Mystery solved

I thought our dishwasher was broken. From one day to the next it stopped getting the dishes clean. I washed all the glasses by hand to try and get them clean. Now I know why...see this article. Read the article to get tips on what to do to get clean dishes again. I guess I'll be buying vinegar by the barrel. Avoid Cascade, it's the worst. I've been using Cascade for years, but not anymore.

I don't mind recycling and separating our newspapers, plastic, boxes, etc. from the trash.
I don't mind trying to be careful and cautious and conserve water.
I don't litter.
I don't put toxic stuff down the drain.
I try and only use the heat and cooler when necessary.
But this is too much.
I can't stand these dirty, white film coated dishes.
Bring back the phosphate, please!!!!

30 on Jordan

My baby girl Jordan turned 30 last Friday, September 25. Wow, how can that be possible? I was out of town on an adventure and didn't get a chance to post a message wishing her a happy BD. Jord is an amazing young mother. Here are 30 things I LOVE about her:
1. She is steady and constant
2. Her feathers aren't easily ruffled, she almost always takes things in stride
3. She is super organized and she even helps her friends organize their homes
4. She is good through and through
5. She is a great problem solver
6. She is dependable and responsible. If she says she will do something, she does it
7. She is great at juggling many things. She keeps her home running smoothly
8. She doesn't sweat the small stuff (and it's all small stuff.)
9. She loves to read and knows a bunch of stuff about a bunch of stuff
10. She is a great mother. She has the perfect touch of being loving and setting boundaries. She's no push over.
11. She has many talents, one of which is playing the piano
12. She is great at budgeting. She and Jake handle their income very well. She's a cash and carry girl.
13. She has self discipline and can wait for what she wants
14. She is kind and helpful to many people and helps those who need help, even when it's not convenient for her
15. She has some spit fire in her, but she knows how to use it.
16. She is independent and self driven
17. She is a very conscientious mother. She doesn't coddle or isn't overly protective. She has the perfect touch
18. She is a great wife. She adores Jake and gives him the support he needs to do his job. They have a great relationship.
19. She loves do learn new things and try her hand at new techniques like gardening. She is a great cook and makes a home cooked dinner every night for her family. She plans her meals out weekly and feeds her family healthy food.
20. She exercises routinely and keeps in shape but doesn't go overboard. Mother of three? You'd never know it.
21. She is very practical. She just lives her life and isn't overly concerned about impressing people or worrying about what others think. She has great self confidence.
22. She loves to serve in the church. She went from Primary president recently to serving as Laurel advisor with the Young Women.
23. She has many friends from all walks of life. She is very helpful to people and they are helpful to her. What goes around usually comes around.
24. She and Jake enjoy being parents. They are good at it. They share the load and help one another accomplish what needs to be done.
25. Jordan is beautiful. She has a great smile.
26. Jordan has a lot of faith. Her actions show her commitment to the gospel of Jesus Christ.
27. Jordan is a great daughter. She is a dear friend and we love to spend time with her.
28. Everyone loves Jordan. She has long time friends and lots of new friends. She makes friends easily.
29. She set a high water mark for her brothers and sisters. She set and pace and has accomplished a lot in her 30 years. They love being with her and she with them.
30. She loves the Lord and that is evident in her daily life.

I love you dear Jordan! For always and forever, my baby you'll be.

To see more pictures, check out the entry in 2009 and 2008.

Don't feed the animals

Customize a picture slideshow

Dave and Courtney went to Africa at the end of May to visit her parents who are serving a mission there. They had an amazing experience. I asked them if I could share some of their incredible pictures and they agreed. Get ready to enjoy some beautiful pictures of their African safari. Wow, what an experience!

Pornography = the scourge of our generation

The Deseret News has been running a series of articles detailing the real and damaging effects of pornography on our society. It's compelling reading. We've heard it for years from our church leaders and now more and more of society is getting on board, realizing the societal costs. Parents need to be fully aware of the evil that is so accessible in the comfort of their own homes. I feel that parents need to take every precaution that is necessary to protect their families from this hideous and descructive vice. It ruins marriages, families and the spirit and psyche of people who participate in it. It's the scourge of our modern society that leads to many of the other social ills that are becoming more and more common.

"A recently released study of pornography cites its damaging effects on mind, body and heart.

Titled "The Effects of Pornography on Individuals, Marriage, Family and Community," the study was authored by Patrick F. Fagan, a Family Research Council senior fellow and director of its Center for Research on Marriage and Religion.

"Pornography is a visual representation of sexuality which distorts an individual's concept of the nature of conjugal relations," wrote Fagan. "This, in turn, alters both sexual attitudes and behavior. It is a major threat to marriage, to family, to children and to individual happiness. In undermining marriage, it is one of the factors in undermining social stability."

Study says porn damages mind, heart - link here.

New initiative sheds light on pornography's impact on families - link here

Is porn a real addiction? - link here

Pornography 'grips you with claws' - link here

A generation gap in understanding porn of today - link here

Pornography research generates hate mail - link here.

"Those who are fearful, those who are addicted, those who are anxious are powerfully working against (efforts to understand pornography's effects)," she said. "There is an attempt in the industry to silence anyone who will talk. So every time I do an interview with a reporter, every time there's an article in the newspaper, I'll get hate mail.

"I'm an academic — and I get hate mail!"

Joseph Price, a BYU economics professor who specializes in distilling down large data sets dealing with pornography consumption, concurs with Layden's assessment that a gap still remains between establishing correlation and proving causation in the context of pornography's ability to harm the human psyche. Price, though, goes on to suggest that pornography research could follow a path to proving causation of negative consequences similar to that taken by the tobacco studies of yesteryear.

"Current studies don't necessarily speak to a causal effect of pornography, but they are suggestive of that," Price said. "I think that future research is going to better help us understand the causal effect of pornography on people. And in that sense, I view it as very similar to the research that was done a long time ago about tobacco. It actually took us a long time to come to an understanding of the causal impact of smoking on people's health."

Regardless of the road academics tread while continuing to study pornography's effects on individuals and society, Layden expects her steady flow of unhappy e-mails and letters to continue unabated.

"There's a backlash against those of us who speak out and say, 'Here's the research,' or those who do the research (about pornography)," she said. "Either interests that are moneyed or interests that are addicted or interests that are fearful or interests that are ignorant of the effect — they're all working against this."

The LDS church has launched a new web site called "Combating Pornography - replacing darkness with light" Check it out here. It has many good resources for addicts, spouses, families and others who are trying to help.

Andy at 22

Today my baby boy turns 22. Wow. Here are 22 things I love about him ~

1. He has the best heart.

2. He is fun to be around. There is never a dull moment. He keeps us up to date on current trends and happenings.

3. I love his friends. They are great young men.

4. He gets up and keeps going even when there are set backs...he doesn't give up.

5. He knows how to do hard things and he doesn't shy away from a challenge.

6. He has a ton of friends...everyone likes Andy.

7. He knows what is important in life and he stays grounded.

8. He tries to help people around him. Sometimes they let him, sometimes they don't.

9. He's a good looking young man who has his own sense of style.

10. He is funny and is always looking for funny things in life.

11. He's always been a great sleeper - once he gets to bed.

12. He is a hard worker and is responsible at his employment.

13. He has proven to himself that he can accomplish anything he sets his mind to. He can do hard things.

14. He is a friend to the underdog.

15. He LOVES his 4 nieces and enjoys hearing little stories about their growth and progress. He's so cute with them.

16. He "gets it." He has a strong testimony and he understands the importance of the gospel of Jesus Christ in his life.

17. He likes adventure and doing thrilling stuff. He is kind of fearless. He has broken bones to prove it.

18. He likes to take his parents better cars whenever possible and dislikes "his" car.

19. He loves anything Mongolian. Yesterday he got to speak to a Mongolian sister missionary for awhile and it brought him such joy to speak Mongolian again and to hear it well spoken.

20. He's a great son and brother. He loves to spend time with his family.

21. He's figuring out what he wants to do for a career and making steps toward a bright future.

22. He's loves his mom and dad and he knows that we trust him. He has earned that trust.

Happy 22nd son. I love you!!!

For more pictures see here for 2009 and here for 2008.

Alma 5

I read Alma 5 again a few days ago. I can't stop thinking about it. It's such a powerful chapter. I makes me want to do better and be better. It holds such wisdom and gems, such as:

~Behold, he changed their hearts; yea, he awakened them out of a deep sleep, and they awoke unto God.
~nevertheless, their souls were illuminated by the light of the everlasting word;
~according to his faith there was a mighty change wrought in his heart. Behold I say unto you that this is all true.
~And behold, he preached the word unto your fathers, and a mighty change was also wrought in their hearts, and they humbled themselves and put their trust in the true and living God. And behold, they were faithful until the end; therefore they were saved.
~Have ye received his image in your countenances?
~Come unto me ye blessed, for behold, your works have been the works of righteousness upon the face of the earth?
~his garments must be purified until they are cleansed from all stain, through the blood of him of whom it has been spoken by our fathers, who should come to redeem his people from their sins.
~bring forth works of righteousness,
~And now if ye are not the sheep of the good shepherd, of what fold are ye?
~ you that are desirous to follow the voice of the good shepherd, come ye out from the wicked, and be ye separate,

Coming down the home stretch

While we were gone to Denver, the workers made good progress.
Tile in the bathrooms, laundry room and around the living room fireplace- check
Painting - check (this took a month and about killed us all off, including the painter)
Electricians returned to install canned lighting and switch plates - check
Plumber resetting the toilets – check today

Now on to the hardwood floor & then the finish carpenter will put on the moldings in all the upstairs rooms. He is also going to build a railing on the stairs going into the the garage and fix the corroded and rusted metal railing on the front porch! Two more items that needed doing and we have workman around who can do them. Hooray!
Last part - the arrival of the furniture and the decorating of the rooms. That will be the funnest part of all!

Since the pictures were so small last post (because I took them off Courtney’s and Claire’s Picasa shared photos) I’ll make these pictures larger!

   

 

Rocky Mountain high

Over the last weekend, we enjoyed being together in Denver and Colorado Springs, taking in some sporting events and just hanging out. Claire (the best travel planner of all time) got us the hook-ups at the Marriott Residence Inn and she even brought a homemade dinner to feed us the first night consisting of all her signature dishes - Hawaiian haystacks, banana bread, the BEST guacamole dip and chips, and fruit salad. Thanks Claire! We enjoyed looking around Denver, visiting the capital building that is one mile high in altitude, going on a tour of the US Mint and seeing about a billion coins in production, going to the outlet mall, visiting the US Olympic training facility, tailgating with some of R and Claire's friends from their home town and of course attending the BYU-Air Force football game. I got to tend the little girl cousins at the hotel while everyone went to the game. We all took a nap. I think I got the better end of the stick on that deal. We enjoyed attending church on Sunday together and we had a wonderful family weekend. That weekend will fill my reserves for a few months now until we meet again! I love my family!

Happiness!

Coming soon to~

Hobby Lobby

• 360 W University Pkwy ·
• Orem

Need I say more?

Laboring on Labor Day

I'm exhausted after laboring quite hard on Labor Day. Our weekend went like this:
~Friday afternoon visit from Janet - toured the remodel.
~Friday night movie with Rick.
~Got a phone call from Courtney saying that she got a job in a school district as a speech therapist! Hooray! Congrats to Courtney.
~Saturday morning departure to attend Swiss Days in Midway with Janet, Sydney and DaeLynn. Wow, what an event. Who knew that is was so HUGE and attended by 1,000s of people? We made some good purchases and a had a good time. We heard some yodeling, and saw some lederhosen and other authentic Swiss costumes, houses and food. Sauerkraut was smelt in abundance. 95 degree day. So fun to be with the Idaho girls.
~Lunch at the Homestead in the air conditioning, away from the crowds.
~Homestead homemade fudge on the way home.
~Visited Rick's mom Pat who is recovering from knee replacement.
~Went grocery shopping for food for Vern who is staying alone. Made him dinner and visited.
~Watched bits and pieces of the BYU-Washington game on TV
~Enjoyed the Sunday routine. Attended the MTC testimony meeting. Grilled on the patio and enjoyed a garden dinner with Janet, Syd and Adam. Good visit.
~Enjoyed phone visits as usual with our kids and their families on Sunday night.
~Got going early on Monday. Walked for an hour with Patsy. Cleaned the windows of Diane and Steven T. ~Cleaned Patsy's windows and screens and she helped me clean ours.
~Rick, Andy and cousin R. hiked to the Y on the mountain.
~ We washed all four of our cars, cleaned inside and out when they got home.
~Cleaned the garage. Hoisted all of Dave's long term storage boxes up on top of the room in the garage.
~Started putting the tree bench together again.
~Got cleaned up and ate dinner with Pat at her rehab center. Attended the pre-dinner before the concert of KC and the Sunsh*ine Band at the Scera shell. OK concert. Not the best. Exotic dancers were a bit much for conservative Utah.
~Fell into bed exhausted.
All in all, a good weekend!

Service with a smile

I'm very proud of my daughter Jordan. She was released from serving as the primary president in her ward after many years. She served the little children with such kindness and helped teach them the gospel of Jesus Christ. It was great to see her in action a couple of times when we were visiting. She loved serving in Primary and she will miss the association with the children and their teachers. She really accomplished a lot in her years of service and touched many lives. She's moving on to serve with the Young Women now, but a piece of her heart will always be in Primary. Her husband Jake is the EQP, so their little family keeps busy with service in their ward.

The purpose of Primary is to teach children the gospel of Jesus Christ and help them learn to live it. The objectives of Primary are to:

1. Teach children that they are children of God and that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ love them.
2. Help children learn to love Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
3. Help children prepare to be baptized, to receive the Holy Ghost, and to keep their baptismal covenants.
4. Help children grow in their understanding of the gospel plan and provide opportunities for them to live gospel principles.
5. Help boys prepare to receive the priesthood and be worthy to use this power to bless and serve others.
6. Help girls prepare to be righteous young women, understand the blessings of the priesthood and the temple, and serve others (see Church Handbook of Instructions, Book 2: Priesthood and Auxiliary Leaders [1998], 229).

The Primary theme is “All thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children” (3 Nephi 22:13).

Over half way

~The hardwood floor was delivered (in the red boxes) so that it could acclimate to the humidity in the house for 10 days. ~The finish carpenter came and installed bead board in the kitchen and around the island. It will be painted next week. ~The kitchen cupboards were glazed and refinished, knobs were attached. They look NICE. Of all the improvements, I think I may like having knobs on the cupboards the best! ~The horrible wall paper was painstakingly removed from our bedroom and bathroom and Andy’s room and the walls were re-textured. ~The ceiling was painted in a flat paint so that the lights don’t shine off of it. ~The carpenter added crown molding to the front room and dining room. ~The family room is painted “Tavern Taupe” and the living/dining is painted “Salt Bush” (who comes up with these names??) So far, so good.

Independence Day

The BIG announcement came yesterday afternoon with a news conference coming up today at noon with more details. All the fans were a flutter with excitement and questions about possible scenarios. The "what ifs" and "maybes" were flying abundantly. It has dominated the conversation around our house for weeks. And weeks. It has helped distract Rick and Andy from the mess of the remodel. Last night the boys were watching clips of past games and even clips of the hardest hits of all time in football over the Internet. They can't sleep at night in anticipation of the new season beginning on Saturday. Sometimes I wish I liked something as much as they like football. It's fun to watch them get excited about it though.

Two of Andy's friends walked on yesterday. Two. Tanner C. and Greg M. Good for them. He has another friend Tom who is already on the team. It will be fun to watch them play.

Claire wrote again on Cougar Board. She got awarded the post of the day for her entry called "Lifetime of Being a Cougar." Check it out here. Our poor kids. They can't help themselves. It's in their blood. They were brainwashed from an early age and they are true fans through and through. They married people who are equally as devout. Next weekend we're going to Denver to see the Cougars play Air Force. Everyone is coming. No one wanted to be left out. It's what we do!

This building has a huge impact on the decisions that are being made concerning the direction the athletic program is going. BYU TV. Ever heard of it? It's big time for lots of different reasons. Here are a few:

BYU Television is celebrating 10 years of success and in 2010 will be expanding their vision. BYU Television, a service provided by BYU Broadcasting, is often confused with KBYU TV. While KBYU TV is a public service limited to Utah, BYU Television reaches audiences across the world on 650 cable systems reaching more than 50 million households in the USA and millions more internationally.

BYU-TV's new tagline, "See the Good in the World," describes their mission to provide good content with LDS values, including content from BYU campuses and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Programs often include BYU devotionals, BYU sports, General Conference, and various religious and educational series.

It sits on a hill, its tall glass facade gleaming in the sunlight, a modern tower housing a state-of-the-art TV studio that rivals anything in the industry.

This 100,000-square-foot building, filled with enough soundproof walls to build another complete building, has a giant belly filled with complicated cables, wires, high-definition production wares and state-of-the art technology that feeds a modern TV studio.

Next to it is a sports studio. All of this can split off four BYU-TV broadcasts simultaneously and is rigged for digital media operations and Internet streaming. This tower of glass and mortar is hard-wired with video and audio HD capability direct to LaVell Edwards Stadium and the Marriott Center, reducing the need for one of those giant TV trucks.

And a truck? BYU owns the best HD production truck in the West.

This network, with its capabilities and instant access to DirecTV and Dish Network's basic platform and 200 cable companies in North America, is at the center of the national story that caught the attention of the college football world this past week.

By Dick Harmon, Deseret News, Published: Saturday, Aug. 21, 2010