Merry Christmas

Adam's last email was such a great message of what Christmas is really all about. Here it is:

Merry Christmas! We all live in different places. Most of us have seen or lived in different places and we all know that there are different customs and traditions that follow the holiday season. To some it may mean that there are different foods and different songs. I am so pleased by the Christians here in India. Being a minority christianity, Christians here have a tradition of hanging a large, beautiful, lone star out side of their houses. These stars all hang out side, a symbol to the world that Christ was born in this house. You see them about 1 in 40. Another tradition that is a little different to me is that EVERY christian goes to church on christmas eve, or Christmas day. Some one once asked me what our church was doing on christmas. I didn't know quite what to say other than, "Well, I celebrated it with my family. It was some of the best memories I have had." I had mulled the idea over after I heard that. I recollected the times that I had spent christmas. The only thing that came to mind was the time that I had with family. Great gifts where given, but the thoughts remain. When I think of gifts that people give during christmas a line in "once in royal david's city" comes to mind. "And our eyes at last shall see him, through is own redeeming love, for that child so dear and gentle, is our lord in heav'n above. And he leads his children on to the place where he belong." Jesus christ was the greatest gift that Heavenly father could give. I know through christ the best gift of all or as it says in D&C 14:7 "if you keep my commandments, and endure to the end you shall have eternal life, which this gift is the greatest of all gifts of god!" When we celebrate with our families we can truly remember the meaning of christ and that we can truly live with our families again after this life. I love you all and wish you a merry christmas and a happy new year! Elder Adam Petersen

Thanksgiving

As I was writing Adam this week, this is part of what I wrote to him as a Thanksgiving message to him. I wanted to post it here because it made me think of how great it is to just simply express gratitude. I have so much to be grateful for. Here's what I wrote:

We love you Adam. When we are around the table saying what we are thankful for, you will be one that will be mentioned. We are so proud of you and are so glad that things are going so well for you.

On my mission, my first Thanksgiving was in the MTC. You know how that is. We did eat turkey and the main difference was that they gave the teachers the day off. Our teachers came by to say hello though. My second Thanksgiving, I was sick in a hospital in Peru and I spent three days all by myself. It sounds like kind of a bummer for Thanksgiving, but oddly enough it was really quite a special time for me. In the hospital, they didn't have TV's or anything like that. All I could do was sit in bed while we waited for my fever to come down. So I read the Book of Mormon. In those three days I read it from cover to cover and had time to ponder it and go back over things if I wanted and really take it all in. I knew the Book of Mormon was true before that, but at that time I learned to love it and understand it more and in a way, feel what was in the pages. I was not bored for a second while alone in the hospital. My companion told me about the dinner that he and the other missionaries had at one of the members homes. I felt a little left out, but I remember that as they described it, they were actually a little disappointed. They were nice members that knew about Thanksgiving from the American missionaries and were being very nice and trying, but it wasn't like what it is back home. It was an interesting feeling because they missed home by having someone try to duplicate it and missing the mark, while I didn't have anything even remotely like thanksgiving (Peruvian hospital food all by myself) I was so filled and felt so uplifted by the whole thing. (even with a high fever for 2 1/2 of those 3 days)

Whatever your experience is, expressing gratitude is always a good experience. So, we are grateful for you. I am proud to have you as a son.

Love, Dad and Mom

RFA Radio Frequency Ablation (Nothing to do with music)

Sharon spent a day and a half in St. George to have a procedure done to relieve some pain in her neck and head. Radio frequency ablation is a way to zap some nerves and make them stop hurting so much. We found out about this from info gained during her Mayo Clinic visit.

The doctor informed her that it will hurt more, now for a time before it starts to feel good, but it will give her a lot of relief that should last from somewhere between 6 to 18 months. I am so grateful for this and her to have a chance at some relief from the pain that she has so gallantly endured for so long.

David/Dad

Stephen, Anne, talks in church and trees

Stephen was set apart as the secretary in the Priest's quorum today. It was great to be a part of that.

Along with being very proficient at the Oboe and always sitting down and playing a wide variety of music on the piano, Anne has taken up playing the ukulele (and singing) and is getting really good at it.

A couple of comments in the Sacrament mtg. talks made me chuckle today. There was a couple that had returned from a mission in Bermuda. (which oddly enough is part of the New York, New York City South mission) In speaking about senior couples serving on missions, they were told by a general authority that the were asking couples to "Lengthen their shuffle".
Also, in Bermuda there is a sandwich shop that is owned by a member of the church and there is a fish sandwich on the menu called "The Elder" because whatever it was called before was the consistent choice of the missionaries that frequent their shop.

We worked hard yesterday as lumberjacks. We have bugs in our trees and had to cut down 8 trees yesterday. They were from 40 to 60 feet tall. It was quite a sight to see them fall and a lot of work to get them cleared away. My family is awesome.

happy thesis, everyone.

I haven't posted much here because I felt like I had nothing to report. And most of you already know this news anyway. But I'm announcing it officially. My committee has a (fairly?) final draft of my thesis in their possession. I have a defense scheduled. And I'm going to graduate. You're all invited to our graduation party.

And once we have the baby, I'll probably have much more consistent (and slobbery) things to post.

Salutations of love and connectedness

Sharon, Sophie and I were driving along and Sharon saw something that she wanted to share with Kathy and Christopher. Kathy had temporarily lost her phone so Sharon called on Christopher's phone. He did not answer, but in beginning the message, Sharon was in the mode that she was talking to Kathy and gave a bright "Hi sweety!" Right after that she remembered that she was on Christopher's phone and started backing up on the "Hi sweety" greeting. We love Christopher, but hi sweety just doesn't quite fit him. Many people are somewhat uncomfortable leaving messages anyway, and Sharon is too. In this case she became particularly flustered. In efforts to withdraw the "Hi sweety" without withdrawing a pleasant greeting, she began to trip over her words a bit. The more the correcting, the more flustered she became.

Sharon loves more purely and cares about others, especially those dear to her more than almost anyone else I know. I efforts to come up with a guy equivelant of "Hi sweety" so that Christopher would feel good about the call too, she ended up saying that she sent the same kind of:

Salutations of Love and Connectedness

While that did accurately express the love and connectedness she feels toward Christopher, hearing those words out loud made me just bust out laughing. I laughed to the point of tears. Sophie didn't know what I was laughing at, but she started to laugh too. Sharon asked what I was laughing about and every time I tried to say the words, more laughter came. I was about to the point where I needed to pull over because I was starting wonder if I was still safe driving. It was great to have a laugh like that.

So, to those who are near and dear to us, we send a very heartfelt:

Saluatation of Love and Connectedness


P.S. My wife is awesome.

Quick update

Sophie is coming home tomorrow (Monday Aug 24th) She will be starting 6th grade at Silver Mesa Elementary on the 26th and because her teacher from last year moved up a grade, she will actually have the same teacher for this year. She has learned a lot in her time out in Roosevelt and we are excited to have her home once more.

Sharon gained a lot of help from her Mayo Clinic trip. We just got back from a trip to St. George to see a Mayo Clinic trained doctor there that is helping out with continued treatment for her neck and head pain. With some of the improvement she has felt, she has had a surge in creativity, plans and ideas for the present and future. And we have a plan of how to get her back to full health. It will take some time (months) but having a direction is very good.

Stephen and Anne start school on the 26th also as a senior and a sophmore at Alta High School.

Adam's visa to India runs out on April 15th, 2010. So we now know his official "has to be out of the country" date.

I have been asked to speak at the American Behcet's Disease Association meeting as the dentist authority on the disease. I hope give out some information that will help a lot of people. (And while I am at it, I want rock the boat a bit and try to get physicians and dentists to communicate better about this disease.) It will be April 22-25, 2010. So April will be a busy month. It will be in Orlando Florida.

Daniel is making wedding plans, starting school and missing Cassandra. It was hard for him to come back from Texas.

Kathy is excited to be pregnant, even in the face of the challenges that accompany that. (she did make a comment about wondering how the world is so populated.) She and Christopher will make such great parents.

And one last note, referring to the blog about our snail problem. We did try out Christopher's solution. We now have several little bowls full of dead or drunken snails that met their demise in a bowl full of beer. (It really works!) So as to not meet up with some ward member at the store as I am buying beer for my snails, I had a guy who has been working for us in our yard bring the beer. It was very strange to see empty beer cans in my trash can.

Adam look-alikes

I'm pretty sure Adam sent this to the whole family, but just in case...

This week, Adam mentioned in his email that the Indians have told him he strongly resembles John Travolta, Justin Timberlake, and this guy:



















Channing Tatum, from the movie, Step Up. We should rent this movie and make it the first one Adam watches when he gets back.

The thing is, Adam doesn't actually look like this guy, other than the fact that they are both white and tall (and personally, this actor doesn't strike me as much of Travolta impersonator either). When you guys go to India, set those people straight. My brother looks like this guy:

More time at the Mayo.

More tests today for Sharon. We will be here til Thursday or Friday. There were tests today that we will get results from tomorrow or the next day. Things are becoming clearer as to where the problems are. I will put more when we have the answers for sure.

First set of results Sharon at the Mayo.

We met with the Neurologist this morning. The pain in her head is NOT a tumor or an anyrism or even vasculitis. It appears to be radiating from the disc in the neck up (and also down her arm). We can work with that. They are going to test it a bit more to find out exactly where and decide what to do, but some of the big scary possibilities are off the table in regards to that pain and that is a very good thing.

More to come as we know.

the end of tyranny*

When Mr. Christopher first heard about the Petersen 4th of July piñata tradition, he asked if we broke a piñata of a British soldier dressed in the garb of the Revolutionary War. I explained that they don't really sell those—not a big market. We'd used several kinds of piñatas through the years: a pirate treasure chest, a star, and maybe even a Pokemon when piñata stocks were running low one year.

When he realized this year that we could just make our own piñata, he was determined that we wouldn't decorate it with no stinkin' pokemon. That tyrannical king looks angry (and also, rich):



















Here is the Petersens' beating down of tyranny, as captured on film, youngest—as always—first:






































































Everyone felt pretty tough after beating tyranny. Stephen also may have felt like he needed to go to the bathroom.














*Special thanks for this post go out to Mr. Christopher for piñata concept.

i finally hooked my camera up to my computer

What a slacker I am—never giving you guys pictures from the flaming gorge trip. I have 179 of them total, so this is just a taste. I'm definitely not going to load all of them here.

We made it:

















For some reason, Christopher thought the gorge would be bigger:












And it was! :















So we smiled, :









and made funny faces:

Mayo Clinic ratings

US News and World Report put out there "America's Best Hospitals" list for 2009

The Mayo Clinic Ranked:

2nd Overall (John's Hopkins was 1st but Mayo has been 1st before)

1st Diabetes and Endocrine disorders
1st Neurology and Neurosurgery
1st Digestive disorders
2nd Respiratory disorders
4th Rheumatology disorders
3rd Kidney disorders
4th Cancer
7th Ear Nose and Throat

I am taking Sharon to the best place in the world for what she needs to get the answers she needs. We are leaving Monday morning to be able to be there for an appointment starting at 7:00am Tuesday.

I will keep you posted on this blog (pun intended) on what we find while there. Also, our cell phones will work there. If we don't answer, we are where they tell you to turn off your phone.

We appreciate the prayers, support and love that we feel from family and friends.

Anne is a traveling girl

Anne had several days at Flaming Gorge with the family. She was home for a weekend and then went to girls camp and had a great time. Then home for the weekend and then off to EFY at BYU. She is having wonderful experiences but we miss her.

Mayo Clinic and a Family Fast

Sharon and I will be leaving on July 20th for the Mayo Clinic. Her pain level has steadily increased as well as many other symptoms. It has been a long wait to get her into there, but I am grateful that we started the process when we did. What ever the We need to get some answers for her to change how we are going about treating her. We are confident that it will be a good experience and will give us help to get her better.

Now comes your part. For those who are able and wanting, I would like to have a family fast this Sunday on her behalf and gather for a blessing for her on Sunday. Your prayers and support are greatly appreciated and helpful.

Thanks, DAVE

While I was at girl's camp

So just recently I went to girl's camp. It was a blast, and I'm really grateful for the girls in my young womens group. I learned a bunch of stuff and hopefully made new friendships.
But I missed you guys. And I'm so happy and grateful for such an awesome family like you. Thanks for being who you are.

--Anne Marie

4th of July water fight and the Mayo Clinic

I know that we just barely got the word out about the annual 4th of July water fight at our house, but there is change to the plans now. We have loved hosting that and enjoyed it every year, but this year we are needing to give a last minute cancellation to the event.

Most know that Sharon has had a lot of challenges with her health. She has weathered them with great grace and diginity and worked very hard to not have it impact others. The complexity of her situation has baffled the doctors here. Because of that we are going to the Mayo Clinic on July 21st to go where we feel that the extra expertise and communication between doctors will give the answers she needs to get back to full health.

We're sorry, but the situation is such that we aren't able to put on the event right now because of what is happening right now. We'll look forward to it for next year. We have called all the parents in our generation and Dad/Grandpa Lloyd and Dorothy. Please spread the word to all nieces, nephews, kids etc. so we don't have anyone uninformed about the change. Thanks.

David

Balance in the universe, once again

After our 4 wheeling experience (see earlier blog) with some very nice people that helped us, they would only accept a thank you and nothing more for the help they gave.

Last week, in the parking lot of Jordan Commons a man approached me with the kind of look on his face that I imagine I had while on my 4 wheeler and met with our answers to prayer. He and his brother were on their way to Payson from somewhere far away and were about to run out of gas and had no money. Their plan was to get off the freeway where they can be around people and at least have a chance at help instead of being stranded on the freeway, out of gas with cars whizzing by. The look on his face was sincere. When I gave him money for gas, he got out his cell phone and offered to give me his number and address so that he could mail me back the amount that I gave him.

So I refused the same way Steve, Wyatt, Missy, and Tawna did to me and told him to help someone else out in the future and that will be thanks enough. It just felt good.

Dad

engagement photos—never before released!

I've been holding out on you, fam. Already a week's gone by and I haven't emailed you any of the pop-the-question pictures that I took. Forgive me?

I like these three:




I have more. Don't worry; you'll have them soon, too.

Daniel is engaged!

Daniel is engaged! Cassandra Songster is the lucky girl and Daniel also is the lucky guy! There were plans made for the special moment of popping the question. Work went into creating a special atmosphere for the moment in our backyard. The arranged time was a little after 9:00pm Wednesday night. Daniel and Cassandra had not arrived at the house yet when the deluge hit that caused flooding and mudslides in Draper so outside was quickly not an option. We broke out candles and lights in the living room. I think that when there is something as significant as asking someone to marry them happens you want the ideal situation. But I think that when you are in love and you are either excited to ask or excited to say yes, it really doesn't matter where you are or what is going on, because nothing else matters at that moment. So, Daniel and Cassandra, congratulations and know that you are loved. And even though you might not have noticed much, we did try to make the setting, as Daniel said earlier, "As rediculously romantic as possible". Doing it in 15 minutes was less work than the mountain of work that went into the backyard, but both were done with the same amount of love.

We are so happy for you! Dad

Environmental pest control - just for fun

In seeing Christopher's blogs about the farm where they buy their food and how environmentally aware he and Kathy are, it has spread to me.

We have a snail problem in our yard. We have hundreds, probably thousands of them in our yard. I didn't want to do the snail bait because it can kill the frogs and toads that we do like to have in our yard. And plus, it is putting a poison in the yard. So I thought that I would be smart and do what nature does to control populations of animals or organisms: Predators. Get something that likes to eat snails. So with the wonders of the internet I have my answer.

African Black Rhinos and Alpaccas are natural predators to snails!!!!! I thought I was all set, but was sad to see that PetSmart doesn't carry those. Darn.

Father/son experience (aka "Are your legs sore too, Dad?)

Stephen and I went to the annual ward Father's and son's outing on Friday. The main activity for us was to get in some real time on the four wheelers. We got 8 1/2 hours worth.

We went up the trail that we had done for the last several years, but went further because we had more time. When the sign said, "Cedar loop" we both thought, that's good for an uncharted adventure, loops bring you back to where you started so we pressed on. We took on the challenge when the trail got rockier. The view from the mountain ridge was spectacular, I wondered if Stephen noticed the acres of flowers we passed in the brief times when I wasn't focused on missing rocks. As we went down the other side of the ridge, I kept wondering when the loop was going to start looping. At the bottom we realized that we had gone from highway 35 to highway 150. We searched many places for the rest of the loop. Then at the end of a campground we found it and up we went. (We knew where we came from was too rocky to go back up.) At the top of the mountain I was starting to look at the time, worried about being late for dinner. Then as time progressed, we went in circles. I noticed numbers on signs at trail intersections. I felt right that we were on the right path because it was familiar, only to realize it was familiar because we had just been there 10 minutes before. We backtracked and realized that at some 3 way intersections we had explored all 3 directions already, some 2 or 3 times. Then I was worried about missing dinner all together. We were never in any danger, but were were lost and the view of the rolling hills made us feel very alone.

While I was watching the time, Stephen had been watching the gas. Something about his ATV made him burn gas almost twice as fast. We started at 4:00pm. By 8:00 dinner was being cleaned up and Stephen was almost out of gas. So at that time I said, "Ok, prayer time." We said a simple prayer asking to help us back to camp. We went a short way, wanting to have the answer to be, turn here, this is where you missed the way before. After a very short time, we stopped and the answer came: "We need to get to people." Nobody knows where we are, we need to get to people, even if it isn't our own camp. A very simple direct answer to prayer. We need to get to people.

As Stephen ran out of gas, he turned on the reserve tank (good option on a 4 wheeler) and we looked at each other and said, "half a gallon left" and went on. When we reached the bottom where the trail meets the road of the campground, we saw people. Later on, those people said that I looked very relieved when I saw them. They were right. I told them our predicament while they sat in their two seater 4 wheelers with amazing suspensions and power. There were two couples. Steve told us to come on back to camp and they would fill us up with gas. Missy said something about being able to get that midnight ride that she wanted. They told us that they were from Kamas and knew all the trails up there. They asked us about where we were camped and then told us that they would take us there. They gave us gas, beef jerky, water and another coat. We turned on the headlights (it was almost 10 pm by then) and off we went. By the time we reached camp, (after one big retrace of our travels because of a locked gate) it was about 12:40am. They informed us that it was 19.1 miles from their camp to ours, with a mountain inbetween.

Steve Steinmetz, Wyatt Smith, Missy and Tawna Marie got to be guardian angels/answers to prayer that night. And I told them that. I also told them I didn't know how to thank them. They refused me being able to top off their gas tanks. Anything that came to mind as a reward or payment just felt silly or insulting at the moment. They weren't expecting a reward. So I just told them that tonight you get to know what it feels like to be an answer to prayer. And I told them thank you for being the people that God chose to be our guardian angels that night. Missy responded to that saying that she would have something cool to email about to her son who is on a mission somewhere in Africa.

Our 8 1/2 hours of 4 wheeling over very rocky terrain was over. We both are walking a little funny today because our legs are so sore. We had a lot of fun and we also experienced one of the most direct answers to prayer that I have ever experienced when the right people were placed in our path.

Stephen, you were awesome. DAD

Sophie

Sophie is doing well in school. They had their annual olympics. This was the report: Sophie went to the special olympics today, she won first place in two events, and second place in another.

So it looks like Daniel wasn't the only one winning medals this week.

Way to go Sophie!

Draper Temple celebration

May 29th at 8:00pm at the conference center is the Draper Temple Celebration. Anne and Stephen will be participating in it by singing with their YW/YM group. It is the first temple celebration experience in the Salt Lake Valley since the one for the Salt Lake Temple. The parents of the participants get tickets automatically, so we are going (Yay). But we also have potential tickets available first thing Wednesday morning, so let us know if you are interested. It will be broadcast to many stake centers also, but that is not the same as being there. There has been a lot of practices that have gone into this, so I am sure it will be great.

Anne CVMS band concert

Anne has an end of year concert on Thursday, May 21st. (I think around 7:00pm, but call if you are thinking of coming to make sure on the time.

We got to hear one of her songs tonight when the band and the orchestra joined up for one song. It was "Jupiter, Bringer of Jollity" from "The Planets". One would think that something with the word Jollity in it would be good, and they definitely delivered tonight. Way to go Anne and we are looking forward to more on Thursday.

Daniel - Ogden Marathon. Dad 5K

Saturday Daniel ran the Ogden Marathon. I did the 5K. Daniel finished the marathon in 3 hours 30 minutes. If you happen to see the official results on the marathon website, it is misleading. It says that he finished in 4:20 and placed 28th. But he missed the bus up to the starting point and ended up starting 50 minutes late. If you look closely at the official results, you will see how that worked out. They show the split times at several points in the race. The seven mile mark had others passing at 40, 50 or 70 minutes. Daniel's is recorded as a blazing 9 minutes 20 seconds. (thus actually being 59 minutes). Anyway, we know that he covered the marathon in 3:30, which puts him at 7th place in his age bracket. That is just above 8 minutes per mile!. His last mile was 6 and a half minutes. And then he felt like he was going to pass out but didn't.

We are so proud of him. I told him that 3:30 was amazing for a first time marathon. He also informed me that it will be great for his last marathon also. He said that when he had just gotten past the " I'm about to pass out " stage. I will be curious to see if that statement holds up in the future. I can see someone he knows doing a marathon in 3:29 and he just has to go beat it, but we shall see.

I too started late. I was about 2 minutes late, (much construction between here and Ogden). So I did not get in on the official times on the marathon website. But I have the T-shirt and number to prove that I was there. I finished in approximately 41 minutes on the 5K. (which is 3.1 miles). I jogged, I ran a little and I walked in between. I was a little worried to put my post surgical ankle/foot to the test, but was very pleasantly surprised that I didn't have any problem at all with it. My muscles in my legs are just now getting over being sore, but it was a very good sore. It helped remind me of why I liked to run so much in the past. Even with being sore, my body feels so much better. So I now have a baseline to measure against and beat. 41 minutes. There are 5K's for all kinds of occasions and I am going to enter some as they come along. (Plus you get cool T'shirts!)

I remember reading in a running magazine about how excited guys were to hit the milestone ages, 40, 50, 60 etc. Because on those birthdays, they found themselves as the youngest in their age bracket and more likely to win a trophy, medal or cash award. Looking forward to a milestone age like that sounds good to me, instead of dreading its arrival. So that is my plan for keeping a young outlook on life.

Speaking of medals. From what I understand, Daniel got one. Cool.

Error message bx 74102

I went to post a big thing about Daniel and his Marathon on Saturday and my 5K. It was lost in the blogging system at error bx 74102 (or something like that) I will redo it later when I have more time.

Happy Mother's day

I am grateful for Mothers. This is a Mother's Day that most will experience at some time in their life, but never really think it will happen until it does. That is that I lost my Mother this year to a stroke. As a Father now, I realize what my Mother went through in raising me and my brothers and sister. I understand the importance of her being there for every little need and even just being there when there wasn't a particular need. I am grateful for the influence of my Mother throughout my life and I am grateful to know that we can be reunited after this life.

As I look at how great my kids are turning out, I have an immense amount of gratitude to Sharon for the kind of mother that she is. Sharon, you are doing a great job. So in addition to being my sweetheart, thank you for being such a wonderful mother to our children.

Dave

13 - 5 win in Lacrosse

Stephen's lacrosse team, (Alta) won their game tonight 13-5. It was a great game. I sat next to the parents of another player tonight. We introduced ourselves via our son's name, number and playing position. Their son was on attack, Stephen on defense. I commented that when your son is on offense and they score a goal it is great. On the other side I told them that with a son on defense, I always want to have the game be a shut out. But 13 -5 was pretty good.

Stephen achieved a large, unified response by the crowd when he decided to go through a player on the other team, rather than around him. The other player caught air as he fell to the ground. It happened right in front of his team's bench, bringing cheers from the team. Playing defense brings its own kind of rewards. Like acting like blocking a shot with your body to prevent the game winning goal from happening. Then acting like the ensuing welt that will be there for the next 3 weeks really doesn't hurt. While the glory in this move is impressive, it is not nearly as fun as blocking someone to the point that they catch air. From that point on, they think twice about trying to get around you.

I also over heard one of the opposing teams' parents comment about Alta just throwing the ball to get rid of it from the defense. At first I thought, they don't just do that, they play well. Then Anne pointed out how Stephen can pass the ball from behind the goal to a team mate on the other half of the field with amazing accruacy. Way to go Stephen!

Dad

Honor band concert

Anne participated in the district Honor band concert on Wednesday. They chose studentst from all around the district and had them put on a concert. It was an honor (pun present if you want it) to be chosen for it. She was recommended by her teachers for it. She was one of 3 oboe players in the band.
They did great. It was really amazing to hear the caliber of the music that came out of a middle school band.

Congratulations Anne! We are so proud of you.

2009 Spring Ice Show

I (Anne) have a skate show with my syncronized skating team on Friday May 1 and Saturday May 2. The show time is at 6:30 for both and tickets cost $2.00. On May 2 there is public skating after the performance from 8:00-10:00, but you need to pay the regular public session fee. Hope to see you there!

daniel boone was a boy...

Do you remember that song, Dan-O? We sang it all the time when you were three or something. And now you're twenty-three. (23?) Weird. Thanks for being born.

Easter Egg hunt

The annual Easter Egg hunt (or the more accurately named Easter candy hunt) will be held a 2:00pm on Saturday April 11th in our yard. The hunt will begin when everyone is here and ready. If you are late it will make for anxious kids asking over and over, "when do we start, when do we start?" So please be on time. For parents please bring a contribution of candy for the cause. We are excited to see everyone.

writerly news

In January, Christopher and I submitted essays to this year's David O. McKay contest. Today was the last day the winners would be notified. When I found nothing but junk in the mail box this morning, I figured we had expected too much, and therefore, the universe paid us back with last place (when I won in '06, I had forgotten that I even submitted the essay at all).

But then I got a phone call. Looks like the universe just wanted us to wait for a second.

• Christopher won an Honorable Mention in the undergraduate division. You guys heard Christopher's essay at the family Christmas party and it's pretty much amazing.

• I won first place for the graduation division.

The awards ceremony will be held on Thursday, April 16th, at 1pm. I know it's a fairly inconvenient time. But if you have time that day, come for some free food.

lacrosse locations

This is copied and pasted from an email, so ignore some of what is said, but the locations are there and it is less typing for me.

Over the next few days we have the following games:

Saturday April 4th:
10:45 : Alta 2 versus Lehi
12:30: Alta 2 versus Bingham 1
These games will be at the South Jordan Middle School, 10245 South 2700 West.

Tuesday April 7th:
5:30 PM: Alta 2 versus Bingham 2
This game will be at Indian Hills Middle School.

Satuday April 11th:
9 AM: Alta 2 versus Viewmont
We will be playing at Viewmont High School, 120 West 1000 North, Bountiful, Utah. We’ll try to carpool and arrange this once I know for sure who is able to play and who is not.

Laxman Stephen - Game schedule

April 4th 10:45 am Alta vs. Lehi At Bingham
12:30 pm Alta vs. Bingham At Bingham
This is a three way tournament, Alta, Lehi, and Bingham

April 11th 9:00am Alta vs. Viewmont At Viewmont
April 18th 9:00am Alta vs. Bonneville At Bonneville
April 25th 9:00am Alta vs. Brighton At Alta
10:45 am Alta vs. Lone Peak At Alta
This is another three way tournament Alta, Brighton, Lone Peak
They are hoping to be able to play this in the stadium at Alta on the new turf field. We will see on that, depending on how fast the wheels of school politics turn. If not, it will be at Indian Hills Middle School.
May 2nd 10:45 am Alta vs. Weber At Viewmont

So there is the schedule. Any and all are invited to come and cheer.
We don't have addresses yet, so I will post those when we get them.

Last game they won 18 to 3. Being so far ahead at the end of the game, Stephen decided to take the ball the whole length of the field and made a shot on the goal. It was just off a little, but it was fun to see him go almost uncontested all the way to the goal.

Also, I heard a fun comment from one of the other parents of the Alta players. He was yelling to his own son, but also referring to Stephen, and I quote, "Get in there and help, he's pushing 4 guys out of the way, get in there and get the ball." I think this kind of experience that they had with
Stephen had something to do with him not being contested too much on the shot on goal. LaCrosse is so fun to watch.

Dad

Anne's concerts Oboe Player extraordinaire

Honors band concert : April 22, 2009 at Eastmont Middle School. Evening time. We will find out the time.

School concert: May 20th Around 7:00 pm. (more definite time as it gets closer. At Crescent View Middle School. (CVMS)

The Honors band is a neat honor. It is made up of kids from all over the district and put together just for this special event. Only select students are chosen from each school and asked to participate. Anne said that there will be 3 oboes. That is an exciting prospect because she is the only oboe player at CVMS. We are very proud of her and she is sounding really good!

DAD

LaCrosse schedule for Stephen

Stephen has a Lacrosse game Saturday March 28th at 12:30pm at Indian Hills Middle school. Anyone that would like to see him play and support him is invited. I will post the schedule for the rest of the season later so you can know when his games are.

Dad

Hospital time for Sharon

A brief post 'cause I have to go. For those that don't already know Sharon has spent the last 4 days in the hospital. She had intense headaches which they were able to help with. I will put more when I have more time.

David/Dad

holi festival

Just in case you wanted to know, read all about it:

http://www.holifestival.org/history-of-holi.html

Adam update

I thought I would periodically put in excerpts from Adam's emails here. I was going to do that but this last email was so good all the way through that I just put in the whole thing. He is doing great. So here it is:



So I will start with the most important. Clive and elizebeth were baptised last sunday. I was really excited. We had the baptism in a swimming pool that is just on the banks of the Yumana river, which is just north of delhi, kind of by his house. It was really cool. The spirit was really strong. I have some pictures that I am going to be sending home on a cd with a bunch of other ones. They are going to be awesome. Starting at the beginning of last week, Shawn Bradely came for a fireside, (i didn't know who he was either, he is a NBA player) because he was doing some humanitarian work here in india. He was 7' 6". He was the only person I had to look up to here in india. haha. It was really cool and you can tell he has given alot of different firesides and such. He said how it was hard to live a good life in the NBA and how the gospel really helps people in their lives. again pictures coming. Also this week, it was Holi, reasons why the late emailing. This holiday is were they throw paint at every one because of some hindu god that died and they celebrate his death. I was scrubbing paint of me for hours, but it was the funnest thing I have done for a really long time. It was socially appropriate to be throwing water balloons at people and cars, which we happened to take full advantage of, 300 times in fact. We threw alot of balloons. There have been alot of people that we have been going through lately. Elder Schade and I are feeling like there aren't people that aer really interested, so we will find them, and then drop them really quickly to weed out the people that aren't that interested. It is a different technique, but we will go with it. He is super intense though, good for me, holds me to the things I start, or say I am going to do. I love you family, the work is really true, and we are going to rock this week. adam ps. We are getting a new building this month for church which means we are moving out of our college class room. haha. awesome.

Another major award in the family - Stephen

Stephen experienced the annual Alta high school physics department balsa wood bridge event. He took 3rd place with this bridge holding

1610 pounds

By estimating the weight of our family, I think that his little 6 inch high bridge could hold our entire family all at once. (If we were able to stratigically position ourselves over 5 very precise little points)

For his stupendous feat, he received $10! He was only beaten by two students that were in the AP Physics class.

(Thanks to those who have blazed the trail before him, because Dad had seen what worked and what didn't in years past and was able to advise him)

Dad

Pretty well, now do it again.

The concert went pretty well. I think I did pretty well on my solo. I only messed up a little bit! So the concert for the parents was sort of a warm up, I guess. Because tomorrow we're going to festival! So I get to perform the whole solo again, in front of judges! Ya, so that's a little daunting. But we get to miss all of school tomorrow, so it's totally fine with me!!

Just for fun - new cars

After our recent experiences with accidents, the thought of increased safety features on our vehicles came to mind. Any thoughts on these models? I think the red one looks pretty cool.

Dad

Angels watching over Stephen II

Sorry, I did it again and only got a title down before posting. But actually the second title is more accurate.

Stephen was in two accidents recently. First, he is OK and not hurt. The first accident was not his fault. Someone pulled out in front of him, giving him no other choice but to slam on the brakes and then slam into the side of the white Jaguar that she was driving. We are still waiting on the outcome of the car. The damage has not been determined officially yet.

The next one the next week was up on Highland drive on South mountain. He fell asleep at the wheel and kept going straight when the road curved and hit a curb at around 40 mph. It blew out 3 tires. Fortunately he landed on a dirt road that was soft. It is where there are future plans for a wider road parallel to Highland Dr. There must have been angels watching over him on this one, because he crossed over the line, over the lane of oncoming traffic, hit the curb, caught air, landed on an incline that was about 30 degrees, then came to rest after the rims dug into the soft ground about 8 inches deep for about 40 feet. There was a fair amount of sage brush that acted as a brake for him. He said he woke up immediately on the impact of the wheels hitting the curb and he was airborne as he opened his eyes. We went back to the site of the accident and measured things. It was 35 feet that one side of the wheels were airborne, but 70 feet before all 4 wheels hit the ground. It was 200 feet from point of impact to where he got the vehicle under control. Amazingly only the tires were damaged and the alignment was out, but that was the only damage. There was sage brush stuck in three places on the bottom of the vehicle.

So, as a father, I am very grateful for guardian angels that look out for my kids. Also as a father, I put out a "now hear this" to all my kids: Please don't make any of those wonderful angels work overtime in your behalf.

We are all very happy that Stephen is safe and sound.

DAD

Angels watching over Stephen

it's a major award

I hate bragging about myself. But, I figure we created this blog to keep each other in the loop. So here's my part of the loop—shameless self-promotion.

I've received some happy letters in the last week. One saying that I'm good at teaching, and important people in my department want to give me an award for it. And another saying that I won 2nd place in a poetry contest. And I don't really even write poetry.

Now, if I could get someone to say they want to give me money-slash-prizes for what I actually think I'm good at—writing fiction—THAT would be a major award.

Kathy's B-Day

We celebrated Kathy's birthday over at the Petersen's. We held our party a little late because Kathy spent her actual birthday in Chicago.
We played a game where one person writes a descriptive sentence, passes it to their neighbor, who draws a picture of it.
The drawer then folds over the descriptive sentence so that it is not visible to the next person they pass it to, who writes a descriptive sentence of the new picture. The new writer then folds the picture over, hiding it, and passes it on to a new drawer.

What started out as "A punk rock girl with a cupcake tattoo listening to rock music,"
became "Captain America puked into a jar while he was wearing MC Hammer pants."
Steve and Dan wrestled. Dan established his dominance as alpha-male.

Kathy, the writer, was also the speaker

We had the pleasure of going to BYU yesterday and spend the day with Kathy. One of her papers that she wrote was chosen for her to present at a religion paper symposium. (I don't know what it was officially called) It was where students submitted papers on a variety of religious topics. The top papers were selected for the authors to present, which Kathy did very well. It was on rhetoric and how that applies to our study of the gospel, scriptures and in missionary work. We were very proud of her after her presentation and I learned a lot. We were still just as proud of her, but she was even more happy when, at the special lunch they held, they told her that her paper was $250.00 good and handed her a check for her efforts. We sat at a table for lunch with one of the professors that was one of the judges for the contest and he recommended that Kathy submit it for publication in the book/periodical that is associated with that department. Yeah, congratulations Kathy.

Dad

Ditto, for Stephen but in a guy sort of way

Parent teacher conference was again a great payoff as parents when we went to Stephen's. We were asked if he was signing up for AP classes next year, told that he was great to have in the class and other various compliments. The photography teacher was particularly free with the compliments. She is going to search out contests and internships for him because she feels that he is so good and has such an eye that he really out to have other people see it. We will get him to post some of the best pictures soon. He is a great guy.

Dad

A joy, a pleasure to have in class, can we clone her?

I got to go to Anne's parent teacher conference tonight while Sharon/Mom took Anne to her first oboe lesson. The words in the title were the kind of comments that I got from the teachers about Anne. One actually said that if she could have a class full of Annes, she would be in heaven as a teacher. I sure makes PT conferences fun to be able to have reports like that. We love Anne.

Dad

computer skills

My first experience with computers was in high school. I learned Fortran. It was the new programming that had just come out for computers. It was so new, that to run our programs that we created, we had to take the paper cards with the little holes punched in them down to the district office to the fancy computer. The "new computer" didn't show up at the school until half way through the semester.

We have come a long way.

Dad

So here we go! Volume II

I was about to give the inaugural post to our new family blog and pushed the wrong button and didn't get past posting just the title. So here goes the second attempt.

When I hear of other parents talking about how hard it is to have teenagers in the home, I feel bad for them. Our teenagers have been quite a delight for us. And the ones that are now in their 20's continue to be a lot of fun. Each has their own sense of humor. Dinner times have often ended in a lot of laughter, or philosophical discussions or a series of movie quotes that are amazingly tied together even though they are from several different movies.

I am grateful for great kids. For the ones that are still kids and for the ones that are turning into great adults. Adam right now is the one that is in the middle of that transition from kid to adult. He is doing a really good job at it while being a missionary in India. Here is some of his last email: Things are doing really good here. This week has gone really fast, I am not sure if that is good or bad. There are alot of different families that we are working with. One that I am absolutely loving teaching is the Khana family. They have really basic questions that really make you think of christianity. They are hindu, so they don't even understand basic things. They were talking about how they dont believe god can help us through things. I shared about..... how we have all come closer as a family, and that god has helped us as a family, ........ I also shared mosiah 24 which talks about ammron enslaving the peoplr of alma, and telling them how they can't pray. God helped them through the trials. IT was probably one of the best lessons I have ever had. as far as trials here, I am far from them. Things are going remarkably well, and elder schade and I are getting along rreally well. The work has been giong super fast. We haven't spent more than 45 minutes finding beore we could get into a house. We are trying to get people to progress. ........ Life is great. adam

Pretty cool to see stuff like that as a father.

Kathy on her way home from a writing conference in Chicago left a note telling us about how she was grateful for the things that we did that made possible to be at this point in her life.

It is fun to see your kids excel in areas that you never dreamed of.

Daniel texted me a while back saying that he was glad that he had a Dad that cared about him. When we had a golf game lined up to spend some time together and I ended up raining like crazy, he said, " can you still come up?" We played pool and ping pong at the institute.

What a lucky guy I was.

I went to see Stephen play basketball at the church. The other team didn't show up, so they just played against each other. So after that no stress game, the young men's leader tells me that as soon as I walked in the door, that Stephen came alive an started scoring more than ever before.

I am complimented that he wants to impress his Dad. He did.

When Sharon told Anne that we had found an oboe teacher for her, she jumped up and down and squealed and was so excited.

How great to have a daughter who is so grateful. (and talented)

When Kathy and Christopher offered the 2008 Guiness book of world records as a reward for "all 5's" from her reports at school. Sophie went about following all the rules to gain the prize.

I am glad to have that little miracle in our lives.

So as for Sharon, she will get her very own post from me, a man so lucky to have such a great wife.


So there it is! Our inaugural post. Now everyone in the family, feel free to jump in.

Dad aka: David Petersen of the Petersen family

So here we go!