The Week of the Mountain Fire

 Another week has gone by, with lots of fun visits and associations with wonderful people.  On Monday Melia and her grandmother Melissa, who live in our ward. came by to deliver an invitation to a Les Mis sing along she's been planning.  Melia is a great friend of Trevor and Nell's, having worked with them in Primary, and it was fun to get to know her.

 That night Dad and I went to the farmer's market in Mapleton, that this customer had told me about.  She's very interesting, and grows  her own wheat.  Here she does a demonstration showing how she -knocks the grain out of the wheat heads.  It was very interesting.

There were also several musical groups that played and I found a lovely homemade lotion, that I love.

 While in town Dad wanted to drive by his grandfather Warren's home.  It was built in 1947, and it had  a for sale sign.  When we got home Dad looked it up and saw that it was on an acre and a third, and has a second house and a back pasture for a horse.

 On Tuesday Dad woke up with a crazy idea, by his own admission.  He thought we might go in with Darby and buy his grandfather's property.  It was listed for 575, but the previous year had gotten as low as 525.  Darby is just about to buy a horse property for a portion of that amount, and he thought if we did it together she would get a larger house and a larger pasture.   We even drove over and walked the property, only to find that it was pretty shabby looking outside.  Fences were repaired by placing random other parts of fences and furniture, etc.  An old pool that had been filled in, etc.  Becca thought it was a great value with two houses on the property, and the pictures of the house interiors we very nice.

 Here's a great picture that I wanted to save from Spencer's IG account.  How cute is this baby?

 At work on Wednesday I took this picture of the smoke from the fire that has been burning in the hills above Payson.  Yikes.

 Here's Dad checking out the stats on the houses in Mapleton again that night.  He was pretty obsessed, and I was trying to be supportive. We talked about how we would work things out with Darby and talked about how fun it would be to live in a compound arrangement with her.  I even though maybe I might try riding myself.  

While I was at work on Wednesday Dad finished making the pillar to support the double drive gate high enough to do the job, and started on the other pillar.

 After it got dark we drove out to see the fire.  It wasn't as bad as this when we saw it, but I found this pictures on the internet later.

On Thursday I worked and Dad went to the temple.

 On Friday we went shopping and got stuff for Elias' birthday, as well as gifts for a couple of upcoming baby showers.  We stopped by Elias' house on the way home, as it was his birthday.

 Davin lifted Nenna up to get the balloon when it escaped its tie.

Elias love the Lego set that Grandpa chose for him, and got right at it.

I'd bought this little fountain at Treasures for just 6 dollars because it leaked, it was on the dining room table, which we worked on clearing as we were having friends coming for dinner.  I asked Dad to put it somewhere so he would remember to fix it.  He disappeared for a half an hour and came back with it, good as new.  He'd added a washer to each side of the joint where the pipe cut through the side of the can.  Yeah Dad!!

 Dinner that night was lovely with the Moyars, the Kews, Melia and Melissa and us.  Its so fun to get to know new people.

 Eva has been busy.  This is a picture I took from her Dad's IG account.  She has been crocheting craft items for the Beehive Bazaar, and she made $150 dollars over the weekend.  How amazing is that?

 On Saturday morning I got to go to a shower for Krista Moe Terranova, at her cousin's house in Highland.  Brittany is also expecting by not until after the first of the year.  How fun is that?

Her sister Kylie made this beautiful cake, which I hear was delicious as well.

 Here is Robin with Tami and her new baby, as well as with Melody, Daniel's wife, who is making Robin another grandbaby.

 Here we all are ... Robin, Teri, me and Barb.

Becca came too, its so fun to get together with our girls.

After the shower I headed to Mapleton, to meet up with our real estate agent, Becca, her cute kiddos, Darby and Dallas and Dad.  The main house was a big disappointment.  They say pictures don't lie, but in this case they literally stretched the truth, if you know what I mean.  The gathering room that had looked so large in the pictures, was not. Darn it.  This was one of the main things we had hoped to gain.  If anything the gathering space between the living room and the kitchen was smaller than what we have in our current house.  We tried to figure out ways to make it work, especially after the cabin turned out to be so charming and had a huge gathering space.  But as Darby said, it was so 'open concept' that it was like an over-sized studio apartment at 1500 sf.  We walked around and talked our dreams, because it was a lovely dream.  Granted a tons of work, because the main house needed a lot of work, as did the property, even the pasture needed to be graded.  Dang.

We all went to Cubby's for lunch afterward, to see if we could make it work, but in the end we knew it was unrealistic. 

We met with Heuers and Moes for dinner that night, here Eric demonstrates the size of the burgers. Then we went to see Daddy Longlegs at the Hale Center Theater with them.

 On Sunday we headed to Salem to attend Ian Shumway's Homecoming.  After that we went to Highland for the Handcocks' homecoming, they are the last of the senior couples we served with.  The Londons were there as well. Then last of all we headed to our own ward for the second two meetings. 

 Then it was home to get ready for our first family dinner since we got home from Finland.  There were so many other family dinners, that it hasn't seemed necessary up until now.  As it was most of the family was otherwise occupied, but we were very happy to have Darby, Spencer and Brittney, and Trevor's family, and we had a lovely evening.

 We all ended up playing Telestrations, which is one of my favorite games, and also a favorite of  Trevor's family.

 We had a lovely evening, other than the fact that Darby left right after dinner.  Look how cute these girls are.  

This week we passed the one month anniversary of Ben's death.  Trevor had a lovely dream about him, that he shared, that gave me great comfort.  We also stopped by the cemetery on our way home from the Farmer's Market on Monday.  It has been good for us to be together so much, because we can talk about him, and share our aching hearts with each other, on and off.  Its amazing how well we can comfort each other too. 

 We hope that you are all doing well in this regard.  We pray for you all every day. 

 I think that part of the reason that I feel such great peace, is that I know Ben lived a very full life, and I feel that he accomplished much in his life with his extraordinary talent for bringing joy to others.(As Scrooge says, "Mankind is my business.")  I am so grateful that he had a wonderful, if short marriage. I know that he loves Hannah beyond my comprehension.  I truly believe that they are soul mates. She is a wonderful woman, and I have hope that they can be together again.  I also feel that the issues that plagued his life, and caused him such pain, are now being dealt with, with the help of his beloved grandparents, and that he is developing into the incredible man he was always meant to be.