Of Princess Books, and Frogs and Funerals.

This week was pretty typical, until the weekend.  Emily came up to show me how she and 'baby girl' were dressed alike.  I love that she comes up here and shares the baby so much.  On Monday, Memorial Day, Dad, Davin and Trevor, and his oldest two, climbed up to the Y.  Dad came home exhausted, as they had run all the way down, in like 12 minutes.  His muscles hurt, seriously, for three days.  Then, he worked on my garden/green house for a while until he was totally spent. 

 He then went on to work like crazy for the next three days, he has a heavy schedule of resets right now and it is hard on him physically.

I worked on house projects and blogging, mainly, besides working on Wednesday and Thursday.   I also went to the temple on Tuesday night, so that I could attend the session in which Dad lead the prayer circle... I missed my exit on the way, and then the next one was closed, oops.  I was sure I had missed the session, but when I got to the top of the stairs, a couple of people were stopped to let the people in his session pass by, and the worker invited me to join them.  I have NEVER seen that happen.  I can only count it as the Lord watching out for me

 Early Friday morning it was off to Arizona.  Dad had read on facebook on Wednesday morning, that his friend Ilkka Lepannen has passed away late on Tuesday.  Now you have to understand that there is only one thing Dad likes more than a funeral and that is a reunion.  I told him sometimes I think, he thinks they are the same thing.  He said 'he just likes to put the fun back in funeral.' 

 The funeral was scheduled for Friday evening and he was determined to go.  It meant me cancelling a day of junking fun and lunch at a place I was looking forward to along with Cathie and Jennifer, and then also missing out on selling off my clearance stuff at the flea market at Treasures Saturday (Held just twice a year), but he is always so good to support me, I knew I really had no choice, but to return the favor.

Then Dad talked to Trevor and offered to take Scott and Eva down to see their Nana and Papa in Phoenix, which resulted in a kind invitation for us to stay with the Grows as well.  Here are  a couple of pics of the kids on our way down.  Both Scott and Eva were great travelers.   Eva and I worked on our 'Princess Books' for a couple of hours on the way down, which was evidently exhausting for her ...

This is a picture from Dad's last missionary reunion (of his mission group) taken during April Conference.  Ilkka is the blond third from the left in the middle row.  Their mission president's wife, Sister Wade is third from the left on the front row.  We sat behind her at the funeral, and afterwards, she said she knew "it was Scott that was behind me, when I heard your beautiful voice."

Tami was a wonderful hostess, even though J. Scott and I took turns being sick.  Her friend Arlene, (That's Grandma Arlene to Scott and Eva) came by with her daughter who is visiting from England.  It was very fun to visit with her about life in England.  She has lived there around 10 years.  She said that every WEEK a Christian Church building in the British Isles is sold and become a Mosque, because there is so little interest in organized religion  among the Christians in England.  Whoa.

It was fun to check out Tami's decorating.  She is super talented, (not surprisingly as Nell's mom) and I am going to do some blogging about her house.  I LOVED this bathroom.  So charming, and so interesting, that it is basically the same color as my bathroom (above)  Too Fun!!

She was also kind enough to take me junking along with her adorable daughter-in-law Heather who was there for part of the day on Saturday.  We had a lovely time, and Tami and Heather even found a great desk for J. Scott's bedroom remodel that is coming up. 

We went to church on Sunday, just sacrament meeting, and then headed home.  Unfortunately I think it was Dad's turn for the goomboo that J. Scott and I had experienced, and he was super achy and sore coming home, he even relented and let me drive a bit.

My favorite memory from the week is hearing J. Scott sing "Why are their so many songs about rainbows" in his Kermit the Frog voice (done very convincingly, I might add).  He is really good .... and since we were eating bagels at one point we all changed the words to replace "rainbows" with "bagels" ....

"Bagels are visions, but only illusions, And bagels have nothing to hide."

Thanks Eva and Scott!