Happy Birthday to Lori

I meant to post this this morning, but that didn't happen. Here is my tribute to Lori. This is Lori and her beautiful family, Trevor and Kelsi

Lori just after Kelsie was born

Lori & Melanie comparing bellies

Lori on her wedding day

Lori with me and Verlynn on her graduation night

Lori, she was a beautiful child wasn't she? Had tons of hair too

The baby is Lori, this is the day she was blessed. Look at that mop of hair. I am holding her and Tiffani is standing by (in a dress I made!)

Lori, the Christmas after she was born. 8 months old
Have a great day , we all love you!

Funny for the Day

Did you hear about the 83 year old woman who talked herself out of a speeding ticket by telling the young officer that she had to get there before she forgot where she was going?


Makes perfectly good sense to me.....

Aaron's Letter

Ok, sorry I have so many new posts. I guess it will keep you all busy. Here is Aaron's letter this week. I think the caps button is broken on the computer he uses!

this week was great, things are really starting to move here in newton- conover.the ward is awesome, we get a lot of help finding new investigators from the ward. we are going to have a baptism this weekend. his name is alex.he is 11 years old and is a foster child living with a member. he is a good kid and has a great testimony. as we teach him i ask alot of questions to see where he is at and to see what he thinks about it all,this week as he talked it was awesome, he bore his testimony that he knew what we are teaching is true, it was a great spiritual experience for me. i am excited to see him be baptised and receive the gift of the holy ghost, what a blessing that will be for him in his life. what i have noticed about this area since i have been here is it is different from any of my other areas. i was in charlotte or really close for about a year and i got used to how the people are there. when you go tracting in charlotte you can get in homes and teach them right away farely often. here we have tracted more than i did in charlotte and have gotten way less new investigators. it is a little more hard. i have a miricle to report. this week as we tracted we came across a young couple. we invited them to learn, they go to chuch somewhere else but they accepted to be taught by us. we came back the next day for the appointment we had set up and the husband was there but the wife was at school. we taught the guy named cory and had a great spiritual experience and commited him to be baptised, he accepted. that is my miricle report for this week. this work is the greatest. alot of people are worried about how the world is changing and i am greatfull we dont have to worry, we have the fulness of the gospel, i have seen it change lives and i know that it is true. yesterday i was asked to give a talk in church on mothers day. i will be talking about how the holy ghost helps us in our lives. i hope i will do well. i hope yall have a great week and i will talk to yall later.
love elder dees

Family & Sunday Can't get any better than that

Lori and Trevor came over this evening with Kelsie and then Deryk showed up with his kids and then Preston and Melanie showed up with Preston. How fun was that? I tried to get Kelsie and Preston in the same picture but Kelsie wasn't cooperating. This is the best one I got. Ashly is lookin on and you can kind of tell how much taller Preston is than Kelsie. Preston seems to be taller than David too!

Sally asked me to get a picture of what she called the "twins" Deryk is on the right and Preston is on the left.

We looked over and Preston and David were hugging. It lasted long enough for me to grab the camera. David was hugging for the first part, but I think he was done before Preston was done. They ended up on the ground. It was so cute.

Ashly and Preston. Brandon was back in Nathanael's room so he didn't get in on the pictures. Thanks for coming over everyone, too bad Spencer and Angie weren't here with Addie and Seth. And of course we are always missing the Colorado escapees, Tiffani and her family.

DAVID

I got to watch Deryk's children last night. David cracked me up so I thought I would post about David today. Here he is with a great big smile

Here he is with a bigger than big smile. I guess he really likes crackers?

What is that in his hand? I juiced some lemons and he kept asking for one in his own grunting, pointing way. I handed it to him and he was happy as can be. Yes, that is the lemon and yes, he is eating it. Didn't even pull a face!
Below is a little video clip of David. All night long he was "talking" with his mouth closed. It was hilarious so I tried to catch it on video. Sally says sometimes he opens his mouth, but all night long he did it this way. Try it, it makes you lips tickle!

I don't know how to build a ship1

Seth was building with the legos today and asked me to build with him. So I got on the floor (not an easy thing to do anymore!) and built with him. I built a beautiful ship and I handed it to him and told him it was a ship. Look at the picture below for the rest of the story.

This is the remains of my ship! You can see the big tower part in the middle can't you? Oh well. When I handed it to him, he tore most of it apart and told me that I didn't know how to build a ship! Imagine telling me that even after I sacrificed my body to get on the floor to build with him! I don't sit on the floor too well, so I got up and told him I needed to sit on the couch because my back hurt. He told me to scratch it like a bear and then he rubbed his back on the wall to show me how! He is so funny. I'm not sure I can tell you the other funny thing he did without getting in trouble with Angie. Let me know if I'm in trouble and I'll delete this part. Seth and Spencer took off to go home and a short time later Spencer called because his truck broke down and he needed VerLynn to come and tow him back. Seth came walking in and said they had to bring that piece of s--t back. I had to look the other way to keep from cracking up. I told Spencer what he said and Spencer corrected him and told him that he should say piece of junk. Seth then said yes, piece of junk, it used to be a piece of s--t! Out of the mouths of babes!

I have a weird idea

Ok, I have a really weird idea. I look at my site meter and I see people looking at my blog from all over the United States and out of the US too. I am curious who looks at my blog from all over and is it someone I know. So here comes my weird idea. I want everyone to comment on this and tell me who you are if you know me and if you don't, just leave a message how you found my site. Probably through a friends' site or something. I just want to satisfy my curiosity. I think it would be fun and very interesting. I'm not asking for any personal details about you if I don't know you, just general stuff. Thanks and lets see if this goes anywhere.

Like Mother like daughter?

This is Tiffani in her dance class. She took dance from Sheleen Leavitt. Sheleen, did you take dance lessons from Jean Wright too? It seems we all did back in the day.

This is me in my dance class! (can you tell which one I am?)
I have been scanning picures in my computer from my mom's pictures. I posted this on on face book not too long ago so I could share it with Michelle. Michelle Carter Bodine is standing right next to me. We all took dance from Jean Wright for years.

Aaron's Letter This Week

howdy. i am now in newton- conover ward, hickory stake. things are going great i have a good companion. he has been out about a year and president told me to help him to step to the next level. he has great leadership abilities. he has been great. we get along great. he is from kuna idaho. he reminds me a little bit of richard gurr. the area is good, since the day i got here we have been really trying to find new people. we struggled with it. this week we will go at it and hopefully build up the teaching pool. we hardly have anyone in the teaching pool right now but we will build it up. we will probably have a baptism in a couple weeks. it is really weird going from zone leader back to a district leader. i am used to working with 24 missionaries and now my district is 8 people. i am really going to miss going to zone leader council. but i know i am where the lord needs me. i will be able to have a big impact on my district. the ward i am serving in is great, we have really good members. that makes it nice. our area is car share so we bike one week and drive the next. we biked this last week one day we went 30 miles. it is great. have fun at home. i guess i will talk to yall later.
love elder dees
did deryk serve in hickory? what area

Aaron Again

The mother of Aaron's missionary companion (the one he was just with, don't know who is new one is)just sent me this picture and thought I would share it. He sent this picture home to his family and on the back of it wrote "companionship unity, you got to love it" since Aaron is sharing his frosty. Looks like it's vanilla, must be related to his dad.

Newton, North Carolina

Newton is a city located in Catawba County, North Carolina. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 12,560. It is the county seat of Catawba County[3].
Newton is part of the Hickory–Lenoir–Morganton Metropolitan Statistical Area.

The above is copied from the internet. And why would I inform you all of Newton? I just got an e mail from Sister Page here it is:

Jill, I had the missionaries over tonight. I must say It felt VERY different not having Elder Dees with us. He has gone to Newton (where ever that is) Elder Slauson said that he is a district leader there, helping an Elder along who needs it. I know Elder Dees is the man to do that. I know he is going to do great things there.

Aaron's getting Transferred

Aaron with the male members of the Page family

Aaron and his companion Elder Slaughter

Aaron with the Pages.

Aaron giving good by missionary "hugs" to Sister Page and her daughter

******
This is Aaron's letter we got this week:

howdy yall, this week has been great. we did eat with the pages on saturday and they went out of town for the weekend so you will get pictures sometime. i had my interview with president hobbs and it was great, i love president so much. he is the greatest. transfers are this week, on wednesday and so i will no longer be in kannapolis after wednesday. usually i dont know this early but president decided to tell me in my interview. he also told me i am going to be released as a zone leader. i am not sure yet what or where i will be going. he said that he needs me somewhere else. i will miss getting to work with so many elders but i will be able to lift and inspire all those who i serve around. i will miss kannapolis it is a great place. the pages are awesome, they have a great family. there are many other great families in the ward. on easter we ate dinner with a family that 2 of the members are active and 3 of them are inactive so we had a good missionary opportunity there. it is a great time to be serving. i will probably be back to riding bikes later this week. yeehah. have a great week i will have companion number 13 next week. love elder dees

Family Easter Egg Hunt

Addison (Spencer's)and her great big smile

Look Hard. Kelsie is on the ground almost under the chair (Lori's daughter)she is on her own easter egg hunt. She will go wherever is necessary! She found one egg under the chair and she got it.

Lori with Kelsie and Trevor on the easter egg hunt. She found a bonus while she was at it. A broken sprinkler!

Sally with David. He's looking a little too high

Preston and Melani with Little guy.

Nathanael and Little guy (Preston Brigham)

Spencer is helping Addison find her eggs. But Spencer hid the eggs so I think he must be cheating!

Seth (Spencer's son) just found another egg. Ashly (Deryk's daughter) is behind him

Seth and Ashly got on the lawn mower

Preston Brigham (Preston's son) and Ashly (Deryk's)

Brandon (Deryk's son) He has a shovel in his hand and is supposed to be picking up the dog doo doo. He doesn't look too excited about it though

We had a barbq also and this is my mom and dad. (Preston Brigham is in the front ) Lori is sitting on the couch with Kelsie

Spencer with Addison and Deryk Angie is on the stool in the back

Ashly holding Addison and Seth coming to help

Kelsie

Lori stopped by tonight with Kelsie and I snapped some pictures. First Kelsie proceeded to "remodel" the house (as VerLynn calls it) If you look on the floor under her she has emptied off all of the tables of everything on them and then she picked up my shoes and put them on her arms. That is what she has on her arms now. If you know my feet, you know that putting on my shoes is a big undertaking for a little girl! She then picked up my scripture case and put it over her shoulder and waved goodby. I love grandkids!

Aaron's Letter

howdy yall, it has sure been a great week. confrence was awesome. we finally got an investigator to church. she came to the sunday morning session of confrence. she loved it. the first time we had taught this lady was in between the sessions on saturday. her name is beverly franklin. she has a son in high school who plays football, he is a sophomore. he benches 385, he is huge, their school went to state this year. but we taught beverly the plan of salvation because some of her neighbors had some recent deaths in the family caused by murder. she has alot of questons about what the purpose of life is.we had a very spiritual lesson and committed her to be baptised on may 2, she accepted. she came to confrence the next day and we are very excited about her. we also have 3 other people who are committed to be baptised on may 2 a husband his wife and their 9 yr old son. the wife went to mormon. org and just loved it. she then went to her husband and did some missionary work and now we are teaching them all. they are great. good things are happening. transfers are next week and most likely i will be getting transfered, i will once again miss out on the baptisms. as long as they get baptised is all that matters. this work is great. one thing that stuck out to me from confrence is that as we keep our covenants we dont need to worry about anything. i loved the talk in priesthood session by pres uchtdorf. when he talked about nehemiah in the bible his reply to those who were his enemys he said i am doing a great work, i can not come down. i thought this talk fit my situation very well. i dont have much time left so when i am told to go home my reply will be, i am doing a great work and i can not go home. i received revalation:) so with that you dont need to expect me home any time soon. and plus i have changed the way i approach people. with UNC doing so great at basket ball and with my cousin as the all star player. it makes it easier to get people to listen to me. the problem is then i have flocks of people trying to get my autograph. so i give them all pass along cards. things are great here. we are having fun. my companion is a city boy from sandy utah but he is a good man and we get along great. yall have a great week, we are surely going to. talk to ya later.
love elder dees

Elder Aaron Dees in North Carolina

These were taken yesterday. Wanted to share. It looks like he will get transferred next week so I probably won't get pictures any more. I will miss that. Thanks again to the Pages for taking care of Aaron with great meals and taking care of us by sending pictures.

What a Trip But we made it home

VerLynn came up to get me in Idaho so I didn't have to drive home alone. It's a good thing. We made it as far as Beaver yesterday and took off this morning from Beaver. When we got to the 20 (the cross over just after Beaver over the mountains to Panquitch) we debated if we should take it or not, but the weather looked ok, it wasn't snowing so we took off. When we got up towards the top it was snowing and it started snowing harder and then the road was covered with snow. The picture above is the view from inside the car. When we were going down one of the hills the car started to fish tail. I was scared spitless. (who made up that phrase? It's kind of weird) A car was coming towards us and we were still fishtailing and I was freaking out. The car slowed down and VerLynn got control of our car and all was as well as it could be. We passed two semi trucks that slid off the side of the road. I was very glad to get out of that pass. Then after we left Page we entered another kind of storm. It was a wind storm and it was blowing real hard. You could feel it throwing you around on the road. VerLynn had to really work to keep the car on the road. Oh, thank heaven we were in Preston's suburban! Don't think we would have made it out of the snow if we had been in the car! We passed a semi in the wind storm that was on the side of the road and his trailer had blown apart! We got to another area with a lot of room and there was probably 6 or 7 UPS semis parked there, I guess waiting out the storm. Then believe it or not we passed two snow plows that were actually plowing the sand off of the road. Yes I said sand. The wind was blowing sand drifts onto the road. The wind let up a little around Flagstaff, but it stayed the whole way home and it was pretty windy at home too. But it was 82 degrees!!!! I love to be warm.