Happy Birthday!!!

...to my Daddy who is celebrating in Heaven.  

Happy 80th Birthday, Daddy!  

I love you...and I miss you everyday.

Five years and four months...

...almost to the day...since we moved into this house, we FINALLY got our yard-in...sort of. haha
Kevin finished the sprinkler system and we finished leveling and raking the yard AND picked up a TON of rocks;

just in time to get the hydro-seeding done.

For those who don't know what hydro-seeding is....here's Netty's version: Grass-seed is mixed with a liquid which contains the necessary mulch and fertilizer, then sprayed with a hose, over the prepared dirt. The mulch and liquid keep the seed from blowing away, and discourage birds from stealing the seed before it can sprout.

This is what the backyard looks like,
it's mostly done in this picture.

Front yard, east side...all done!

Front yard, west side...

In six to ten days, we should see the rye grass start to sprout. About 3 to 4 weeks later, the bluegrass should come up. We managed to get everything done JUST in time to get things sprouted and rooted before the first hard frost.

We owe thanks to SO many people!!! Our Ward members who have come and helped weed, rake, and pick up rocks. Our High Priest Group leader who dropped by to help whenever we needed him. Marc and Deb for purchasing the hydro-seeding and Gary Christiansen who actually did the hydro-seeding. Most of all, I thank Kevin for his hours and hours and hours of back-breaking, knee-straining, patience-eroding labor. Thanks, Kevy...you're my hero!

ROAD TRIP!!!!

...Ok, not REALLY, just a Sunday drive, but it was fun and funny!

An amazing phenomenon happens whenever Jackie and I get in the car alone together for any length of time. The teenaged-Netty who still lives in my heart almost always comes out to play. The combination of that light-hearted, whacky person and the light-hearted, whacky daughter usually ends in hilarity.

This Sunday was no exception. Kevin and I decided to take a Sunday drive after Church. From our house, we could see great big patches of red appearing on our mountains. That usually signals that the leaves are changing, which usually means it's time for a drive up through the Alpine-Loop. (American Fork Canyon, over the pass to Provo Canyon). Unfortunately for Kevin, he was "on-call" for work and got paged, so he couldn't come. That left just me and Jackie...
dun-dun-duuunnn.... time for an adventure.

Just a little background on me and Jackie and driving in the car. All throughout this past Summer, whenever I would drive Jackie's friends home at night, Jackie and I would end up "going for a drive" on our way home. We'd usually scare ourselves silly (ok, silliER) on the dark-creepy-back-country roads around our house. We're silly anyways, and highly imaginative, so it wasn't difficult. That's led to a mildly crazy sense of adventure whenever we go for a drive...

Jackie was "bored" with our usual drive through our closest canyons and wanted to try something different. So down the road to the south we went, and ended up in Spanish Fork Canyon.

That wasn't interesting enough for Miss J, so we turned around (flipped a U) and headed up some little back roads along the front of the Wasatch Mountains. In and out of neighborhoods, up and out of little canyon roads we went... Jackie was SURE she remembered the way up to a camp-ground we visited with the Young Adults when Kev was in the Bishopric at the UVU Ward....Sure, she was sure... NOT! haha

FINALLY after laughing at our miserable sense of direction and making a couple of phone calls to the navigation-guru (aka Kevin); we wound our way up Provo Canyon and over the Alpine Loop. It wasn't our USUAL drive...we did it in the opposite direction, this time. haha

Here are some pictures from our "adventure"...

The architect of our adventure...

Daring-Duo??? Or Complete-Crazies???
You decide... haha

To add to our mad-adventures...
As we were coming out of American Fork Canyon,
just below the Mt. Timpanogos Cave,
we encountered a sign like this one:

I said, "Wouldn't it be SO cool if we actually got to SEE a real-live mountain-goat?" (It's actually a big-horn sheep, but I didn't know that at the time.) To which Jackie replied, "Like that would happen, it's the wrong time of day." I said, "You're probably right. If we were here really early in the morning or at dusk, we'd have a better chance."

The words were scarcely out of my mouth as we rounded a bend in the road and almost ran into THIS:

She was a little lost and a little confused. I tooted the horn to get her moving out of the road so she tried to "play-chicken" with on-coming traffic...

She then tried going up the slope to our right. Unfortunately the rocks and dirt were really loose, so she kept sliding back down into the road. Poor thing...

She finally found a place where she could get some traction and off she went - after stopping traffic in both directions for almost 10 minutes.
That was the "Grand-finale" of our little Sunday-drive.

Who knows where our next adventure will take us.
Dun-dun-duuuunnn...."Only the Shadow knows..." (or Jackie haha)

Wherever we end up, it's a sure bet you'll be able to read about it here.

Thanks for being my co-pilot on this jaunt, Jackie! I love you!

The Holy City

This weekend, Kevin and I had a rare and wonderful opportunity to walk the streets of Jerusalem. Right here in Utah!!! Thanks to our dear friend, Ken Harris, we were able to tour the LDS Church's film set of Jerusalem. This HUGE (and amazing) set is just south of us in Goshen, UT. To say it was incredible would be an understatement, but I can't think of a better word, so "incredible" will have to do.

This is a scale drawing of what the set looks like from above. This is from the program we received when we arrived.

This is the inside of the program where they had a
break-down of what each area represented.

Kevin and our friend, Kenny standing in the
"Court of the Gentiles" where we entered the set.

As we entered the set in the "Court of the Gentiles",
"Solomon's Porches" was on the right....

The doorway to the "Court of the Women" was on our left...

Inside the "Court of the Women",
which also contained part of the Temple Treasury.
This would be where the widow paid her mites
(Jewish coinage) in tithing.
I just taught this story in
Primary a few weeks ago.

Ken's prop-director created accurate replicas
of the money of the time... Roman AND Jewish coins.
These are what the "Widows mites"
would have looked like!

This was on the way towards the "Pool of Bethesda".
Ken said they used this room for
various scenes depicting Jesus teaching...

In this same room was a replica of what an oven of the time
would have looked like... Imagine cooking in that???
This was too totally cool!

The "Pool of Bethesda"
where Jesus healed the lame man...
no water in it at this time,
but amazing nonetheless!

Just off the area with the "Pool of Bethesda",
was a narrow stairway going to some upper rooms.
Here's Kevin in the doorway to those stairs.

Going up... it was easier than coming down,
let me tell you! ha ha

This was the door to one of the "upper rooms".
I can imagine it being "THE" upper room where
Jesus and his apostles had the "Last Supper".

Above the courtyard with the
"Pool of Bethesda" was this balcony.
They used this as the setting for the scene
where Pontius Pilate washes his hands
of the blood of Jesus.

The next few pictures are various areas that I found interesting...

They used this room for scenes of Jesus teaching in a
"Synagogue" (a Jewish Church).

This was the street they used to film Jesus'
"Triumphal Entry"
into the city on what became known as
"Palm Sunday".

This doorway could have led to somebody's house.

Looks like an aqueduct...

Could "THE" stable of the Nativity
have looked something like this?
I wonder....

"Golgotha"...place of the crucifixion.
Kenny said that when they filmed those scenes,
it looked and felt so real that sometimes he couldn't watch.
I don't think I blame him...

This was a marvelous adventure. What amazed me most is how real it looked and felt. The stone-work looked like real stone. In reality, it was all made of foam-block; shaped, carved, and weathered to look authentic to the time. The attention to detail was incredible. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Kenny, thank you with all our hearts to sharing this with us. We appreciate it more than we can say. You have an AWESOME job!