September through the eyes of......

September FamiLee Report
Joe - Hello all! As you know, I am the Administrator of Woodland Skilled Nursing & Rehab center, a 91 bed, 100 year old hospital focusing on rehabilitating seniors (and others) recovering from stroke, heart surgery, broken bones, knee replacements, hip replacements, and other ailments of the mind and body. My job is fascinating. In many ways I feel like I'm on my mission again... in terms of the emotional effort, and service rendered every day. Historically, I could easily be categorized as a night hawk, but since taking this job, I am ready for bed by 9:00 p.m.. Amy thinks I must be getting old.

It is interesting to be here. A few months ago I had never heard of Woodland, CA; now I run one of it's founding businesses, and serve in the Bishopric in one of it's two wards. We have been uniquely blessed with an instant immersion opportunity into this historic, agrarian city.

Well about September.... Wonderful business month! I've seen the fruits of my labors increasing and ripening daily and it is very exciting. I love that the weather is cooling off here. The tomato harvests are over and many of the surrounding farms are now plowed, empty fields. The leaves are beginning to fall, and we are discovering much of the "Mayberry" like charm of this place. The majority of the city is very old; old buildings, old large victorian homes; enormous OLD oak and cottonwood trees. Rather romantic and quaint, to tell you the truth.

Brynn plays soccer at an old elementary school in the middle of the city. During her first game last week, I yelled and cheered and tried to give her directions from the side lines. This was a new experience for Brynn. In her past performances with dance and ballet, we cheered and clapped for her energetic efforts, but here at the soccer game I was yelling directions! "Stop the ball... Go Go.. Kick it... Run!!" It was all too much for my sensitive little angel. In a dramatic moment, 5 year old Brynn took the ball on a solo breakaway, dribbling all the way down the field, passing the other rug-rats and scored a goal! I was whooping and hollering.... and Brynn was overcome in the moment. She started sobbing on the field! She didn't know what to make of her baffoon of a bellowing, screaming father. I called for her and she ran to my arms. She wanted to go... never to play that aggressive sport again. I calmed her down, explaining to her that I was cheering and yelling because I wanted her to have fun and do her best. It didn't matter to me if she "won" the game, but it was always important to try hard and give her best effort. Well, she overcame her reservations and yesterday had a marvelous, enjoyable, soccer game with her team. I toned down on yelling directions, and focused on big smiles, thumbs up, high fives, and happy hollers. She jogged off the field happy as can be. (Victory)

My greatest joy in life is my beautiful wife. She is a rather remarkable, incredible mother to our children. I am constantly in awe of the million little things she does. I make the living, but she makes our life WORTH living. She is creative and smart, detailed, and diligent. After every 10+ hour day at work, She greets me with a super sweet smooch and hug, and my children wrap their arms around my legs, and I am fulfilled! I am most blessed among all men.

In three weeks I am signed up for Foxy's Fall Century, a 100 mile road ride (race) starting in nearby Davis, CA. I have not ridden much for the last month... a few measly miles on the pedal bike. Where is my time? Oh yea, running a big business, serving in the church, and squeezing in as much time as possible with my family! Oh well, I may not set a world record time, but I am a fairly determined fellow, and I will have a great race! (I will report in a few weeks with pictures hopefully). I am riding with Bishop Brooks with whom I serve. He is the eccentric, Institute Director for UC Davis, who surfs, sails, cycles, and skateboards. What a cool, unique man.

Speaking of Davis, what a town! With regulations precluding city growth, it is teeming with academics and bicyclist's. We enjoyed a great date Friday night, trying out a new age salad shop called "Pluto's" and an extraordinary dessert house called "Ciocolat". We tried the carrot cake and cranberry/apple crisp. Davis considers itself the bicycling capital of America. Everyone travels by bike. At every stop light, swarms of people. all shapes, colors, and varieties rode by. We saw pirates on bikes, nun's, men in suits, and even (albeit blasphemously) a man dressed like Jesus riding his bike (with crown of thorns and all). Phew, what a place!! Amy and I loved our evening and really enjoy the energy of college towns...but we are glad we live 9 miles away in conservative, homey, Woodland. That's all for now.


Amy - This month has been a long month for me. Long in a good way, long in that we crammed so many wonderful things into the month of September that it is amazing for me to think that it was just one month. It was a wonderful month of happiness, hard work, personal refelction, spiritual growth. and lots of great family time. We were blessed enough to see my whole family this month and Joe's mom.

As we start to settle a little more into life here in Woodland, I feel more peace that this will be a fine place for us to live for this season of our lives. I really struggled when I found out that we would be moving here. I had heard positive and negative things about the city, and we were leaving such a paradisical situation at our home in Anatolia (living there was more like being on a two month vacation). Now that we have been here in Woodland for a couple of months, I know this is where we are supposed to be. I know there are things for us to do here and people for us to reach out to, and that there are people who will touch our lives and help us become better people. I have already been amazed at the faith of those around me and I am grateful to have the opportunity to get to know them better. The other day on my way home from the girls dance class in Davis, I felt that I should call Joe and tell him of the peace and happiness I was feeling about being here. I was so glad I did, it meant so much to him. I want to make the best of any place we live, and in fact make it a better place to live, in part because I know how much it means to Joe to know that I am happy! One thing I have learned about myself is that I can be happy even when circumstances are not exactly as I had planned or hoped for, something I am grateful to realize, because I have often questioned this ability in myself. I guess it really just takes noticing all of the many blessings rather than the little disturbances in life. It's funny, the blessings absolutely outweigh the challenges, but sometimes it's easy to let the hum-drum cloud our vision.

So....a few of the things that have made me happy this month. I love the place we have found for the girls to take dance. I googled dance areas near Woodland and came up with the Applegate Dance Studio in Davis. Davis is such an interesting college town. It is very liberal and highly educated area. I think it has the most graduate degrees per capita than any other city in the nation (or something like that). Anyway, so it looks like there will be some cultural opportunities we can take advantage of living so close. The girls are in separate ballet classes and look forward to their classes each week. I love going because it is in the coolest area. It makes me so happy just driving there. First of all the city is full of lovely tree lined streets, and the dance studio is in an area called "Village Homes." I don't even know where to begin to describe this place. It is so awesome, in a simple sort of way, I hope I don't make it sound larger than life, because it's the simplicity of the place that makes it so unique and wonderful. I'll have to take a picture sometime, because my words won't do the place justice...anyway, right outside the studio there is a little neighborhood nature park with swings, big boulders and manmade "mini mountains" for the kids to climb. There is a huge cement pipe tunnel that is tall enough for them to walk through and there are big logs for the kids to climb all around and sit on. Then, you walk over a little bridge (no water thank goodness) and there is a grape vineyard the kids can run through, I guess it's a neighborhood co-op vineyard and garden area where the neighborhood can reap the benefits, I guess???? I don't know exaclty how they work it out, but it's cool and very well kept. There is a grassy area, probably 3 acres with a little ampitheater (sp) and a bike/walking path around this entire area. It makes me look forward to Wednesdays and Fridays because I get to spend time with my kids in this fun little nature area. Aaron LOVES it! He thinks he is a mountain man and I try to give him as much freedom as possible to let him roam and feel tough, and get a little dirty. Eventually maybe I'll bring a book or something, but right now, I have so much fun chasing them around and watching them, it keeps me very entertained.

Brynn continues to love school. it's fun to take her to school and see all of the little girls yell,"Hi Brynn!" with enthusiasm. I love that she is making friends, I want her to feel the happiness that can come from developing relationships with the people around her and being a good friend. She works hard on her homework and loves it. I have to pace her on her homework packet each week, because she wants to complete it all in one shot, she just gets on a roll and says, "I just love doing my homework!" Hopefully she'll continue to be this enthusiastic as the years go by.

She reminds me of myself as I watch her play soocer. When I played with some EFY coordinators at BYU, my mom used to tell me that I looked like I was frolicking on the field. I imagine I looked like Brynn does . I'm glad she's able to have some fun and get some good exercise. And she of course has lots of fun with dance, she has some natural talent that will be fun to see her develop throughout the years.

I started a little musical playgroup once a week at our house with about 10 other children. We do it in the morning so all my kids are here and they all love it. We based it on the Cherubs program that we did in Spokane, so it has taken some work to prepare everything to go along with the songs, but anything that enriches their lives is worth the time I have to put in. We will start our Halloween songs this week and my kids can hardly wait.

Abby has also had lots of fun playing with friends at park day, primary and our singing group. This month we also started having 2 little twin girls come over on a weekly basis. Abby goes to their house too. We walk to Brynn's school with Molly and Maggie. She keeps us roaring with the things she says. She's 3 going on 30. The other day I was staring into space and Brynn asked me what I was thinking about. I told her I was daydreaming. Abby then remarked, "She's just daydreaming about her huthband!" They both had a good giggle about that. It was so funny.

My husband and kids make me so happy. I won't pretend that life is perfect, because it's not, but when I am serving them wholeheartedly I feel extrememly happy and so blessed that I get to do life with them! They are wonderful! I loved it when Sister Beck talked last night about families and children and the work that they are, but that we can do, and are good at....work! I love the happiness and satisfaction that comes through hard work!

Oh and I'm glad to report that I made it to church today by myself with the kids and with time to spare. I lost Aaron and Abby once this morning, I know, how do you lose your children before 9:00 a.m. on a Sunday, but they were on the side of the house. Aaron was sitting on top of the lawn mower and Abby was trying to push him, yes they were both in their church clothes, it sounds a lot more dangerous thinking about it than it seemed at the moment. Sacrament meeting went well, Aaron was good for the most part, he only tried to escape once getting a few feet from the stand, and then thankfully one of my young women, Talmage Ellis, was sitting next to me and she captured him. She only had to take him out once at the very end, so I think this is going to be doable. Today required lots of preparation and extra time, but I know I had the help of heaven! We are as excited as ever for October!