Saying Goodbye to Grandma Barnum

Nate's Grandma Barnum passed away last Friday, February 19th. The funeral was held on Wednesday in St. George. Nate and I drove down Tuesday afternoon, spent the night, and drove home Wednesday after the services and family luncheon. We opted not to take the kids with us. It was going to be such a quick trip and an especially emotional one since Nate was so close to his Grandmother.

We attended the viewing on Tuesday evening at the Metcalf Mortuary on St. George Boulevard. Grandma was laid out beautifully in her pink casket. Grandma Barnum was always a planner. She'd made all the arrangements for her passing about 12 years ago. Nate remembered when she picked out the pink casket. Pink was her favorite color.
It was difficult to see her lying there. Grandma was always so full of life and spunk.
Grandpa was sitting next to her in an armchair. We gave him hugs and held his hands and talked with him for a while. You could see in his eyes that his heart was broken.
We got to visit with several of Nate's cousins that we hadn't seen in years, some that I hadn't even met before. It was so fun to catch up with them and to feel so welcome and included.
The funeral services were held at Grandma and Grandpa's chapel. There was an hour viewing beforehand. Uncle Dean and Aunt Kat had put together lovely displays of pictures and special things of Grandma's.

Here is a picture of Grandma and Grandpa that they had on the table.

This one is of Grandma when she was 23 years old. She was so beautiful! Then in the front is their wedding picture. The rabbit on the side was a gift to Grandma from Grandpa when she had surgery. Nate told me that she would often let him hold it and play with it.

Nate was asked to give the opening prayer for Grandma's funeral services. It was such a difficult thing for him to do, but he did a beautiful job. The services were wonderful. Uncle Dean gave her life sketch, which Grandma had written herself, and David(Nate's dad) spoke as well. There were also two beautiful musical numbers.
It was neat to hear things about Grandma's life that I hadn't known before. She wrote 18 volumes of personal journals. Uncle Dean related how special those are now to him and his brothers and encouraged all of us to leave behind something for our children to read.
I knew that she had been big on family research and genealogy, but I hadn't realized how much she had accomplished in that area. She published two books during her lifetime. One on the original Dixie Pioneers and one on the Blake family. She submitted all the names of the Dixie Pioneers that are on a monument in their honor at Dixie College.
Grandma submitted over 220,000 names to LDS temples for endowment work to be done! I had no idea it was that many. What a wonderful service she did for her family members who had passed on before her and what a great example she was to all of us who remain.

Nate also served as a pall bearer. After the funeral we all traveled to the cemetery for the internment. Here is a picture of Grandma's headstone. This was also picked out by her and has been in the cemetery for years. The top line reads "Saviors on Mount Zion".

Nate and the other pall bearers waiting to carry Grandma.

Her beautiful pink casket.

After the internment, we all went back to the chapel for lunch. Grandma and Grandpa's ward had prepared lots of wonderful food for us. While we were eating, Nate's cousin Seth asked if Nate would stand in the circle while his son Hunter was ordained as a deacon in the Aaronic Priesthood. Hunter turned 12 in December. Their family lives in Phoenix, so it was really special for them to have Hunter's Great Grandpa Barnum ordain him to the priesthood. Here is a picture of Hunter and all the men who stood in the circle.
We left right after that to make the snowy drive home to Magna. Thank you to my mom and sister Sarah for taking time out of their lives to watch the kids for us. It was such an emotional and special experience to be there and to say goodbye to Grandma.

We love you Grandma Barnum! You will always be in our hearts.

Our Beloved Grandma Barnum

Nate's grandmother, Roberta Blake Barnum passed away this morning. Grandma Barnum was always so spunky and full of life. She was passionate about doing her genealogy work and spent many hours in the service of those who passed on before her. We know she was welcomed into Heaven this morning with many open, loving, and grateful arms. We love you Grandma! You are already sorely missed.

Valentine's and Tax Returns and Dividends

I'm sure you're all aware that Valentine's Day was last weekend. Nate and I don't really do anything special to celebrate. We usually go on a date, but we didn't this year. We did get to spend a few hours together on Saturday doing some shopping.
Lilly took valentines to her preschool last week. Since Jonah was off track until Tuesday, his Valentine party at school is going to be tomorrow. He very dutifully wrote his name on all 21 valentines by himself and we attached a little bag of sweet tarts to each one. He's very excited about it.
The kids got fun valentines in the mail from their grandparents. They got a fun package from Grandma and Grandpa Barnum and Aunt Emily. Thanks guys!

Here's Jayne and Lilly in their matching outfits from the Barnums

February and March have become two of my favorite months since Nate started working at Les Schwab. We get our tax refund in February and Nate gets a dividend check from Les Schwab in February as well. Then in March he gets his annual bonus, which is usually a good chunk of change. So this is the time of year that we pay off bills and sometimes get some fun or much needed things for ourselves.
The tax return came last week and the dividend check this week. Wanna know what we got? You know you do! Too bad, you get to read about it anyway. =)

We've needed a new couch for a very long time. The one we had in our living room had belonged to Nate's grandparents for a lot of years before it was given to us. Between kids jumping on it and all the time Nate and I spent on it watching movies together, the poor thing had reached its end. All the fabric was worn, the back cushions were ripped off in some parts, and the springs were practically non existent. So, we'd been price checking for quite a while. We found this red sectional on sale at RC Willey and fell in love! It was the only thing we found in the style we wanted that was in our price range, and with the sale it was 1/2 off plus the ottoman was free! Yippee! It was delivered yesterday and the kids immediately started climbing all over it. I wasn't sure about the red color, but now that it's here I absolutely love it!
We also got a new TV. We hadn't bought one since we first got married, almost eight years ago. That one died and was replaced by one we were given which was also the old, huge, heavy style. So we invested in a 37" LCD HDTV. We are loving it! We're movie people, so we'll definitely be getting our money's worth out of this one.

Then, for the grand finale.........Nate bought a 1993 Jeep Wrangler.

Some friends in our ward have had this thing sitting in their driveway with a flat tire for a very long time. Last week, Nate brought them a tire from work and helped them put it on. That led to the conversation about how they had been trying to sell the Jeep with no luck. So Nate made a deal. He helped replace the fuel pump and get it running, and they sold it to him for $1000 less than what it's worth. (Don't worry, I looked it up and made him get it to pass safety and emissions before buying it just to be sure.) We got it registered today and Nate is loving it. He's been driving a really beat up 1990 Subaru station wagon. The Subaru needs some expensive repairs(the kind that aren't worth doing because it would be more than the car is worth) before it would pass safety and emissions and it was due to be registered in April. So we had been looking for something to meet our needs and feel lucky and blessed to have found it.

So, there you have it. Happy Tax Season!

I'll leave you with a picture of my two paleontologists digging for dinosaurs in the backyard this afternoon.

Discovery

First of all, let me say that I have no idea why this is all underlined and I can't figure out how to get it to not be underlined, so we'll all just have to live with it for now.

Yesterday I woke up feeling ambitious. I decided that I would take the kids somewhere fun. We've all been cooped up since Christmas because we've all been sick and poor Jonah has been off track at school for three weeks and hasn't been able to get out and do anything exciting.
Now, the reason that this is ambitious for me is that I don't usually take all three of my kids out by myself unless we're going grocery shopping or to the park or maybe McDonald's. But yesterday I decided that we would go to the Discovery Children's Museum at the Gateway. We've never been there before and I thought the kids would like it.

The kids were excited when we got there and had a good time. It was really crowded! Way too many kids in one place for my liking and the adult supervision was sadly minimal. I was amazed by the number of moms who had brought their kids and then were sitting in the corner talking with their other mom friends and not once even looking up to see where their kids were or what they were doing. This made for lots of chaos and a few tears from Jonah when kids would take things away from him or wreck something he built or just be mean. Their moms were nowhere to be found.

Anyway....the kids did have some fun. Jonah liked the water area and the beehive, which is a big contraption with tubes and a million ways to make little plastic balls go through the tubes and into different containers. Lilly's favorite was the play house. She liked to play in the kitchen and plant flowers in the windowbox. Jayne had a great time going up and down the stairs in the beehive area.

We only stayed for about an hour. The kids were getting frustrated with all the other kids not playing nice and it was getting to be lunch time. So we headed home. Jonah told me that he did not want to go back there ever again. I hate to say it, but I agree. I felt like it was overpriced(kids and adults are all 8.50, including Jayne) and too many parents weren't paying attention to their kids. I was definitely disappointed. They have a lot of neat exhibits and things for the kids to do, but they require parent supervision and interaction, which I guess most of these moms were just too busy gossiping with their buddies to provide. Next time, we'll just hit the aquarium or the park.

I did get a couple pictures....

Jayne kept wanting to climb into this wheelbarrow

Jonah playing in the water area

Jayne navigating the stairs

Lilly planting flowers in the window box.

C'mon, Get Happy!

I'm usually a pretty optimistic person, occasionally bordering on the delusional. But lately, I'm having a hard time seeing the 'brighter side of Sears' as Nate would say. I think it's partly the usual winter blues, part stress, part frustration with our current situation and how we can't ever seem to change it, and part exhaustion from caring for sick kids, sick husband, sick self constantly for the last month. We've had sinus infections, ear infection, eye infections, pink eye, coughs, colds...you name it. I took Jayne to the doctor last night, which made our fifth doctor visit in the last four weeks in our family. She's got the ear infection/sinus infection/eye infection thing that Nate has.

Anyhoo....back to the point. Lately all this has really been getting me down. So I was thinking about it last night and I decided that I need to make the time to do things that make me happy and help me feel better about life. These things don't usually occur on their own during my day without me deliberately making the choice to do them. They include, but are not limited to.....

• playing the piano---I've played piano for a lot of years. You can usually tell my mood by what I choose to play. A Chopin Nocturne, for example, would probably represent a melancholy feeling or a need to relax. If I'm pounding out my favorite Rachmaninoff prelude, I could be a bit upset or stressed. Playing a triple forte always makes me feel better.
  
• taking a hot bath---as a mom, I usually get about 5 or 10 minutes to shower and they're usually interrupted by one or more of my sweet offspring. A hot bubble bath in a candle lit bathroom is one of my favorite ways to unwind, but is also a luxury that doesn't come easy. I'm just going to have to wait until all the kids are in bed and are definitely asleep for this one.
  
• watching some 'Friends'--- this is my favorite TV show of all time! It always makes me laugh, no matter what kind of mood I'm in.
  
• Eating some chocolate---now this one actually does occur more than it probably should. I'm not ashamed to say that food makes me happy. What I really need to do though, is get some of the good stuff. Maybe some Dove chocolates or some truffles. Just one of those a day is enough to lift my mood.
• Go to the temple---Nate and I usually go about once a month. We haven't been since December because of everyone being sick. I always find it so peaceful there. My mind can just relax.
  
• Light a scented candle---smells can have such an amazing effect on how we think and how we feel. We have a mango cilantro candle that I love, but I hardly ever light it and just sit and inhale the pleasant aroma.

Well, there's my list for now. I'm feeling sunnier already! Feel free to leave a comment and let me know what little things you do to help lift your spirits. I'm always up for trying new things!

spelling it out

Spelling is Jonah's new favorite past-time. He's begun spelling out his answers to my questions. For instance, I'll say "Jonah, do you want to watch a movie?" and he'll say "that's a Y-E-S!" Here are some of my favorites from the last few days:

"Mom, I'm h-u-n-g-r-y. I think I need a h-o-t d-o-g. Are they really made out of 'd-o-g's?"

Me: "I thought maybe we could go rent some movies today."
Jonah: "That would be a w-o-o and a h-o-o Mom!"

He's even got Lily in on the deal. She's spelling out all of her 'Y-E-S's and her 'N-O's.

I love seeing my children grow and learn new things!