Beneath the Wraps

 I wish I had planned better and just taken two weeks after Thanksgiving and then returned.  Three weeks may have been too long on my immune system.  Ryan says I was a tremendous help.  I'm grateful that he thinks that.  I did not feel as productive as I was hoping for.  I suppose I did do at least one productive thing each week I was there.  The day after I had arrived one of my granddaughters had expressed having missed me while she was at school. Ryan and Chelsey's youngest was born two days after I arrived.  Chelsey had already made arrangements with one of her brothers to take the kids while they were at the hospital.  They did return to take the girls to the school on Monday.  Because I was there the aunt was free to drive each girl without having to load up the car with everybody else (as she has three of her own).  Once they brought the baby home the kids were much more interested in their baby sister than they were in spend...

            Joseph Smith knelt in a grove of trees in fervent prayer and was visited by Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.  This is known as “the first vision” which took place in early spring 1820.  https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/media/image/the-first-vision-fe5db8d?lang=eng According to the equinox the first day of spring begins at the end of March (usually 20 – 22 depending on the year I guess) and ends in June on the same numbered date.   My definition of spring includes blossoms on trees, buds starting to peek their heads out of stems promising to become flowers. https://beneaththewraps.blogspot.com/2016/02/spring-arrived-early.html   I have always seen spring as a promise of growth.   That means no snow, no wind and no darkness. Or so was my belief when I lived in Salt Lake.   I remember seeing the blossoms and buds appearing in February 2016 our first year in Oregon.   It is so different from Salt Lak...

          I have followed a few blogs off and on.   Many of the creators have stopped posting.   Others have closed for privacy or discontinued the blog altogether.    My niece had three blogs going - though not all simultaneously.   The first one was one that a friend had started when they were living in Thailand in the summer of 2011.   She had started another the year that my mother died.   Her first post was a tear jerker.   She made some profound thoughts - much like her mother.   I have wished that Sunny would create a blog to post to.             Ellen (not her real name.   Unlike Corey and I, she uses the real actual names in her blogs) started off her first post mentioning how every journal she starts will include a history of herself.   I can relate to that.   I have tried cramming my entire life into a few pages - oft...

          As with my instructors, I find I recycle the same design for my PowerPoints. Though the majority of instructors have seemed to go for a darker design, I have always tried to go with a white background.   But did try my hand at a dark background for one of my projects in History. The first was a midterm In the assignment, I was to choose from four events or movements that had been discussed in the first two weeks (Immigration and Expansion) and two  (Business and Technology). I chose immigration and transportation. I started out by talking about immigrants who had come to the US in search of a better life and how many dreams were not met.   Many had taken jobs in the factories and textile mills just to help make ends meet "It wasn't just the men who worked, but women and children would put in long hours as well, still dreaming of a better life.   Some had come to ...

          When I was 7th grade, the mandatory history class focused on American history and Utah history.   We had first did a brief study on Europe and the reasons given for explorers making their way to the American continent.   I don't recall a lot on either Revolutionary or Civil Wars though I'm certain that each was mentioned.   We cruise through Utah history as 95% of the class had been raised in the LDS church and obviously knew more about Utah's history than the text book - which had Joseph Smith martyred by hanging - in Utah.   Joseph Smith was not hung nor did he live long enough to see the Church move toward the Utah territory.             That is just one example that I remember.   The instructor was not LDS, but he could see that the class wasn't going to budge - weather right or wrong. I think we ended up skipping three chapters.   It was t...