Grandpa Tic Tac

Yesterday we went to a funeral of our good friend Bro. Allred. We knew him from our previous ward in Clearfield. His wife passed away about 3 weeks before him. He was such a good example of a true diciple of Christ. He was always willing to help anyone in any way that he could. I worked with him a little when he was in the YM and I was in YW. He was called Grandpa Tic Tac because he always had tic tacs in his pocket after church to give to all the kids. He had lost an arm when he was 19 from cancer but he did not let that slow him down.

One good memorie I have of him is when we were moving he came over to help us load stuff into the truck. He was there for many hours helping with only one arm. He did not complain one bit just kept going and going. We will miss him but will remember the good memories!

Pres. Gordon B. Hinckley, Prophet, Seer and Revelator

Our beloved prophet Gordon B. Hinckley passed away last night. We had had a very busy Sunday and we were conluding the day with the dedication of our new church building. KC, K, and C sang in the beautiful choir. Elder Garff of the 70's came to offer the dedicatory prayer. It ended at about 7:30 and then CK and I had to go talk to a member of the stake presidency about Trek. When we came home the kids said that uncle Jefre had called from Florida and they had turned on the TV and there it was. His passing is bitter sweet. It is sad to see him leave and yet I think on his life and his wonderful example to us and it makes me happy. I am sure he is happy to join his wife once again.

A few of my favorite ideas from him are "Try a little harder to be a little better" and his 6B's that later became 9. This is where I got the idea for the title of our blog "The awesome 7 B's". We used that for our Christmas names this year. In hopes that we will remember these qualities.

G = Be Grateful,

CR = Be Smart,

S = Be Clean,

C = Be True,

K = Be Humble

KC = Be Prayerful

L = Be Positive

All = Be Involved

extra = Be Still

While Pres. Hinckley was on his mission and was a little down. His father told him "forget yourself and go to work". This gives me encouragement and helps me remember that it's better to give than to receive.

When asked his idea on how to have a long happy marriage he said: "Love your spouse just a little more than you love yourself" What great advice!!

He started the building of so many temples, one of which we just toured last week. "We Thank Thee O God for a Prophet to guide us in these latter days"!

I have too many great memories. When he first became prophet I read his biography and it gives me such a good example to follow. For more information on his life go to : http://www.ksl.com/?sid=&nid=520.

Rexburg ID

We had the opportunity to go to the open house for the new Rexburg Temple. We went to our ward, then went to our old ward because some friends of ours were going on a mission. From there we left to ID. First we went to dinner at Leah's house (my sister's good friend). Her family invited us to dinner. It was delicious!

After that we went to our Hotel Room. We were just sad cause we read online that there was a microwave and we were all looking forward to having our weekly Sunday night popcorn but when we got to the room there was no microwave. So we ate goldfish (crackers that is).

The next morning we went on the tour of the temple at 7:15am. It was -7 degrees and lots of snow on the roads. But it was beautiful. To see this temple with our children is a blessed experience. Although the temple was not dedicated yet you can feel that it is the house of the Lord.

The first picture was taken before the tour. This second one after the tour.

Just a picture of G toppoling down a tower at Leah's house. One of her favorite things to do. Awesome picture if I say so myself.

January K

K has been studying very hard to get a 4.0. She almost made it. Just got one A-. She will probably reach her goal next term! She's working on driving 20 hours with us so she can get her lincense. We just feel she needs a little more practice before we turn her loose. What a fun and silly girl to have around. We call her repeat because she repeats and can quote many funny things that her dad says.

You can read more about K on her own blog at: http://www.kikikrazyworld.blogspot.com/. She does a wonderful job with it.

January C

C found out yesterday that she will be able to go on Trek this year although she will not quite be 14 yet! She was very happy. She has been busy with dance and school.

Last night C got up at midnight thinking that it was morning time and got in the shower, got dressed, put her contacts in and then went back to her bedroom to realize that it was not 6:00am. So she went back to bed. This is the second time that she has gotten up thinking it was morning time. The other time she got up, got dressed, and ate breakfast before she realized what she had done. I'm sorry but I have no pictures of this. I was sleeping (surprise)!

January S

S is our little performer. She tried out for the school musical production of Wizard of Oz and got the part of the Tim Man. She was so happy. She wanted to be Dorothy of course, but as we learned in church yesterday we all can't always be in the lead. It is a great part though. She gets to sing a solo and has many lines. She practices a twice a week for the play and the other 3 days she has ballet.

January CR

Our fun boy. He's such a friendly guy. Everyone always calling him to play. In order to give him a little more of a challenge is school he is is having to do extra projects. The last one that he just did was on a culture. He chose Australia and discovered the didgeridoo. So he wrote a report and then had to do an oral report for his class. He read a ton of books on the subject and now can tell you lots about this Aboriginal musical instrument. We made some simple didgeridoos out of pipes so he could demonstrate them to the class.

January G

Time goes by too fast. I cannot keep up. So I have to try to catch up again. How about I just say a little about each of the kids.


First G is 13 months! Not walking yet. Just around the furniture. That's a good thing, I am not ready to chase her all over the house! She loves to feed herself. We are just trying to finish off the leftover baby food jars and cereal. She does love to eat whatever is placed before her. A few weeks ago, I was sewing and I was sitting on a folding chair, G was crawling around me. I stood up to cut or something when she pulled up on the folding chair which closed and then she fell with the chair on top of her. She was sad for a while. She would not let me put anything on it. She ended up with a black eye. See why I am not ready for her to walk yet?

This is the face she makes when the flash on the camera goes off.

This is G doing yoga. Downward dog?

New Year

It's cold and snowy. Just like January should be. The kids have been sleding and having fun in the snow.

We now have church at 9:00am. Here's a picture of our snow princess.




Last Thursday we went to the Capitol Open House (it's been remodeling for 4+ years) It looks beautiful. Forgot my camera. I will post some later if we can get them from my phone. The we went for pizza at Big Kahuna's. It was great!

On a sad note. On New Years Eve when we came home we could not find our dog Cupcake anywhere. But she has gotten out of the electric fence before so we didn't worry. On New Years Day our neighbors called us and we found out that she had been hit by a car. Probably on the night before. We were really sad. C went dug a hole and we burried her in the back yard. We will miss our crazy dog, she was a part of our crazy family. This is an old picture.

New Year's Eve

We drove down to Cabellas and saw all of the fun stuff there and then we went to IKEA. We still had not been there since it opened in Utah. The store is huge that we spent a long time there. The kids were excited to go there but after a while they started complaining. We were there so long that we got to celebrate the Swiddish New Year with them!

That evening we went out to dinner with M&P and the M's. We went to The Old Spaghetti Factory at Trolley Square. We had a fun time just talking and eating. Afterwards we went to Temple Square to look at all the pretty lights but it was like 10 degrees that we were only there for about 10 minutes and left.

We came home, played some games and waited for midnight. The kids stayed up and played video games or something for a while but we went to bed. We know that G will still wake up at the same time.