November 8th seemed impossibly far away when Gerrit opened his mission call back in June and learned of his assignment and reporting date. As he’s watched his friends get their calls after his, but leave before him, he’s said that he feels like the last autumn leaf clinging to the tree. But the day has finally come.
Favorite Family Funnies
One of the joys of parenthood is the surprising and often unintentionally funny things your kids say. I started keeping track of some of these, and now that my children are old enough to be funny on purpose, I thought I’d share some bits of dialog I’ve collected from their earlier years.
Remembrances of My Step Dad
Dwight Dean Peden, May 3, 1935 – February 8, 2017
The Chimpanzee
In some personality categorization schemes, people are compared to animals: The “drivers” are lions, the “analyticals” are giraffes, and so on. Dean cheerfully placed himself in the “expressive” category — the chimpanzees. My earliest memories of Dean, from when he showed up in my “tween” years, are of wild piggyback rides, rattling dentures, bird calls and angry squirrel impressions. He was abundantly affectionate to mom, telling her she was beautiful, playfully kissing her, and complimenting her profusely on dinner (even on the nights when he did the cooking). He was always ready with a joke.
Continue reading “Remembrances of My Step Dad”Nativity
On Saturday our family honored our annual tradition of hanging out on a farm in Alpine, Utah in the freezing cold. It isn’t a secret snowboarding hill where horses pull you to the top (though that would be cool). Rather, it is the site of an annual living nativity started by a family in our ward.
Wizarding Wednesday
When the topic of school’s fall break came up a few weeks ago, Afton immediately said she wanted to go to Disneyland. Or, even better… Harry Potter World! I didn’t know there was such a thing, but apparently there are three of them at the Universal Studios parks. A trip like that is more ambitious than our typical fall break plans, and cost and time off from work made me reluctant. The boys both said they weren’t interested in going at all, so we tried to think of other options. Afton kept lobbying for a few days, but fearing she was pressuring me too much, left a cute note on my nightstand saying, “We don’t have to go to disnyland [sic] if you don’t want to.” Would we really go on a family vacation and just take her? I guess so.
Recording Artist
When Gerrit and I ran into a roadblock on our current project (more on that another time), we visited a ward member, Matt, in hopes of some guidance. We got a little advice, then Matt talked to us about his own projects as an amateur composer and recording engineer, which recently led to a fun experience for Afton.
Leaving the Nest
A few weeks ago, when Gerrit and Afton were anticipating the start of school the next day, Ethan danced around the house, laughing gleefully, since they had to go to school and he didn’t. Gerrit and Afton were much more gracious Friday morning, though, when they said goodbye to him as Shannon and I drove him up to Rexburg to start his college career at BYU-Idaho.
Hawaii without (really noticing) Garbage Cans
Normally, a few weeks further into summer, Shannon and I would be saying, “We really ought to do some kind of family vacation!” Then we’d try to figure out what and where and when, which is always the hard part for us. So in an uncharacteristic bit of pre-planning, we had the basics figured out clear back in January, and the trip completed a week into the summer break.
Continue reading “Hawaii without (really noticing) Garbage Cans”
Cruisin’ Firsts
For our family vacation this year, we decided to go on a cruise. A large part of the appeal was a reduced planning effort compared to our previous epic road trips. No decisions about how far we’d go on a particular day, where we’d sleep, how long we’d stay somewhere, etc. It also gave our family a chance to experience several “firsts”.
The Mormon Shakespeare
A thousand miles is a long trip in the back of a car for a teenage boy — especially in the days before smartphones, portable movie players and the repeal of universal 55 MPH speed limits. So on this trip to grandma and grandpa’s house years ago, my step-dad Dean gave me a book by some guy named Orson Scott Card.