Who’s Carin’ About Aaron?

This is an early birthday wish to Aaron because we are losing our internet tomorrow.
Yes, we signed up for the Qwest bundle thinking it lasted forever. The small print said otherwise & now it is over $45 per month. We can get that price anywhere. Not to worry we will go to the library, Aaron’s or Grandma Crane's.

Yeah, it is Aaron’s birthday soon,& good news he is still in the lower 30’s. Many changes are taking place @ his home with Mauri’s new job & the taxidermy business. He has had many calls and hopefully a healthy business will result from this. Since the bow hunt began this month, he has been busy stalking the wildlife. They have stayed under the radar so far, but it is just a matter of time before he bags a big one. This great dad, husband, worker, scout leader & hunter is keeping busy until then. Happy Birthday, may you be & do all you dream of and then some.

SO OLD SOLD!

Sold the white 1940's dresser for the same price we bought it for 20 years ago to an older couple buying furniture for their new winter home in Mesquite. What is next?

Colonoscopy vs. Table, colon wins

I've got money going down the crapper - literally! I have to have a colonoscopy on Thursday to figure out just what on earth we need to do about my Ulcerative colitis. I guess that means that the table that I want is going to be put on the back burner for now. (I've been saving, but figured I'd wait until I knew what Jed's work situation for the future is - basically if there's any chance we'd move. Why buy a nice new table and chairs just to turn around and move them? What's the opinion on this set? I really like it - it's the style that I'd like to get. I need to see it in person, however.) Anyway, wish me luck on the liquid diet tomorrow and all of the other fun things that go along with this little look into the great unknown! (Does colon cleanse sound a little bit better?)

Eating Healthy- What’s in Your Drink?

Did you know? Soft drinks have the highest amount of added sugar in our diets. Sports drinks are full of sugar & water is better. Soft drinks provide empty calories that don’t give the body any nutrients. They lead to extra weight, putting you at risk for extra, cavities, weight, diabetes, blood pressure, heart attacks & strokes.

Instead of a soft drink: Drink Water-you should drink 64 ounces per day.

Drink Milk-Aim for 3 servings of dairy daily. Low fat or fat free is a good way.

Drink 100% Juice-drink juice in moderation but whole fruit/veggies is the best choice.

Drink (20 ounces) Amount of Sugar (teaspoons) in drinks

Propel Berry 1.25

Gatorade Lemon Lime 8.75

Dole Orange Juice 13.75

Sprite 15.8

Coke 16.25

Pepsi 16.9

Dr. Pepper 16.9

Minute Maid Lemonade 16.9

A&W Root Beer 18

Mountain Dew 19.4

Sunkist Orange 21.7How much sugar in your favorite drink? From the label on the drink, check the grams of sugar & # of servings per container x 2 gives total grams. Divide by 4 will be #of tsp per serving

SOLD!!

We haven’t sold the Intrepid yet, but we did just sell the 2 Shopsmith woodworking tools (the dust collector & sander I bought for $1k) that I put on KSL.com last week. They’ve been taking up space for ten years & I decided we needed to make some money.

Our swamp conditioner is on its last leg. Selling off some old things will help us come up with the means to get central air. Is anyone opposed to us selling the living room couch & love seat (we could bring the one from our bedroom down), the desk, dresser, hutches & 2 poster beds (Breann’& Alicia’s rooms), antique white dresser in the sewing room (we kept patterns in) and anything else that I might think of or you suggest? Maybe we could throw in the Intrepid for free.

Mr. Schmidt, Is a 4th Grade Teacher?

Mr. Schmidt, may I go to the bathroom? I lost my pencil. Do I have to do this? My dog ate my homework. Who is John Wayne?

This is Mr. Schmidt, the new 4th grade teacher of Aspen Elementary in Orem. He has survived his first 2 days of school. Imagine that. After arriving at 6:30 am on his first day from a night of dreaming he had forgotten to show up, he actually faired okay. His writing is very legible, his room is nicely organized and he looks like the greatest new teacher in the USA. Don't you agree?

A Birthday Remembered

He would be 83 today, but died at 63. He served our country in WWII in the US Navy in the Pacific Ocean joining in 1943 just before turning eighteen. Dropping out of school like many peers his age, weighing about 120 lbs. but excited to see the world, he was one of four brothers to serve in the military. His job was a gunner’s mate & kitchen helper. Honorably released in 1948, he met Grandma and married a year later at the age of 24.

Jobs were sporadic at first, since he had no high school diploma. Exciting was the day when he was hired at Kennecott working on the track gang repairing the rails. Eventually he worked up to be a train engineer. He preferred the 3-11 pm shift, to allow more time for working the land. He enjoyed farming and going to the coffee shop to chum with and tease friends. As a loud laugher, chronic optimist, early riser, 24/7 worker and many a close call from farm & vehicle accidents, he had a full life. He was my dad, Gale Crane.

Just six months after retiring, he passed away with heart failure possibly due to body size or previous injuries. I loved the things he taught me through example. Often I would test my jokes on him at the dinner table, getting a positive response and bringing joy to my heart. I have his nose, work ethic and gift of tease. May you also think of him this day and remember how he influenced your life, too.

1600 Pages Later

Everyone has trials, challenges and faces crap on a daily basis. It’s looking for the positive in the hard times, the rainbow in the cloud, or making the best of a bad situation that helps us to try harder. Why not turn the problem into a good thing by using the energy invested to benefit your life. It could be a gift to ones self.

A year ago as I read the account of President Spencer W. Kimball’s reasons for reading the Bible, I decided to take the challenge in my fifty-fifth year and read the Old and New Testaments. I began, with advice that if one chapter was read per day, it could be completed within a year. Forty five days into the reading and with the calculations I made it would take three years to complete the goal. Therefore, I increased to three pages per day. Every morning upon waking at 3, 4 or 5 a.m. (this was my chronic problem), I would pull out the scriptures, read the allotted pages then go back to sleep (my blessing). With June 1st as my end date, the last few months I read five pages per day. I am happy to announce the mission is completed. What did I learn? Many great things about the creation, obedience, love, trust, Christ, commandments, promises and blessings were the most important to name a few. Mostly, I want to set goals to achieve more great things.

Sherman's Peak

Jed and I went to Nounan to visit his grandma Friday night and we hiked to the top of Sherman's Peak. It was a lot of fun. We drove up Skinner canyon a bit in his grandma's pickup and then we both got on a dirt bike and rode up to the base of the hike. (murderbike is more like it - I kept thinking of how I might just have to bail off the bike at certain spots of the ride. I was also concerned about breaking my arm, or neck for that matter!) We hiked up to the peak and I thought that I was going to simply DIE. (I think I'm in okay shape. I've been exercising regularly for a while now, but to no avail. I think my heart was about to beat right out of my chest!) It was worth it when we got to the top - we could see Soda Springs, Nounan and Georgetown; we could even see Bear Lake in the distance. There were so many colorful wildflowers all around. Down was a bit of an easier hike, but I think I may get blisters on some of my toes. While riding the dirt bike down, I got hit in the forehead by a huge bug - it thankfully didn't leave a splat on my forehead!

fhe ideas

So, I've been thinking a lot recently about Family Home Evening. I'm lousy at it, and I'm thinking of trying to do a better job. Lousy as in perhaps have had one fhe since Sarah was born. It was a totally awesome one, though, if I do say so myself. Jenn and I chatted about the family home evening thing recently, and I told her I would come up with some ideas. Here's what I've got so far:

• help the kids make family trees (This is the one I did fairly recently with Sarah. She really enjoyed it. We used pictures I had on the computer of different family members and cut them out into little squares which we then glued onto a clipart tree on a piece of paper. We talked about who each person is and how she is related to them back to like her great grandparents. Now that I think about it it would have been easy to carry this over for a few weeks telling her some stories about each person or reading her their testimonies or something like that.
• focus on different prophets and tell stories about them or important things about them--both modern and ancient (show pictures and start with President Monson, talk about what a prophet is, etc.)
• make a gratitude tree (This could obviously be done close to Thanksgiving and could be as elaborate or as simple as you wanted to make it. It could also be started during a fhe and carried on throughout the week or even throughout the month of November.)
• using the gospel art kit, pick a picture a week and tell the story about it (You could pick the picture before-hand or let a child choose the picture and try to remember the story on the fly--it's written on the back, I think.)
  
• talk about tithing, have them pay tithing, fill out slip, etc.
• talk about faith, read the scripture in Alma about the seed, plant a seed, and watch it grow (and hope that you have a green thumb)
• talk about missionary work--tell your own experiences, show nametag or other mission paraphernalia or pictures, talk about the mission experiences of someone else in the family, talk about how you can be missionaries now even when you are young, encourage them to do one thing during the week to share the gospel with someone around them
• stories about the pioneers
• talk about the temple and go take a walk outside your local temple if you have one; talk about how your family can be together forever
  
• http://www.fastq.com/~jbpratt/lds/resources/index.html This website, although I haven't looked at it in great detail, seemed to have some good stuff.
• If all else fails, play some games (red light, green light; mother, may I?; don't eat pete; board games; no bears are out tonight; etc.) Most of the point is being together as a family, and games are a great way to do that.