I got to spend the funnest day with my sisters last friday.  It had really been a long time so it was sure good to see them.  

I got the stitching done on this pillow for Teina's birthday while I was at Camille's so I just needed to put it together.   It turned out pretty cute!  I love the one I have and keep it right where I can look at it every day, so I hoped she would like it too. 

 

 I almost laughed when I saw the fore cast for Friday... snow!  Ha!  We have the worst luck!  And that's what we got!  It was raining so hard all the way to Teina's the water was just standing on the road, then around Layton, it started snowing a full on blizzard!  I was worried Leslie and Brenda were going to have trouble coming from the other way but they had Angie and Denise with them and Denise was driving so she was fine with it.

We met at the Quilted Bear there in Ogden.  It was great to see Denise and Angie too.  Angie was visiting for her grampas'  90th birthday party.  She is still battling her cancer but was telling us her tumor was shrinking so that is good news.  She was telling us about a new treatment her dr. mentioned where they go in and freeze the tumor.  It sounds really promising but very expensive.  She is checking with her insurance company to see if they would help her with it. She is so brave and keeps such a great attitude.  I sure hope things start getting better for her.

It was great to catch up with my sisters too.  We shopped around for a while, then went to Applebees for lunch.

Brenda was telling us about this little black book she found in her things from Daddy that he had written to tell about his life history.  She had typed it all up and made each one of us a copy of it. It's quite a lot, but I read the whole things in a couple day's.  It was so interesting to hear about daddy's life growing up.  As I read, I could just hear daddy talking.   He has such a great way of telling a story.  I used to love to listen to him talk as we sat around the kitchen table after dinner.  Seems like he must have talked to Kelley about things maybe he thought were more guy stories.  He would tell him about experiences he had in the war and on his mission. I'm glad Kelley has a good memory too so he can pass them along! 

Anyway, this life history was really interesting.  I didn't know much about his life growing up and it gave me a whole new love and appreciation for him as I read it. He did not have an easy life. But the stories he tells are full of humor and gratitude for what he did have.  I learned a few things about family and people I had heard him talk about, but didn't know where they fit into the picture.  A lot of things came together and made sense as I read this. He had such an interesting childhood, so many adventures and great stories!  I read about what they did for fun back then and it think it would have been a hard but great time to be alive! Such a simple, but happy life. 

 He learned to play the guitar and was in a band with a bunch of friends that was quite good.  They would do shows and even make money at it.  He really was very good on the guitar.  We had to coax him to get it out though and he would say awwww, I'm no good at it, or I can't remember how to play, but then when he did, it was amazing!  I used to love to listen to him play while we'd all sing.  With him playing guitar and mum on the uke, the girls all in harmony, it was a sound that's embedded in my heart and mind that I'll never forget.

 Grampa taught Daddy to work and he was about the hardest working guy I ever knew. He looked at work as an opportunity because jobs were hard to come by at the time and he was glad for any chance to do it.  He worked several different places, usually going away for the whole summer for a job.  

It was interesting to hear him talk about going on a mission.  It wasn't something he really wanted to do, and when the bishop asked him if he would go, he said he would have to think about it.  When he told his folks about it though, they were disappointed, so he told the bishop he'd go.  He was a quiet guy so I think this was just a hard thing for him to imagine himself out there teaching someone the gospel (let alone in a different language)  He had some great experiences though and I"m so glad he wrote them down! 

 He talked about being in the Marines too which I didn't know very much about. He had some very harrowing experiences that are proof to me that he was being watched over and preserved to be able to carry on his life after the war.  Anyway, I'm sure grateful he wrote all of this down so we could know a little more about his life and also to Brenda for typing it all up and sharing it with us!  That's a treasure!