Well,  I still can't write on anyone's blog but Mom's.  Most likely has to do with permissions. We received our first electric bill, which was $40.  It will be nice to see the impact of the solar panels once the summer rolls around.

I added weed n feed to the yard, watered it, put weed killer in the flower beds,  During the process we identified a carrot that was in the ground and a little bunny.  We have a whole bunch of lettuce growing, so Carter and Halley tried to unsuccessfully feed it.  After the carrot and the bunny, Halley came over to me and wanted to know if I had any more surprises.  I told her I didn't know if I did.

As I was thinking about it, I came to the realization that having a garden is spiritual in nature.  There are so many analogies to a garden and you can learn virtually every aspect about the Plan of Salvation from a garden. Here are a few.

1. What to plant- Certain things grow better in the type of soil than others; Certain teaching methods work better for helping our kids succeed such as through love and persuasion
2.  Carryover garden-  The lettuce seeds from last year and a few of the tomato plants kept growing/sprouted during winter.  Sometimes your efforts have a much larger impact than you realize.
3. Too much water-  Too much water can lead to growths on the tomatoes.  You have to balance the water with the sunlight as well as the type of plant for it to grow correctly.
4. If you don't water your yard on a consistent basis, then the grass dies and weeds grow.  It becomes much harder to take care of a yard on an inconsistent basis than if you do it regularly.
5. The harvest tastes good-  Except when I say that a cucumber is a squash, for the most part homegrown items simply taste better.
6. Miracle of planting.  That a seed can grow into a fruit-bearing plant is a miracle.  It is amazing that one tomato seed can produce hundreds of tomatoes. This is part of the Abrahamic covenant that his seed should be as the sand of the sea.

We brought our van into the dealership to get fixed before the extended warranty runs out.  We have gotten it on both cars and so far we have come out about even when we buy it.  We are hoping our cars last quite a bit longer such that we can pay cash next time we need to buy it.  

Observations

I have been thinking alot about a few things recently.  Elder Lawrence from the Seventy came to our church two weeks ago and spoke about a few things.  When I reread his talk from conference, which was "what lack I yet", the same impression of what I need to fix coincided with what my wife told me and what my boss told me... :)  I need to listen more intently and my wife adds, listen with the same energy as the person communicating....I need to speak kind words at all times, especially get to know and actively seek to develop relationships with those I meet...I need to more effectively give the background of the subject before I communicate the principle.  This could take years but I think with time and prayer and study I can be much more successful in my mission here in this life.

Heidi mentioned something that I thought was interesting.  She mentioned that one of the reasons that taking care of our children is so taxing is that they are high emotional.  This of course is one of the things I fell in love with Heidi, that she had a personality, and loved and served others.  Miles, Carter, and Halley are all emotionally demanding individuals.  Satisfying their needs often involves more than simply the physical needs but showing you care at their level.  Definitely draining but worth it whenever, you see that they care. 

Our solar panels are up on our house now and functioning.  For Valentines Day I purchased a $20 ice shaver for Heidi.  She said she usually goes through about 8 cups a day.  That's when you know ,your present was a success.  Apparently, people with low iron crave ice for some reason.  That is her. 

I have made the observation more than once that Mom and Dad didn't really invite people over to our house growing up except for choir practice.  I feel somewhat in that same pair of shoes.  We have a few of Heidi's friends that come over from time to time but really we are in survival mode a lot of the time.  Taking care of the kids and getting things done on our massive to do list really doesn't leave time for many things.

I have thought recently after looking at several pictures of us growing up why all of us kids turned out all right. Even though Mom had to make the bittersweet decision to go back to work, much can be said about what she did during those 14 years with kids before that happened.  You can say with all earnestness that our parents helped us keep the Sabbath Day to be holy, Mom helped us to pray, Dad showed love by playing music for us while going to sleep, dressing up for pioneer days, the family home evenings, the family prayers. Those are what held us together.  The spiritual connection that was created by the sealing covenant was strengthened by those spiritual activities such that we as children were able to develop a spiritual refinement at an early age that we could not forget or abandon.  Mom and Dad helped us to feel and appreciate the love of our Savior.  Thanks Mom and Dad.

Busy as a Bumblebee

6/7/2015

Well, I spent some more time trying to get more of the mold off of the back and front of the house with the bleach and the power washer.  Some of the mold from previous rainy seasons buried underneath the dirt and an additional layer of mold won't come off.  A friend from church is going to loan me he high-powered PSI power washer that might be able to get it off....that and I am going to rearrange a few of my hoses so that the non-leaky hose is in the front.

We played frisbee golf on Thursday instead of Ultimate frisbee on Thursday and had a good time.  Grandma invited me over a few times for dinner, which was nice.  Her meatloaf she made for dinner today was tasty. Too bad Dad wasn't here to finish off the leftovers.  I think Carol was going to finish them off tomorrow.

This weekend we ended up getting together to do some cleanup work along the San Marcos river.  Some of the apts. there had quite a bit of mold spreading up almost 4 ft high from the flooding.  We worked about 7 hours each knocking down drywall.  It was quite the workout.  I rode up with the Stake President who went on and on about the Slaugh family and all they had done for the Stake.  Then he started to talk about Susan and the Messiah.  All I could do is smile.  Susan has done a good job with her family.

I am going to protest the value of my home on Wednesday using my Bishop's Bexar County property tax assessment. We have basically the same house, except his has a .4 acre lot with a 3 car garage and his property is assessed at 20K below mine.  We also have partial rooms added by the previous owner that weren't even included in the assessed value. Somehow mine shows as having gone up $32K in one year.  That is more the 10% max for homestead owners.

Heidi comes home either late Monday or on Tuesday.  Their family likes to drive at night-time, which makes me a little unnerved, but I get it.  If the kids are sleeping it does make for an easier trip....you just have to stay awake.

I bore my testimony today about family.  It was fitting since my family wasn't around.  I did have a few impressions.  One of which that I could and should reach out to old friend that I had a long the way and catch up with them.  A few of them resisted my friendship while they were going through hard times...maybe they are reading and willing to see an old friend.

The other impression was after hearing the following quote, which struck home, one because I myself had similar experiences.

Elder Joe J. Christensen said: “There are those who wake up every morning dreading to go to school, or even to a Church activity, because they worry about how they will be treated. You have the power to change their lives for the better. … The Lord is counting on you to be a builder and give them a lift. Think less of yourself and more about the power you have to assist others, even those within your own family”.

When I was in 5th grade I was beat up on the street behind me, which caused me think of myself as unimportant.  The bullier then rubbed it in my face while I was at school and even threw little acorns sometimes at Linda and I when we walked home.  I remember key figures who stood up for me along the way.  One was when the bullier again approached me in 7th grade in the bus line, only to be reprimanded severely by Tiffany.  The second was when I was acting dumb and said something I shouldn't to TJ and David Lee stood up for me, even though for whatever reason, we weren't close any more.

The same thing happened in choir in 8th grade.  My heart was so innocent, that I just sang the way I loved to sing.  That annoyed two boys who made it their job to threaten to beat me up.  They wanted me to admit that they were better at singing then I was.  I decided to stop trying in choir so they wouldn't make fun of me.  They took the fun out of singing.  So I dropped out of show choir and didn't sing in High School.

Unfortunately, I was on the other side too when there was someone in my high school band that was called gay.  I knew he wasn't gay but because I myself was made fun of my freshman year of band, resisted being his friend.  4 years later I saw him show up one time in our ward.  I eagerly reached out my hand to say hi, do you remember me?  Unfortunately, he didn't.  I felt really bad about that.

So many experiences that I just kept inside.  I didn't really feel comfortable with sharing them with anyone.  When meeting with a counselor a few times, I realized that Heidi wasn't the only one that had dealt with trauma, I had dealt with it myself, only my nature was to whenever I was confronted to shield myself off from everything and everyone because I felt unsafe.

Heidi has been through quite a bit as well; however, when we share our experiences, we tend to bond a little, knowing that having gone through all we did we came out imperfect, but alright.

One of my favorite songs growing up was I'll walk with you.  It kind of hits home sometimes.

Days of the Bachelor

Well, Heidi left with the kids to California, but the good news is that she is coming back. :) She called me a few times to stay awake. She should arrive any minute.  Surprisingly, she didn't leave a list of things for me to do...however, I did make a list and it sure is long. Mold has been especially present on the stone on our house and brick fence.  We need to pressure wash and spray a bleach solution on it.

I walked to church today, which takes me about 5 minutes and somebody stopped to give me a ride because they thought my car broke down...The church speakers did a great job talking about hastening, which has been interpreted all the way from technology, kids doing family history, and the lowering of mission ages.

When Dad mentioned his cougar dream, it reminded me of an experience mentioned today concerning Hugh B Brown.  He was about to become a millionaire and wasn't sure if it was the right thing for him.  So he prayed and prayed as if he was fighting the devil all night.  His wife came in and prayed with him.  Then when he went to the office that day on a Saturday and prayed he felt his peace.  When he came home, David O. McKay called and asked if he would be an apostle.  So he left his job and lost out on becoming a millionaire.  However, a few years later someone from his company who had made 7 million dollars said he would give all of it if he had the peace of conscious that he had.

There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.

A good week

Well, we had a lot of special projects at work.  Quite a bit of my time goes to provide information on various data scenarios to provide information in a way that would be useful to our CEO.  GAAP numbers does not provide meaningful information to real estate consumer in the industry.

I haven't been able to have a meaningful scripture study since we started exercising at night.  I've found that lunchtime works great and I have a half an hour to really study the scriptures in addition to listening to things on the way to work.

As I have done this, I have felt more promptings.  I asked Mike for some training wheels before I bought some online and he just happened to find some at a ward garage sale.  Also when I was getting some free water barrels, I asked the seller about the basketball hoop that was there and she said that we could have it.  Carter loves basketball hoops and will bring it up any time we go to church.  His birthday is coming up.

We watched the movie Insterstellar and I thought it was very thought-provoking, and especially liked the last 30 minutes or so of it.  I liked the thought that love motivates us to do things that we otherwise would be unable to do, but didn't think much of the "they" being their species in the future to create the wormhole.  That was somewhat confusing. It was interesting to think about the time differential,but aging doesn't affect resurrected bodies, so that is a moot point.

I had some interesting thoughts as I was praying last night.  Heidi has been through more in her life than anyone I know, including ailments in just about every part of her body.  For her to be the person who she in spite of that says a lot about her.  Even more so, to see Heavenly Father have to watch somebody go through those things is a type of what Heavenly Father had to do for his Son Jesus Christ.

Another Week

Well, life is general is moving on.  There are always special projects of analyzing information at work which keeps me constantly busy.  Susan closed on her 4 acre plot of land which was exciting.  They have big plans for it.  I am grateful for our house.  Grandma and Carol came over and we went through some of our acestors' pictures.  It was neat to see the James and Snodgrass relatives and grandfathers and grandmothers and to hear Grandma's one-liners about each of them--some of which weren't that nice.

Grandma made a comment that Heidi didn't know when she married me that we were going to live in such a big house.  I didn't envision this either.  I just walked into a good job.  We have been trying off and on to plant avocado trees from the seeds but haven't got any to give roots yet.  We will keep trying.  Wouldn't mind planting some pecan, avocado, and peach trees in the back.  We have some work to do to spruce up our yard.

We have been warming up for the BYU alumni 5K run.  I have a much longer stride than Heidi so I might not be running.  At least it will be good exercise though :).  I also signed up for the Helotes Market days, which is basically a book of mormon desk at a farmer's market. I think the focus has been family history as of late.

Heidi gave a good talk today about the need for the Book of Mormon.  After reading about President Benson's scathing words about the need to repent for our lack of use of it in our family, I figure I should redouble my efforts to use it in my personal scripture study.

More than anything I am just trying to put Christ more in my life.  As I do that I have felt that all of the other potential problems I might go through will dissipate.  

Easter

We had a great weekend for the most part.  We spent a lot of our Saturday in between sessions putting down mulch, and added some sand underneath the playground set.  Would would of thought $10 in sand would bring so much joy.  Our kids played with it for hours.  Emma wasn't feeling well so Halley Facetimed her and showed her the sandcastle she was making and wished her well.  It was fun to see Emma so excited to see Halley and talk to her on the phone.

The first two sessions of conference on Saturday were mixed.  All of the kids had coughs and runny noses, probably from the oak pollen.  Miles has it the worst plus two teeth coming in and an ear infection.  He was quite clingy.

I enjoyed priesthood session.  So many things that I need to be doing better.  Interesting that putting down your phone to be with your kids is no longer just common sense but church doctrine.  I think I am going to go back on the phone diet and only access it when my kids are asleep or someone calls.

Halley thought she saw Grandma in the Mormon Tablernacle Choir and Grandpa was Elder Eyring. Halley made a cute book on Jesus and the resurrection.

Grandma, Aunt Cathy, and Stockwell family came and ate some Brazilian lunch on Sunday.  We did a little Easter egg hunt and then we talked about Jesus and Easter and about how Jesus's last plea before he was resurrected was for the apostles to share the gospel with all men and that's what I did in Brazil and am trying to do now.  We do Brazilian food every Easter as a tradition.  Next Easter I will probably try my hand at a churrascaria.  Grandma liked the Brazilian cheese bread which turned out pretty good this time. At first she thought the dough was mashed potatoes, but then when she realized there was dough left over she make a few comments about it and then confronted me directly about how I needed to let her take some home so she could make some more. :)

We gave some food to our neighbors who in turn gave us some of their food.  We do that often.  I enjoyed several talks but probably liked the most Elder Oaks', Elder Holland's, and Elder Ballard's.