Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Family Newsletter March 2008

Sid & Jeanne Stephenson

Another month has whizzed by…and I confess it has been packed with goodness. I can see all of you snickering, wondering how senior citizens can have lives packed with goodness (when they are on their way “out”) but wait until you get there and you will discover it is true. Each morning we wake up we decide that it is going to be the best day of our lives, and you know what? The prophecy is always fulfilled. Our health is good, our family is exceptionally wonderful (that’s all of you), we live in the greatest country ever, the earth is beautiful, we have a rich heritage, and we have a knowledge of the Savior and His gospel. It just doesn’t get any better. Thank you for the blessings you bring into our lives!

Early March we spent some time in Utah with Sherri, Spencer and family…you know how we love being with family members and each of you make us feel so welcome and loved. While there, Sherri’s nanny who is attending beauty school, gave me a ‘new look’ with a perm, hair color, manicure and pedicure. I loved the pampering!!!! After leaving Sherri and Spencer’s, we spent some time at Shelly and Dave’s (while they were in Hawaii) and stayed with Ryan. What an enjoyable time we had with him. He is so pleasant and makes no demands, has a charming personality, respectful, and the ideal ‘teen’. (We have quite a few other grandchildren that fit into the same mold.) Upon returning home, we picked up our regular routine of just having our lives filled with the ‘best’ we can.

I picked up a new hobby this past week…I tuned up my harp and have been plucking out some tunes (with one hand to start with). I also enrolled in a new course of study entitled “The Louvre”. It has been especially interesting as there is a lot of history woven into the course. Another challenge that Sid and I have taken up this month is we are attending the Family History classes, which include lessons on the New Family Search that the church has just released. I am grateful for those of you who have shared information with other family members about your forefathers so we can preserve records of our “roots”. I hope we appreciate our ancestry because we wouldn’t be living the good life we live today without their many sacrifices.

We love each of you and DO count our blessings each day for having you a part of our lives. Thanks again Stephanie for your perseverance in keeping the family newsletter rolling….

Love, Mom and Sid

Shelly & Dave Senior

Dear Family,

This picture seems to best sum up the past seven months in Utah. We have had a plethora of snow and are anxiously awaiting sunshine and for me, an opportunity to need a pedicure. Life has been so busy the past few months for us, but we are indeed alive, barely though. Dave and I about two weeks ago were involved in a pretty severe car accident. Needless to say we jack-knifed on the freeway, pulling a trailer going about 50 miles an hour. We were driving the High School drum line equipment to Northern California for Ryan’s school. It is a miracle we


are alive and the most important things in life became a very short list. So first and foremost I am so thankful for my family and am thankful that we are all so close.

Our kids are doing well. Derek is busy as ever with school and his band playing at several BYU events and having a great time. He is teaching Spanish to Dave’s office and hoping he gets paid well for doing it. Scott has done so well this year at BYU and adjusted well to the college life, works a little making Pizza’s and ventures home once in a while so we can see him. Ryan is right in the middle of a hectic drum-line season. They did great at their national competition in Hayward, taking second 9/10 of a point below first place. They did a great job and he loves every minute of it. In between that, he is playing basketball and seems to have enough energy to do it all. I have been traveling with Dave this year so far and have had a lot of fun doing that. It was not the same to go to Hawaii without Craig and Linda there we missed them a lot. It has been great to have Mom and Sid come to visit, see Craig and Linda at Sherri’s for dinner, ski with Steph and Sherri, and see Sandie and Neil (who it has been FOREVER) since I had last seen. We are off to Switzerland with Mom and Sid and very excited to spend time with them. I can’t wait to race Sid to the top of the Matterhorn. Ryan will be meeting us in Rome for Spring break with a couple of his friends and we will train it through northern Italy. I think they would rather be on Vespa’s but a train will have to do. I am hoping for sunshine along the way and a little bit of cheese. I hope all is well the each of you we really do have a renewed appreciation for the most important things in life, a lot of that being family. Happy spring!

Love,

Shelly, Dave and boys!





















Stacy & Greg Hansen

March was such a wonderful month for our family. Madelyn celebrated her 10th birthday. We had a party for her and went bowling with 10 girls. It was so much fun. Koby went to Robotics competition in San Diego & won first place on the business plan that he wrote for the team. They are headed to Nationals & koby is so excited to go. Koby also had several debate competions in March & won awads and made it to state. Emma is enjoying her dance classes & preschool. Madelyn is busy getting ready for her dance competitions that start this weekend. At the end of March we took the family and spent an incredible week in California and enjoyed the sunshine every day!! We needed it with our cold and snowy winter! We spent 5 days in Disneyland & California Adventures. It was our spring break and everyone elses so it was crowded! However, we didn't mind because we had sunshine!! We also spent a day at Huntington Beach & watched the surfing competitions. It was so much fun. My kids love the ocean & the sand. We also stopped in St. George and had the chance to see Greg's parents. We toured the Brigham Young summer home and Jacob Hamblin home. They were so neat & worth the stop if you are ever in St. George. We were also fortunate enough to see these incredible scultures of Chirst & times in his life. The lady that sculpted them felt impressed 10 years ago to start sculpting & had never done it before or had any formal training. She is from Arizona & they are on loan in the visitor's center for a few weeks. They are amazing & so detailed that you could never guess she had not been sculpting her whole life. I know she was inspired. As we were driving home from our vacation we came back to a blizzard in Idaho, so we really appreciated the sunshine we had. Spring will hopefully come soon. We love you all & hope you are doing well!

Greg, Stacy, Koby, Madelyn & Emma

Sherri & Spencer Plummer

Spencer has been busy with work again. It is good to see his mind churn again. He has been accepted to Harvard to get his Masters in Business. I am so proud of him! This program is a very difficult one to get accepted to, so he is extremely happy. He is live in Boston for the months of September and October for the next 3 years. He is getting anxious to go. We all know that he will be great. He had an oxcipital occlusion surgery done on his eyes. Basically they burn the tear ducts so that the tears do not drain into the nasal passage, but stay in the eyes. It has really helped and he is doing great (other than the April fools prank he pulled on me that he was blind in one eye.)

I am busy planning a birthday party for Spencer IV. We are planning on about 50 kids to be at the party. Last year he felt so bad for everyone that was not invited that he invited the whole bus to his party, without telling me. I would rather plan on 50 kids and have them come, than to plan on 15 and have 36 come. I have been trying to get more organized, and trying to keep up with my house with the cleaner being out for knee surgery. I love my Sunbeams and they all tell me that they love me as well.

Spencer IV is doing great in soccer, the star, and has done excellent in gymnastics. He took 2nd place on the floor and 3rd place on the double mini at his last competition. He has his state competition on April 19, cross your fingers for him. His report card contained only 4s.

Sabrina has been such a sweetheart. She is so helpful with Sydney and is so good at her jobs (except her room). She is excellent at gymnastics and can do 17 backhandsprings in a row on the ground and is so tiny she can just flip her body in any direction. She is doing well at school, and doing great at soccer. Her first game of the season, she was the only one that scored a goal.

Sammy is doing great at school, and now knows when her birthday is. It is her favorite thing to tell people. She is so addicted to strawberry milk (thank you Shauna). She loves her sisters and brother, and is such a pleaser for me. When Sabrina and Spencer are practicing their gymnastics, she always has to get out there with them and do 30 summersaults in a row. Sammy always has a smile on her face and brings us all such great joy.

Sydney is so much fun. She is now standing a couple times on her own. She is a speedy crawler and hard to catch once she has started her sprint. She is so easy to get to laugh, and her laugh gets everyone else laughing. She really brings our family such happiness. She is our miracle child in more ways that one.

Our family is so blessed to have each other and how willing everyone is to help each other. We love you all!

Spencer and Sherri Plummer Family

Stephanie Farnsworth

We had a good March. We enjoyed Easter and all of the activities it brings Egg hunts, egg decorating and of course Easter Sunday. We have invited the Easter bunny to come the Saturday before Easter. Hopefully he finds us in Arizona next year.

We also enjoyed the boys Spring Break. We spent a few days at the park, a day at the Fort Worth Zoo, a night at "Going Bonkers" and indoor play area, and spent lots of time with friends. It makes me realize how much I miss having Austin home all of the time. We all had a great week.

We had a house fire this month as well. Totally my fault. The house was covered in a layer of ash that took hours of clean up. You never realize how many surfaces are in a home until you have to clean every one of them. We are just grateful it wasn't worse.

Dave had a good month. He is coming along in his thesis reasearch and is working hard to secure a job in Arizona. I don't know how he does all he does in a day and still comes home to help and be a loving dad. I am just grateful. Dave's been working every Saturday. We miss him for baseball games and saturday chores and fun, but soon enough he will be ours on Saturdays. Dave passed out at work last Saturday and the paramedics came. His EKG and blood pressure were normal when checked. They checked him out at the hospital and want him to follow up with a cardiologist. We are confident he will be blessed and things will turn out okay.

I am just surviving. After lighting out house on fire and meeting Dave at the hospital within two days of each other I have felt pretty overwhelmed. Although I have felt much better over that last week or so. I have been super busy being the acting primary president and 1rst counselor. It has been almost too much especially while I wasn't feeling well. I guess sometimes the Lord forces us to stretch ourselves more than we think we can. I spent a lot of time going through things and organizing for our move. It just seems so much more manageable little by little. We have gotten rid of some junk and it feels good. am still enjoying Institute and the weekly uplift I get. Other than that I am just loving my kids and trying my heart out to be a good mom to these sweet little guys I have been blessed with.

Austin had a great moth and enjoyed his break off school. He had so much fun playing with Chase & Blake all day every day. He participated in his Pony Parade this month. He & the rest of the children in kindergarten rode their stick horses around the entire school while parents and all of the kids in the school watched. It was so cute to watch. They went back to their classrooms and had a Texas party. He was excited for days. Austin also proudly presented his year of work at the open house at his school. He saved his best projects and papers from each subject to display. We were so proud of his hard work and were amazed at his growth in just a few short months. He is still enjoying baseball and getting better each week. Austin is beginning to question everything. The "why's" and "why do I have to's". It is good to see him grow and mature, but hard to always have the answers. We love him and his inquisitive ways.

Chase had a good month too. He had a great month at preschool and brought home some really great Easter crafts. He enjoyed his days off for Spring Break too. Chase cracks us up. Everyday he wants to wear his PJ pants whenever he is home. To school he always wants to wear basketball shorts or sweats. He is a man of comfort. More often than not we find random underwear throughout the house. He prefers to be without I guess. I remind him probably at least 4 times a day to put them back on. Chase is so sensitive too. One day I was putting Blake down for a nap and Blakey cried a little bit. Chase was with me while I read to Blake and we gave Blakey hugs. But when I shut the door Chase started to cry too. He told me, "Mom I don't wike it when Bwakey is sad". He has a sense of empathy unprecedented for his age.

Blakey is still our little sunshine. He talks and talks then sings and sings. I just can't believe he is still1. He understands so much. He LOVES books and needs to have a couple in his crib to look at as he goes to sleep and when I hear him talking in the morning I go in to find him reading them again. Blake still loves balls and would play catch all day long if allowed. He can actually catch balls now and can aim and throw pretty accurately. He laughs at himself so much that you can't help but join him. He will do something and crack up then stop then start cracking up again to make sure you join him. Whenever we are just driving in the car he will sting along with his brothers to the songs and actually insert what sound like real words now and then.

Love,
Dave Farnsworth Family