Last week our ward hosted a service
project at the high school. There were three areas that needed attention. First and far most was the shed/ticket
booth. That needed to be primed and
painted. Second, weeding of the grounds
- particularly over by the restrooms and track.
Third, power wash the bleachers. Ron appeared to be in charge of said
activity. He gave the assignments and we
all went to the areas we had been assigned.
There were six of us painting the
shed. Roland took over with delegation. He has always been a "take charge"
kind of guy. Those who showed up to late to the
activity just assumed that Roland was in charge. I was impressed with how Roland conversed
with an eight-year-old from our ward (geographical boundary within the church) explaining what we were
doing, why we were doing it, and how it would get accomplished. The eight-year-old in turn asked questions
that Roland would answer. I loved the
way he explained about the primer and the paint.
Roland told him that the primer
would have to dry before we could paint.
Why would we need paint if we already painted? (The primer itself was a
drastic improvement upon the shed that probably hadn't seen paint since the day
it was built) Roland explained to him that the primer is needed to go
underneath the paint. He asked the boy
to think about the way he got dressed in the morning, and if he put underwear
on before or after his outwear. The boys
just laughed as he answered and Roland compared the primer to underwear needed
for the paint.
There was one youth upon the latter trying
to get the final touches. The rest of us
gravitated to areas two or three to see what we could assist with. I tried pulling weeds, but as the ground as
quite tough, I went to find a hoe to break it.
I chopped into the earth with a spaded hoe and felt like a field
hand. The work seemed endless until
shortly after someone brought another bunch of hoes to all of those who were
assisting.
This is the kind
of hoe that I have used and seen.
I had never
seen this kind before. I didn't
understand its value.
One of the youth taught us old fogies
how to use this weird looking hoe. And
you know what? It was easier. For those of us who had never experienced
anything like it, it was kind of fun.
My
time in the "field" was short lived.
When the primer dried, I returned to assist with the painting. By then more youth had joined us as well as
the full time missionaries. (I don't where
Elder Morris was from but I don't think had ever seen a paintbrush before) Even the principal of the school
assisted. We had a good turn out and got
a lot done.
We'd been looking forward to my
sister and her family arriving and staying with us for a week. We were hoping they'd make it to the pool
party that our ward has after the service project. Unfortunately they got off to a late
start. I think we had finished our
service project before they had left their motel room in Idaho.
Kayla and Bill have three children: six-year-old
Anna, four-year-old Gary, and two (well almost) year-old BJ. Of course there were several stops made between Utah and Idaho. They had hoped to arrive in Boise on Friday
night but did not arrive until after midnight early Saturday morning. Kayla said she had just gotten the last child
to sleep before dozing off herself. She
said that it felt like she had been asleep only three minutes when the fire
alarm went off and all people from the motel were evacuated. (That was roughly
2:00 am) No one knows why the fire
department was called. The kids were
excited about the fire truck. It did put
a damper on Bill and Kayla's plans however.
More stops until finally they
arrived at our house just after 10:00 and straight to bed. They went with us to church on Sunday. The first thing on our agenda for Monday
morning was blueberry picking. Last year
we would move from bush to push accumulating only two or three pounds max. This year the blueberries are thick and ready
to fall off. From just six bushes we had
over 24 pounds among the eight of us.
Well, I don't guess all eight of us were picking. BJ was dropping blueberries into his mouth
rather than in his bucket. Gary refused
to allow his blueberries to be weighed with everyone else's. He needed to keep them separate as they were
his and he was proud to have picked them all by himself.
Roland and Bill took BJ drove to the
big city of Roseburg (as Bill forgot his camera - which is actually worse than
a typical teenager being without a cell phone) while Kayla and I took Gary,
Anna and Jenna to the park before heading home.
Each day we had blueberries in one form
or another. Blueberry pancakes,
blueberry syrup, blueberry cobbler, blueberry muffins, blueberries from the bag . . . . there are
still a lot of blueberries. Gary took
his home with him. I don't know how many
got eaten before their return. Kayla
said she needed a recipe as many of the blueberries got squished - I don't know
if from Gary's bag or from the frozen ones we sent. I'm guessing the latter.
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