My status update on Saturday:
"Memorial Weekend (I know it's officially on Monday) has to be one of my favorite holidays. The rain, the family, all of it. We're going to visit Grandpa Allen's grave in Logan, then Grandpas Brigham and Stillman in Richmond, then we'll head to Blackfoot to spend the night with my parents. Sunday, we get to visit Grandpa Johnson's grave, then Grandma Chloe and Grandpa Cannon's graves. And to top it all off, we get to see my Grandma Johnson, who is NOT in a grave. It will be such a treat to see her.
I honestly love this holiday. Have a great weekend everyone!"
We did just that. It was an absolutely wonderful weekend. We spent Saturday morning tidying up the house (although we left a HUMONGOUS stack of laundry waiting for washing and a lot of piles everywhere). I had one of those rare (for me) moments where I realized that all the housework could just wait and it was more important to spend this holiday weekend with family. That was a good thing for me. I'm not claiming to be an immaculate housekeeper (HAAAAAAA!!!!!), but I tend to forgo fun things for our kids in favor of cleaning up way too often. Anyway, we started out our late morning by going to the Logan cemetery with Dave and Judy. We visited Grandpa Stanton Allen's grave, as well as some of our pioneer ancestors who are buried there. Gideon Brownell, John Knowles, and his father, ____________.
Dave spent some time telling the kids and I about John Knowles' experience building the Logan temple. He was a plaster worker and was about 4 stories up working on the exterior of the temple. He fell from that height and hit the ground. He tells that he felt his spirit leave his body and that he watched from above as the other workers ran to his body and picked it up. They took it to the temple president. John Knowles recorded in his life history that his spirit followed the temple president home, who washed up, changed into a white shirt and tie, and came back to John's body at the temple. It was then that the temple president laid his hands on John Knowles' head and gave him a blessing by the authority of the priesthood. John Knowles wrote that he then felt his spirit sucked back into his body and he lived a long life after that.
It is such an incredible story and a great part of our family history. I know God's priesthood is real and not just because of out of the ordinary stories like that one. But those ones are just as real and important as the every day experiences we have that affirm God's power here on earth.
It was fun for the kids to hear about this ancestor of theirs and their attention was pretty rapt (or at least Chloe & Lily's was - Brigham was in and out of interest and Cannon found a John Deere whirlygig at another grave to entertain him :) ).
It was so fun to go with Dave and Judy because they brought pictures to share with the kids and stories that I just wouldn't have been able to tell. Grandpa Stanton Allen was a great hunter and Dave told the boys about how he still had the rifle his dad used to shoot over 90 deer. Can you even believe that???! It was fun to hear the stories we hadn't heard before.
The picture above is at the headstone of John Knowles. I love how Lily is looking up at Dave.
After visiting the cemetery, we went to lunch at Chuck-A-Rama. It was a bit of a zoo with all of us, but Dave & Judy helped me so much. The kids ate their fill - it's so fun to go to a place like that with kids - they just get a little bit of everything and are in high heaven!
We headed out in a crazy rainstorm and said goodbye to Dave and Judy. Our next stop was Richmond, UT, where I have several ancestors buried - all from the Pond side of the family -- that is my Grandma Virginia Pond Johnson's line. It was raining torrentially when we arrived, so we didn't stop at my great grandparent's grave (Gus & Rella Pond). We went to Brigham Pond's grave and Stillman Pond's grave and called it good. :)
We headed to Blackfoot after that stop. It was a rainy drive, but the kids were really good. We got to my parents' house around 5:00 and the kids wasted no time commandeering my mom's total attention! They love visiting Grandma and Grandpa! Brigham got the treat of his life when my dad gave him one of his old cowboy hats. He has worn it non-stop since then. (In fact, he was up at 5:59 this morning, completely dressed in his day clothes and his cowboy hat! He definitely has the early to rise part of ranching down. :) ).
We visited for a good while, then went to dinner at Rupe's (my favorite restaurant in Blackfoot). We got home late and got everyone off to bed after scriptures. By then, it was 9:00. We stayed up talking for another couple of hours (that was one of the nicest, best conversations I've ever had with my parents. How I love them!), then my mom and I made a quick trip to Walmart. We had to grab a bit of food for Sunday and some Sunday shoes for Brigham and me. Yeah, I forgot Sunday shoes and Brigham had grown out of his! Thank goodness for the Walmarts.
Sunday morning, I got to go to church with my parents, which was a huge treat. And my dad spoke in Sacrament Meeting...another treat! It was SO fun to see so many people I knew growing up - there were some wonderful people who sent tremendous examples for me in that ward. It's sad to see them all getting so much older, but I feel so blessed to know them.
We made sandwiches for everyone right after church and then made our way to Idaho Falls for more grave visiting. We picked up my Grandma Johnson at her assisted living center and headed to the Fielding cemetery where my Grandpa Hal Johnson is buried, along with Baby Girl (my mom's sister who was stillborn) and my aunt Jill, who died when I was in middle school. Also buried there are my great grandma Leona Hansen Johnson and her husband (whose name I can't remember). We visited each of them and decorated their graves.
The dark red maple tree in these pictures was a gift to my grandma when my grandpa died. They were mission presidents in Sao Paolo Brazil in the 70s and have remained very close with their missionaries from that time. They presented this tree to my grandma as a remembrance to Grandpa. She knew she wouldn't live in her condo forever (and indeed, she doesn't even now), so she asked the cemetery if she could plant it here by his grave. They agreed and so we have this beautiful living memorial to the great man that is my Grandpa Hal Johnson. I loved him so much and miss him!
We visited the Rose Hill cemetery after Fielding to see some of our Pond ancestors. I didn't take pictures of any headstones and my memory is already failing me! It was getting rather cold by then and so we kept that trip short. I did get a couple of my favorite pictures there, though!
Grandpa and Brigham in their hats. LOVE this one!!!
And all the kids with my mom and dad. And if you look in the car window, Grandma J is in the picture, too! It was pretty darn cold and I'm glad she didn't get out!
We said goodbye to my grandma and parents at Rose Hill and headed to our last stop of the day. The Ammon cemetery. It was pretty close by and the rain had stopped by the time we got there, thank goodness! It was still cold and the kids were tired, though, so we only visited Grandpa Cannon Anderson's grave and his parents - Chloe Gardner and Reuben Anderson. There are other Anderson relatives there, but we didn't take the time to stop by them.
Cannon was melting my heart with his utter adorableness visiting Cannon's grave. I took a million pictures. :)
And here are a few pictures I snapped of some special family graves - I wish I had taken more!
We headed home for Cache Valley after Ammon and made it just a little while after Stanton had arrived home from San Diego. It was a happy reunion!
And as if this post couldn't get any longer, we spent today (actual Memorial Day Monday) in the motor home with Dave, Judy, and Em & Nate's kids (Eliza, Ben, and Matthew) visiting graves around our valley. We started in Mantua, then went to Wellsville, and finally Mendon. I didn't remember my camera for those particular graves, but it was great to hear more stories of Stanton's ancestors.
After we finished the grave visiting, we took the backroads from Mendon to Richmond for lunch at Pizza Villa/Big J Burgers/Taco Maker. It's our favorite place to take the kids. We had lunch together, then dropped Dave & Judy and their crew off at their house and headed back home. We cleaned the house a bit, did some laundry, napped, and the kids played while Stanton visited his grandmas at Legacy House and I updated the blog. This has been a fabulous weekend absolutely jam-packed with everything under the sun and our favorite thing in the world - being with our family.
I have to end with pictures of each of the kids with their namesakes.
Chloe Rose Allen with Chloe Gardner Anderson
Lily Virginia Allen with Virginia Pond Johnson (at the site of her husband Hal Roscoe Johnson's grave)
Brigham David Allen with Brigham Pond (his wife Aroetta is the one through whom our family descends)
Cannon Gregory Allen with Cannon Christian Anderson
And finally, all of the kids with Stillman Pond, in honor of our new baby, whom we are pretty certain we are going to name Henry Stillman Allen
Also, he snapped a beautiful picture of the San Diego temple. That is one gorgeous temple.
Stanton didn't get home until Sunday night, so he missed our Idaho trip. We missed him!!!
This was a great start to our long Memorial Day weekend. We loved it!
Cannon has loved preschool this year and is looking forward to another great year of it! We're lucky to have such an incredible preschool right in our neighborhood. We love Miss Traci, Miss Linda, and Miss Shelby!
Next on the agenda was Brigham's end of year program. They went sang through many songs they've learned throughout the year. I was surprised at how many of them Brig knew and knew well. Music isn't always his thing, so it's fun to see him changing a bit with that. I love the different faces he's making in this collage. The mean face was during "Dig A Dig A Dig A Dig A Dinosaur." He definitely loves that one!
This is him with his teacher, Mrs. Ashcroft. This is our third year in a row with her as a teacher and oh, how lucky we feel. Brig's class was a rowdy one this year and she really helped Brigham to have a good year. She showed him a lot of love. We love her!
The afternoon ended with Lily's first grade program. They did a couple of cute songs and three plays. Lily narrated one of them and was the farmer in the another one. She read with such animation as the narrator - it warmed this drama nerd mama's heart! And she was very cute as the farmer, too.
Lily has really liked Ms. Follett this year - we've been lucky to have fantastic teachers at our elementary school!
Chloe didn't have a program this year. Why is 2nd grade already too old for such things? I guess if they stopped doing them in 3rd grade I'd think the same thing. They have to grow up some time. :) She has had a great year with her teacher, Ms. Phillips. I will grab a picture of them on Wednesday when I'm there for her class party.
We have one more week of school and it can't get over quickly enough. It's going to be such a great summer. How I love these sweethearts of mine. It's fun to see them grow and learn and see new things at school. I'm grateful for a good one right here close by!
