Kids reactions to their missioon calls yesterday

Tyler is reading his mission call. Landon allready has his

and Cade is waiting to here his.

Lance is reading Dorrin his mission call. He looks like he is listening

really closely.

NicNicole is reading her call. They were all really

excited. It is exciting to share the Gospel to everyone in the World.

I cheated and used some pictures from yesterday.

Family Home "morning" with Becky and Derek at Derek's home

They all look pretty serious right now. After they got their

Mission calls, they were much happier.

Sister Bates and Sister Welch were visiting with the Bates couple.

Sister Bates is there also.

Here Elder Bates and Elder Otteson were trying to answer the questions that Derek and Becky had. They did quite well with their answers. We also sang "I hope they call me on a mission"

More pictures from our Family missionary lesson--

Elder Welch and Elder Otteson were teaching the

investigators, Brother and Sister Otteson.

Elder Otteson didn't say to much but he shook his head a lot.

Each one of the grandkids had their own mission call for our home

evening that Derek and Becky had for us.

Everyone was so good and watched everyone else preform.

Elder Bates and Sister Welch were teaching the investigators

Grandpa and Grandma Bates.

Elder Bates didn't say too much but Sister Welch

explained a lot to this older couple.

These cute Sisters, Bates and Otteson, were having

a good family visit with the Welch couple. Every set of missionaries got an appointment to come

back and also some got a commitment to go to church.

More fun at Derek's on February 26

Elder Otteson and Elder Bates , companions, were having a good

converstion. Mariah was smiling also.

This treesome set of Sisters were having a good discussion with

Brother Bates. What good sisters.

We had a great meal of pizza, tossed salad, fruit, pies

ice cream and good drinks.

Thanks Becky and Derek for this home evening.

We even skyped earlier with the Black family and heard where

they were going on their "missions".

Toys, Toys, Toys

Webbles Wobble but they don't fall down.

This is one of the old ones.

A bucket full of fun.

Little people and their vehicles.

This old play garage has had many kids play with it and it is still

a favorite with some of the grandkids.

All we are missing is the kids.

Up, up and away for the last time.

This is the last mission for Discovery spacecraft. They had the main computer down and

were not sure if it was a go until 5 minutes before.

They have blue sky there!

Not so here.

We got dumpted on again last night.

It is always cool to see it liftoff.

Sometimes it is still hard for me to know that this is real, not just

a picture.

This tells it all. Those poor people in Libya have had enough from

this dictator and his 8 childred.

Hopefully things can get better for them.

Sometimes we complain and forget just how lucky we are to

live in a free country.

drp, drip, drip

A little bit of sun causes those icicles to melt and start to slid off the roof again. It was nice to see a little bit of sun, but I would like to see a lot more.

This shelf of snow has fallen off the east side off the house now.

It is unusual to see this longer white "roof"

I can dream------Think Spring

I am so tired on snow pictures. So here is some spring pictures

from yesterdays, long ago yesterdays.

I love pansies as you know.

Now this california poppy should cheer you up.

It looks like sunshine itself.

" Little purple pansies, touched with yellow gold."

This is a song I used to sing in primary.

Purple is such a royal color.

Today is the month for purple. My month.

New ride is working great

Whenever Derek and Lance are home we take advantage of them and get

them to do all the odd jobs around.

Our motion light has not been working in the garage at night

for some time now and I was afraid I might fall

down the stairs so Derek and Becky

helped get it working again.

Dad, Lance, Becky and Derek have almost got the snow off from the new

trailer so they could load the traxter. We went over to the church parking lot to ride it behind the church. Lance is ready to back it off the trailer. See Becky's pictures as she got some good action shots. Here is Dad when he came back from his ride. We each had a chance to ride it and it does great in the snow. We can't wait to get it up the canyon above the canyon. That will be really beautiful up there. You will all have to come and try it sometime.

Winter Wonderland--again

As you can see we got dumped on last night. I think we got at least

3 inches of new snow overnight.

Becky and Dad were out shoveling snow before we went to church.

When Becky came in she had a cap of snow on her head.

Just look at all the snow on Becky's car and the new trailer.

Winter is still her for awhile yet I think. It snowed while we were in church also and Becky went out to shovel the sidewalk into the house again before our home teachers paid us a visit. I called the road condition and the road between Newdale and Tetonia is closed due to drifting snow. Darn I was hoping we could get up there tomorrow. Guess we will wait and see how it is in the morning.

Our turn to clean the church

Today was our turn to help clean the churchouse. Becky had plans to go to IF with Kathy and Leah to celebrate Leah's birthday so we went at 8:00 inside of 8:30 like everyone else. Becky and I cleaned the chapel. I also emptied all of the wastecans in the church.

Dad manned the big vaccume and did all of the hallways, primary room, and

priesthood room. I helped Dad move the cord and tried to

keep it out of his way. The cord has been ran over so

many times, I'm surprised we don't have a

short in it. At least it didn't stop and we didn't get an unespected charge.

The others came at about 8:30 and we were finished

with the church by 9:30.

Many hands make light work.

We had 4 families there. We had 12 people there. One other family

were out of town who were supposed to help.

Friday February 18 - looking for trailers

Dad and I had to go to Idaho Falls today to get the car serviced and for

Dad to get his lab done.

So we decided to look for a trailer to load our traxter on.

This is the one we liked the best and cost less

than some of the others we saw.

Dad and I have spent a lot of time at this building since Dad had the problem

with his heart in June 2005.

When he was in the hospital with his broken neck

they did a test on his heart.

The results were that his heart is working great compared to 2005.

It was 65% which they said was comparable to a much

younger man and it was only 35 % in 2005.

Guess something is working right.

food dryer results

Here are two results from my food dryer.

It took 2 days to get raisins

from purple grapes.

Just too long.

But the beef jerkey on the other hand only took about 5 hours

and tastes much better.

We all decided that we wouldn't try the grapes again.

The green grapes are not dry yet.

The oranges, limes, and kiwi dried okay but

they are not very good.

Guess I'll just stick to the jerkey in the future.

The Rexburg Temple is open again

The temple has been closed for 2 weeks to have it cleaned and it opened up

again yesterday. Dad and I went to the temple this

morning to do sealings.

As soon as we got there at 6:30 they put us to work.

The rest of the people working were workers. The number of people

coming in to do sealings has really dropped since they haven't been assigning them

this year they said. We worked with the group from 7 to 8 also.

None were walkins except us. We will have to try to go at least once a month.

I'm glad I am finally feeling well enough to get out.

Valentine surprises and hard work

Last night the doorbell rang again and guess what a valentine sack. Look at all the

goodies. I told Becky I would share, but she only took the "hot" heart

candies. I ate the Dove candy bar myself. Mummmm good.

I finally got the good dryer out of the garage and worked hard to clean it

up and then decided to try my hand at drying some

unusual fruits. We will see how they

turn out. Grapes dryed, make raisins so I'm told.

I'll let you know if they are any good.

Grandpas unopened Christmas gift.

As you can see Grandpa has not opened one gift he got for Christmas.

The other night Dorrin was carrying it around and looked

like he would like to open it.

You kids will have to get him to open it.

It has a firing missile launcher. Wow!

Saturday February 12

We paid Micah a little early birthday visit. I was taking the picture towards the sun

so they are not the best. Happy Birthday early Micah!

That frog will keep you good company.

Have fun on monday.

Wildlife abounds---

We have lots of "wildlife" around our home even though we do not have any pets.

I especially like the elks.

The kids seem to like the bears around the house. We have a few of them here

This picture doesn't do this Elk justice. Tim Whitworth did this for Dad years ago and it is very nice.

Plants Abloom!