change. Learning one language is hard enough - I don't see two.

OUR MISSION CALL!

Eileen is in Tooele, Utah with our grandson's babysitting and I am in Lake Oswego, Oregon looking after my mother. While in Church yesterday my phone started vibrating so when I got home I checked it and Amanda wanted me to call Steven's. Mom also told me Steven called and we had our call. Lisa, Paige and Amanda gathered at Steven's and Lisa called Kristi, Amanda called Eileen and Micah called me (Randy was on an airplane and Heidi in Church and Steven had to catch a plane). Backing up a bit - we were in Japan when our first mission call came and so Lisa and David called us there and read our call to Romania. This time we wanted to open our call but you can see our kids didn't want to wait for two weeks until we got home. We were excited to find out too. So Paige opened and read our call to the Denmark Copenhagen Mission reporting to the MTC on September 22, 2008 to prepare to teach the Gospel. For those who may not know or remember, Eileen did not want to go on a proselyting mission the first time, but after our experience in Romania she is excited to do it again. This call is another example of the Lord's hand in the work. I was contacted by the Polynesian Cultural Center to be their Architect and they submitted a request for me to serve there. The family history department outside the US also said they were requesting us as well as the CES department and we think our good friends the Boggesses submitted a request to join them in Nigeria. With all those requests it was a surprise to be called to Denmark. We love the people in Romania and serving them so are excited for the opportunity to do it in Denmark even though the thought of trying to learn another language is still beyond me. What a blessing to be a member of the Lords Church.

Book for new parents and grandparents

We have been babysitting since Saturday and Tyler and Jacob are great kids and Jacobs sleep habits are amazing. I have never had or seen a one year old that goes to bed on a set schedule with absolutely no protest of any kind. We just put him in his crib with his blanket and say night night and he lays down and we don't hear from him again until his two naps are over or it is time to get up in the morning. I am sure you find that hard to believe and I would too if I wasn't here experiencing it. Heather tells us it is the result of the book Good Night, Sleep Tight by the sleep lady Kim West. While I haven't read it, I highly recommend it to all new parents and for you grandparents reading our blog to recommend to your kids when they have a new baby. If you have any questions call Heather - it truly is a miracle in my opinion and what a blessing for the babysitter!

Ty's favorite Aunt

Aunt Lisa sent Tyler a Halloween costume which Tyler has decided is fun to wear right now. She also sent him snow boots which he was wearing for the first pictures I took but then I decided to take more and he had them off. Aunt Lisa is always sending clothes for Tyler which he loves to get but I don't think it will happen much more as Tyler is catching up height wise with his cousin JT. Jacob also wanted to be in the pictures.

Nothing like a blizzard in May!

About 3 PM we finally decided we had no choice but to stay in Sidney NE another night. We got up at 5 AM Saturday and took off without breakfast. There were still lines and lines of trucks parked from the day before so I wasn't positive everything was open. We ran into lots of ice on the roads as we left Sidney but that didn't last too long and the next bad area was the pass west of Cheyenne. We made it in time to spend an hour with Randy, Heather and the boys before taking them to the airport. Randy gave the boys a blessing that they would not be unhappy or cry while Mom and Dad were gone. When I got back from the airport Eileen said the boys were doing great - the wonder of blessings. We had a good evening with them and then today they were happy to see us in the morning and they did great at Church.

Stuck in Nebraska

We left Austin May 1 at 9 AM and we arrived in Sidney NE about 7:30 PM. I would like to have continued on but the winds were 50 to 70 MPH from the right making it difficult to handle the car. We got up this morning thinking we would continue on even though the winds never stopped during the night. We looked out the window and found it was nasty out but worse yet we found out I 80 was closed from Cheyenne to Laramie. Then we found out I 80 from Sidney to the Wyoming boarder was closed. The picture is of Cabella's well it would be if the snow and wind didn't hide it. We have been on the phone and checking all websites for weather and road conditions all day and the storm seems to have settled on top of us and we don't appear to be going anywhere. I have been in the lobby many times today and there has been a steady flow of people coming from the east having to get off here at Sidney to spend the night. The first one I talked to was at 11 this morning. He left North Platte and 6 AM and said the roads were bad mainly because of all the trucks that had jackknifed. The trip should have only taken 2 hours not 5 that it took him. He is on his way to Boise. The family moved and he was in the process to trying to sell the car and was going to fly with the cat to Boise but ended up driving instead and was not too happy about it. We are supposed to be in Tooele today to take care of Tyler and Jacob but we won't make it today. We are now praying we can make it tomorrow.