Journaling

What a hectic week and this one promises to be too! We had concerts three of the weeknights and a Halloween party that the ward youth put on for the primary children. (Pictures above, Krysta helping with a bowling game and Camille, with Tricia in the backgound getting ready for the party). It was so much fun to attend each performance. The choir program was excellent at Northridge High on Monday night. It was so fun to watch Camille sing in the choir and an extra treat to see Rachel (who like Camille, in women's choir) and then later in the night Daniel and Paul. Paul sang with a smaller little jazz group and accompanied them on the piano for one song and was excellent.

Wednesday at Sunset Jr. we heard from both of their orchestras (Eric in one and Amy in the other) and their choir groups. It was great to watch Krysta having so much fun as she sang with her women's choir.
Friday was a highlight. Camille's voice teacher had arranged for a performance for all her students at Layton High's small theater. Camille sang, "Someday" from Hunchback of Notre Dame. She has nice poise and confidence when she sings and is progressing and sounding so good.

We have been having furnace trouble--actually it has been broken. The fan wouldn't shut off without turning off the power and it wouldn't make us any heat. We researched the problem on the internet, learned to decipher the blinking led code, Bruce took the furnace apart and took out a suspected part, and I took it to a furnace repair and parts store that Alison had recommended. The guys there told me that the part I brought really worked and showed me on a furnace on display what their guess would be. I drove home, Bruce took out the new suspected part, I went and got it and he put it back in. Voila, Heat! It only took three weeks, some chilly mornings, two trips to Clearfield, 21 dollars (yeah, only $21), multiple hours of work and research and it was fixed. The same morning we picked up the snowblower we ordered from Sears. We are prepared now to huncker down for the winter.

Katrina called and asked Tricia to illustrate a children's book she had written as a class assignment. She sent it Thursday but our internet was down. Friday was way too busy to begin it so Saturday morning at 9:45 I put Tricia to work drawing. We figured that to get it to Katrina on time we needed to get it to the post office on Saturday which closed at 2pm. With Tricia drawing, me outlining her art in black and Krysta and Tricia coloring. We got it done and zipped up to the post office with 3 minutes to spare. Pwhoosh, (that was the sound of me wiping my brow).

Camille gave her first Sacrament mtg talk on Sunday. Our home teacher (also in the bishopbic) asked her to speak a month or so ago but never really told us the date, so it was really embarrasing two weeks ago when from the pulpit he asked, "Sister Stanford, Are you planing on speaking today?" My heart raced! Camille's probably did too. So, this Sunday when I woke up and realized that this was the week of the talk, there was no postponing a second time. Bruce printed a couple of talks about the subject off from the internet and I talked to her about it. She went to her room and 45 minutes later she was ready for church and ready to give the talk. She did a wonderful job. It was organized, she used scriptues and quotes and applications to her life--makes me want to see what she could do with more time.

Last night we drove to Springville to participate in blessing David and Rebecca's new baby, Henry. (Tricia tells us that is such a handsome name for a young man) He is a perfect little boy, so cute. It was nice to see extended family and spend some time with Staci, who we picked up at BYU on the way there.

Krysta is planning a muder mystery party (actually it is a theft not a murder) for Thursday. She planned for us to clean "top to bottom" on Saturday and worked hard long after the rest of us got tired. She has left me a list of things to do today so I better get to it.