Celebrate a Life Worth Remembering

JULY 4th, 2010

Help us celebrate a life worth remembering
on Dave's birthday this year.

We will meet at 5:30 PM at the LDS Ward at
2285 South 200 West (across from the Bountiful Cemetery)
to share memories, stories, food and friends.

Bring a potluck dish and your favorite story from Dave's life
and plan on sharing with all of us.

ALL ARE INVITED

We hope to have a short video put together for you.
We will meet at the outdoor bowery behind the church
and even plan a short walk to visit Dave's grave

HELP US SPREAD THE WORD!

We would love to have everyone there including
Those who knew Dave
Those who never knew Dave
Those we love
Those who love us

Help us make this a day to remember

Children Through a Mother's Eyes

A strange thing happens to a mother
when she looks at her children,
and especially pictures of her children.

She does not see the grown man or woman of today
or someone altered by a cruel accident or disease,
No, not even one taken by death far too soon.

She sees the babe in her arms, newborn and helpless,
she feels the tug of a small mouth at her breast
or a tiny fist coiled in her hair.

She hears the first word and is filled with joy,
sees the chubby smile which made their hearts one,
and smells baby powder and sour milk and love.

A mother's mind is incapable of sorting
through time's troubles. bumps, quarrels and grief.
She only sees the child encircled by her arms, her baby.

Whatever happens, however time changes both,
the child will always, always be hers,
and she will always be a beloved mother.

Darlene M. Phillips (2010)

This poem was written by my mother after something that Janene said about David, and something Angie said about Nathan touched her heart.

A view from the garden.

We awoke this morning to find a little chill in the air. When I have to haul stuff up to the garden, I always like it when it is not hot. Somehow it seems easier if the air is crisp and cool. We had a few things to plant and it looked like the sun would come out. When it did for a minute or two, I was surprised to see the view to the north. We could only work a short while before the hail and wind forced us to come down from our mountain retreat. In preparation for the coming frost, we had to cover our little seedlings. We hope it doesn't get too cold. About twenty tomatoes, ten peppers and all our squash and pumpkins won't be too happy if it gets real cold.

A New Game Nathan Can Play

We love living so close to our kids. Tonight before heading over to my dad's house for his 76th birthday, we stopped in Angie's neighborhood and joined the boys and Angie for a walk around the block. (Laura and her Dad had gone to a movie) Nathan is a great walker now. When we got back to their home, Janene and Sam were playing a game with Ben in the stroller. Janene would push the stroller from the top of the driveway and when Ben got going pretty fast, then I would catch him. Ben would scream and then laugh his head off. Pretty soon Sam was helping too and both boys were having a great time. I had been holding Nathan so he couldn't get away and had to let go of him once to catch the stroller. He went up to Janene, took the stroller from her and started doing exactly what she had been doing - pushing the stroller and then bringing the stroller back up the hill. We had a blast! How exciting it is to see Nathan beginning to learn some things. He can now say "Grandpa!" pretty much on command, and he can identify shapes like squares and triangles at school. Pretty awesome if you ask me.

Mother's Day - Late Again

We were able to have a pleasant Mother's Day this year. All of the kids either called or came over for a BBQ. My mom and Janene's mom were here, and while it was a little crazy with all the grandkids (and even one great-grandchild -Wow! can you believe that Doug is a grandpa?), we all had a fun time and were able to catch up on each other's lives. Chelane sent a card from her trip to Spain, France, Italy, and Tunisia. Shon called from his job in Hawaii. Steve called from Mexico - he still has not had a sip of soda this year, and Lisseth came over the day before so she could be with Glen at the hospital.

I am pretty darn lucky to have my mom still with us and able to be involved with our family. She has had a pretty rough year, but she is too tough to give up. I was reminded of one of my favorite memories with my mom - and there are a lot of those. We were getting ready to go to church at our house on Colorado Street, and I was told to polish my shoes. We had a flight of stairs going down to the basement with painted wooden treads and I was sitting on the stairs with the bottle of shoe polish. It was the old type of shoe polish with the little dauber inside the bottle. I pulled the dauber out.... and shoe polish went all over me and down those white painted stairs. We were late and my mom yelled at me "Can't you do anything right?" I thought I was going to shrivel up and die. She sat down next to me, grabbed the bottle, and said "Here is how you do it!", and proceeded to flip shoe polish all over me, her, and the nicely painted stairs. I didn't know what to think. Surely there were going to be some swear words out of this, but no - my mom burst out laughing! We both sat on those stairs laughing until we cried. My mom has had to deal with a lot of serious stuff over the course of her life, but she has never forgotten how to laugh.

One of my favorite memories of Janene's mom was something that she always did when Janene and I were dating. You could always tell when Marie was in the house because she would be singing. She sang old songs from the 40's, Primary songs and hymns. Her rendition of Happy Birthday is a family classic.

Today, she can't remember who we are. She always wants to know if her mother knows where she is, and she often asks where Blaine is. If you ask her who Blaine is, she can't remember why he's important to her, but if you start singing an old song, she chimes in with the harmony part remembering all the old words. The other day, she woke up early at about 4:00 in the morning and I could hear her lying in her bed in the other room, singing one of those old melodies. When I poked my head in to check on her, she was sound asleep, still singing. When I get to heaven, I expect she will be singing when I come in the door. (provided I make it.)

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!!

A whole lot more fun than a baby shower!

This is one of my grandsons. His name is Mikey. Today, his mother, Brooke needed to go to a baby shower for Steve's sister, Christine. It just so happened that it started at the same time as Mikey's first soccer game. With Mikey's dad gone on a film shoot, Grandpa got to go to Mikey's game. We rigged up my truck with his car seat and drove to the soccer fields. West Valley has so many soccer fields that there was no parking, so we drove halfway back to Mikey's house and parked on the street and walked.

Mikey loved playing soccer. He wanted to kick the ball anytime he could, especially when the referee wanted the ball to be left alone. One of Mikey's teammates started the game off by kicking the ball into the wrong goal. As soon as he did it, he got this big smile on his face and turned around looking for his dad's approval. I don't think he ever figured out why his dad wasn't very pleased.

Mikey's team didn't seem to even understand why they were there, so Mikey's team only scored two goals. The funny thing is that Mikey didn't seem to know why he was there either - and he scored both the goals. He just likes to kick the ball. He had two girls on his team and they were both pretty good. A couple of the boys sat on the side and cried. Some of the time, the boys just wanted to talk to each other and totally forgot about it being a game.

Once, when it looked like Mikey's team was doing a good job moving the ball down the field, Mikey just stopped. He had seen a bug in the grass, and he was immediately on to better things. The best part was when the game was over, Mikey got a treat - a granola bar. He peeled off the wrapper, ate half of it, wrapped it back up neatly, and said "I have to save this half for my sister". His mom asked if he was nice to the other kids. His response? "Yep, I didn't even talk to them". We had a fun time, Mikey never quit talking on the whole drive back to Bountiful and seemed to be excited about getting to go home to a party where "no boys are invited" (baby shower).

Happy Holidays!

I woke up on Saturday, realized it was May 1st, and thought " Today, I'll get the rest of the garden planted. We'll run out to J & J and pick up some plants and really get this garden going." Then I looked out the window. Blaine, Janene's Dad, used to tell me I was pretty foolish if I planted anything before Mother's Day. It looks like he was right again. I went up to Angie's house and it looked just like Christmas. I wondered if I was going to have to put the truck into 4 wheel drive to get off the hill. I realized that the same thing has happened for the last couple of years. If I knew how, I would include a link to previous May Day posts with similar scenes. So much for global warming!

Grandpa's Pride and Joy

Mikey and Lily came to visit last week and when it was time for them to go home, Mikey cried and cried. "I want to stay at Grandpa's house". Atta boy Mikey! It's always been Grandma's house for all the other kids. While Mikey was still sobbing, Lily wanted to pose for pictures on the front porch. Is that a cute little granddaughter?

On Monday, we shared family night with Angella and David's family. Ben wanted to have his picture taken, but he kept virtually crawling into the lens. I have lots of pictures of his big blue eyes - out of focus. It was only yesterday that he was a newborn baby. Just look at him now. When it was time for Ben to go to bed, he cried for the longest time. It was heartbreaking.

And then there is Sam. Sam always used to pose for the camera with his trademark Cheshire Cat grin. I talked to him about not goofing off and he came up with a nice grown-up smile. You can sure tell he and Ben are brothers. If i could find pictures of the two of them at the same age, they would look like twins. I realized that the little kids aren't getting as much face time on the blog. I will try to be better at that for their sake. I just wanted to share some recent pictures of my precious ones.

It was thirty years ago .... yesterday.

We went to dinner last night with our good friends, Larry and Kay as a belated birthday present for Larry, who just celebrated a milestone birthday. Kay pointed out that it was on this day thirty years ago, that our little family was sealed in the Salt Lake Temple. Heather was the baby then and David was just getting ready to make his appearance. If you look at Janene, you can see that she was already showing him off.

When Janene saw these pictures, she commented " Oh look, two little kids playing house - with real dolls" It does kind of seem like we were just playing grownup then. Little did we know then how important that sealing power would be to us at this stage of our lives.

Janene and I never seem to be able remember this date. We spent a lot of years remembering the day in November before this day came along. Kay has always remembered, and has remembered to send us a card. Lisseth has reminded us lots of years as well. While we look forward to that day when we will all be together again as an eternal family, we try our best to find joy in the journey now. We can look back at what seemed like happier times in our lives, but we have a tendency to forget that many times we couldn't pay the bills. We forget that Janene was buried in diapers most of time and went days without an adult conversation when I was working out of town. We both agree that we would not want to go back in time. We have learned that life is what you make of it. The scripture says "men are that they might have joy". I would add the word "now" to that. It has taken me a long time to learn that lesson, but I try to make the most of it.

On one somber note, we would ask all of you to pray for Kay, who suffered a stroke this afternoon shortly after bearing her testimony at church. It will be a while before she can feel joy again in her life, so she and her family will need our prayers and God's love.

A Trunk Full of Bees

You probably don't want to drive to church with Janene tomorrow. She picked up our bees today and one of the boxes had a hole in it. By the time she got home, about a hundred bees had escaped. There was no way to stuff them back in their box, so they remained in the car when she carried the boxes up the hill. They don't know where they live because the smell of the queen is still lingering in the trunk. We shooed some out of the trunk, thinking they would go find a home. Instead, they hung on the bumper - even after Janene drove the car up to Judy's house. So.... there they remain, unwilling to leave and doomed to die.

The good news is that by nightfall, the other 20,000 bees were safely in their new home on the hill - our new cliff dwellers. This year, we bought a new kind of bees. They are called Minnesota Hygenics. They are supposed to be able to keep themselves cleaner and able to fight diseases and pests like ants and varroa mites better than our Carnolians. They are supposed to be more aggressive, too. We didn't see that as we put them in the hive with their queens. The air was full of bees, but they didn't seem angry or threatening. We put them in a new location at the back of the garden, just in case.

Busy Bees

Next weekend our new bees will arrive. That means that we are busy little bees preparing new homes for the little critters. We levelled a new location on the hill for the hives. That freed up some ground for us to use for more garden area. Last weekend Shon and Joseph helped me haul up some railroad ties so that I could use them to create another level. This weekend we painted the hives and next week we will be working on the frames, maybe building some new ones. We want to have everything spit spot for our new guests by next weekend. What? You don't think we need more area in our garden?

Some Depression Stories

I think the whole family has heard lots of stories about my Grandfather, Al Morton. Most of the stories revolve around his talents as a famous photographer, river runner and cinematographer, and we have all watched and enjoyed his adventure films. But today while talking with my mom, I heard some other stories about my grandmother and grandfather that some of us have probably never heard. Here are a couple of those stories.

Grandma and Grandpa lived fairly close to the tracks in Salt Lake, and often men we called tramps in those days would stop at the house for food. My mom thinks the house was marked somehow so that they knew it was a safe place to get fed. Grandma always made sure that they got something, even if it was only a peanut butter sandwich when times were hard. Grandma used to bake two loaves of bread every night and then leave them on the counter to cool. One night, she left the bread on the counter, mopped the floor, and Grandpa left his wallet, spare change and keys on the counter before bed. When they awoke the next morning, Grandma found muddy footprints in the kitchen, and one loaf of bread was gone. The money and wallet had not been touched. As we talked about that, I wondered if that would happen now. Back then people stole what they needed to survive. Now it seems to be another profession.

During the depression, it was hard to find work. Grandpa Morton, was not immune to the troubles and had to scrounge to find whatever work he could. He heard there was a job opening for someone to clean apartments, so he decided to apply. When he got to the place, there was a huge line of people waiting for the place to open so they could interview. He knew the job would be filled by the time he could get in. He decided to do something out of desperation. He went to the back and found the coal chute to the building. Stuffing his hat into his shirt, he crawled into the coal chute, dropped into the bin, dusted himself off as best he could, and put his hat back on. He went upstairs where the office was and startled the man who was hiring, scaring him into falling off his chair. "I'm sorry to bother you", he said, "but I really need this job. I have four little girls and a new baby." The man decided that if he was willing to crawl through the coal chute to get the job, he deserved to have it, and Grandpa got the job. "There's just one thing, though" came the response. "You must leave the same way you came in. I can't afford to have a riot here." So that is how Grandpa got the job to support his family and feed my mom who was the new baby.

People complain about how hard things are right now, but I think we have no idea how hard things can really get, or how much our parents and grandparents suffered during these times. We owe them all a huge debt of gratitude for what they did to make our lives better.

Time for Janene to shine

I am always posting pictures that I took or would like everyone to think that I took. Many of our family photos have been taken by my talented (and lovely) bride. I thought today would be a good time to show off some of her photography.

These first two pictures were taken last year on our trip to Colorado. Janene has an artistic eye and a talent for composition that really stands out. She is often very aware of textures and contrasts that I walk right past.

Janene is used to dealing with details, especially as she has been involved in her pottery work. Often, the difference between a beautiful pot and one that goes to DI is a small detail, a double line instead of a single one, a slightly muted glaze instead of a colorful one, or some such intricacy. She will throw stuff away that I think is awesome. That attention to detail, I think, helps her in her subjects for photography. She took the picture below, I am sure, to document the creation of our dining room set , but the placement, shadows, color and texture demonstrate her talents as an artist, not just her excellent craftsmanship. Our home is a beautiful warm place thanks to her creativity.

Hmmm - April Fools Day

I had great plans for an April Fools blog post. First I thought about maybe posting that I had lost my job, but since that could be close to a real possibility with the decline in the construction industry, that wouldn't be funny. Then I thought, "Why not announce that Janene and I had been called on a mission to Mongolia?" Nope, we know someone that went there. That wouldn't be funny. That would be too cruel to our grandkids. Besides, some people at church might believe it since it is one our goals as a couple, and I would have a hard time explaining why we weren't really going.

I remember one time when my mom wasn't feeling too well, sick in bed, and I decided to scare her into thinking I had been bitten by a black widow.....(or something involving spiders). Turned out not to be funny, for me  - or her. Then there was the April 1st that I got up in the morning, put on my nice clean underwear, and then found out later that Janene had sewed up the flap in the front. Again - not funny!

I guess I'm just not cut out to be an April Fools jokester. I would like to hear about some of your favorite April Fools pranks, though. I can laugh at the things other people do to each other. I just  can't bring myself to do it to people I love.

Photo Tag Time

Photo Tag
Here is how you play. Open your photos folder or program.
Go to the first folder that comes up.
Go to the 10th picture in that folder.
Post that picture and tell about it.

One of the things I love about my job is that I get to travel all over the state visitng customers and putting together bids for unusual types of fire protection systems. Last week I visited a power plant in Bonanza (yes, that's in Utah), next week I will be at top secret sites at Dugway Proving Grounds. This week I was up in Cache Valley putting together a proposal for an explosion suppression system in a machine that creates aluminum dust at an electric sign company. While I was there I stopped and took this photo.

I don't know why it is, but Cache Valley seems to have the best barn signs in the state. There is this one outside of Wellsville and several other good ones up by Richmond. I've always wanted to do a kind of photo essay on all of them, but that somehow seems to be at the bottom of my "to do" list. Thursday, I thought it wouldn't take me too long to stop on my way back and at least take a picture of this one.
This will need to be the early spring picture in the photo essay since it's not a very picturesque time of year.

Now it's your turn ... I tag Brooke, Heather, Crystal and Chad, Lisa and Jesse and Joe and Marie.

A Wolf, A Racoon, and an Angel

Max earned his Cub Scout Wolf Award yesterday too. He is serving as the Assistant Den Chief and was awarded a bunch of arrow points. He got to pin the award on his mom right there in front of everybody. He then got to lead the "sneeze applause" given by placing your hands in front of your mouth in cupping shape, sneezing loudly, and then because you have no place to wipe your hands, you rub the deposit into your hair.

Mel would have nothing to do with it and rubbed hers in Max's hair! Shon, Mel and the whole family were especially proud of Max and his achievements. Max wrote a nice thank you note for the help he got working on the rocket written on special "I Love Grandpa" stationary. There was a lot of waiting time while others raced their rockets.

Jake spent his time playing with the elastic bands that were used for the rocket motors. He fired them off at just about everyone and even spent some time pretending to be a propeller blade for a while and a racoon with little beady eyes.. I'm not sure that he knew his brother was racing a rocket in the middle of all his fun.

Isabel was an angel the whole time. We asked her if she wished she could race a rocket. She said she didn't go for those boy things. She got several chapters of her book read while she was there amid the pandemonium. Hmmm - sounds just like a Phillips girl.

We love being able to be involved in the lives of our grandkids. Last Sunday, we walked over to my Mom and Dad's house. Along the way, we stopped at Heather and Joseph's home and picked up Elsie, Cy, Andrew and Caleb and all eight of us went to visit Tammy and Mom and Dad. As we were walking the last part back to our home, Janene and I commented on how happy we are to be surrounded by our children. We know that very few American families are so blessed. Angie and her kids were here today along with Brooke and her two and a half children. Chelane was here yesterday. As parents, we feel like we don't see each other enough, yet we know many families see each other only one or two times a year. We thank the Lord for these blessings in our lives.