It was a dark and stormy night...

It rained buckets today, and the pretty, crunchy leaves clogged all of the storm drains so every intersection was a lake.

I went with Emily to the lobby of the BPAC to rent her cap and gown from Herff Jones, as I have done several times before.  We got out of there pretty cheaply, since we will get announcements from the photographer these days, and she didn't want a ring or a jacket or anything except some sweats that say Seniors down the leg.  I remember how fast those Senior years seem to go.  I'm probably not ready for that. I'm still in a fair amount of denial, and I can't even imagine what life looks like after June 1st of next year.  So I don't even try.  I wonder how I'll do at Senior Night this week, the last football game she will cheer at.

I ran a couple of substitute teacher orientations today for a new auto-sub dialer program we are starting in the district, and I think they went well.  I'll do that again next Monday at 3 and 6.  I feel like a grown-up now, I guess, finally, maybe.

Tomorrow is when Veronica finds out if she is having a boy or a girl.  I bought yarn tonight, and I didn't buy pink.  We went to Walmart for pumpkins to carve for FHE, but there were NO PUMPKINS LEFT IN THE ENTIRE CITY so we bought yarn instead.  None of it is orange.

The Cadillac always stops working in October.  But it's OK because I can ride my bike, or Kerry can ride his bike, and that's good for us and good for the environment.

Steven made a horror movie.  It was good, but horrible.  I can't watch the ending, but I watch the beginning a lot.  I like when the scarecrow is standing in the corn and the kid can't see him there.

Tonight for FHE we read emails from 2 missionaries we know, Kylie who used to come to Emily's birthday parties, and now she's in England living in a flat and being brilliant.  Also Derek who sent his first email home from the empty sea today.  Those are always unique, those first letters home.

Emily went all the way to Orem on Saturday for marching band.  She missed Sadie Hawkins.  Last year, she only went to 3 dances, and there were only 4 total.  This year, 2 dances were on days of marching band competitions in Utah.  Bad luck.  But then she had good luck.  She got home after 1 a.m. and was considering sleeping in and missing church, but then she didn't.  And she had a really great Sunday which involved getting her first calling.  Not counting being Laurel President.  She is the youth Family History coordinator with an emphasis on name extraction.  The bishop pulled us in his office and said she was getting set apart, which I assumed was for Laurel President.  When he said what he said, I was really surprised.

Almost as surprised as Veronica will be tomorrow when she finds out what she's having.

Marisa got a kind of promotion at work, Adam's moving to a new place this weekend, I saw Caley's mom today at the sub workshop, Peggy's coming out of retirement for a few months to help her former employer, and Sarah and Jimmy are moving to West Hollywood.  Also, Susie is getting married in January to Mr. Goodspeed.  And a radio personality is coming to Super Saturday.

So that's what's going on around here.

The Suite Life: Memories That May Or May Not Be Accurate

It all started when they announced that they had some conference tickets available in our ward this time around.  Usually, we don't get them.  We don't ask for them, and we definitely don't get them.  We always let other people, people with greater need to strengthen their faith and such, get the few measly tickets that our ward ever gets, even when Kerry was in the Bishopric for 7 years straight.

I didn't really think anything of it when Bro. Simpson announced it on Sunday.  (I guess I should call him Bishop, because he once was one, but right now he's a counselor in the Bishopric, so I don't want to confuse anyone.)

Then, Emily said, hey, she would be playing at a marching band competition in the Riverton area on Saturday, and if we came and picked her up and got a hotel room, we could stay there and go to conference on Sunday morning.  Then, I wanted those tickets.

But I was patient.  I waited clear until the end of Sunday School in case some people who had never been to conference before, ever, wanted them.  I have only been to conference once, and it was with tickets I scrounged up on my missionary moms list, from a lady from Canada I met in a hotel lobby.  And then, we've been to a few memorable concerts at that Conference Center: David Archuleta, James Taylor...I guess I haven't been really unfortunate.

So after Sunday School I asked the Bishop if anyone had spoken for the tickets.  He said I could have them, nobody else mentioned wanting them.  And so that is how I came to need a hotel room in Salt Lake City during Conference weekend.

Well, we already know from the Pugmires who have a General Authority in the family now, that the Marriott downtown is all booked up by the church for the general authorities.  So don't even try that one.

I decided we wanted to be downtown, so we could get there early, and that is how I came to find that the Embassy Suites is now the Doubletree Suites, and the price is right.  Free parking.  I remember that we stayed there once, but I couldn't remember why.  I remember that Adam had a key card from that stay, and he used it once to sleep in the lobby when he got stranded somehow in Salt Lake during his freshman year in college.

Suddenly, I remembered how and why it was we came to stay there once with all of our little kids.

The night before we dropped Adam off at BYU, we had a ward outing to the Martin Harris pageant in Clarkston, Utah or some such town.  I remember that we had our big, shiny, dark blue Suburban, packed with 6 kids and all of Adam's college stuff.  It seems that Kerry was out of town on business, but he was flying into SLC instead of all the way home to IF so that we could pick him up at the airport after the Martin Harris thing.  And since it was late at night after that pageant, (during which Adam actually left and drove into Logan to see Marques and Matt) we met Kerry in SLC. He just met us at the hotel, taking a shuttle from the airport, which might be why we stayed at that hotel...they had airport shuttles.

Then the next day we had a lovely hot, cooked breakfast, drove to Provo, dropped off Adam, found out that the other kid from Blackfoot at BYU was on his same floor at DT, and then headed for home.

Long story, I know, but it's been 6 months since I blogged.  Looking forward to staying once again in the Embassy suites, going to conference, and having a nice memory of a momentous trip that seems really long ago.

In other news, we fed the missionaries last night.  Just when I thought one of them looked like Doug, we found out that he is actually going to Argentina, just hanging out in Pocatello while he waits for a visa.  The other one is from Maui.  The one going to Argentina is from Herriman, Utah, roughly where Emily will be marching on Saturday.  He said the chicken enchiladas were just like his mom makes, and reminded him of home.  Naturally, I found him on facebook.  His mom seems nice.

Today, school's out for summer, but for me school's out forever.  

Great Aunt Josephine

If you happened across this headstone in a cemetery in Santa Clara, California, you might not know that this is actually my Papa Rankin's aunt Josephine Rankin.  I got to do some of her temple work today, and it was pretty exciting to actually carry the name of one of my Rankin ancestors.  At first I thought she was my great grandma, I got a little confused.  I went back to look  at the family group sheet to find that she is my great grandpa's sister...you know Charles Wesley Rankin, his little sis.  Her sister in law, my real great grandma, was the famous Emma Belle Wyatt, which I bet is how my grandpa came up with his nickname for me, "Belle Starr."  Even though her last name on this headstone is Storey, she was married frst to someone named Dunn, and her oldest daughter Hazel lived in Oregon and was actually LDS.  There is a Rankin Motel in Ashton, and some Rankins up in Montana and - ta da - those are some of her children.  This is fun, I like family history, when it's my family history.  My parents would have be so surprised to know that some other Rankins joined the church hereabouts.  But probably my dad isn't so surprised anymore.

In other family history news, my grandma's birthday is this week, she would have been 102 on Wednesday, and I just found  her youngest son, my uncle Mike on facebook - my dad's youngest half brother.  I'm thinking of messaging him and asking where he buried Grandma, since he didn't tell anyone when she passed away and hasn't talked to any of us since.  He bought a nice ranch with his sole inheritance, it seems.  The benefits of not telling your four siblings when your Mom dies, after you had her change her will and such.  Family intrigue!  Marisa and Doug were just there in Placer county this week, where Grandma passed away.  At the end of her life, when she was 90 years old, Mike came to Coeur d'Alene and talked her into moving out of her retirement home and back to California with him, and sadly that was the last any of us heard of Grandma.  Her third husband had left her well invested.  From his facebook wall I can see that Mike doesn't think much of Mormons, he's not a good speller, and he is a self employed farrier who never married and has lots of younger women who seem to think fondly of him, probably because he is now loaded with Grandma's money.

In the end I am blessed to have my father's inheritance, which is his name and his faith, and also I can spell pretty well.

And this is the story of my life.

coralina

Time Capsule

Just for today...
Steven's in El Salvador, Kerry's on the golf course, Emily's in the other room, Thomas and Adam are in Utah, Veronica's in Kentucky, and Marisa is in Cincinnati.
Just for today...
I went on a bike ride around Rose Pond, got lunch at Rupe's for Emily & I, and I'm washing some sheets and pillowcases for the Scharf's and Thomas & Caley to arrive tonight.  I've also been switching sprinklers around the yard all day.  The mailbox had the usual bills and ads, and a card from one of our children thanking us for being good parents.
Just for today...
I am a grandma to one perfect granddaughter, a mother in law to 3 of the best people I could have ever hoped for my children to marry, a wife of 32 years, a great aunt to 8, and 3 out of 4 of our parents are living.  I have never seen the Atlantic Ocean.
I haven't been to Canada for 32 years.
I have run 7 marathons and one half-marathon.
I played drawing games and word games with Veronica and Adam.  Just like when they were little, except there weren't smart phones, just smart kids.
Just for today, Friday the 13th, that's how it's going so far.  Tomorrow, will be almost the same.
10 years ago we were just finishing up our Martin's Cove Trek and getting ready for Adam to come home from his mission.
10 years from now...Kerry and I will be in our 60's and I will have more than one perfect granddaughter, and that's all I know for sure.

Photo Of The Day

We found some photos that probably haven't been viewed for 20 years or more. 

I can't figure out where this was exactly, maybe near the apartments we lived in on 1600 West in Provo when Adam was not quite a year old.

I like it because I'm laughing, and it reminds me of how much fun it was to have a baby even though we were young, broke, college students living in an apartment in West Provo.

And, I was still skinny enough to wear that dress I wore the day I got married.