A Funeral for An Almost Stranger

Weird title, I know.  Let me explain.  Jena performs with the Friend to Friend theatre group on Friday afternoons.  A grandmother of two of the kids in the younger class passed away and she was a BIG fan of Friend to Friend.  The family reached out to Shelley Davies, the director, and invited them to come and perform a song from Wicked as part of the funeral service.  They had learned "For Good" along with the sign language.  Jena was happy to participate so we headed to Centerville last Tuesday for a quick practice and then to sing as part of the service.

They did well and the words were so sweet in that setting. especially being sung by her two grandchildren and their friends.

I've heard it said

That people come into our lives for a reason

Bringing something we must learn

And we are led

To those who help us most to grow

If we let them

And we help them in return

Well, I don't know if I believe that's true

But I know I'm who I am today

Because I knew you...

Like a comet pulled from orbit

As it passes a sun

Like a stream that meets a boulder

Halfway through the wood

Who can say if I've been changed for the better?

But because I knew you

I have been changed for good

It well may be

That we will never meet again

In this lifetime

So let me say before we part

So much of me

Is made of what I learned from you

You'll be with me

Like a handprint on my heart

And now whatever way our stories end

I know you have re-written mine

By being my friend...

Like a ship blown from its mooring

By a wind off the sea

Like a seed dropped by a skybird

In a distant wood

Who can say if I've been changed for the better?

But because I knew you

Because I knew you

I have been changed for good

One additional note:  I have never met Susan Tresse, although I did recognize her grandchildren and their mother from F2F events.  But sitting in her funeral was a special experience.  She led a simple life by many measures and life was hard for her from birth to death--financial pressures, health problems, challenges of every kind---but she had faith and she was gifted to share that faith in poetry and songs...even from a young age, she knew her Heavenly Father loved her and was guiding her life.  It was a worshipful experience.  It made me think that maybe I should just attend funerals of good people every week.  It is so uplifting to learn from the memories of those left behind.

And I certainly have been changed for good by SO SO MANY people in my own personal life.  My heart is filled "with their handprints."

 

"Dancing and Prancing"

 ....for Jena and the rest of the Premier Ballroom and Dance Studio.  I love their December tradition.  Instead of doing a big Christmas recital, they perform at a local Assisted Living Facility and then later on the same day perform at the Festival of Trees in Sandy, Utah.  It is about 1 hour each time--one dance each class and then you are done.  But the Christmas costumes and music is a fun way to start off the holiday season.  Here is some shots from the day--

Practicing their bow at the Dress rehearsal on Friday

Their final bows
I was sitting anywhere to get a picture of them dancing

Afterwards, the dancers went and talked to
the residents.  That was a good experience as well.

Jena's classmates and teachers

At the Festival of Trees

Afterwards, Jena and I strolled around the Festival and checked out some of the 1000 trees.  This is a fundraiser for Primary Children's Hospital, some place we are fans of.  People's creativity was amazing!

Christmas is really coming again this year!

Dining--Out and About Town

Last Sunday when I reviewed the week's activities, I realized that I was not having dinner at home any of days Monday through Friday AND Saturday lunch was not at home, either.  It was all good stuff, but just funny that it all fell on this same week---

It went like this:

Monday-- Dinner at the Cheesecake Factory in City Creek Mall, Salt Lake City---with three of the sweet missionaries we served with in the Church History Library--Jim and Linda Twelmeyer and Marianne Jones. The Twelmeyers were in town visiting family and called to set up this meal.  This was a place we went a few times with them so it was a perfect place to gather for a meal and conversation.  Before dinner, the three of us were able to visit The Light the World Giving Machines where we donated to Special Olympics, The Stella Oaks Foundation, and another place I can't remember that provided computer training for refugees--Gary's choice.

It was so great to be together and so much to talk about that we ran out of time.  We will actually spend time with the Twelmeyers in their home in South Carolina in May and then Marianne is going with us to Africa next July.

Tuesday--  Dinner at City Creek Mall-Food Court with Ben.  Ben likes the Celtic Woman and they were performing that night at Abravanel Hall.  It made him very nervous, but he was brave and made the trip to downtown despite those fears and we had a fun Christmas concert.  (The food from the food court was just average.)

Tuesday's meal

Lights in the Mall

At the concert

I enjoyed the concert, but Ben was a bit disappointed because his favorite singer is no longer in the group and they sang mostly Christmas songs.  We will watch for other concerts in our area in the future--non Christmas ones.  Glad to share this one with Ben.

Wednesday--  In preparation for the film screening that was hosted by USSC on Thursday, some of us met for dinner with the film maker Gail Freeman.  We met at J Wong in (you guessed it-) in downtown Salt Lake.  It is also great to have time with these amazing people, to meet Gail and also to spend time with Crystal Fox and her daughter, from Angry Moms Arizona. The food was great--I had yellow curry and conversations were even better. They have a robot server who carries out the food.  So fun!

L-R: Debby Anderson, Deb Widmer, Therese Cavlovic, Gail Freeman,
Crystal Fox and her daughter, Mia, me, Sherri Wittwer, Angela Provstgaard and
last but not least Nick Pensari from the County DA's office

Thursday-- This was the night of our pre-screening of Gail's documentary "No One Cares About Crazy People."  We (USSC) sponsored this event and held it at the Main Salt Lake County Library.  The auditorium holds about 300 people and we had about 280 pre-register and about 200-220 in attendance.  It was a great event and a good connector with others who are interested in this population of individuals with severe mental illnesses. I headed down around 4 to help get things set up and then just talked to people before and after the movie.  Five people (at least) came from DBH which was so great including Ben's psychiatrist, Dr. Schenk and Dr. Todd Souter who runs Crisis and CIT in the state.

Deb Widmer welcoming our guests

I did have dinner that night again but it was at 9:15 pm at a downtown drive up window of McDonalds.  I realized I felt too hungry to wait 45 minutes to get home. Meal #4 in Salt Lake.

Friday--  This time dinner wasn't in Salt Lake, but at our Stake Center for our Ward Christmas Party.  It was good food, good conversation, and a sweet program--a video interviewing youth and Primary kids in our ward about Christmas and Jesus Christ.  It was so awesome.  Just the right thing for a Ward Christmas Party.

Saturday-- This was one of Jena's busy performance days so I will make a separate post about that--but in keeping with the "theme" of the week, she and I ate a late lunch in Bountiful between her performance there and her later one down at the Festival of Trees in Sandy.

For the record--we did eat dinner at home--around 8:00 pm---Jena had burrittos and I ate a salad.

In addition to all of these things--and the prep work related to them, we also attended the temple and kept working on getting our house ready for guests next week.  The basement carpet is being cleaned tomorrow so I was busy with the total cleaning and reorganizing and de junking of the storage room.  Good progress is being made and hopefully that continues into this next week.

And Christmas decorating and gifting getting are in full swing.....

Happy Birthday, Zander!!

 This is slightly out of order as his actual birthday isn't (wasn't) until December 4, but on the Friday after Thanksgiving, I (with Ben and Jena) took him for his birthday dinner.  He chose Asian Buffet where we had celebrated the September birthdays.  I was excited that he liked "Chinese" food, but no, he loves their Mac and Cheese and french fries!! And the cooler of small ice cream cartons.  Luckily, they had the Mac and Cheese and it was as good as he remembered it.

photo by Ben

photo by me

Because we weren't available on his actual birthday (and the several days right before it), we also opened presents with him from us when we got back to his house. (Gary missed the fun as he was subbing at the temple.)

He seemed happy with the new hoodie
and the games we gave him. (His book was too
late for opening on this day so will happen
on Ezri's birthday lunch day next week.)

Jessica sent this photo from his birthday.  They had put balloons on their already decorated Christmas tree to bring in a birthday vibe for the day.  Zander loved it.

Happy Birthday, Zander.  I know you were so excited to be 9.  You have talked about it for a couple of months.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

 At first, I wasn't planning to do Thanksgiving at all this year.  My sister, Robin, is going to move to Utah so that we can provide more support to her and we were first planning to move her this past week.  However, the needed paperwork didn't get completed so now we are shooting for the week after Christmas. When that was finally settled, I invited Jessica and Elessia and family to come for a simple meal and to attend the movie Zootopia 2.  Our seats were a bit close because I reserved them just a few weeks before the holiday, but it was a fun show. Ben came with us which is always a nice bonus.

My simple dinner got a bit bigger than originally planned, but we are enjoying the leftovers including my favorite turkey dressing casserole which we had for dinner today.  I only cooked a small turkey breast and a ham since most people prefer ham.  One year, I will do the whole thing again.  I don't want the grandkids to grow up and say that I never cooked them a Thanksgiving turkey. :0

We started off with a movie at the AMC Layton Hills Theatre--Zootopia 2 which was enjoyable (and definitely had a political comment to make about "Othering".) 

Carter and Jessica are the smart ones--to bring a blanket to the theatre.  It was cold.

Always great to have Ben join us.

We then headed home for dinner.  It made for a late night and we will definitely look to get earlier movie tickets next year.

The J/E grandkids got to eat at our new kitchen table while the grownups sat in the dining room--except for Ben who wanted to sit with the nieces and nephews.

I forgot until the next day that I didn't even offer to send leftovers home with Jessica, so that meant we were able to enjoy leftovers all weekend long including my favorite turkey dressing casserole on Sunday--yummy.

We had a jar where we put the lists of things we are grateful for--Top One this year-- FAMILY!! Wish we could have all been together this year like last year, but looking forward to gathering in June for the Hall Reunion.

Happy Thanksgiving 2025!!!

What You Might See On the Road?

I loved this clever license plate- 1 Ne 3 7 which clearly means ! Nephi 3:7, a very powerful and popular verse of scripture in the Book of Mormon---one of my favorites'----

"And it came to pass that I, Nephi, said unto my father: I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall  prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them."

I wish that I had thought of that---a symbol of their testimony everywhere they drive.  Love this.
 

Clouds--

Sometimes you just need to look at some cloud pictures and remember how amazing they can be in the sky--their changing shapes, their reflecting colors, all of it.

Go outside today and check the skies!!!

 

Halloween Bingo

...in November. I had to do a Halloween Bingo Game for Jena's dance class, so I kept it to play with Jessica/Elessia's kids on Halloween.  However, that night was too busy.  I kept it and brought it when I watched the kids on Saturday night.  They loved it and the simple dollar store toys I had for prizes.  They want to do it again for Christmas which might happen. :)

Two of the kids picked puzzles so we spent some time putting those together --a couple of times that evening. 

Ezri picked a painting project and of course, wanted to do it as soon as Bingo was done.

 Carter was proud when she did hers all by herself.  The first time, she had a few extra helpers (which she really didn't need.) She was patient with them, but immediately after they were done, she quietly took it apart and then put it back together by herself.

Fun times!


 

Night TIme Session at the Layton Temple

There is something unique about seeing a temple lit up in the night. 

I have loved learning and pondering more about the temple and the work that we do there.  In addition to all of the spiritual and doctrinal reasons for the temple, I have been struck lately by how it gives purpose to many people as they get older and move into their "retirement" years--both the opportunity to serve as temple workers but also just to be able to serve there. You are able to help people even though you can't stand up long enough to can beans at the cannery or hoe weeds at the local welfare farm.  You can still have service opportunities and the uplift that they give in your life in the temple every and any day you can be there.  What a blessing---for that time I get old!
 

Utah Shattering Silence Coalition

 In addition to several meetings with county and state officials as well as at the state hospital, we also had a nighttime gathering with our members including a dinner and then a business meeting. It was so great because we got to meet Sheree Sobel from New York in person as she and her husband came to spend some time with their son, Doug who lives here. People took photos but I need to track them down to add.

We also joined a community event sponsored by Jenny Wilson, major of Salt Lake County.  They hosted the film, "The Definition of Insanity" which is centered on the Miami-Dade model to divert and support people.  Judge Leifman, a central force in that program, was there to answer questions as well.  We were able to connect and reconnect to many people we have spoken with over the past three months as well as meet new people in this arena. We shared a table with NAMI Utah in the lobby and got "caught" in the photos they posted on their social media platform. All in all, a very productive event for us.

Now, we are gearing up for our film event which is this Thursday at the Salt Lake City Library!  We are hosting the film "No One Cares About Crazy People." More on that later.

Community Thanksgiving Dinner at DBH

Ben invited us to attend the Community Thanksgiving Dinner at Journey House mid-month.  The food was amazing, and it was fun to share it with other DBH employees, local police, and other government officials.  We are grateful for the work that Journey House does with Ben and others suffering from these complex brain disorders.

 

New Railing

As part of our remodel and preparing our house for when we are old, we had railing added to our front porch and garage entrance.  I could have used those during my summer months of sickness/recovery, but find them handy now as well.

 

Northern Lights

On November 11, Jessica sent us some amaing photos of the Northern Lights which they took from their front yard in Northern Ogden.  After Gary took Jena to dance, we headed out to the Causeway area (along with lots of other people) and parked and did our own watching.  With your eyes, it was very hard to see, but through the cameras, you could capture the green and the reds.  I learned later that I should have used the night mode but here is our faint photos.  It was still fun to be there with so many others in the parking lot and along the sides of Antelope Road and enjoying this unusual moment. I guess that there were solar fires and flares which led to the Northern Lights being seen in some areas as far south as Florida.  Gary is hoping this removed "Northern Lights" from my secondary bucket list, but I don't think so.  It just makes me want to get closer and see it in "full color."

THE WORLD IS JUST AN AMAZING PLACE!!

 

It Is Now Past Thanksgiving.....

Where did November go?

It is a problem when I don't keep up with the blog on a weekly bases.  I do have photos to help me remember certain things, but much gets lost week to week in the busyness of life.  (For which I am sure you are all grateful for.  There is already so many photos of so many things and words about them all.  Hopefully, something will be useful to some one or two of my descendants in the future.)

My calendar for November shows that I was busy most days, going here and there--often taking Jena to a variety of her activities. So, I will give a general update on everyone--

Jena:  She is attending the RISE program twice a week, usually on Tuesdays and Fridays.  She loves it. She is also doing FHE with her ward on most Mondays, a dance class on Tuesday evening, Institute on Wednesday in Bountiful, and Friend to Friend theatre class on Fridays in Centerville.  She is still looking for a job and spends an hour a week with Jeri, her job coach, doing applications and having a few interviews. She usually attends the temple with us on Thursday mornings.

Tosha and family are still in Tacoma.  Niki started middle school which means an earlier start to his day to catch the bus.  Tosha is still doing event setup and organizing usually on the weekends.  She is amazing at it.  She also manages their social media presence.

Ben is still living at home.  He attends Journey House, the Clubhouse in Davis County, five days a week. And occasionally he does their recreational activities after hours.

Scott and family are in Oro Valley and still loving it there.  Scarlett also started middle school. Scott still works for Benner Health and is also working on his MBA which he hopes to complete in April of next year.  Chantel continues to serve as a fitness and nutrition coach which she does mostly online.

Jessica and family are busy with life as well.  Jessica, who works at the Salt Lake County program for young adult homeless individuals, also started back to school at Weber State to get her master's degree in social work.

Gary pointed out that they--Jessica and Scott--following in my footsteps.  I actually hadn't thought of it in that way, but I guess they are actually following my example of following my dad.  I was about five when my dad received his masters degree from University of Idaho.  For some reason, my parents took us kids--3 or 4 of us five years and under--to the graduation.  I am sure it wasn't fun for my mom.  However, I have one clear memory of that experience--I can remember the "hoods" and thinking to myself--I am going to do that someday so I can wear that hood.  Weird for a five year old--I am sure I had no idea what "getting a masters degree" even meant.  But that thought and image stayed in my mind and as I got older, I set up goal on getting a master's degree and as it turned out, I ended up getting two--one in school psychology in 1987 and one in social work in 2017.  And I made sure to take a photo of the hoods, both times.  Maybe you will want to follow our example and get a master's degree.  There are lots of ways to get knowledge, to work, and to grow---you need to figure out the best way (and healthiest) way for you as a person.

Gary missed serving in the temple during the closure for cleaning and repairs of the Syracuse Temple. We continued to go to the temple by serving in the Layton, Ogden and the Saratoga Springs Temples during the break.  Gary has been working hard on the outside of the house--fitting our rain gutters with leaf guards, trimming brushes, and making many trips to the dump and the DI. He arranged for some neighbors to help carry up some old furniture that we no longer need (bye to Scott's old heavy dresser) and our old freezer.  Excellent progress as we continue to settle back into our house. He also continues to solve family history problems in FamilySearch and FindAGrave.

Organizing the basement and de-junking our storage room have been my ongoing project the past several weeks. I have made progress and filled the trailer and Gary's truck a few times for DI and dump runs. Carpets are being cleaned downstairs on Dec. 8 so I have a deadline now to finish the reorganization of the storage room.  We have TOO much stuff, but it harder to get rid of stuff than it should be.  Having a space for something is not a good enough reason to keep it.  One hard thing (which I am still working on) is my collection of art work. I loved these pieces enough to buy them to begin with and many have hung in our houses from West Jordan through Hong Kong and Plano and now here---but I have added other things and the rooms have been reorganized for other purposes. Some pieces I have kept thinking my kids might want them--but no, they have their own style and taste in these things as they should.  Others I have kept to switch out--and sometimes I do, but is that enough of a reason to store something and will I continue to do that as I get older?  Some pieces were from my dad and I want to keep them but where should they go?  Decisions, decisions, as each piece brings memories and feelings...............and I haven't even begun to sort the boxes of photos I have to organize and to share with my kids.  That is the project for January.

I have also been busy with Utah Shattering Silence Coalition. We have had meetings and more meeting this month as we have tried to connect with other people involved in the systems in our state involved with treating those with severe mental illnesses.

I continue to recover from my bypass leg surgery.  I am a bit frustrated because I can't seem to get past 2 miles or 45 minutes of walking each morning.  If I try to add even a few more minutes or a bit longer distances, I can't seem to manage a regular day without my leg swelling and hurting.  I have decided to stick with the 45 minutes for a couple more weeks and then try again adding more distance to my walk. We had our first snowfall today so will be trying out the indoor track at the Syracuse Community Center this week if the snow is still on the ground in the morning.

That is our summary so you can skip the next few posts which have more details.  Life is ramping up for the holidays already so I hope I can get November recorded before all of that starts...

"What Have I Learned?" "How Are You Different?"

These are the questions still bouncing around in my head.  They are the questions that Therese Collins challenged us with at our last class at the end of October. To recap in case you missed my first introduction to the class back in September.  This was an 8-week class given by Sister Collins (my former mission leader) which she designed around a talk given by President Nelson in October 2022, "Overcome the World and Find Rest."  She designed the course and put together an amazing collection of presenters, music, quotes, and personal experiences to teach us and motivate us and to increase our understanding of our covenants. Most of all, to make a step--tiny or huge--but a step forward closer to the Savior.

Each Saturday morning, she provided 6-10 sheets of quotes, activities, and scriptures for us to use during our class on Monday and to keep in our journal which she provided at the beginning of the class.  I took notes both in the journal and on the sheets she sent us (which we glued into the journals). I added summary pages to some of the lessons and will probably go back and do that for the few classes which I didn't attend since I was out of town. My journal is now packed with great quotes and priceless information, but there are still many blank pages.  I am trying to figure out how to use the journal for future study and as a reminder of the truths I heard and felt.

Our course of study:

One week there was an emphasis on our patriarchal blessings.  We were invited to print a copy and then mark it like we would do with the scriptures--highlighting special parts, noticing words which were repeated, looking for warnings and blessings, etc. It was AMAZING!  I kept my working copy in this journal for future review. I also took the opportunity to write down what I remember about the experience of receiving my patriarchal blessing when I was 15.  That was good as well.

The topic of the desires of our hearts is an important one for me and I loved the class where we talked about that.  We also had an assignment to choose a scripture from a list and rewrite it as if it was written specifically for us.  When I decided to use that for my summary of the class, I knew that I did not want to have a traditional heart shape, but I wanted an image that reflected the human heart inside of us.  I want my desires to match our Savior's with my WHOLE ACTUAL heart and I want His Image and His Teachings to be found there.

As you can see, we learned things, we heard things, and we felt things as we discussed a variety of topics together in the group and in smaller discussion groups.  These women were almost all from Sister Collins's stake in the hills of Draper.  They came from different backgrounds and were living lives for the most part in certainly different economic ways than the more suburban life of Syracuse.  I didn't know any of them.  But you know what?  It was great to hear their comments and testimonies and many times I would think--I wish I knew that person and could have known the rest of THAT story or experience they shared. And when we did one on one discussion groups, it was so amazing to connect with them on these gospel topics. It all was well worth the hour drive down and then back and a great way to start the week.  

And it was fun to connect with Sister Collins during the week as we thought of other things we could have said and I learned near the end that many people did the same thing with her---she said she was going to miss these spiritual emails coming each week.  We love her and she loves us as a class and individually and the people she invited to share were amazing as well.

But it still goes back to the question--how am I different because of this whole experience?

1. I have "uped my game" in regards to the temple.  We have done fairly well going once a week (except when I was sick with the kidney stone), but I think I was taking it a bit casual.  I loved it, but I wasn't using the experiences there to worship intentionally.  Being intentionally in our discipleship is important and one of those places is the temple.  I have also focused on learning more about the temple covenants and history.  I am currently reading a small three book series about the temple and hope to read more to expand my understanding. My new goal: four endowments, a sealing session and an initiatory each month. I know it isn't a huge commitment but it is the right goal for me right now.

2. I am different because I have learned some new teaching skills which I hope to use as a gospel doctrine teacher.  It is good to learn from others.

3.  I am more connected to my patriarchal blessing and to my testimony of them in general in our lives. I hope to continue to write about its fulfillment in my life to share with my children and grandchildren after I am gone.

And the desires of my heart continue to adjust and refocus on things that really matter--Jesus Christ, His Gospel and His Atonement in behalf of all of us; our family; and the community we live in. May I be found doing good.

Thanks, Theresa.  Until the next time....

Draper Views

Although I have been making weekly trips to Draper for my "Living Within My Temple Covenants" class, it wasn't until the last day that I noticed that you can see Antelope Island from the road.  Since I am a fan of the Island, it was worth stopping to enjoy the view and take a few photos.

It was beautiful to see the island and the whole valley in front of me and the colors in the mountains behind me...although I should have taken a photo a few weeks ago to get the brighter colors--and also the rains had started so I took this photo from inside the car.