This morning I prayed to "live in thanksgiving daily."  I'm not sure what made me think of it, but I do want to be a more grateful person.  To turn my negative thoughts into positive ones.    I had to look up the scripture:  "Live in thanksgiving daily, for the many mercies and blessings which he doth bestow upon you."  (Alma 34:38)   What a great scripture! So today, I've been thinking about all the things I have to be grateful for. A car that takes me places with a heater that works. Lots of countertop space in my kitchen. Time to practice the organ.  Organ shoes.  A place I can go to practice. Money to buy food for my family.  Nearby stores. Plenty of rain and snow this winter so we'll have water this summer. Recently I took Mindy cross-country skiing at Soldier Hollow.  It was a really warm day but there was still a good amount of snow. Time to exercise.  A treadmill to walk on for when there's too much ...

This is a really late post since yesterday was Valentine's Day!  But for family history purposes, here it is: Christmas was on Sunday this year.  We woke up to lots of fluffy snow.  First thing, we Skyped with Everett, our current missionary.  This is always a huge highlight. Our married children joined us from California and Canada where they were visiting in-laws. After Skyping, we had a big traditional Christmas brunch.  Then we went to church.  Afterwards, since it was snowing, we enjoyed playing together in the backyard.  It wasn't good snowman snow but the kids had fun throwing it and burying Talmage. Garrett and Scott got cool new hats. For the break, we decided to stay home and not go anywhere, especially since it was not very long.  We let the kids pick what they wanted to do. On Monday afternoon I took Mindy and Camille sledding and we just happened to meet their cousins there. Camille was finally b...

This spring-like morning as I went walking, I listened to a talk that Elder Quentin Cook gave at BYU yesterday:   https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/quentin-l-cook_banquet-consequences-cumulative-result-choices/ . It was an excellent talk and I highly recommend it.  His main theme is that Satan's goal is for people to see bad as good and good as bad.  One of the ways he accomplishes this is by devaluing children.  He said,   " The adversary has targeted women and painted motherhood as a dead–end road of drudgery."  But, he says that motherhood and having children brings great joy and happiness.  He said, "In raising children, there are challenges and sacrifices, but the rewards, both in this life and in the eternities, are breathtakingly beautiful." One of my all-time favorite pictures.  I just wish Lincoln were in it but he was on his mission. It helped me feel really good about my choice to have 9 children.  And it does bring me ...

Back in October of 2016, we were at the orthodontist and the orthodontist told me there was something really weird going on in the floor of Talmage's mouth, something he hadn't seen before.  It was a big bubble.  He encouraged me to check it out and recommended an oral surgeon.  The one we saw was a young guy.  He knew that the bubble was a ranula (which is Latin for frog, like the bubble under a frog's mouth) and full of saliva but had never seen one before.  He didn't inspire me with confidence so I made an appointment with a different oral surgeon who had done Garrett's jaw surgery.  When we went to see him, he said oral surgeons deal more with the bones of the skull and for soft tissue work, we should go see an Ear, Nose, and Throat doctor who had more experience with this.  He referred us to Dr. Robert Hunter in Salt Lake. So we went to see Dr. Hunter.  He said that ranulas were uncommon--he saw maybe 6 cases per year but he knew how to dea...