Beneath the Wraps

            I vaguely remember a class called “Culture Refinement”.   It was taught in Relief Society on the 4 th Sunday of the month.   I remember my mom was a cultural refinement teacher.   I know that was her calling while I was out on my mission. The subjects of her lessons seemed to focus on arts, literature, and customs.   I liked the custom part of it – learning about other cultures, nationalities and backgrounds. The class was dropped sometime before this century – though I can’t pinpoint a date.   I was serving in the primary for so many years.          I guess I was reminded a little bit when we had our lesson on Sunday.   The theme (from my point of view anyway) was on acceptance and loving a person though you might not agree with their lifestyles.   It would be nice to understand different walks of life – what makes one tick.   Becoming more aware of our diversiti...

                 Before I went on my mission my dentist suggested that we remove my wisdom teeth.  They weren’t bothering me and I opted to keep them.  I mean they must be there for a reason, right?    There was a while there when I would bite my cheeks – but it didn’t last and the pain was never severe enough for me to make an appointment.                 I believe it was 2017 when part of my top right wisdom tooth broke.   I had it repaired – three times by the same doctor!   So when it broke again in September (I think) I thought “bag it” – I’ll just live with it – although it was beginning to annoy me also.   But I haven’t ever done anything about it.                  On December 20th I made an appointment with the medical doctor for a sinus infect...

       It ’ s taken me YEARS to not become offended by the actions of my children.  I have one who could never sit still, one who would sulk, one who is considered gifted – he tends to get bored very easily.  Jaime figets.  I never considered her as having ADD or ADHD screenshot of Google response      I knew the oldest two had it but hadn ’ t considered the other two might have had it as well.  There are different signs, symptoms if you will, that one may experience that others may not and vice-versa.  There are countless websites which address these issues.  Some provide quizzes and council.          ADD was changed to ADHD in 1987  ( reference )  which is the year our oldest was born.   When I first met Richard the eldest boy had difficulty sitting still – or sitting at all.   He reminded me of a caged animal.   Over the years he ’ s gotten better at placeme...

                 Since we have been in Oregon I tend to fall asleep between 8:00 and 8:30.  I rarely sleep through the night.  I drink more water than my bladder can handle and tend to get up during the not.  Often I am unable to return to my slumber and end up getting up, playing games on my kindle sometimes in the room, sometimes in another.  I’m up for about two hours before returning to bed and will sleep until 7:00 or 7:30 – except lately.  One I’m up, I’m up for the day.              Richard, on the other hand, used to get up early and now is the one who will sleep in – but then he doesn’t come to bed until after midnight – unless the internet goes out, and then he’ll come to bed.   But usually he is up and down also.   Just never at the same time.             This morning I got up at ...

             Richard had a 9:00 appointment with his doctor this morning and I had a dentist appointment at 11:00.   With only one car we drove to Roseburg together in the pouring rain.   The rivers and creeks are always feast and famine. The rain has made them really high to overflowing.   I smile when I look at the murky brown color as I think of Jaime comparing it to chocolate milk.                     I haven’t been to the dentist for over a year and now have an abscessed tooth which will need to be removed.   I set up three dentist appointments for myself.   One in March and two in April.   Ugggh . . .

            Yesterday Richard decided he wanted to drive to Ashland to take some watches to a vendor – though I didn’t think it necessary to make a special trip.   I told him we should pray about the decision to go – afterall the nation is experiencing untamed weather, we are still not receiving local news and perhaps we should remain at home.              I took the closed pumps as a sign.   We had gone to four different gas stations before finding one that still had gas.   They expect they will run out today.   Oh, my word!   I feel like I’m living in a Sci-Fi.   It’s been raining non-stop.   It’s a wonder that we don’t have a lake in our backyard.  On the plus side our grass is very green.

  Richard and I slept in yesterday morning.   He had turned the news on just as it was ending.   He said there had been filmage of our news anchor outside of his apartment building showing us the fallen snow and advising all of Lane county to stay indoors if at all possible.  None of the stations even offered local news this morning.  The elements have created somewhat of a Sci-Fi feeling - sort of like the pandemic in April and May of 2020 Last week Jaime had a six day weekend as school was cancelled due to weather.   So much of the nation is experiencing the severe snow storms and cold.   It ’ s been cold in Myrtle Creek though the snow hasn ’ t stuck in Tri-City we have seen snow in the hills.   Lots of moisture and cold.   But the elements have not effected us the same way as north or south of us.   I don ’ t know if Eugene is experiencing what the rest of the nation is currently.   It ’ s weird to think about. We also have ...

                 This will be my tenth post on promoting my growth due to The Come Follow Me program which was started in 2019. That was the same year that the church cut back to just two meetings though we were encouraged to take the opportunity to keep the third hour with us in our homes. We started out 2019 studying the New Testament.  Unbeknownst to any of us it was a prerequisite for being able to study on our own during the pandemic as we spent more hours at home than at church that year. Book of Mormon was the topic that year. 2021 Doctrine and Covenants and finally 2022 with Old Testament.  The cycle started again last year with the New Testament.  This year ’ s topic is The Book of Mormon.  Manuals were passed out for those who wanted physical books.  Seemingly more detailed than in year s ’ past.          You can find the online manual at this site.  At the end of each lesso...

             I have written a few posts about things being blown out of proportion because of something in the background ( here ) or interpreted in a way that was never meant to be the forerunner ( here ) and will share a piece of the latter.             I believe it was Corey’s senior year in high school when the student directory came out.    On the cover was an art student’s work depicting the mascot and school spirit.   [T he artist] had signed his artwork “Zion” as he had with many (if not all) of his other pieces.    It wasn’t meant to stand out as the main theme of his drawing but rather blend into the design.    However an instructor who was anti-religion especially anti-LDS had discovered the “hidden” Zion and made such a great fuss over it that it drew much more attention to the drawing and the word than was intended.            I don...

 Today I matched lids and containers for hours of Enjoyment Jai informed me that the school (and I would guess a good chunk of Ashland) is closed today due to the weather

 weird weather going around everywhere across the nation snow, cold, storms . . . . we have had rain off and on

Every once in a while I will see this message on facebook: Wondering what in the world got removed so quickly for whatever reason.   I know it happened quite frequently in 2020 when those who would share false information which facebook (along with other social media from what I understand) repeatedly removed - which is a good thing. Facebook allows millions of people to use their platform and those who work for the facebook company are allowed to monitor that which they work for but sometimes I feel that perhaps contents are taken down in error?  And yet it somehow leads me to believe my privacy settings really are not. I did not get the above message on my own wall but would imagine that is what others saw as the contents were deleted with a message that Ralph Waldo Emmerson was not the correct source.   Or it wasn’t RWE or something to that content.   Too bad I didn’t think of screenshotting that before deleting.   Hopefully I’ll never have another opportun...

                 I probably mentioned in a few posts that the geographical boundaries are huge in the ward where I currently reside.  We don ’ t have snow but there are some members who woke up to snow.  Some made it to church.  At least one family was snowed in and unable to make it to church.           We took Jaime back to Ashland.   During our drive we encountered some areas of slow moving traffic due to snowfall.   It ’ s weird to think about.   It does look pretty in the hills and mountains and brushed on trees.   We did not encounter any problems.   Oregon snow (at least the western end) has nothing on Utah snow.     

            Rained all day today.              Richard asked if I would like to            watch something with him.              I said I would rather play games.              Jaime’s last day with us as            we return her to Ashland tomorrow.              We played Sniggle –            a game put out by Amway.               Funny, huh?

       In September  Kevin had called Richard to ask if he would join him for a safety convention in San Diego.  Kevin paid for Richard's plane ticket - but Richard had to drive to the Portland airport. They both collected trinkets from the show and brought them home to share.       Richard had brought socks and tee shirts (the tees he had purchased in San Diego) and a stuffed whale for Jaime.  I remember taking pictures of the shirts and socks and asking Jai which she preferred.  I placed all items in a bag and added earbuds and a deck of cards to the mix.  I don't know why we missed giving it to her then - but somehow the entire bag of goodies got misplaced and was not retrieved until yesterday.     For Christmas she had asked for a letterman's jacket featuring "Five Nights at Freddy's".  It had been the only thing she had asked for.  There was a delay on shipment however and we were told that it woul...

 My feet LOVE all the socks I received for Christmas