Christmas lights at Temple Square

Last night we took a trip down to Temple Square to see the lights. We usually go earlier, but found time to go this year. I thought it would not be too busy as everyone has had a chance to go, but it was really crowded - almost as crowded as the night they turn them on or when they have the First Presidency Devotional. As always they were very pretty and between the lights and the cold puts even a grinch like me in the Christmas mood.

I have been fighting flu like symptoms the last couple of days and it has not been very fun. I hope I am on the tale end of it, but now I have a cough that has caused my ribs to ache from coughing so much.

Our family is getting ready for the big day to come. They are talking about what they want and Santa coming, hopefully they won't be disappointed.

Mom mentioned that she had talked about everyone going up to their new place for our family reunion this year, and I got really excited. Mom had mentioned the June for kids out of school and such , but I think that will need to change with the post on Matthew and Diana's blog. That is a great reason to have to change time windows. Just thinking out loud, but anyone coming from our direction, I was looking at either stopping on the way to or back at Mt. Rushmore. It is about 10 hours west of Farmington, MN and 8 hours from SLC, so almost in the middle of our trip up there. Anyways, hope we can all put our heads together and work out our schedules so that we can spend some time together again.

Well hope everyone has a great Chirstmas, we sent our presents out last Monday, so hopefully Mom and Dad, Michael and Heather and Matthew and Diana should be getting some boxes of have received them.

Duck! for a new found enjoyment

Last spring I did my hunter's education through a guy at work and so I always see him. A week or so ago he asked if I wanted to go out for the opening day of Duck hunting season. I decided that should be fun, so I took yesterday off of work and woke up real early to head out to Farmington Bay just west of our house. We got there at about 6:10 and joined 300-400 other hunters that were out for a good time. We walked a till we found what looked like the perfect spot in the pitch dark, to slay some ducks. The season didn't open till 8:00, so after waiting in the marsh for an hour the season opened and it sounded like the start of the civil war. Despite the number of people there was plenty of room for that many people, and there seemed to be enough ducks to shoot at. The first two I shot ended up in the frag weed that is really tall and dense and so they were lost, but I dropped two right in front of us and went out and got them. After about 1/2 hour of endless blasting the ducks decided to hide for a while and the shooting tapered off, so at about 9:30 we packed up and left, with the promise to return and have some more fun! I am addicted. I brought them home and fried them and Carter really liked them, but they mostly tasted like some creature that eats crap off the bottom of lakes. I will look for a few other recipes to cook them up. If you have any send them my way. Nicole can't wait till I get my first duck call and go around the house learning that fine art.

Maiden voyage in Utah

Well after a few hundred miles and a few days we got the canoe wet in some Utah water. She still floats great. we ran down to Cabela's and got some life jackets and then came back and took her to a local pond to take her for a trip around the pond. Afton was really tired and she hated the life jacket, so she was sort of grumpy. We went around once with her and then Nicole got out with her and I took the kids out around one time. Anyways, it was a good time and it brought back a ton of memories for me.

NEW PHONE NUMBER

Just wanted to let everyone know that my cell phone number has changed it is now (801)913-3400. It is a cell number for Rocky Mountain Cremation Service, so if I answer that chance are it is me. (There is a chance on long weekends or vacation that someone else will have it, so if someone else answers, I am off and try Nicole's cell phone. If you call my old number you will get a grouchy old guy that I work with, so BE CAREFUL. Just kidding, you will get someone else, he's older and can be grouchy

Fun Day

me in one of Mustangs that you can use if you wanted to go to driving school

Saturday Nicole and I went out to Tooele County to the Larry H. Miller raceway. It is a road coarse where they race motorcycles and road courses for grand am cars. They were having a 30 year anniversary party for Larry H. Miller's company. We had a special passes and were able to go to that and they fed us lunch and then we got to watch some races. It was really neat. I guess you could say that grand am is sort of NASCAR for more sophisticated rednecks. It was the first time I have ever been to a motor sport race. It was neat to be able to go see all the team trucks and see the mechanics fine tuning the cars for the race. Some of the crews would set some of their used tires out so you could see them and touch the tires and be part of the event. I have watched NASCAR races and have them talk about how the tire rubber gets so hot that it melts and will roll off the tires. It was neat to be able to see some of that on the tires and you could see how the rubber had melted and then pushed to the edge of the tire. It was really fun to be with Nicole and we had a great time. The sad thing was that the entire time we kept saying how much fun the boys would have had. It was sort of like being in the middle of the show CARS. Here are some of the pics from th9at and a video of the cars shooting by during one of the practice sessions. If you ever get the chance to go to a race like that I would go for it!

This is the team trucks (Ferrari of Houston)

I'll Still Around (and still round)

WOW it's been a while since I put anything on here. Things are going good for us. Nicole does a way better job of updating everyone on how are family is doing. I check everyone's blog's regularly, but have not put anything new in a long time.

So Landon is going to be baptized on June 6th. Everyone is welcome to come. He turns 8 on Saturday and Afton turns 1 on Tuesday.

We have been trying to get our yard in shape. The front yard is in OK condition, but our backyard needs some attention. Last night we got one of the side yards cleaned up and looking better, so we will keep plugging away at that.

Well I wish I could write more, but I can't think of much. See Nicole's blog for more intersesting stuff about our family

Larry H. Miller Funeral

So most of you probably don't care, but here is the article and some pictures from Miller's funeral. They had the casket custom painted by one of his body shops. It was pretty cool. If you look at the pictures there is one with the cobra's driving in the cemetery. If they had zoomed out 2 more feet you would have seen me standing by the blue car. Anyways, it was pretty big, President Hinckley was bigger, but other than that, the biggest funeral we have done.

http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=148&sid=5720629

Tell me what you think

So this might be a little bit long - not quite as long as Bug's, but crazy thing, and want to get some opinions about what happened. First let me start out by saying that in my profession, I haven't had any crazy, spooky, or neat things happen at work, even when we lived at the mortuary, until now.

When I was in high school I went with dad and grandma to help dress grandpa after he had passed away. I remember it like it was yesterday. The room we were in had a curtain, and as I walked into the room, it felt like I walked through a wall or maybe a veil. It is something I cannot describe, but very peaceful. I have always remembered it, and that room is still hallowed to me and it still feels special to me, as I go in their on a regular basis.

Friday night I was on call and spent the night at the mortuary (which I have done many many times - nothing new) I went to bed about 11:00 after helping take care of Larry Miller, and fell asleep. Normally I sleep downstairs in one of our the arrangement rooms, but I didn't have my truck that has my pillow and blanket, so I slept upstairs in the "on-call" bedroom. It's been a while since I slept in that room. About 2 or 3 in the morning I heard someone walking on the carpet on the room, and could see the outline of someone. I thought it was maybe that was just coming to the mortuary to crash for the night and sleep in the room (unlikely, but very possible), and I didn't want them to think they were disturbing me, so I just laid there. The person talked about the need to spruce up the room and put new carpet and paint and make it look better. Again, I didn't think much about it and decided to fall back asleep. As I started to go back to sleep it felt like this person put a blanket over me and I felt much warmer as a drifted off to sleep and thought that was nice of whoever was sleeping in the bedroom to put a blanket on me. After I woke up Saturday morning I was puzzled and perplexed by the events that happened. The more I think about it, the more I think I was a spirit, but I'm still trying to figure it all out. Some of the old timers say that Alma Larkin is still around haunting the building, or his son, Jay (Max's brother). There was no point during this whole event that I was scared, or felt cold, or felt bad. Anyways - post your comments on what your thoughts are.

On another note - I finally did my Hunter Safety course, and so now I can put in for draws and by tags to hunt a big Elk or Mule deer, or whatever else I decide to pursue. I don't have any plans, but I would like to get out and do some hunting in the near future.

So Larry H. Miller died today. For those that don't know - he owns the Jazz and is quite the businessman here in Utah. Anyways - guess who was on call? He has been sick for a while with type II diabetes. Just an FYI for those Utah transplants that don't hear all the local news.

I spent yesterday out in the west desert. A guy I work with took us out and we spent the day driving and seeing all kinds of neat stuff out west of SLC. We drove 380 miles, and we were gone from 7 am to 9 pm. We stopped and shot lots of ammo, we saw a few antelope, and had a good time. If you want to go, we can plan a day and go out. Here are a couple of pictures from that.

Been a while

I saw this and thought it was way too funny to pass up - maybe because as soon as I put batteries in mine, I stuck it to my chest and said "Yep it works" I don't think there is a man alive who hasn't done that.

So it's been a while since I put anything on my blog. I think Nicole has kept everyone informed about the doings of our family. I have a couple of pictures I want to post of when I took Carter ice fishing last month, but I haven't pulled them off of the memory card. As with any fishing trip with children, it more about time spent with them then it is about fishing. It was nice to get away for the day with Carter.

Well I can't think of much to add - Nicole covers the basics in our family and not much to add. She does a great job!

Santa doesn't forget childhood dreams

Santa brought me a cotton candy maker that you can make cotton candy AT HOME. It can be done! Santa found it at the DI, and knew I always wanted to make cotton candy at home.

We had a good Christmas. Thank you to all, hopefully thank you cards will be in mail shortly.

We are still working on getting settled in to our new house. It is sort of crazy trying to find a place for everything.

WHAT a game the Utes played. So much for the great BCS.

We went up to IF for New Years, we stopped by and saw Grandma and Grandpa, they looked really good. I took the boys sledding, and was sore for a day after doing that.