Amazing Strength in Families

JUDY: I recently saw this on YouTube and it really affected me. I think it shows the strength and power of families:

Soldier Homecoming Surprise

Along with this, I recently read that military marriages are surprisingly resilient. We hear lots about how military divorce rates are increasing and how veterans have all sorts of other dire problems. In fact, what is not reported is that the military divorce rate is still way below the national average for divorce compared to the civilian population. A strong, loving, committed family is one of the best sources for healing--whatever the wound. As you can see in these YouTube pictures, love is a powerful force for good, and it's in families that this kind of healing love is found.

LLOYD:  I remember a particular Brother who came before the High Council with his Bishop. And I wondered how his situation would be resolved for him and his family. Both the Bishop and Stake President reported that the man's wife had accepted his deep remorse and was a major support to her husband in his repentance process, and their children had rallied around them both. I watched this happen and have thought about it often. 

Years later one of the younger daughters referred obliquely to their family trial and then commented on the amazing influence of love they had all experienced. The daughter was recently married and said that this personal family experience had given her great strength and increased her understanding and faith in the power of a covenant marriage.  The family not only remained intact but has also been productive and healthy in every aspect.

Judy once had occasion to tell me, "This isn't about you, or about me, or even about us. It's about our covenant with the Lord and to this marriage."  The deep affection between husband and wife, and father and children demonstrated above in "Soldier Homecoming Surprise" only hints at the power available through family bonds.

More movies

1. Just last Friday we saw Hugo. It was amazing! It was directed by Martin Scorsese and I understand it's his first PG movie in 18 years. I guess when you're good, you're good because this movie has it all--great visuals, wonderful cast and a great story. You never know what's going to happen next, which is sort of rare at the movies. The 3D here was how it's supposed to be; it enhances the movie without detracting from it. In fact, you hardly know you're watching 3D except you are in the scene. I heard that when James Cameron saw this movie, he said the 3D in it was better than he'd done in Avatar.

 Sometimes the pace is leisurely and sometimes it is almost too intense, but just know that there is a very happy ending. If I'd known that for sure I would have enjoyed it even more.

2. Twilight: Breaking Dawn, Part 1. Of course we had to see this one and Lloyd and I liked it a lot. The reviews were scathing, but I'm glad we didn't pay any attention to them. The first part where Bella and Edward get married was beautiful and very romantic. Lloyd says the reason the critics don't like this movie is because it portrays waiting for marriage and then shows how incredible marriage is and that's not a popular notion in Hollywood.

When Bella is pregnant, she looks really terrible and much too skinny because they say the baby is taking all her nutrients. I can't imagine how they made her look like that, but it's very effective. So the bottom line is that next to the first Twilight movie, I liked this one the best of the four.

3. Unknown with Liam Neeson and Diane Kruger.

I think this one is probably out on video now and I would recommend it for the grown-ups. It has an intriguing story and I was totally surprised at the explanation at the end so I won't tell you what it is. But do check it out.

4. Tower Heist with Eddie Murphy, Ben Stiller, Matthew Broderick, etc.

This one was okay, but I think they put the funniest parts in the trailer. I liked the cast, which is always a good thing if  you're going to spend some time with them and Eddie Murphy was the best. We forget how funny he can be because he's in so many dumb movies. But I would wait to see this one on video and don't waste your money in the theater.

Movies!

We've been to several movies lately so I thought I'd give you my opinion on them. I'll go alphabetically:

1. The Big Year with Steve Martin, Owen Wilson, and Jack Black.

It's about competitive bird watching, if you can imagine such a thing. It's called "birding." These three men have decided to have a "big year," which means they are going try to see/identify the most number of species during a calendar year. If they see the most, they get written up in bird watching magazines and get bragging rights, but not much else.

I thought it was a very enjoyable little film. We saw it in the theater, but it didn't last long there so it will probably come out on video at some point. I'd highly recommend it. The reviews I read didn't like it because they were evidently expecting a broad comedy with big laughs, but it wasn't like that. It was more that you just had a smile on your face all through it (with the exception of one uncomfortable scene where one of the men blows it with his wife).

2. Footloose (the remake) with Julianne Hough, Kenny Wormald and Dennis Quaid as her father.

I liked this movie a lot! Maybe even better than the original with Kevin Bacon because I thought Julianne Hough was way better as Ariel. The story follows the original pretty close but now it takes place in the South. Of course the dancing is the best part and it was great. They did a couple numbers almost exactly the same, but there was new, more modern stuff too. The best part was probably when they were teaching Willard to dance--absolutely adorable scene. I think at the prom at the end, both Ren and Ariel are wearing the same clothes as in the original.

3. Hannah with Eric Bana, Cate Blanchett, and Saorsie Ronan

I think this one came out last summer or even longer ago than that. I thought I'd put it in to warn you. It was a thriller and I didn't like it at all. It was too depressing. Lloyd said it was as if it were made by and for Germans, to give you an idea. Roger Ebert said it well when he said, "It is a cross between a Grimm fairy tale and a high tech action movie." And he called it a "first rate thriller about the drawbacks of home schooling."

4. Midnight in Paris with Owen Wilson and Rachel McAdams

This is the best Woody Allen film I've ever seen. If you don't see anything else on this list, see this one. It is still in theaters around here and has been for a couple months at least. It is funny and has a wonderful, imaginative story. An engaged couple are in Paris with her parents. One night he is able to travel back in time to the Paris of 1920 and he meets several of the literary giants of the time. Also his little adventures show the cracks in the couple's relationship. I loved the costumes of the 20's. Roger Ebert said, "this film is a sort of daydream for all of America's lit majors."


5.The Muppets with Jason Segal and Amy Adams and the Muppets.

Delightful movie! Very fun and innocent and I thought it really showed up movies like Shrek, which are all snarky, wink-wink. The Muppets show how to be entertaining with being snide. Also, I really enjoyed the musical aspect. It's just fun to watch singing and dancing and they included some of the good Muppet music along with some new stuff.

This is all for now since it's kind of a long blog. Next week I'll talk about four more recent movies.

Our 50th High School Reunion

The flurry of impassioned emails began once the committee published it's plans for our 50th High School Reunion. Clearly the emotions are from deeper wells than suggested changes in venues and scheduling.  If nothing else, this ongoing conversation showcases the personalities we knew so well 50 years ago. 

Beyond that I am reminded of a passage from Exile's Return by Malcolm Cowley adapted to evoke the aromatic eucalyptus and jasmines that permeate our beautiful Central Coast Community.

Somewhere the turn of a dirt road or the unexpected crest of a hill reveals your own childhood, the fields where you once played barefoot, the kindly trees, the landscape by which all others are measured and condemned. . . This is your home . . . but does it exist outside of your memory? On reaching the hilltop or the bend of the road, will you find the people gone, the landscape altered, the [eucalyptus trees & jasmines] cut down and only stumps, dried tree-tops, branches and fireweed where the woods had been? Or, if the country remains the same, will you find yourself so changed and uprooted that it refuses to take you back, to reincorporate you into its common life? No matter: the country of our childhood survives, if only in our minds, and retains our loyalty even when casting us into exile; we carry its image from city to city as our most essential baggage:

                        Wanderers outside the gates, in hollow

landscapes without memory, we carry

each of us an urn of native soil,

of not impalpable dust a double handful

anciently gathered-­-was it garden mold

or wood soil fresh with [eucalyptus leaves &

jasmine blooms] this little earth we bore

in silence, blindly, over the frontier?

--a parcel of the soil not wide enough

or firm enough to build a dwelling on,

or deep enough to dig a grave, but cool

and sweet enough to sink the nostrils in

and find the smell of home, or in the ears,

rumors of home, like oceans in a shell.

Judy: New house

MY LIFE IS CONSUMED WITH MOVING!

We moved out of the San Luis house on Fri., Oct. 7, but could only put our stuff in the garage at the new place because the guy who lived there wasn't completely out yet. We hoped to be able to close the following Friday, the 14th, so the weekend of the 8th and 9th we stayed with the Kleinmans.

On Monday we decided to get away from it all because this time is officially Lloyd's annual leave and we wanted some kind of real vacation. We went to Monterey and stayed at a bed and breakfast for two nights and visited Carmel and saw lots of galleries. It was great.

We came back on Wednesday evening and stayed the next three nights at a Motel 6 (a little different from the B & B). Turns out there was lots for us to do but we expected to close on Fri. the 14th, like I said, then we planned to move in on Saturday. HOWEVER (cue scary music), on Thursday we learned that we couldn't close until Mon or Tues. of next week. Meanwhile, we have to pay the owner $50/day in rent till the house is officially ours. Then we had the carpet cleaning man come and tell us the carpet was so saturated with dog urine that we'd have to trash that carpet and buy a new one. Then the flea treatment man came and said he could kill the current fleas, but more would probably come later. Then we saw that the whole backyard was covered in dog poop and nobody could walk back there. (sigh) Did I mention that the previous owner had two huge dobermans that evidently lived in the house and never went for walks anywhere but the back yard?

So we thought maybe we could still move some of our stuff into the house and use one of the small bedrooms that didn't seem to smell quite so bad. We tried on Saturday morning, but soon everybody had watering eyes and scratchy throats from the smell and we realized we couldn't even be in the house until we replaced the carpet. We tore it all out that afternoon, including the pad and you would not believe how stained the carpet looked underneath. Lloyd had to spray the concrete under it with a strong, even toxic deodorizer that night. Meanwhile Kristen's son Jacob, with a little help from Alec, spent most of Saturday cleaning up the yard. They ended up with several white trash bags full of the stuff.

Since we were going to have to wait till Thurs. or Friday before they could lay the new carpet, we decided to go ahead and paint the whole interior in colors we liked instead of just pure white everywhere. I feel like this is a sweet little house that has been abused and it's now up to us to nurture it back to health.

But in the meantime, here we are, homeless; thankfully Kristen and Nathan have taken us in. We may close Tues. or Weds., the painters should be finished on Weds. or Thurs. and the carpet may be down on Friday. And then maybe we can actually move in NEXT Saturday.

But I'm not holding my breath.

Goodbye Grandpa

As many of you know, Grandpa passed away on July 23 and I'm now ready to blog about it. It must have been exactly as he would have wanted to go. He was at home, Lloyd was with him, and it happened so fast that as Lloyd said, "His body didn't know quite what to do without the spirit." It was like it just slipped away.

Then came all the excitement of everybody gathering for the funeral. For about a week people were coming and going and actually it was a lot of fun seeing them--sort of like a big family reunion. During that time I hardly had time to think about things. The following week was taken up with arrangements with the lawyer for the trust and other such stuff. This week we've been really busy getting the house ready to sell, which means going through EVERYTHING, sorting into piles of "trash", "Goodwill" and "keep", then taking loads of stuff to the dump or to Goodwill.

Occasionally I think of Grandpa and start to feel sad, then I think of where he is now and what he's doing--meeting all the people he loved who were waiting for him--and I just have to feel happy for him. I picture his meeting with his wife (my mother), Ruth,  and his own mother and father and sister Norma Jean, not to mention all his friends like Tracey Call and I have to smile. I think of all the physical problems he had, some for most of his life, and some for the past few years, and again I'm happy that he no longer has to deal with them.

So now our plans are to sell this house and move up to be with some of our family.

May we all live so that at our funerals we can have the same huge outpouring of love and respect that Grandpa had at his!

Judy: Grandpa, again

Grandpa had gone nearly two months and two catheter changes without a UTI (urinary tract infection) and we thought we were home free. We'd been giving him some supplements that seemed to help. Then last Sunday night he started the muttering/hallucinating and we thought, Oh boy, here we go again. So we immediately started him on an antibiotic and he did pretty well all week. But yesterday (Sunday) he was restless and wakeful all day and sure enough, last night he started the talking again. It's kind of discouraging because right now he's in the middle of taking the antibiotics and he's still exhibiting this behavior. Sigh.

I thought it might be interesting to write down some of the things he says when he's in the middle of his hallucinations. Thankfully, it's never that someone is after him or negative in any way. But here are a few of his quotes:

Did Lloyd tell you we were robbed last night?
There are all those people in the living room. Should we invite them to dinner?
My friend is under the bed and I think we should ask her to come out and eat with us.
That man singing in the living room kept me awake all night. He had a nice tenor voice and was singing The Battlehymn of the Republic.
What town are we in?
It's a word salad.
Did you see all those boys and animals running around in here?
Here's something I don't understand. That is a section of farmland with nothing on it so I'll go ahead and run that.

Judy: Women's sacrifice

I want to quote part of an amazing article I recently read in Mormon Times: June 4, 2011. You can probably go to the paper itself for the whole article, but I'd like to quote the parts that impressed me the most. It's written by a woman who was sitting in church, seven months pregnant with five young children. She said the speaker was talking about pioneers and he told the story of the Sweetwater crossing when grown men and women sat down and cried on the banks of the half-frozen river because their strength was utterly spent. That day three young men carried dozens of people through the chunks of ice and onto the opposite bank.

 She said at that moment the Spirit whispered to her in a deep impression: Your sacrifice is like unto theirs. There are spirits on the other side needing to cross to this life and any pregnant woman is carrying them, one or two (usually) at a time so they can continue along their own path to Zion.

Then she quoted Paul in Romans 12:1: I beseech you, therefore, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy acceptable unto God...

Present your body as a living sacrifice. Sacrifice--from the Latin meaning to make sacred. She says that a couple years later she had a miscarriage and even then she felt strongly, it wasn't a waste. She wasn't sure exactly what she meant by that except that somehow, that great loss COUNTED. It was known by God and would, in some inexplicable way, contribute to His work and glory as well as to her personal holiness.

She continues, "I realized this is true for women in a variety of circumstances: women who try and try, but are unable to conceive; women who subject themselves to the rigors of adoption; women who remain single and must forego not only maternity but also intimacy on a number of levels.

"I came to this conclusion. Every woman of faith consecrates her body as a living sacrifice. Whether our particular burden is fullness or emptiness, each of us is pushing against the world's current with our eyes on the kingdom of God."

Judy: Life goes on

Even though our lives are pretty much the same as always, taking care of  Dad and all, I decided I wanted to blog about the rest of our lives. Dad/Grandpa is actually doing pretty well. He hasn't had a UTI for over two months, which makes life better for everyone. The reason, I think, is that one of the nurses who comes to see him, gave us a list of products that other people in his situation found useful. We got them for him and they are working. 

But on to some other aspects of our lives. We saw the movie "Super 8" and thought it was great! It takes place in 1979 and even the film looks like it's from then. It not only has exciting things happen in the story as well as explosions and everything, but it also has very good interpersonal relationships.

On Friday we went to a new restaurant in Morro Bay that we've been wanting to try for a while and loved it. It's called The Galley and it's right on the water. It's always crowded and you need a reservation which tells you it's good.

Last Sunday I spoke in church and I talked about patriotism. And what I found interesting was that among the people who congratulated me afterwards, were 4 immigrants from other countries. These were extremely shy women who hardly ever say a word to anyone and they each came and thanked me for talking about America and how right I was about the greatness of this country. Seems like it's those who have seen the contrast who know it most clearly.

Judy; Taking Care of Dad, an update

We've gone two full weeks now with no sign of a UTI so we're feeling pretty good. In fact, Dad seems to be doing remarkably well. He got a haircut yesterday--the lady who cuts my hair comes over to the house and does his--and he looks probably ten years younger. Also, his face has filled out so he doesn't look so gaunt.

I think it really helps that Lloyd has been home for the past two weeks to help. Between the two of us we take very good care of him. We care for his hair, his skin, his teeth, his fingernails, his diet, and his "intake and outgo".  During his dinnertime we've started reading him a Tony Hillerman book about a Navajo Tribal policeman in the four-corners region; he thoroughly enjoys hearing about that area that he knows so well. It's true that everybody likes to be read to, no matter what your age.

Meanwhile Lloyd continues to get better. He can wear a regular shoe for up to two hours a day now and today he drove for the first time (to a near-by home teaching appt). Last night we went out to dinner for the first time since his surgery and he did all right but was tired and limping by the time we came home. Actually, it was the first time he's left the house, except for two post-op doctor's appointments.

Judy: Taking Care of Dad and Lloyd

Last Friday Lloyd had foot surgery. It was an outpatient procedure in which they removed a large lump on the top of his right foot. The podiatrist said he thought it was something called a rheumatoid cyst, since Lloyd does have rheumatoid arthritis. Anyway, he's doing very well now. We have pain pills on call, rented a pair of crutches, and of course have a wheelchair for use on occasion. In fact, I wish I could show you a picture of Dad and Lloyd side by side in their wheelchairs on Saturday. For the most part, though, Lloyd uses the crutches and gets around pretty well. He just has to be sure to keep his foot up as much as possible so he spends most of his time in the inclined lazy boy in front of the TV.

Judy: Taking Care of Dad, 4

Some people might say that Dad doesn't have a very good quality of life at this stage, but he thinks he does. He gets to sleep all he wants, which frankly has been his goal most of his life. He looks forward to eating when he does get up and he enjoys his meals tremendously. He always thanks me "for that delicious meal." Occasionally he likes to watch TV or a movie (if it's short) with us. For example, he recently watched something on the BYU channel about the church in France during WW2 that he talked about for a couple of days. Also, he likes to see episodes of the old JAG TV show that we get from Netflix.

And he doesn't have to worry about the things the rest of us do, like paying bills or doing our taxes or keeping the house clean. He doesn't even have to worry about keeping himself clean because the aid that comes in does that for him.

He is still a "people person" and always like to visit with anyone who comes, although he tires easily so he can't do it for very long at a time. His 90th birthday was a week ago and we invited several of his old friends from Cal Poly and the church and the neighbors in to help celebrate. He LOVED it. (See the pictures that Hilary posted on her blog because I can't seem to get pictures onto this blog.) Unfortunately, he had another UTI a couple days later and is just now coming out of it, but he is coming out of it.

So he continues longer than anyone thought he could go and Lloyd and I consider every day a gift.

Judy: Taking Care of Dad, 3

We had another bad night, meaning Dad was awake all night "talking," which we can hear from the baby monitor in our room. This happens when he's having a urinary tract infection (UTI). Since September, he's had one every month or so, but this is the second one in January. They say it's because of the catheter that he's more susceptible.

Every time goes through specific stages: 1) he's wakeful and energetic for long periods. He will wake up early in the morning and go to bed late, be awake all day with no naps at all, eager to be doing exercises or go outside or go through his office. Once he was convinced he needed to look for a job. He wants to try to use his walker again. Many times he'll want to watch TV or a movie and once he was all excited about a championship football game, which he watched all through for nearly three hours. He seems more lucid even than usual.

The only thing that lets you know something may be slightly off (besides the job thing) is his complete lack of empathy--he has no idea he's keeping us awake along with him. Since he's such a sensitive, generally kind person, this is unusual. (Side note: everybody who comes in to care for him, from nurses to physical therapists to social workers comments on what a sweet man he is, always so gracious and grateful for whatever they are doing for him.) When we see the beginning of this wakefulness we immediately give him a basic antibiotic, but still he goes on to the next stage before it can take effect.

Stage 2: he starts having hallucinations, both visual and auditory. Evidently this is usual among older people with infections. Once he said there was a man singing so loudly in the living room that it kept him awake. He often asks who all these people are in his room and he has long conversations with individuals or groups "surrounding his bed." This is what happened last night. We would probably ignore it except at the same time he's anxious to get out of bed and will try everything to get around the bed rails we put up at night. Once he slithered all the way down to the bottom of the bed, then right off the end between the rail and the footboard, where we found him on the floor. He was going for a walk and was very surprised when his legs didn't hold him up. During this stage we can hear him talking all night long, like last night, so we know he's not getting any sleep.  And we know we have to check on him frequently. We give him a medication for agitation and insomnia, but it doesn't seem to do much good.

Stage 3: I don't know if the antibiotic is starting to work at this point or if he's just worn out, but after a day or two of hallucinations and agitation, he sleeps deeply for long hours. Once it lasted 24 hours and he was completely unresponsive, meaning we couldn't wake him up. It was more like a coma than a sleep. Then after 24 hours, he woke up and said he was hungry, which also happens no matter how long he sleeps.

Last Tuesday, when the first symptoms appeared, the doctor ordered a urine sample. Yesterday (3 days later), it came back positive for an infection, now we're waiting to hear which antibiotic will specifically target this particular bug. Since the broad-based antibiotic we've been giving him since Tuesday doesn't seem to be doing much good, I'm anxious to start him on something that will.

Thank goodness today is Saturday so there was no Seminary this morning and also Lloyd has the day off. Maybe we can spell each other with naps today.

Judy: Taking Care of Dad, 2

When Dad came home from the transitional care center at the end of August, he was not doing well. He'd been very sick and was still extremely weak. He'd lost a lot of weight, mainly because he didn't want to eat anything. In fact, we had to spoon-feed him to get him to take any food at all. The only conversation he'd initiate was, "I want to go back to bed." Other than that he didn't participate. At the care center he'd refused to even try the physical therapy because all he wanted to do was sleep. He had a catheter, which we were told he'd have from now on.

We asked if he were eligible for Hospice and he definitely was, so we signed up with them. They were wonderful! A nurse checked on him twice a week, and they made sure we had the equipment we needed: we already had a hospital bed, but they supplied a special mattress to prevent bed sores. In addition we had a bedside commode and a wheelchair. Hospice is all about palliative care (just make sure they are comfortable), not about getting better.

But lo and behold, after three months, he was no longer eligible and they said he'd "graduated" out of Hospice because he got better all by himself. He got stronger physically so he could scoot from his bed to the wheelchair (although we still have to lift him back into the bed); he got his appetite back and really enjoys his meals; he's awake during the day now more than he has been in years; and he's very involved in the household doings. He loves to have people come visit and stays awake much longer when other people are around.

Bottom line is he's doing very well--until he has a urinary tract infection. Which will be the next topic.

Judy: Taking Care of Dad

I've considered blogging about this experience of being a caregiver for an elderly parent because it's such a huge part of my life right now. But I've hesitated because I didn't want to be disrespectful to Dad in any way...and some of what I could write about might be. But I've decided to go ahead for a couple reasons: I need to write about this as therapy for me, and also--maybe someone else can use it.

Some background: it's been almost fifteen years since Lloyd and I gave up our jobs and house in Maryland to return home and basically be here with Dad. He had recently been divorced and I could tell he wasn't doing well living by himself, so here we came. It was great watching 3 of my kids graduate from my old high school and of course we were able to live in the house I grew up in.

I did all the shopping, cooking and cleaning and considered it a small price to pay to be here in this place I love. Up until now Dad has been independent and a fun "roommie." Although he has gradually become weaker and more frail over the years, he could still get around with his walker. He enjoyed reading the newspaper when he woke up at 5:00 pm and then played chess on the computer or surfed the web, reading news and the family's blogs and sometimes staying up most of the night with a good book. He went to church, to visit family nearby, out to dinner occasionally and life was pretty good for all of us.

Then last summer he had a serious urinary tract infection, landed in the hospital for almost two weeks, then a rehab facility for three weeks after that, and when he came home in September (with a catheter), everything was different. The main difference is that he's immobile--his legs don't work at all. This means he's essentially bedridden although we get him up in his wheelchair for meals at the table two or three times a day. For those who've done this, they know there is a world of meaning in the words "he's bedridden."

More about this next time.

Judy: Weekends

Why is it that weekends are the only times worth blogging about? It's sure true in our case. So let me begin with Friday. Lloyd and I went to Avila's Fish and Farmer's Market and had great time. It was a beautiful day in Avila and the whole front street is the "market." Actually, there are only two or three actual farmers' booths and the only fish is sold in the restaurant booths.  And food booths of all kinds abound so it's hard to choose. A live band is playing and with the beach in the background, it is a sensual delight. We walked around with a a ripe, fresh mango-on-a-stick, then had other stuff for dinner.

Afterwards we came back to town and saw, "Inception." WOW. It blew me away. One of the reviewers said, "You will be confused and disoriented but trust the director. All will be explained." Very true and I would give that advice to anyone seeing it.

On Saturday we went to Paso to have lunch at the Odyssey Cafe because they have paintings for sale and we are looking for one to put on our wall (replacing the picture of the lighthouse). We didn't see any we loved, but we had a good lunch with Kristen anyway.

Sunday morning I picked up Marilyn at the airport and she will stay with us for a few days. Always a treat.
In Church Barbara led the music in Sacrament Meeting. She and Ben have been called as ward choristers and they will take turns. She went first because Ben was singing in church. He sang a Primary song called, "I Will" and I loved it.

I feel funny just "talking" with no pictures, but I do want to keep everyone updated. Just remember I'm older and not used to this new-fangled technology stuff. That excuse is as good as any.

Judy: Lloyd's job

Lloyd sure has an interesting job. Last night he had to wrestle a patient to the ground, then with the help of a couple other staff members, held him there nearly 20 minutes. As you can imagine, poor Lloyd is pretty sore today. He says he can keep this job as long as he can physically do that when necessary.

I think he's amazing; he can do things, not only physical things like that, but dealing with all kinds of people, that very few people can do. Last night Michael and Yvonne came to visit and they said several people at their party last Saturday mentioned Lloyd and what a great guy he was.

Judy: Days Off

I love Lloyd's days off because then I also have permission to have time off. I already told about Friday so here goes about Saturday. As usual, Lloyd spent the morning at the prison with his support group of inmates. He gets home around 11:30 and we often go out to lunch. We went to Tahoe Joe's, which we like a lot, but it's a little pricey for dinner so lunch is the better option. Afterwards we spent some time in the library (one of our favorite things to do), then of course nap time.

While we were sleeping, Ben took a call from Lloyd's nephew, Matthew, who said his parents were coming to town to help him move back home. (He just graduated from Cal Poly's five-year architecture course and will be going home while he looks for a job.) So they invited us to go out to dinner with them: Matthew, Sidney and Mike. It was a VERY nice evening; we sat outside at a great Italian restaurant and had a wonderful visit. It was good to sort of have closure after looking out for Matthew while he was here. We really don't usually go out to eat twice in one day, but this was unexpected and a special occasion.

At night, we watched the old movie, "Marty" with Grandpa. I highly recommend it, although kids won't like it. It was made in 1955 and is in black and white, but it won four oscars and is a very simple, very touching story. They really don't make them like that any more. One thing I found interesting about it was how it showed what life was like in 1955.

Tonight Lloyd is at work, of course, and Ben is getting ready for tomorrow. He is going to be the director for Camp Melodrama for the next four weeks. It lasts from 8:30 till noon five days a week and there will be 53 kids ages 7-17 expecting great things. Ben is excited about doing this, but tonight is a little nervous.

updates

I've decided I like other people's blogs so much that I want to contribute too. (Besides, I am disappointed when they don't update for long periods of time.) I think my life is pretty boring, but I'm sure other people feel the same way about their lives. However, I still want to hear about their lives so I'm assuming someone might feel the same about mine. One problem is that I probably won't have pictures very often--even though they are what make a blog especially interesting. In my case I'll have to rely on text.

Yesterday was Lloyd's day off. He spent it working on stuff for his volunteer position at the prison and I worked around the house (translation: I read most of the afternoon). Jonathan is painting the outside of our house (Christopher helps sometimes, but it's mostly Jonathan). We used one back wall to try three different colors of paint before we settled on one and I really like it. It looks gray when he puts it on next to the white primer, but when the whole wall is covered, it looks like a light blue.

Last night Lloyd and I went to the melodrama and thoroughly enjoyed it--it was classic melodrama and vaudeville. In fact, I think it was one of the better things they've done for a while. Ben is working there at the box office during the day, but he stayed and saw it with us last night. One of the things we always look forward to is the food there. We always get a polish sausage and potato salad and Lloyd said he started salivating for it as soon as we were inside the door.

Judy: Gold Country--The Mother Lode

It's been so long since I did a blog, especially with pictures, that I hope I can remember how to do it. (Click on the pictures to enlarge them and see the details better.) Here goes: Last week was Lloyd's annual vacation so we went somewhere we've always wanted to go, but never had. It's called the California Gold Country and it's between Sacramento and Lake Tahoe and it's all about the Gold Rush. I guess I'll tell about each day, then try to put the pictures in somehow.

We left on Monday and it took about six hours to drive to a little town called Sutter Creek, where we stayed all week at a wonderful Victorian-style bed and breakfast called The Foxes Inn. That first night we ate across the street at the Palace, which obviously used to be an old saloon.

In this picture of the Inn, our room was the one in front on the second floor.

And here's inside. It was full of antiques and wonderful little touches and a large bathroom with a big, claw-footed tub AND big shower.

I have to say something about those gourmet breakfasts we had. They looked beautiful and were such a work of art we almost couldn't eat them, but we managed. Usually we ate out in the garden, (where Lloyd is in this picture) but a couple times we had it in our room. Check out those fruit cups, which were the first course.

This is my French toast one morning. Look at the tiny butter dish with the tiny blossom on the right below the (heated) syrup pitcher.

Anyway, on Tuesday we explored Sutter Creek, which had lots of quaint stores, including antique stores (they always just look like Goodwill to me), tea rooms, a museum of a turn of the century store, and a music box store.

We lingered there quite a while and for Mother's Day Lloyd bought me a music box and had them put in the tune "La Vie en Rose," which is what my Grandma Hansen had in her music box. We had lunch at the ice cream emporium and afterwards drove to El Dorado Hills to a big shopping center because I'd forgotten to bring any sox, of all things, and had to get some. Then we had some soup at Chili's and went to see "How to Train Your Dragon" in 3-D at the IMAX theater. Awesome! Why can't we have an Imax here?

Wednesday we went to the Sacrament temple, which was only a little over an hour away and went to two sessions. Since it was Cinco de Mayo, for dinner we had fajitas at Chili's.

Thursday we explored more of the area around Sutter Creek. We toured the Sutter Creek Gold Mine and learned what a hard life miners had, and probably still do. The guy above was our guide and has spent his life and still is a gold miner. He says when you see pictures of groups of miners they are always frowning because they always have a headache. And, besides a shortened life, that is just one of the problems with the profession. You can also see the veins of white quartz in the side which is what they dig out and find the gold inside. At one place we saw little pieces of gold winking in the middle of the quartz.

The sluice above is where we panned for gold. We bought a bag of sand guaranteed to have a few gold flakes in it and they showed us how to swish it around in the plate through the water. It was fascinating how the gold, tiny as it was, shone through the sand and was not too hard to find. SO much fun!

Also, that afternoon we explored a big deep cave with lots of weird stalagtites (above) called helictites.

That night we went to a smaller town called Plymouth where we ate at an incredible restaurant called Taste. The town looks run down and a little seedy, but this restaurant looks very urban and would have fit right in in San Francisco. I understand people come from all over, including Sacramento and the Bay Area to eat there. I should have taken pictures of that food because it was amazing to look at as well as incredibly delicious.

Friday we drove up to Placerville, a little bigger town with an historic downtown and lots more shops where we spent most of the day. Then we went back to El Dorado Hills because we'd bought tickets to see "Iron Man 2" in the IMAX. Before the show, we ate at a Thai restaurant that gave us so much food we brought a lot home and were still eating it several days later. Fortunately it was so good we wanted to. We enjoyed the movie a lot, although I still think the first one was better, but frankly, ANYTHING is fantastic on that screen.

Saturday we went south instead of north and saw the towns of Jackson, where we spent a couple hours in a used book store, Murphy, which looks a lot like Sutter Creek, and Angel's Camp (above), which is famous as the site of Mark Twain's story about the jumping frog of Calaveras County.

I was about to take a picture of this carving when this big guy comes out of the store and asks, "Do you want a picture of the artist too?" I said sure so here he is with his artwork.

 On both sides of the sidewalk, every few feet they have these plaques with the year, length of jump, and name of the champion frog for that year.

We ended up that evening in Copperopolis. We were able to see a very local version of a melodrama which was a fund raiser for the volunteer firemen. The play was written by a local woman and everybody knew everybody else in the audience and the cast and we were obviously the strangers in town. But it was a fun play and we had corn dogs and sloppy joes there.

Sunday we went to church at the nearby Jackson Ward and people were very friendly. We even met an older man who'd once lived in San Luis and knew my dad and remembered Lloyd as a red-haired teenager.

The Inn had fixed us a fabulous picnic basket, even including the tablecloth, which we took to a place called the Amador Flower Farm. (Lloyd was really happier than he looks, but he was eating.) It was drizzly and most of the flowers weren't in bloom yet, but it was an interesting place, like this little house below, which is part of the corn maze during the Fall.

Then we drove further north to Auburn, quite a big place but which had more of the same flavor of all the little towns around we'd seen. Hint: if you go, don't drive up Highway 49, which is steep, narrow and full of twists and turns.

The whole trip was fun and relaxing and wonderful. We enjoyed seeing a different part of California that we'd never seen before and listening to books on tape as we drove around. But most of all, we enjoyed being together (Lloyd is always a fun date). And on Monday we came home, where it was nice to sleep in our own bed again.

Lloyd: 9 out of 10 boys and one-third of girls use pornography--what to do.

I recently learned from the new LDS website "combatingpornography.org" that 9 out of 10 boys and one-third of girls use pornography; that the body reacts to pornographic addiction by shrinking the cerebral cortex, which contributes to compulsivity and impulsivity; and that the website may be more relevant to me and my family than I had suspected or wished.


Long before pornography was openly available, I received a promise in a blessing that has more importance to me now than it did then:

Dear Brother always have thy mind and thoughts and actions pure and clean. And the Lord will bless thee that you will be able to reject those things which should not come into thine ears.

In other words, if I avoid looking at or seeking out smut, the Lord promises to shield me from the effects of rotten stuff that comes to me uninvited. My son recently pointed out, "In your day you could choose not to look, now smut comes looking for you."

Judy and I recently stayed at a hotel that had a television, but a fee of $5.00 was charged for each selection.  Several selections were labeled “Adult Viewing” and carried a banner promising that their titles would not appear on our credit card bill. Instead of TV, we read our books and visited.

In the past I warned my children against turning on the television in hotels and motels when they traveled alone on business. Now, the internet makes access to pornographic materials as easy as turning on the laptops or smart phones that they carry everywhere. 

The following foreshadowing was also in the blessing:

Be aware the Lord tests and permits to be tested even His prophets. But as you prove true to the trust you will be given strength even in multiplied ways to permit thee to surmount and conquer adversities.

During my training to become a licensed psychiatric technician, I read the charts of many Sexually Violent Predators that were committed to the psychiatric hospital.  And I was surprised to learn that men were given lengthy prison terms for an act that was perpetrated on me by an adult babysitter when I was only four or five years old. I told my mother about it, and we never had that man babysit us again.  But the harmful consequences to me have been life-long and problematic, and I had no idea that they were related to that incident so long ago.

In all honesty, Judy and I are able to find peace in being parents and grandparents only because Heavenly Father got us through many tight spots. So we have confidence that he will look after our children and grandchildren as well.

We also recognize an opportunity to help out. I recommend that parents and grandparents, husbands and wives review the materials made available at combatingpornography.org. 


The website addresses issues of pornography addiction for Home, Individuals, Spouses, Parents, Youth, and Leaders. And for each of these focus areas, there are strategies and background information to prevent, recognize, overcome and support recovery of addiction.

Check it out.

Lloyd: Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.

Late last night a patient in a  hospital  attempted suicide. He wrapped a strip of torn sheet around his neck, went into the bathroom, climbed up to a vent where he tied the other end of the sheet, and let go. For a moment he felt suspended in air and then the strip of sheet broke and he fell backward, hitting his head. He was found sitting on the tile bathroom floor, his back up against the wall, part of the sheet still tight around his neck, and weeping that he'd failed.


He does not understand that he is a child of God and that the Savior atoned for his sins upon condition of repentance and baptism. And he's in an intensely secular institution where employees are forbidden to discuss his true identity and the great gift of forgiveness extended to him.


Recently I gave a blessing which surprised me. The individual blessed was told that we live in a time when the presence and assurance of the Holy Ghost is to be recognized by a feeling of peace and that this peace would be felt internally when external circumstances would seem to dictate confusion, frustration, fear, anger, and despair.


After referring to the Holy Ghost as the Comforter, Jesus Christ said, "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." ( John 14:27)


Whatever our struggles, whatever our challenges, I have come to understand that learning to fully receive the gift of the Holy Ghost in our lives enables us not only to weather the storm but also to help those around us. Our efforts to overcome our struggles and challenges must start with a spiritual journey. Our threatening circumstances or deep yearnings are meant to motivate us to make that journey in earnest. I especially appreciate Abraham's humility in the following statement (Abraham 2:12-13):

"Now, after the Lord had withdrawn from speaking to me, and withdrawn his face from me, I said in my heart: Thy servant has sought thee earnestly; now I have found thee; Thou didst send thine angel to deliver me from the gods of Elkenah, and I will do well to hearken unto thy voice, therefore let thy servant rise up and depart in peace."

The First Commandments Give Priority & Structure to Everything Else

This is Heavenly Father's first commandment to Adam and Eve when he joined them as husband and wife (Moses 2: 27-28):

And I, God, created man in mine own image, in the image of mine Only Begotten created I him; male and female created I them. And I, God, blessed them, and said unto them: Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. 

Later He clarified roles (Moses 4: 22-25):

To Eve: I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband  

To Adam: Cursed shall be the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life..By the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, until thou shalt return unto the ground 

In our day the Lord further clarified the foregoing commandments and roles through a joint declaration by the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve entitled: The Family: A Proclamation to the World.

One temple president cited the following scripture: Notwithstanding she [Eve/Women] shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety. (1 Timothy 2:15). And then he explained that women receive their exaltation through conceiving, bearing, and rearing children. Of course there are many different situations for women in the world, but the president placed great emphasis on rearing and nurturing children.

I well remember the great sadness when we lost 4 children through miscarriage.  No matter at what point through the pregnancy cycle, these were more than fetuses; they were our children with potential and dreams attending. And we mourned deeply.

At one point Judy and I thought we would have 10 children. We planned for it. And at one point we seriously considered adoption and attended classes in Baltimore for adopting children from other countries. Nothing we every have done in our life has been more vital and exciting and joyful or more challenging and difficult and, at times sorrowful, than having and raising our children.

And we covenanted that we would receive whomever the Lord would allow us to receive by whatever means. That meant that we would accept the Lord's will in this matter. We had children, not numbers. It wasn't a contest about how many, rather who was coming to join us. Although saying that we were a family of eleven became a way to describe and deal with the challenges and unusual phenomena of being a large family in a small-family world, our focus was individual personalties with whom we were grateful to associate.

Given all the hazards, we were extremely naive to plan on 10. For each family the Lord has a plan, and you can be certain that his plan will take everything you have to execute it. At the end you will be happy but feel entirely spent. It's true.

I appreciate the church programs and conferences and many materials that the Lord provides today to help us raise our families. There are so many helpful resources that it's like trying to drink from a fire hydrant. We need the Spirit to help us choose and select what's needful for us. Our situations are all so very different. Truly, we can't be faithful in this stewardship without divine assistance.

Our wives' yearning to have children is of amazing intensity. Contrast the responses by Adam and Even upon learning from an angel why they offered sacrifices unto the Lord, symbolic of the promised Redeemer (Moses 5:6-11):

Adam: Blessed be the name of God, for because of my transgression my eyes are opened, and in this life I shall have joy, and again in the flesh I shall see God.

Eve: Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient. (Emphasis added)

And as husbands we walk with our wives and give ourselves to them as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it. (Ephesians 5:25) Our greatest desire is their joy and happiness.

The first commandments give priority & structure to everything else. Then with Heavenly Father we work out the details that are unique to our individual families.

Lloyd: Consecrating myself, my time, my talents, and everything with which the Lord has blessed me or may bless me.

I remember Hermano Miquel Bötz, a humble Quiché Indian in Guatemala. Each Sunday he walked 5 kilometers to church and back with his little family--all barefooted. He learned Spanish by accepting assignments to speak in Sacrament Meeting. At first he would read in halting Spanish several passages from the Book of Mormon. In time he became reasonably fluent in Spanish and was called to be branch clerk. Some of the earlier converts, Spanish speaking and educated, were miffed that Hno. Bötz received this honor. But they attended only sporadically, and Miquel was absolutely faithful. Later, with financial assistance from returned missionaries and their parents, Hno. Bötz and his family journeyed from Guatemala to the Mesa Temple in Arizona, where they received their endowments and were sealed as a family for time and eternity.


I'm reminded of  D&C 58: 8-12 in which the Lord said he would prepare a feast of fat things for the poor, of wine on the lees well refined, a supper of the house of the Lord, well prepared unto which all the nations shall be invited, first the rich and the learned, the wise and the noble, and after that would come the day of His power; then the poor, the lame, and the blind, and the deaf, would come in unto the marriage of the Lamb, and partake of the supper of the Lord, prepared for the great day to come.

In this vein I recommend the following Ensign article, which relates stories from the lives of a couple who truly live the law of consecration--humble members who have their priorities straight, who demonstrate their love for the Lord by their obedience and faith and service to others. Very impressive and a great example for every one of us to emulate. 

R. Val Johnson, “A Temple for Kona,” Ensign, Apr 2010, 46–47

When Leroy and Rose Alip decided to sacrifice to attend the temple monthly, the Lord blessed them beyond their means to go—and to take others with them.

Leroy Alip listened intently as he was set apart to serve on a stake high council on the Big Island of Hawaii. In the blessing, Brother Alip was told he would be on the island when a temple was built there and that he would serve in that temple. This was in 1984, and the only temple in Hawaii was on the island of Oahu, over 200 miles (330 km) away by boat or plane.


The priesthood blessing energized Brother Alip. “I believe that when you are given a blessing, you have a responsibility to do whatever you can to bring that blessing to you,” he says. So he and his wife, Rose, decided to attend the temple on Oahu once a month.

Doing so was not easy. Traveling there cost U.S. $300, a lot of money for a couple barely getting by on Brother Alip’s paycheck from the government office where he worked. The only way they could make the trip was to dip into their savings. They did so gladly.

Within a year, however, they were out of money. “But our hearts were in the temple,” Brother Alip says. “We wanted to continue attending. So we prayed for help.”

Not long afterwards, Brother Alip unexpectedly received an offer to supplement his income by delivering papers for a local business. For these early morning deliveries, he was paid nearly $700 per month. With more than enough money to continue going to the temple, Brother and Sister Alip were prompted to put the surplus in their own special temple fund.

By June 1986 the reason for that prompting became clear: now living in the Kona Hawaii Stake, they could take a number of women from the stake to the temple who were worthy but had not been able to receive their endowments. So each month, the Alips took one sister with them to Oahu. Each time, the sister returned to bear testimony of the spiritual power and joy she felt in doing her own and others’ temple work. Soon, the spirit of temple work spread throughout the stake, and more members began looking for ways to attend the temple.

Through contacts Brother Alip had in the travel industry, he was able to arrange for discounted airfare, ground transportation, and lodging for all in the stake who wanted to go. By 1994 more than 100 members of the Kona stake were making the monthly trip to the Laie Hawaii Temple.

Brother Alip laughs. He recalls, “The temple president joked that the Saints from Kona were wearing out the carpets because so many of them were in the temple.”

In 1997 President Gordon B. Hinckley announced a new direction for temple construction. Building smaller temples would enable more temples to be built. The faithfulness of the Saints on the Big Island was rewarded six months later when President Hinckley announced a temple for Kona. After the temple was dedicated in 2000, Brother Alip was called as second counselor in the temple presidency. Today, fully retired from his career and fully engaged in the work of the Lord, he supervises the workers who keep the grounds of the Kona Hawaii Temple beautiful.

Brother and Sister Alip are grateful for the ways Heavenly Father has blessed them to have what they need to continue serving others. When they first came to Kona, Brother Alip says, “We had no place to stay except for a small shack in the hills built for a worker in the coffee fields.” They lived there for months until they were able to rent a small cottage.

A number of years later, they had enough savings and income to consider a nicer home, but nothing they looked at felt right to them. One day while Brother Alip was working on the Kona temple grounds, an elderly sister came by. She was crying. “She was being evicted from her home and had no place to go,” Brother Alip says. “For some reason, I told her to go visit her grandchildren, and when she returned, she could move in with us.” The problem was, the Alips’ home was big enough for only Brother and Sister Alip. So they started praying—and looking earnestly for ways to obtain the blessing they sought.

Shortly, a real-estate agent invited them to consider a two-story home with six bedrooms. They loved it, but they assumed the house would cost more than they could afford. Reluctantly, they turned the offer down.

But a way opened up. Within a few weeks, the price of the home dropped, and the Alips learned they had sufficient credit to buy the house. As a result, the sister in need had a place with Brother and Sister Alip when she returned to Kona, and three of the Alips’ children, in need themselves, found shelter for their families at the house, too.

“The Lord has taken good care of us,” Brother Alip says. “When we show that we are willing to sacrifice our time, talents, and means for Him, He showers us with His tender mercies.”