One Adventure after Another

San Xavier del Bac

2011-07-17T15:14:00.000-07:00

The more things that we do in Tucson, the more I realize how few places we have visited. You probably know how it goes, you have some amazing places within ten to twenty miles of where you live and you never visit them. Meanwhile, some people travel thousands of miles to see them. Last year we visited a number of Indian ruins and cliff dwellings in central Arizona. This last Saturday Debs and I decided we had to visit the Mission of San Xavier del Bac while we are still here in Tucson.

I can't believe we almost missed the opportunity to see it, especially since it's closely related to many of my own studies, including some colonial courses that I have taken.

Father Eusebio Kino founded the mission in 1692, and the current cathedral was built between 1783 and 1797. It is the oldest edifice in Arizona of European influence. The east tower was left unfinished because of the lack of funds. Over the years the mission has been visited by the likes of the Mormon Battalion, and much later, Ansel Adams.

Despite its historical significane, this amazing edifice in the middle of the desert continues to face a shortage of funding for restoration projects; nonetheless, a lot has been accomplished in preserving it in the last 25 years.

The iconography on the facade of the cathedral and all throughout rivals that of most European cathedrals, even if some of the artwork and materials used do not quite match the skill and resources available in the Old World.

The mortuary chapel filled with candles and numerous figurines of saints lies to the west of the cathedral inside a small enclosure that features a wide variety of cacti.

Here Gabs and Bells stand by one of the doors on the west side of the cathedral.

The west tower has been restored and whitewashed and stands in vivid contrast with its surroundings. It should come as no surprise to learn that the mission is also known as the White Dove of the Desert.

A docent took us on a free guided tour, which was fabulous by the way! Our guide pointed out the iconography throughout our visit as well as the mozarabe influence in the construction of the mission. I could have stayed for hours, but with temperatures reaching 105°F and no air conditioning in any of the buildings, we had to cut our visit short before Sammy Jay got too hot. I've already planned another visit to the mission before we leave Tucson in a few weeks!

Baby, Ride Your Firebolt

2011-07-17T15:01:00.001-07:00

Okay, so a lot of my friends don't like Harry Potter; perhaps it's not academic enough. I, on the other hand, am crazy about the books. A guy can dream can't he! ;-)

Chanté, one of the apartments in the video looks a lot like one of the complexes you lived in--is it the same one?

Red

2011-06-26T15:13:00.000-07:00

From June 11th to the 19th I went to Cincinnati Ohio to grade Spanish AP exams; something I've done the last two years. It's a great way to meet professors and high school teachers of Spanish from around the country. Each day after grading exams, the readers can find a wide variety of activities to entertain them. Last year I enjoyed a trip to the Freedom Center, a museum on slavery. This year on the evening of June 17 I walked down to the Great American Ballpark with Jeff Turley—one of my former professors at BYU—and three other professors.

Earlier this summer I took Bells and Gabs to a couple of minor league baseball games to see the Tucson Padres before we move back to Idaho this fall. I hadn't been to a baseball game in about fifteen years and the last time I went to a major league game was about twenty years ago when I watched the Oakland A's while visiting my oldest sister and her family in California. It's been fun to get back to a few games.

During the 6th inning Drew Stubbs of the Cincinnati Reds hit an inside-the-park home run that had the more than thirty thousand fans on their feet. Now that's not something you see every day! That night as I walked into my hotel room at the Millenium, Duane Rhoades, my roommate told me that my wife had gone into labor and was at the hospital. I was in trouble! :-)

Thanks to a feature on Gmail, I was able to call Deb's cell phone and learn that she gave birth to a 6 lbs. 11 oz./18 in. baby boy. He came three and a half weeks early. It's a good thing he came early though, or he would have been even bigger than his older siblings. The following day during the AP reading, the room leader announced my "dedication" to about four hundred other readers. Believe me, had I known she would have gone into labor that week, I would not have been at the reading, but at least I got to see an inside-the-ball-park home run!

On Saturday night, June 18, Deb's mom took the kids to the hospital to see their baby brother. Erik suggested names like Pooh Bear, and after a bout with hiccups, Hiccup.

Erik also insisted that the baby try on his cowboy boots while at the hospital.

On Sunday afternoon when I returned home, Debs and I settled on a name. When we announced it to the family, Gabs decided that Sammy Jay, after a character in Thornton Burgess' Bedtime Stories, would also work. None of my suggestions survived. I guess that's what happens when you miss the birth of your son. Aside from William, which is a family name, I suggested Red or Cincy since I was at a Cincinnati Reds game watching an inside-the-park home run, which by the way, happened at about the same time as Sammy Jay's birth. I can always tell my son that I was on my feet cheering vociferously during his birth! Can you?!

Bells's Graduation

2011-05-29T18:38:00.000-07:00

Two years ago Gabs, our oldest, graduated from kindergarten. This time it was Bells's turn. She loved her class. Ms. O'Hare, her teacher, was kind enough to provide us with a lot of pictures from throughout the year.

This picture is from the start of the school year, when Bells was still four.

Here she is in her graduation cap and gown! We loved watching the graduation program that included several dances and songs that they sang! They just keep growing up.

This is her class on one of their field trips.

If we ever get a job and move out of Tucson, we are going to have to do our best to find a good teacher for Erik and his brother-on-the-way. Wish us luck! It will be hard to replace them.

Ride 'em Cowboy

2011-03-13T14:28:00.001-07:00

Erik loves the time that he gets to spend with his friends twice a week at preschool. Four kids participate in it and the parents generally alternate on who will do it each week. Toward the end of February it was held at the Francisco's home. As part of the Tucson Rodeo that comes to town each February, the kids learned about cowboys, donned the necessary western wear, and made their own horses out of a wrapping paper tube and a cutout horse head. From the pictures, do you think Erik enjoyed it at all? Erik loves wearing his six shooter, Tombstone sheriff badge, and cowboy hat around the house, but this time he even got to carry a lasso and sit on a real saddle. Oh to be a kid again!

In the following two pictures, three of the gang of four get together for some memorable pictures.

Kira, Erik, and Robbie are ready to get outside and show what they can really do.

Here Erik patiently soothes his newly tamed horse.

Tucson Festival of Books

2011-03-12T21:31:00.000-08:00

Two years ago we attended the first annual Tucson Festival of Books. The festival has grown each year and just gets better and better. For the last couple of years it has been one of our favorite springtime activities as we climb into the van and drive the 4.5 miles to the University of Arizona campus to attend the wonderful event. The Festival of Books brings hundreds of authors to the campus each year for book signings, lectures, and storytelling. It also offers numerous activities for people of all ages. Since we have three kids, we spend most our time in the kids' area and at entertainment venues.

This year we got to meet the Berenstain Bears. Bookmans, a local store that buys and sells used books gave out the hats that our kids are wearing. Gabs, Bells, and Erik also received numerous other free gifts from the different booths in the children's section. Several of the hospital booths gave out reusable grocery bags, slap-on wristbands, night reflectors, and reading buddies (adorable little stuffed animals). Another booth gave out free children's books. Our kids got three hardbound books (Snow White and two Dr Seuss stories: Thidwick the Big-Hearted Moose and There's a Wocket in My Pocket).

We love going to one of the main storytelling tents, where authors do a superb job telling short stories. This year we only managed to listen to one storyteller, Joe Hayes, as he told the stories El Cucuy, The Lovesick Skunk, and one or two others. Gabriela especially enjoyed the stories.

The Lindley Lopez Literary Circus was also very entertaining with a contortionist, jugglers, acrobats, etc. They also did several fun Alice and Wonderland scenes (unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of that).

In the science section, the kids got to make DNA strands using two pieces of licorice, which they put together using toothpicks that had colored miniature marshmellows on each end. Gabs got to sit on the long end of a teeter totter as they taught kids about fulcrums, levers, and pulleys. Bells and three others rode the short end of the teeter totter. The kids also got the chance to try to lift 60 pound weights before having the chance to raise them off the ground using pulleys.

Here the kids wear their turtle hats that the Tucson Medical Center gave out.

And after five-and-a-half hours of a fun but warm 83° day, we finished things off with Frog and Toad.

Learning New Tricks

2010-07-25T19:55:00.000-07:00

About two months ago my wife asked me if I thought I could make a website for her Scentsy business so she could expand beyond the Tucson market. I had never made a website before then. Sure I've done a blog or filled in pre-made templates with a couple pictures and text, but I had never really made a website from scratch. But, what choice did I have? She could spend hundreds, if not thousands of dollars to have someone else make it, or I could stretch myself to get beyond my basic knowledge of a few html tags for bolding or underlining a text. Since then it has been like drinking out of a fire hose, but it's been fun! I've learned some more html, some css, a little javascript, and a very little about Flash. I've now finished the basic design of my wife's website, but we still have to edit the text and spruce up the appearance some. Here is a page grab of that website.

In the last week and a half or so, I decided I would use the template I had created to update my own website for school. The old one I had was quite atrocious and was made on a very simple template designed for all the new people in the Spanish program at the University of Arizona that had no idea what they were doing. At least I was able to choose the colors on the page.

I replaced that website with this one that uses the same basic template that I used on Deb's Scentsy website. While not perfect, I think it is a marked improvement over my former site.

I have begun to upload image collections and the Richard Tyler plot summary collection that I wrote about in an earlier blog post. The intent of the site is to obviously present myself as I go on the job market this year, but I also hope to provide a number of materials about Golden Age Spain and Latin America including images of playwrights, 15th-17th century maps of a number of the cities, pictures–of cathedrals, stage machinery, tourist attractions, etc.–taken on a 2005 trip with some good friends from my BYU days (when we finished the trip we put all our pictures together, so I'm sure several of them are theirs--if so, and if you don't want me to share them, just let me know which ones you would like removed). I considered using Adobe Flash to show some of the images, but it makes it difficult for people to copy them for use in class, so I decided against it.

The experience has taught me how much work goes into a simple website. It has also taught me that I have a lot to learn to improve the sites and make them function exactly how I want them. If anyone has any suggestion on aesthetic changes or even code problems, I welcome your comments!

Human Kindness

2010-07-04T16:25:00.000-07:00

From the evening of June 22nd until the morning of July 1st, I suffered from the longest flu I have ever had. During the last few days I was able to get out of bed and do a few things and feel somewhat productive. By Saturday morning, July 3rd, I was feeling quite well and decided to go play in a weekly game of soccer--an ongoing activity that I have been participating in for almost four years now.

From the very start I realized that I wasn't going to have the normal energy that I have, so I stayed back by the goal and primarily played defense. Even though I was taking it easy, it didn't take long before I was throwing up in the bushes. A little while later I was on my back with my head and shoulders experiencing a tingling sensation much like when you lie on your arm and it "falls asleep." After about fifteen minutes I thought I would have enough energy to drive the twenty-five minutes home. I was wrong--I only made it about ten minutes before my entire upper body started feeling the tingling sensation and seizing up. My hands curled up and became rigid. Very concerned, I managed to pull the car off into a small cul de sac where I stumbled up to the door of the nearest house and pressed the doorbell. A clean-cut, middle age man opened the door, and I explained as well as I could my predicament and then asked if I could use his phone to call my wife so she could take me to the hospital. Barely able to stand and with my hands and arms curled up in front of me, I watched in astonishment as the man said, "Sorry," before closing the door on me. I have read numerous times when people just walk by a stabbing or shooting victim without offering any help, I just never thought I would live to see such calloused behavior myself.

I spent the next four or five minutes stumbling to the nearest house, where a kind lady dialed our phone number and asked my wife to come pick me up. I thanked her and managed to get back to my car where my symptoms became much worse. For the next fifteen to twenty minutes I was unable to move and I was concentrating as hard as I could to maintain consciousness. If I had been physically able, I would have returned to the second house and asked the lady to call 911--something I should have done the first time.

My wife finally arrived and took me to the Emergency Room at TMC. Fortunately, I regained a little of my movement by that time and was able to climb into our other vehicle. Just before getting out of the vehicle I started throwing up again, this time into a grocery bag that my wife handed me. As you may know, however, grocery bags almost always have holes in them, so I was a mess when I walked into the ER. A good friend of ours watched our kids while the doctors did a variety of tests including an EKG, blood tests, etc. After four hours and the first IV I have ever had, they indicated that they thought I was suffering from heat exhaustion. My brother has suffered similar symptoms in much cooler weather, so initially I was skeptical, but I now think he was probably right in my case.

Since this all happened yesterday, I have repeatedly thought back on the behavior of the first man who refused to offer any help. What kind of person is he? How could he simply close his door on someone who was in obvious distress--particularly when that person was asking so little? Did my staggering and my slurred speech make him think I was drunk? If so, couldn't he still have called the police to tell them about a drunk person stumbling around in his front yard? If I had passed out before making it to the second house, I could have been lying on the very hot Tucson pavement. Even if someone had found me in such a state, would they have bothered to call for help? This case and several like it makes me wonder how I or any of my friends would respond in a similar situation. The answer seems so obvious, yet just a couple months ago a homeless man who intervened to help a woman being robbed in Queens, New York was stabbed. Although a number of people passed by him, it took almost an hour before anyone bothered to call for help. Surveillance cameras showed one man take a picture with a cell phone, but he didn't bother to stop and assist the dying man or even press a few more buttons on his phone to call for help. What is going through the minds of people like this?

An Opportunity Gained

2010-06-23T20:54:00.000-07:00

On June 21st we began our trip home after several weeks of vacation in Utah and Idaho. We have made the trip eight or nine times since moving to Tucson, and we have always made the 850 to 1000 mile trip (depending on whether we stop in Utah or Idaho) in one day. We planned this trip to be the same long, boring drive. However, as we approached Flagstaff, a large forest fire on the surrounding mountains closed Highway 89. Consequently, we were rerouted through the Southern Rim of the Grand Canyon. Unfortunately, we drove 33 miles past the detour road and had to drive back to it. We noticed that the detour road had an electronic sign, but it was turned off--so 66 miles later, we drove through the Grand Canyon.

When it was all said and done, we had added nearly two-hundred miles to our trip! Tired and beat, we got a hotel room in Flagstaff, hoping to get a little rest.

The next morning we decided to visit some of the Indian Ruins in the area--Toozigoot (pronounced two-see-whoodt), Montezuma's Castle, and Montezuma's Well. We headed down the scenic Highway 89A through steep mountain valleys until we finally arrived at the Toozigoot ruins, located on a hilltop near Clarkdale with the meandering Verde River running in the fertile valley below.

Mountains along Highway 89A.

Toozigoot from a distance.

The ruins that remain today attest to a bustling culture of the Sinagua (Spanish for 'without water') society. The dwelling had 77 ground-level rooms, some with multiple stories and was constructed between 1150 and 1400, when, for reasons unknown, the Sinaguas left. At its peak, the dwelling housed a couple hundred people.

From there we made a short drive to Montezuma's Castle, where Sinaguas from the same time period build several dwellings on and along a cliff. Montezuma's castle, located near the top of a cliff and once accessed by a series of ladders, is five-stories high with 20 rooms. A larger structure, measuring six stories high with about 45 rooms, was gutted by a fire hundreds of years ago. Little remains of that structure.

Arifacts left at the site show a trade system that brought items such as shells and parakeets from a distance of several hundred miles.

From Montezuma's Castle, we drove a few miles to Montezuma's Well, a depression in the ground with a 55-foot deep pool of water in the bottom of the bowl. One and a half million gallons come from the spring each day. Additional dwellings line the cliffs that surround the bowl.

Cliff dwellings can be seen near the top of the cliff in this picture.This close-up provides a better view of the cliff dwellings at Montezuma's Well.

The water in the bowl that makes Montezuma's Well flows 150 feet underground and comes out here. This escape keeps the bowl from filling up. The park ranger invited our kids to cool off from the near-100° heat by putting their feet in the cool waters.

The Sinaguas made a mile-long-canal where the water comes out to water their crops. The picturesque canal measures three feet deep and was constructed with primitive tools. I think it would be difficult enough using a modern shovel. I can't imagine making and lining a canal of this size with stones using the tools they used. This picture shows the water flowing under a tree. A sycamore near the outlet is 300 years old.

While we hadn't planned this detour in our trip, it turned out being a great experience. We purchased an annual park pass, so if any friends and family are in the area, you're welcome to join us on a visit to some of the nearby ruins.

A Different Angle

2010-06-18T05:01:00.000-07:00

Since Gabs demonstrated that she was a very capable hiker on our trip to Picacho Peak a while back, I decided to take her to 'M' Mountain in Malad, Idaho—the small town where I used to go to school.

Since I was going to be gone for a week as a grader for Spanish AP exams, we decided that we would go to Idaho so Debs and the kids could enjoy the time with relatives in my absence. A few days before flying out to Cincinnati, Gabs and I started our trip up the relatively small mountain, enjoying what to us seemed like a hike through some hills in Ireland. After four years in Arizona . . . well you can imagine how green it must have seemed to us.

Gabs and I stopped at the top to look over the valley.

We gathered numerous wildflowers for Debs and Grandma during our hike. Perhaps the most interesting flower was one that looked identical to the red Indian Paintbrush flowers, except it was yellow. Unfortunately, I didn't get it in this picture, it's on the other side of the vase. Has anyone heard of yellow Indian Paintbrush?

This is Malad High School viewed from the 'M'.

As we came down the face of the mountain, we took these pictures.

And finally, as we were walking on the frontage road at the base of the mountain, we saw a couple deer.

Although I had a number of grueling training runs through the surrounding mountains for cross-country when I was in high school, I never made the trip up this particular peak. I enjoyed spending the time with my daughter, and it's always nice looking at things from a different angle and doing worthwhile things that you've never done before. Are there things that you would like to do or places you would like to visit that are close to your home? Are you—like me—the kind of person that hasn't visited many of the wonderful places in your neck of the woods? If so, what are you going to do to start changing that . . . if anything!?

Rainbow Bridge

2010-06-06T20:20:00.000-07:00

In 1909 two exploring parties went in search of a legendary, natural sandstone bridge in the maze of canyons that are now mostly submerged by Lake Powell. The two parties joined their efforts and found the mammoth bridge on August 14th of that year. The following year, President Taft named the arch, with a height of about 275 feet (almost the length of a football field), a national monument. Since then, thousands of people visit the arch each year--most by boat, although visitors can hike to the arch from a couple of trails starting near Navajo Mountain, but permission must be received from the Navajo Nation, since the trails are on the reservation. Loretta and Heber Black, an aunt and uncle of mine who used to work for years in schools on Indian reservations, used to live on Navajo mountain and made the hike on several occasions.

This year the bridge, located on sacred ground for a number of Native American nations, celebrates its centennial year as a national monument. On May 28th, during our trip to Lake Powell, Warren Rustand took our group through the somewhat narrow canyon leading to Rainbow Bridge. As we went he told us about Miami Vice-like races through the canyons that he has had. We had a great time visiting the place and enjoying the majestic surroundings. Some of the young men and leaders on our trip took some of the pictures included here.

These are the young men that went to Lake Powell with us.

As for what Eric Rustand is doing . . .? You'd have to ask him!

As we left we were treated to a tamed-down Miami Vice race out of the canyon. Warren gave his son, Eric, a head start before chasing him down in the speed boat.

In a part of the canyon where it widened out a little, we took the inside track and passed up the other boat.

Here is the demoralizing view from the other boat as we raced past!

Lake Powell

2010-05-30T22:23:00.000-07:00

This last Thursday the young men in our ward left our local church in Tucson, Arizona a little after 6:30 a.m. to head to Lake Powell. Warren Rustand, a member in our ward graciously let us use his house boat, motorboats, and jet skis that he rented.

John Wesley Powell, a Civil War veteran whose right arm had been amputated after one of the battles in which he fought, took the first organized expedition down the Green and Colorado Rivers in 1869. Nearly a century later (1956), construction began on the Glen Canyon Dam, just south of the Utah/Arizona border, to store the water flowing down the river. Seven years later it started storing the water flowing in from the Colorado River, and in 1966 it started producing electricity. It took nearly twenty years after completion to reach its full capacity in the early 1980s, but with the drought spanning several years during the last decade, the water level dropped nearly 140 feet. Since that low point, the water has risen and was only about 70 feet below capacity when we visited it this last weekend.

We had an uneventful drive of almost 400 miles as I worked with Scouts on the Pathfinding merit badge, which is only being offered this year as part of the centennial celebration of Scouting. The last time Scouting offered the merit badge was in 1952, the year it was discontinued.

After taking the house boat, motor boats, and jet skis to a beach several miles from the marina, the Scouts quickly changed into their swim trunks and slid off the slide on the back of the house boat. During the couple days that we spent at Lake Powell, the young men in our ward prepared meals, worked on Lifesaving, Swimming, and Motorboating merit badges, and had a blast going on the jet skis, riding on an inflated floating device behind the ski boat, and jumping off the rocks into the deep water below.

Yep! If one person jumps off a cliff, so does everyone else!

Even me!
Dana Willis and Scott Evans continue their tradition of doing back flips on trips they take.

It wasn't all just play--although I don't think I could convince my wife of that! Here the scouts can be seen working on the Lifesaving merit badge.

On Thursday night I rode on the yellow floating device behind the ski boat with two young men. Warren Rustand takes pride in his ability to make those riding the tube fall off. I managed to stay on for quite a while, but he finally wore me down. After falling off two or three times, I was exhausted from the constant exertion of trying to hold on--one time he even flipped us over. There was no chance to stay on. When I finally went to get on the boat, I could barely pull myself up. Jed Mayfield, one of the leaders jokingly imitated the Tyrannosaurus Rex on Meet the Robinsons, bringing his upper arms close to his body and raising the lower part of his arms into the air while saying, "I've got a big head and little arms!" I couldn't help but laugh because that is exactly how I felt.

Three of the young men who went with us gave it their best shot. The hardest part of the ride is when the boat starts to turn and the outward force begins to pull you in the direction of the turn.

Thanks to the generosity of Warren Rustand and his son, Eric Rustand, we had a great experience on Lake Powell that we otherwise would not have been able to afford, since the houseboat alone would have cost somewhere in the range of $2700 to $4000 just to rent. Thanks to the Rustands, the other leaders, and the great youth that we took up with us, it was a memorable experience for me and, I'm sure, for everyone else.

This evening shot shows the canyon walls to the southeast of where we parked the houseboat.

This panoramic picture taken by James Evans shows where we "camped." We stayed in the houseboat on the right-hand side.

Picacho Peak

2010-05-22T16:28:00.000-07:00

A week ago my former bishop kindly took me and three teenage Scouts for a hike up Picacho Peak. For those unfamiliar with the mountain, it is a prominent landmark mentioned in Stephanie Meyers The Host. It is also the location of the westernmost battle between Union and Confederate troops during the Civil War. It is located about 40 miles north of Tucson along Interstate-10. While I had wanted to hike the mountain several times since moving to Tucson, Arizona four years ago, I never got around to doing it. The hike was challenging for some of the youth that came with us, but they persevered and we finished the hike up the switchback trail that skirts the eastern side of the mammoth rock outcropping before going over the saddle between two peaks. It then heads down the west side of the mountain for several hundred yards before rising back up with some steep climbs where hikers cling to cable railings in numerous locations to scamper up crevices, climb steep rocks, and walk along the edge of small drop-offs.

Until a day or two ago, the state park was scheduled to close, meaning the trails would be closed to the public. Thanks to fund-raising efforts by nearby residents, the park will be able to stay open beyond the original closure date of June 3rd. Since hiking the trail last week, I decided to take my family up just in case they don't get the chance to hike it again. I wasn't certain my kids would be able to hike that far, but we decided to give it a try. Gabs (6 yrs old) and Bells (4 yrs old) hiked the trail with Debs and I, and I carried Erik (2 yrs old) in a child carrier. Because of the difficulty of some parts of the climb, very few young kids make the hike. Besides our kids, the youngest person we met on the trail was six. Both Debs and I were amazed at how well Gabs, Bells, and Erik did. Just after going over the saddle to the west side we got stuck for about fifteen minutes behind a group of middle-age people who work at Raytheon. One in their group was clearly scared of heights. When he finally got down the steep stretch, our daughters climbed right down and went right past the group resting at the base in preparation of starting their ascent again. That group would occasionally pass us while we were resting and vice versa, but seeing our daughters go fearlessly up and down the climbs seems to have temporarily cured the person of his fear of heights. After that he seemed to do much better on all the the steep climbs and descents.

Gabs had no problem with the hike and led most the way. Our calling her a mountain goat just seems to have motivated her to prove that the hike was easy for her. Bells needed some help on some of the steeper parts and the latter half of the hike back due to fatigue. Debs and I did just fine until we rationed our water toward the end of the hike so the kids would have enough to drink. With about 4.5 to 5 liters of water, we knew we would be cutting it close, but we didn't really have a way of carrying much more. Gabs carried one liter, Debs carried two, and I carried the rest in the pack with Erik. As a result, both Debra and I started to cramp some toward the end of the hike--me in the shoulders because of the weight of the pack, and Debs in the calves. We probably really disappointed the half dozen vultures that were circling the area.

We saw a common chuckwalla (I think--the one we saw was a large, dark lizard with a tan tale.) We saw one last week too and one of the Scouts called it a push-up lizard because it does push-ups, but if I'm not mistaken, there are a variety of lizards that do push-ups for one reason or another. Elizabeth, if you want to add a chuckwalla to the list of lizards you have caught, come on down!

It ended up being a great hike with excellent scenery, a good workout, and a trip to a Dairy Queen located a mile or so from the trailhead. Our former bishop treated me and the Scouts to some ice cream at the Dairy Queen last week, and I decided to make it a tradition every time we do the hike. If any friends or family are in the area, you'll have to hike the trail with us.

Bells, Debs, and Gabs stop for a picture before starting the last climb to the summit.

Don't worry, she's not scared as this picture seems to imply. Bells actually sat here voluntarily and is several feet away from the cliff edge. This picture makes it look like she is much closer than she really was.

Some other hikers were kind enough to take our family picture.

This is the mischievous trio at the top! Erik had the easiest hike of the three, rocking back and forth time after time in his child carrier just to make sure his ~~pack animal~~ ride was balanced.

Debs grudgingly stops for yet another picture on the west side as we go down the mountain.

Debs and Bells come down a particularly steep part of the mountain.

This panoramic looks south from the summit of Picacho Peak.

A Trip Down Memory Lane

2010-04-30T13:24:00.000-07:00

In acknowledgment of the reminiscences of a friend of mine about her childhood home in "The Valley," I decided I'd venture writing my own blog post on the subject. During the last few weeks I have heard a song on the radio that brought back some good memories from my childhood, and although the song has a melancholy tune that doesn't quite match my attitude, I think it captures the nostalgic feelings that many of us may have for the "good old days," days in which your home life protected you from many of the ugly blights of society and the bitter political wrangling over just about anything you can think of.

While life on a farm definitely had its challenges, it was a simpler life that taught the value of hard work and integrity. On a small family farm in south-eastern Idaho, my family of nine shared the responsibility of running approximately 1,400 acres of land. The chores were always suited to my age. I fed the chickens and gathered the eggs, or I would help make cracked wheat for the dogs and cats. Other chores included weeding a large garden, mowing an equally large lawn, or working in the fields. We would pull wild rye out of the crops, haul rocks off the fields, drive grain trucks, plow and weed the ground, thresh the seed grain for planting, etc. We even went hunting once a year to provide us with meat until the following hunt the next fall.

Looking back at those years, we probably could have gotten by without doing quite that much work! I can't think of a single farmer in the whole county that put as much time into hauling rocks or pulling rye as our family, but the older I got, the more I appreciated a good day's work and the the things that can be accomplished in that time.

About nine years ago, a little after my grandpa passed away, the farm that had been in my dad's family for generations was sold, the proceeds divvied up among his children as part of the inheritance. He had wanted to keep the farm in the family, but as often happens with inheritance, another small family farm became a statistic.

I will always look back on my childhood years with fondness because of the values I learned. While I would have liked to have raised my children under similar circumstances, the family farm served its purpose in my life. Physically the farm has changed since it was sold, as evidenced in this video, but in my memory, it will always be the farm where I grew up. And when times get hard I can think back to the lessons learned on the farm.

Paraphrasing the words of the Scottish poet, James Barrie, one author writes, "God gave us memories, that we might have June roses in the December of our lives."

County Fair

2010-04-25T18:59:00.000-07:00

For the third consecutive year we had a great evening at the Pima County Fair. I've written about our past experiences at the fair, so I've already said most everything there is to say on the subject with just a few exceptions.

We rode on many of the rides that we rode on last year--thanks to the promotional discounts they give for the rides in the weeks leading up to the fair.

One of the recurring themes of this year's experience seems to be the boar or the pig!

A nice addition to this year's fair was the petting zoo. Within minutes of our entering, one of the many goats found Deb's pant-leg and peed all over it. Truth be told, the goats were rather obnoxious. One man who was wearing a solid green shirt had the goats swarming around him, apparently thinking his shirt was food! Sorry, no pictures of this phenomenon!

This critter was fairly skittish, but the girls managed to get close to it.

The excellent sea lion show was one of the highlights of our evening!

Can I see your ID?

2010-04-25T18:34:00.000-07:00

A week ago after dark I noticed a few police cars parked across the street from us. I pointed this out to my wife, and she had a brilliant idea to pop some popcorn and see what neighbor was getting busted this time! When we didn't see anything going on, we went back to cleaning grapes for our trip to Mesa, Arizona the following day. A few minutes later I opened the back door to go outside and noticed that the door to the Arizona room was open, which occasionally happens when the kids play outside. I stepped inside just to make sure some thief hadn't come in our backyard to try to steal anything from the Arizona room. As I looked down the length of the room I noticed a couple of flashlights through the windows that look into the back yard. As I turned to look at them, they both came up to shine in my face. It's amazing how many things can run through your mind in a split second! Frozen in place, all I could do was say, "Hi! Can I help you?" Fortunately, they identified themselves immediately as the Tucson police.

I turned on the lights to the back yard and they informed me that a neighbor had called to report that our van door was open and it looked like someone may have broken into it. I went over and checked it out, but everything was still there. It looks like the kids left the van door open too! I closed the door and resolved to lock the back gate more often to better ensure against theft--since we have been the victims of it since moving to Tucson. It was at that point that the police officers asked me for identification. It almost made me laugh, since the thought passed through my mind to say, "Do you know who I am?", and then belligerently badger them all the way to their vehicle. Okay, so I didn't give the thought serious consideration, but the question did bring to mind the incident between Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and a Massachusetts' police officer last summer. I respect the job the police have to do and I'm sure they've probably heard enough people give them that line since the Gates' incident.

I was thankful that we had a vigilant neighbor that was willing to call the police when he saw something that looked suspicious.

My wife, who had been inside, had a different experience. When she heard me say, "Hi! Can I help you?", she thought someone hiding from the police, whose vehicles were parked out front, had hidden in our back yard. Some of the thoughts passing through her mind were, "Should I call the police? Should I close and lock the back door?" etc.

In the end, we were relieved that nothing had happened, but we found it somewhat ironic that the police had come for us and not for the drug-dealing neighbor across the street.

Trap Restoration

2010-04-04T22:06:00.000-07:00

The other day I was getting something out of our laundry closet when I noticed some rust sticking out of a mess of garden tools and paint cans. The rusty objects were two traps that I kept from the farm where I grew up. Like the license plates I have written about in an earlier post, I initially found these traps in the old homestead that served as my great grandparents' home before 1916. I have hung onto them with the hopes of one day being able to clean them up without damaging them too much.

I recently started looking for different rust removers that might help me clean the traps, realizing that in order to get what is probably more than a half century's worth of rust off the traps, I would have to fully submerse the traps in the solution for an extended period of time. I found most rust removers that sell in large quantities end up running about $20 per gallon, which is a little out of my budget. My wife suggested I try vinegar, so I went to the store and bought a gallon of vinegar and gave it a try. I didn't soak the first trap long enough, but it still came out better than I had expected. This picture shows one of the traps in the vinegar. The other bucket is a bucket of water. In order to keep the vinegar as clean as possible, I worked on the trap in the water bucket, only using the vinegar to soak the traps. I had to keep them submersed as much as I could since the iron would quickly begin to discolor again with rust if it started to dry. Consequently, I had to empty and refill the water bucket numerous times. When I had finished cleaning it, I had to quickly run a cloth over it to clean it and then, with another cloth covered in oil, I oiled the trap before it could rust again.

This picture shows the difference between an uncleaned trap by a cleaned one. Gabs wanted to see how they worked, so I set one of them and sprang it with the metal rod used to anchor the trap. They still work as well as ever.

I soaked the second trap in the vinegar a little longer than the first, and it cleaned up even better.

The traps' pans, which were almost completely illegible when covered in rust, revealed that the traps date back to 1917 or 1918 based on the patent dates. Debs probably thinks I'm crazy to spend so much time repairing traps that I will never use, but it's a lot of fun preserving pieces of family history!

Air Show

2010-03-21T17:31:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm momentarily back in the blog world. It seems like I just completely quit when the school year starts and then start up again as the second semester of the school year enters its second half. This year I actually wrote a few posts but decided not to put them up because of their negative slant--kind of like the maxim, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." I've had plenty to be grateful for, but as I imagine most everyone can relate, sometimes the negative seems more prevalent.

Anyway, yesterday I was able to relax a little and go with my family to the Aerospace and Arizona Days air show at the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. Somehow we missed it the first year that we were here, and they haven't had the show for a couple of years, so when we heard that they were going to do it this year, we packed the van and drove to the base. It was interesting to observe the behavior of the different military personnel. Some of those who helped direct the parking were prone to treat everyone like animals (or military personnel of an inferior rank), tersely shouting out orders; while most those who gave tours of the aircraft were very congenial and informative.

Our kids survived nearly four hours out in the sun as we went to the different aircraft parked on the tarmac and watched the different aircraft stunts and maneuvers.

Here Gabs gets to try on an oxygen mask.

Erik loved climbing all over the aircraft and trying to press buttons.

These were some of my favorite planes. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of the simulated bombings done with the A-10 Thunderbolt II, the upper plane.

We were about to head home after a short lull in the program, but we were glad we stayed a little longer. We really enjoyed the precision, speed, and sound of the F-16s.

In one of my sister's blogs, we learned that earplugs/hearing protection is advisable with these birds. It was helpful on a few of their passes, but most of the time they didn't come too close.

After a long day in the sun, Erik was ready for a nap. A thorn punctured one of the stroller wheels, so our trip back to the vehicle felt longer than it should have.

As for pictures of myself at the show, I'll spare you! Debs thought I looked like Papa Bear in the Berenstain Bears books.

Would you just hold still and smile?!

2009-11-22T19:17:00.000-08:00

This evening we decided we would try to get some family pictures in our desert surrounding, so we grabbed our camera and tripod and headed for the foothills of the Catalina mountains. There is only a small window of time where you get great lighting during the morning and evening hours, and we were hoping to get enough shots during the evening hours to get something worthwhile.

We'll have to rethink that one. Bells and Erik decided not to listen to their parents' warnings to stay away from the cacti, and as a result, we all had a fairly miserable experience. Even if we had taken a photographer with us, we would have been lucky to get them both to smile at the same time. To add to the problems, I didn't use the remote, which meant that we never were positioned quite right. Oh well! At least with some photoshopping, blurring, and sepia-toning, the pictures are somewhat respectable. Now we just have to re-plan a trip to the foothills for another valiant effort--this time with a remote.

When the younger two would have no more of it, at least we were able to get Gabs to look at and smile for the camera.

And when the lighting was gone--which happened much too quickly, at least I could turn the camera on the desert sunset for a moment while Debs and Gabs herded the whining duo to the van!

Trick-or-Treat

2009-11-01T14:40:00.000-08:00

I used to always love dressing up for Halloween and going trick-or-treating. Obviously my children feel the same way. This last week we went to a trunk-or-treat activity a few days before Halloween where a lot of people from our local church parked their cars so all the kids could go around and get candy. Bells and Gabs both dressed up as witches and Erik was a little lion this year.

When we tried Erik's costume on him earlier in the month, he wasn't very fond of it.

He seems to have adjusted over the last few weeks.

Scott Evans put his head on a platter and the kids had to grab the candy surrounding his head. The message was clear, "You better not take more than one or he might bite your fingers!"

One lady had a cannon that she used to shoot out the candy.

The kids would then rush to pick it up. There was just one hitch. The cannon kept shooting the candy into a low-lying mesquite tree, and anyone that has been around a mesquite tree knows that they have sharp thorns that can grow to be several inches long.

I couldn't help but laugh at the little kids that would rush over to the mesquite tree and while repeatedly saying, "Ow!" or "Ouch!" they reached and stretched to get the candy from out of the tree. Anyway, it was fun until the kids started to ask an innocent bystander to fetch the candy for them--I was the bystander. After my hands and arms got more scratches than I cared to count, I started to use my feet to pull the candy out, thinking my jeans would protect me from the thorns. Nope! I was pulling thorns out of my pants the rest of the evening.

So let me explain why the candy kept getting shot into the mesquite. The lady wasn't out to get the children, she just didn't have anywhere else to shoot the cannon without having it hit the surrounding cars. If she pumped just a little air into the cannon, the candy would fall on the ground right in front of the cannon and the kids would be bumping into it. Very rarely was she able to find the happy medium that would make the candy land just in front of the mesquite. Gabs' favorite moment was when the candy flew into the tree, scaring a black cat out like it was a horse breaking out of the gates at the Kentucky Derby.

On Halloween night, Debs and the kids made caramel apples, mummy dogs, and cheese-stick fingers. Although it's hard to remember just how much I enjoyed Halloween growing up, I think I enjoyed watching my kids more than going trick-or-treating myself. I'm looking forward to next year!

Daddy-Daughter Campout

2009-10-18T13:42:00.000-07:00

This last Friday evening our church hosted a daddy-daughter campout at Camp Zion. The camp is a little higher than 7,000 feet above sea level, and considering the exceptionally warm weather in Tucson over the last few days, Gabs, Bells, and I welcomed the chance to get out of Tucson for a while. I especially looked forward to the trip, since it would allow me to leave all my work behind me for a little while and spend time with the girls.

We started the trip on the wrong foot, unable to find the campsite. Luckily we managed to get cell-phone reception and get some directions from Debs. When we finally arrived, we went straight to the lodge and decorated sugar cookies with frosting, candy corn, and licorice.

The weather was great, but Gabs and Bells, having spent the last three years of their lives in Tucson, were a little chilly. It proved to be a long night with potty trips to the nearest latrine and Bells getting cold on numerous occasions after getting outside of her sleeping bag, but morning finally came, and with it, a spectacular sunrise (unfortunately, I didn't have my camera with me when it was at its best). This picture looks out over Tucson after most the color in the sky had already faded.

From the feel of things, I believe it must have warmed up some during the night. That comes as no surprise, however, since temperatures in Tucson for October 17, 2009 climbed up to 99 degrees, which broke the record high for the date by three degrees. If it had climbed one degree higher, it would have set a record in Tucson for reaching 100° at the latest time of the year in recorded history.

As Gabs and Bells went to play with some friends, I spent the next twenty to thirty minutes packing things up and taking the tent down. As I was folding up the tent I saw numerous crickets and bugs that had decided to bed down underneath us. The last critter I saw as I was brushing off the bottom of the tent made me a little more wary than the others. Since moving to Tucson, this small scorpion is the first I have seen in the wild. Apparently I don't get out enough, because I've only seen one tarantula too.

We I enjoyed the breakfast burritos and fruit that was provided for breakfast, and then we traipsed around the mountain playing tetherball and horseshoes. Gabs, who has seen a lot of pictures of my childhood, immediately recognized tetherball as the game I used to play when I was younger. Now when she is older, her kids will be able to say the same thing about her. It's too bad tetherball isn't more popular!

Before heading down the mountain, we hiked to Inspiration Rock and found a little tunnel in it that we could crawl through. As you can see from the girls' faces, it was quite the adventure!

The winding road down the mountain made Bells sick, so we made several stops to enjoy the scenery.
All in all, we had a great time and we're looking forward to our next grand adventure!

Valued Friends

2009-09-20T16:28:00.000-07:00

A little over three years ago we moved to Arizona so I could attend graduate school at the University of Arizona. Previously, my wife and I had been attending Brigham Young University. During that time we met the Yancey family, and I even participated in the production of a play that Jason Yancey directed. He was a year ahead of me in school and ended up going to the University of Arizona a year ahead of me. So, for the last three years I have been the beneficiary of someone who figuratively took me under his wing, helping me prepare for deadlines and deal with the stresses of graduate school. Since he was a year ahead of me, I could always go to him if I had questions about classes I was taking, paperwork that I needed to turn in, or to learn about deadlines that were occasionally so "transparent" that you would never know about them unless someone told you about them. Now that Jason has graduated and the Yanceys have moved on, we are left wondering how we ever would have managed without them. Hopefully, we can be the same type of friend to others as they were to us. So, thanks, Jason and Aleece, for being such good friends. Thanks also to our many other friends. We hope you're all doing well!!!

Fairy Magic

2009-09-06T18:32:00.001-07:00

Fawndear has enchanted our daughters with her fairy adventures. Things went into high gear when they watched Tinkerbell just before our trip to Disneyland back in May. They were delighted to meet Tinkerbell and Rosetta while at Disneyland, and since then they have made fairy traps, fairies, and tickets to fairy land--which they plan on redeeming as soon as Gabs loses a tooth. This is how it works: The tickets aren't any good unless they can get them to a fairy. So Gabs plans on putting them in an envelope with her soon-to-be lost tooth. The Tooth Fairy will then see them, read them, and then take them to visit the fairies.

During the last month or two, they have created fairies at pixiehollow.com, where they can choose the color of eyes, skin complexion, dress color, leg and arm position, etc., etc. etc. They have given their fairies names like Emerald Twinkletoes, Flora Flutterflower, Sunflower Prettyshimmer, Twilight Candleglow, and Windy Roseflower.

When they put up a fairy trap (a doll's bed and doll dinnerware) it took a fairy nearly a month to come sleep in the bed and leave behind pixie dust (glitter). The girls were so excited you would have thought it was Christmas.

In addition to all this, they are always drawing fairies or making wands of light like those in Barbie and the Magic of Pegasus. This last July Gabs had a fairy birthday party where she and her friends all got fairy wings, which they decorated with glitter and plastic jewels. It's great to see the girls' imagination at work!

Look out!

2009-08-30T16:20:00.000-07:00

The last few weeks our son has begun to do a lot of new things. Perhaps his favorite thing to do is imitate others. After Gabs went around the house spraying everyone with a spray bottle, he found the bottle, and pointing it at us, he used his mouth to imitate the sound of the bottle when it sprays.

In a similar scenario, the girls like to throw me kisses after I put them to bed at night or when I'm about to leave to work and school. I act like they are throwing things at me and dodge out of the way. Erik was always "safe," so if I was holding him, their kisses wouldn't affect me. Well, now he has followed suit by throwing kisses of his own. Now I can't even turn to him for help; however, I'm not the only one that has to be careful with the kid. The girls have always loved to dress him up and continue to do so whenever they can.

And even though he doesn't have a whole lot of say in it still, I don't think it will be long before he can hold his own.

A Piece of History

2009-08-16T17:29:00.000-07:00

This summer Debs and I read all nine of Laura Ingalls' Little House books to our kids. It was fascinating even for us as parents. I ended up going through my grandparents' picture book, their life history, and some license plates from the farm where my paternal grandpa grew up (I was also raised there).
Years ago, right before I went to what was then Ricks College, I went into an old wood shed behind our house (at one time the homestead used before the main farmhouse was built) and grabbed three license plates from a collection of about forty or fifty--two of which are pictured above. The third, and perhaps my favorite comes from 1928. Unfortunately, I don't have it with me. It's still packed away with my things at my parents' place in Idaho, but it looks like the following plate with numbers imprinted over a large potato--yep Idaho was even famous for potatoes back then.

So, where am I going with this? Well, I served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Spain for two years shortly after that and somehow never thought to go back and grab the rest of the plates before the farm was sold. I thought each of my siblings might like to have an old, framed license plate from the farm where they grew up, so I resolved to contact the current owner to see if I could purchase some of them. However, when I talked with my mom about my idea, she indicated that they had been sold along with numerous other antiques, tools, and odds and ends; the proceeds of which were to be divided equally between my father and his siblings. Although I'm glad to have the three that I grabbed years ago, I'm disappointed that my brother and sisters won't enjoy the same fortune. I guess those things happen with inheritance.

If I'm not mistaken, the first plates issued in Idaho came out in 1913. I'll probably never know if there was one from that year in my grandpa's collection of plates. My grandpa, who passed away while I was serving my mission in Spain, turned eight years old right after the 1916 plate pictured here came out. In my grandpa's life history, he talks about his "eighth year" and of harrowing in the fields behind a pair of horses, while his father built their house (the house in which I grew up). I've since thought of all the other license plates and the stories from my grandpa's life history that are associated with the years they came out. While it is unfortunate that they will not stay in the family, there is a comical side to all this.

Last Sunday I showed the 1916 license plate to my kids and told them that it was almost 100 years old. Gabs, who just turned six this summer, querried, "From when you were little?" She seems bound and determined to make me out as being older than I really am.

Earlier in the summer, just after we had read Little House in the Big Woods we enjoyed a night together as a family discussing how journals and photo albums help us know our ancestors better. I showed Debs and the kids some pictures taken when my parents were younger with just two or three kids. One of the pictures shows a deer that my dad shot one year during hunting season. That of course led to an explanation about how I used to go hunting each year with my family during the deer hunt, which provided our family with meat for the following year. Gabs seemed to be quite fascinated with the concept, and, more as a comment than a question, she said, "Just like Laura's [Ingalls] dad from Little House in the Big Woods." Both Debra and I confirmed her statement, and with her eyes opening wide, she said, "Whoa! You lived a long time ago!"

Tucson is the top go-to place for simpler living . . . or so they say

2009-08-02T19:36:00.000-07:00

About a week ago I was reading in USA Today when I stumbled across an article that caught my eye. The article mentioned that according to the AARP Tucson is the top place to go for simpler living. Apparently the AARP came up with the top twenty-five cities and then picked out some from all the different regions of the U.S. to make sure all areas were represented. They created a "stress index" based on crimes, depression, proximity to a university, affordability, and the multi-cultural feel. They interviewed the mayor, who says he is the mayor of paradise. According to him, Tucson has the highest quality of life of any city in the country, thanks in part to its temperate climate and low crime rate.

"Wow! You've got to be kidding!" I thought. Is this the same Tucson where I live? It had to be. Along with the article it had a picture of the Catalina mountains covered with snow (something that you don't see much here). Thought after thought passed through my mind such as a quote that I have heard attributed to J. Golden Kimball, "If I had a summer home in Tucson and one in Hell, I'd sell the home in Tucson and move to Hell." William Tecumseh Sherman, who succeeded Ulysses S. Grant as the Commanding General of the army, having a similar perception of the region, said, "We had one war with Mexico to take Arizona, and we should have another to make her take it back."

Today I heard someone quote a song that reflected our thoughts about the weather, "Spring has sprung / Fall has fell / Summer is here / and it's hotter than . . . usuel." With the 108° weather we had in Tucson today, combined with the fact that the air conditioner at the church didn't work, you might understand how it was almost hot enough to make a saint swear (but not quite)!

In the last month, we have only had nine days at or above 107° according to the historical weather data on kold.com. That's accompanied by seventeen days of balmy weather between 100° and 106°. We even had one day top out at a frigid 95°--but that's the exception. On February 23rd of this year we had already topped the ninety degree plateau at 91°, so yes, if you compare us to Phoenix or Death Valley, which usually top us by about five or six degrees, we have quite the temperate climate.

As for the crime rate. Well, last Monday at least four vehicles had their windows smashed in just a block to the north of us. While that may sound pretty bad, it's been a full three months since four vehicles on our street had their windows smashed out. Also on Monday, a friend of mine had his bike stolen after someone cut his bike lock, and it's been over a year since I've had a bike stolen from me. Debs just finished serving on the jury in a first-degree murder trial, but that doesn't happen often--there were only 73 murders in Tucson last year. Per capita that's quite mild, compared with . . . say, Ciudad Jaurez. If you look at the per capita rate of crime compared with other cities in the U.S. you will see that Tucson is quite comparable. Compared with the number four city on AARP's list; Logan, Utah, you can see that Tucson holds its own. There are only five times as many murders per capita. If you live in Tucson, you're only 28 times more likely to have your car stolen, 25.4 times more likely to be the victim of a robbery, or 8.99 times more likely to be the victim of aggravated assault. Take a look for yourself. I've also included El Paso--once again, you are only five times more likely to be murdered in Tucson and just 2.4 times more likely to have your car stolen in Tucson.

Logan/Tucson crime rates El Paso/Tucson Crime
Rates

If you take a look at the map showing the crimes/activity reported in Tucson on July 27, you'll see that it's a rather quiet city. If you take a look at the last fourteen days, you'll see an artistic canvas with a few unpainted spots (largely gated communities). These maps only show the crimes that the Tucson City Police dealt with--they don't include the University Police, the South Tucson Police, or even the County Police. Having said that, however, I bet you still can't locate the University on the two week crime map. I've removed the "suspicious activity" from the two week map to remove a layer of paint that would cover everything else.

So, congratulations to us, we live in the city of simpler living where you don't have to wait long before someone knocks out your car windows or steals your bike. If you want to get rid of all that excess in your life, come to Tucson, there seem to be plenty of people that will gladly take it off your hands.

Ok, so maybe I've been overly sarcastic and negative about Tucson, but when a mayor blindly overlooks some things in his community (i.e. crime), it kind of gets your gander up, particularly when we have been the victim of it several times--whereas before, I cannot recall ever being the victim of such crimes.

Family Home Evening at the Drive-in Theater

2009-06-14T20:02:00.000-07:00

This last Monday we went to the one drive-in theater in Tucson--the De Anza. In nearly three years in Tucson, it was just the second time our family has gone to the drive-in theater. As long as you have a moderately good movie at the drive-in, the ambiance will make up for the rest. In our case, we watched Up and Earth. With the back of our van facing the big screen, we took the back seat out and placed it behind the van. While Debs and I sat on the seat, our two girls sat in their car seats or lay in the back of the van with their pillows and blankets. Erik slept for a good part of the first movie, which allowed us to actually watch and enjoy it. With our four pound tub of Redvines licorice, a few bags of microwave popcorn, and some water, we had a very enjoyable evening.

On the downside, the battery to our vehicle died halfway through the second feature, and we had to wait until it was over for another viewer to come help us jump start it. In the past I have recommended using earplugs when going to watch a NASCAR, now I'm going to make a few suggestions about going to a drive-in theater. Take jumper cables--almost nobody has them in their cars these days and good luck finding an employee at the drive-in theater after they close concessions. Also, you might want to turn your vehicle on for a few minutes between features. Or you could just take a radio or walkman powered by batteries.

Rolling with the Punches

2009-06-07T18:47:00.001-07:00

Well, I have held this post for a few weeks trying to decide if I should publish it to the Internet or not, due to its somewhat pessimistic tone, but I finally decided to do it anyway. So here goes!

The last three years that our family has lived in Tucson has been a learning experience for our family. During our first couple years we had a window broken out of our car and a bike stolen. Since March of this year, the crime and vandalism on our street and neighborhood, which generally seems to be very quiet, has shot through the roof. When I returned from a conference held in El Paso, Texas, I found our car had been egged. A little while later someone came during the night and smashed the windows on four cars parked along our street. Fortunately, our car was passed over this time. Graffiti has also become much more visible in the area. The stop sign at the end of the street was recently sprayed over, as were some telephone and electrical boxes. Some brick walls to a nearby church and a house were also tagged. Fortunately, those were cleaned by the church and resident almost immediately. While my wife and I have always been cognizant of the high crime rate in Tucson--made abundantly clear by the regular flyovers made over the surrounding neighborhoods by the police helicopter with its spotlight on, we are clearly concerned with how quickly it has grown in our neighborhood. To make matters worse, Debs discovered this last week that one of her little-used credit cards was stolen and used. Most people we speak to in Tucson have been victims of one crime or another over the last couple of years. Those that seem to escape them generally are in the more affluent areas to the north and east.

So what's the solution. Do you have to live in a gated community with cameras and a security guard to escape the stupidity of some teenager that was raised poorly? Do you have to lock everything not bolted down to keep drug addicts or "opportunists" from walking away with it to make a quick buck?

If that's the answer, I'm not sure what we would decide to do. Yes, we would like to escape as much as possible the dishonest and immoral practices of a growing segment of society, but at the same time, at what point are you overdoing it? At what point do you become so isolationist that you are no longer an influence for good in society?

A Week in Anaheim

2009-05-31T16:40:00.000-07:00

This last week we went to Anaheim to go to Disneyland and California Adventure Land. For family members that receive a weekly e-mail from me, much of what I write here will sound a lot like our weekly family e-mail. For those who don't receive our weekly e-mails, I'll try to spare you some of the details.

With a five-year-old daughter, a three-year-old daughter, and a fourteen-month-old son, you can imagine some of the challenges the trip posed for us. Fortunately, we were able to play Disney movies in our van as we made the seven-and-a-half-hour trip (it was actually a couple hours longer due to some stops we had to make and some heavy traffic as we neared our destination). Additionally, we had to walk about a mile to get to the park. Two of the kids generally rode in our double stroller, while the other often rode on my shoulders.

After checking into our hotel on the afternoon of Memorial Day, we made the walk to Disneyland, where we finally revealed the destination to our children. While it was a great surprise for them, we aren't sure what is better--the surprise or letting them know well in advance so the anticipation builds up. What do you think?

We had a great time meeting Disney characters throughout the week and getting their signatures and pictures. The longest line we waited in all week was the one to meet different Disney princesses (An hour and a half). While Debs waited in line, I took the kids to the It's a Small World ride and then I switched places with her. We were fortunate to be in the right place at the right time. We were visiting with Mulan when Princess Aurora came to take her place, so the girls got to see four princesses instead of three.

Since Gabs was the only one tall enough of our kids to go on several of the rides, we used Bells' ticket to get an extra Fastpass to allow us to skip the long lines. That way either Debs or I could go with her on some of the rides while the other took Bells and Erik to more suitable rides for their age. Gabs would literally skip from one ride to the next, and was constantly talking. Both Debs and I were glad to finally get the chance to give our children some one-on-one quality time. It was like Christmas every day for an entire week.

There was one ride at Disneyland that Gabs couldn't ride, since she didn't meet the height requirements. It was the Indiana Jones Adventure ride. Debs rode it by herself, while I took the kids to another ride, and then I rode on it. Halfway into the ride, the truck in front of use broke down. Consequently, we sat in our truck, unable to unbuckle, for half an hour. They finally escorted us out on foot, giving us a Fastpass good for any ride in the park for up to six people. While I enjoyed the part of the ride that I was able to do, I realized that it was not nearly as fun as when I rode with my daughter or family. Both Debs and I enjoyed seeing our kids' excitement much more than the rides themselves.

As for how we afforded to make such a trip on such a small budget, Debs found a great five-day deal for a hotel and park-hopper passes that included a $50 gift card. In addition to the things we bought with the gift card, she also brought Disney games and toys that she had found on clearance during the last year. To further help a budget strapped family, she started experimenting with recipes she found online for our rice cooker. Yes, rice cookers can cook a lot more than just rice.

On Saturday, after checking out of our hotel, we went to Huntington Beach for a little more than an hour, so our children could see the ocean for the first time and collect seashells.

Kindergarten Graduation

2009-05-24T08:58:00.000-07:00

This week Gabs graduated from Kindergarten. Her class put on a great program with several songs and dances that were absolutely adorable. Afterward we got to watch a slide show of the year in review. It's amazing how much she has grown in the last eight or nine months. It's also amazing how much she has grown since she was born nearly six years ago. It seems that from here on out, our lives will be marked by a series of milestones leading to the day that our kids will be all grown up and moving out of the house . . ., but we're going to enjoy experiencing each of those milestones with our children! We are grateful to be so blessed!

Developing Our Talents

2009-05-17T18:13:00.000-07:00

Anyone that knows our oldest daughter, Gabs, knows that she loves to make cards for other people. Often she will make drawings for them, or she will cut the paper out in some shape and write something on it. In the past that has meant that our envelopes or colored paper have mysteriously disappeared whenever she got the urge to make cards.

This last week Gabs decided she wanted to cut out heart shapes.
Bells, her younger sister, naturally wants to do everything her big sister does, so she also wielded a pair of scissors and started cutting. The result...well, anyone that remembers being young knows that for some reason or other it just seems impossible to learn how to cut out or draw a perfectly-shaped heart or star. Completely frustrated with her attempts to make a heart, Bells burst into tears and sought solace in her mother's shoulder. After receiving the much-needed comfort, she went back to the drawing board and devised a new design. A little while later she had a card for Debs and myself, which she hand delivered. She proudly announced that she had made us each a pair of panties. She had found a design that she could master.

A Fieldtrip to the Zoo

2009-05-15T15:14:00.000-07:00

Last Friday I had the privilege of going with my daughter's class on a field trip to the Reid Park Zoo here in Tucson. Along with another parent, I had the responsibility to keep track of three kids, including my daughter, while we were at the zoo. Each of the kids had to carry their own water bottle throughout the day, while we tried to remind them to take frequent drinks in weather that climbed to 102° Fahrenheit. Yes, this is Tucson, but no, it isn't supposed to be that hot yet.
From about 8:30 a.m. until 3:00 p.m. we were outside in the heat. After we finished looking at the animals at the zoo, we went to a nearby park, ate lunch, and then played an array of games. The kids did gunnysack races (in pillowcases), three-legged races, freeze tag, etc. They also tossed water balloons back and forth to see how far they could toss them without them falling to the ground and bursting.
The teacher planned several activities throughout the day that would get the kids wet and help them to cool down. As they were finishing up with the balloon toss, the parents got to chase the kids and pour water on them or get them with the remaining water balloons.
I don't know how the kids did it, but they never seemed to slow down, despite the heat. They just kept running. I was tired and hot, and I even got to sit in the shade during several of the activities.

Tucson Bike Fest

2009-05-06T20:41:00.000-07:00

For three years I have been biking to school, making a trip of over four miles each way. For a while I rode a Scattante street bike, but realized I wasn't getting much of a workout on it. It was almost like I was cheating. Consequently, I decided to get the cheapest Walmart bike I could find. We found one that had been banged up a good bit and was marked down to $35. It served me well for almost a year and a half until one night some brazen thief came and took it off my front porch. The one day I got careless and failed to lock it up after parking it on the porch was the day someone came and stole it. But this is Tucson, I should have suspected that. As a result, I woke up to a slight sound--usually nothing but an alarm clock will wake me up, just ask my wife. I instantly remembered I hadn't locked up my bike, so I quickly looked out the window and saw it was gone. The next instant I was running down the road in sandals after a white mini van that was speeding away down our normally quiet street, but I was too slow to get a license plate. I take a little comfort in knowing that one of the brake pads was missing, the other three were worn to a frazzle, and the wheels had been wobbly from the time I bought it. But they probably still managed to get $10 or so out of it to help pay for their next drug fix.

I spent the next few days trying to find a similar bike that would give me a good workout and that would be within my price range. I got lucky after calling around to several local stores. Once again I found a bike for under $40. Like the one before it, it has served me well for some time now, and also like the one before it, I need to change its break pads. While most drivers are quite courteous to bicyclists here in Tucson, some force you to make abrupt stops. On one occasion, not very long after we moved here, I started riding my bike through an intersection after the light turned green. As I was nearing the middle of the road, I heard brakes screeching for what seemed like an eternity. I was lucky to get to the middle of the road before a pickup truck slammed into the car that had been beside me at the light but that had started out a little slower. The two vehicles slid right behind me and took out a sign posted on the center median. That experience along with two or three others has made me ride with more caution, and perhaps, use the brakes more than I need to.

Fast forward to the end of March 2009. As I was waiting at a stoplight near the University of Arizona, I noticed a plastic container with brochures announcing the Tucson Bike Fest, a month-long drive to get people to stop driving and start cycling to work or school. I grabbed a brochure and two or three times a week I entered all the times I rode my bike to work and school during the month of April. The organizers of the event along with the numerous sponsors had various events throughout the city, including an occasional bike station where cyclist could stop and grab a quick breakfast, a t-shirt, a bike bell, etc. During the second week of April, I won a water bottle from Ajo Bikes in the weekly drawing. In addition to prizes, the camaraderie of the event, and the opportunity to talk to new people, I also got to see some of the benefits to biking that I had kind of overlooked. For the month of April, this is the data I received after entering online all my trips to school on my bike. I'm not sure how the cost in savings was calculated, but I'm sure I saved at least that much after factoring in gas, wear and tear to a vehicle, and a very pricey parking permit at the university.

Your estimated cost savings is $76

Mode	Trips	Vehicle Miles Saved
Carpool	0	0
Vanpool	0	0
Transit	0	0
Walk	0	0
Bicycle	46	190
Telecommute	0	0
Totals:	46	190

Pollution Reduction
Reduction in carbon monoxide:		3.85 lbs.
Reduction in oxides of nitrogen:		0.56 lbs.
Reduction in organic compounds:		0.41 lbs.

Greenhouse Gas Reduction
Reduction in carbon dioxide (and other gasses):		160.26 lbs.

On the fourth of May I received a phone call from an employee of the city of Tucson informing me that I had won one of the two grand prizes, a $540 Trek Allant donated by Trek Bicycles of Tucson. I went and picked it up today and was treated to some of the best service I have ever had at a cycling store. Not only did the store throw in a few bells and whistles such as front and rear lights, a bike bell, and an insulated bag to go on the back rack, but they also took the time to answer other annoying questions from someone who knows very little about bikes aside from the basic tire changes and a foray or two at replacing the bearings in the bottom bracket. I rode the bike home from the Trek store and enjoyed one of the smoothest rides I've had in a long time. The only setback was that whenever I stopped, I had to remember that I was no longer riding a woman's bike (the last two bikes we found below $40 were women's bikes).

Anyway, I offer a heartfelt thanks to the many sponsors of the Tucson Bike Fest for a fun and eventful month.

An Eventful Few Weeks

2009-05-05T19:50:00.000-07:00

My comprehensive doctoral exams are finally over! In fact, I finished them nearly two weeks ago. For the first time in years I have been able to relax a little at the end of the semester instead of pushing myself to the edge of my sanity for the final month of the semester.

A few weeks ago a good friend of ours gave us four tickets to go watch a NASCAR race at the Phoenix International Raceway. Due to a couple of accidents on the interstate, we arrived late, and having never been to a NASCAR race, we didn't have earplugs. For those of you who have gone to a NASCAR event, you're probably saying "amateurs"! We were fortunate to have ladies all around us scrambling through their purses racing to be the first to give us earplugs for our three kids. We all enjoyed the opportunity to watch it live, even if it was quite the hassle packing everything up at the last minute when we learned that we had tickets. As for my favorite part of the race--we didn't get to see any spectacular wreck or anything, so I would have to say my favorite part was after a minor wreck when the caution car finally pulled off the track and all the cars started racing again. With all the cars passing close together, the air filled with the multiplied sound of all the cars passing close together.

If I could do it again, I would take earplugs and I would put the movie Cars in our portable DVD player for the kids to watch on the way to the track.
Two days after our trip to the racetrack, our family enjoyed an evening at the Pima County Fair. Last year marked our first time at the fair here, and like our NASCAR experience, we were novices. We paid full price for the rides, and as a result, our kids only got to go on a few of them. This time we bought tickets in advance, so every ride was marked down considerably. As a result, we spent a very full and fun evening at the fair for a reasonable price.

Having grown up on a farm, one of my favorite parts of the fair was going through the barns to look at the animals. It reminded me of the good old days of raising lambs in 4-H and taking them to the fair. At the same time, it's nice to see and even smell farm animals again after living for years in the city. One of these days we're going to escape the city (at least to a certain degree) and actually have a yard with some room to move around!

Who can pass up the chance to ride in the teacups?
Even the goats are willing to pose with passersby.
This kind girl pulled her chicken out of its cage with an apparent full-awareness of what a treat it is for "cityfolk" to pet chickens.
For those who have not seen our barnyard, well here it is.
Debs got to watch our mischievous son during our ride on the ferris wheel. Both he and the girls loved looking down at the lights of the fair. In fact, we couldn't get Bells to take her eyes off the lights. She turned her head for the picture, but her eyes remained fixed on the lights.The girls loved the rides, and Gabs grew just enough during the last year to be able to go on some of the bigger rides. It's tough to top the experience of taking your kids to the county fair and watching their faces light up with each new adventure.

So having gone twice, what will I change for next year? We'll probably listen to some Chris LeDoux (i.e. County Fair and The Ride) as we drive to the fair, and we'll get a friend to watch the kids while I ride the ferris wheel with Debs.

This last Friday and Saturday, Gabs lost her first two teeth. Each night the Tooth Fairy left her eighty cents in shiny new coins. After losing her second tooth, she told us how she was planning on catching the Tooth Fairy that night. She was so tired, however, that the Tooth Fairy had little trouble retrieving the small tooth from under her pillow and replacing it with a few coins.

On Sunday evening, Grandma Hansen called to speak with Debs, but Gabs got to the phone first, which resulted in a ten minute play-by-play of losing her teeth and getting money from the Tooth Fairy. Don't ask me how you can talk about something like that for ten minutes, but if you're interested in hearing the story, you can call and talk with Gabs--I'm sure Grandma Hansen could tell you all about it now also. If I understand right, Grandma Hansen finally asked to speak with Debs, but when Gabs went to give her the phone, she saw a wonderful opportunity, which she conveyed to her grandma over the phone, "Well it looks like Mom is changing Erik's diaper, so shouldn't I just talk to Grandpa instead?" From what Debs tells me, Gabs then proceeded to tell the story about her teeth to Grandpa.

How lucky can two parents get to have such adorable children!?

Christmas in Malad

2009-01-05T08:02:00.000-08:00

This year we had plans of staying in Tucson for Christmas instead of making the thousand-mile drive to visit family. But it wasn't to be, Deb's grandma died shortly before Christmas, causing us to make some last-minute schedule changes. On December 21st we drove to Malad, Idaho with perfect roads the entire way. The following day we drove through a winter snowstorm over Malad Pass to get to the funeral. On the 23rd we returned to Malad to spend the next few days with my parents, two of my sisters, my brother, and his wife and two kids. They all arrived on the 24th.

Trena Doll, my second-oldest sister, almost immediately enlisted Spens, my younger brother, and I in a very important project. She gave us both a shovel and had us pile snow in my parent's back yard. We dutifully obeyed and before long we had a nice-sized hill of snow constructed out of snow that wasn't packing very well. Fortunately, on Christmas it snowed all day (17 inches worth) and the snow packed splendidly. Our sledding hill went quickly from then on and we quickly realized that we would have to create a turn to keep the sledders from running into my parent's house. Here's some footage of the end product. In the video you will see my Dad ride with Bells. When it was over, she kept saying, "Grandpa tipped us over!"

Dad did, however, have better rides, including one where he raised a finger to the sky to indicate he was number one and that he had gone the farthest. Gabs didn't buy it though and called him on using his hands to go further.

Also while we were in Malad, I spent some time scanning one of the family photo albums. ELK, our ten-month-old son, wanted to get at the book and seemed to have all sorts or strategies to do so. His Grandpa's job was to see that he didn't get to it. Sing, my youngest but older sister, caught it all on camera. You decide who won!

When the last of us left on the 27th, we had enjoyed a memorable Christmas together in my parent's small, but cozy home in Malad! Thanks, Mom and Dad, for letting us all come. And thanks to the rest of you who went for making this Christmas an unforgettable experience!

Richard Tyler Files

2008-10-05T12:41:00.000-07:00

I pulled The Complete Works of William Shakespeare off my shelf and counted the number of plays he wrote. If the edition I own is halfway decent, it looks like Shakespeare wrote about 37 plays that are still extant today. Has anyone read two of them? Three? Four? All of them?

Early this year a professor of mine introduced me to the personal files/notes of Richard Tyler, a former professor of Spanish. While Shakespeare was writing plays in the late sixteenth century and early seventeenth century, Spanish playwrights and artists became a part of the most extraordinary period of artistic and literary genius in Spanish history--the Golden Age. Richard Tyler not only read more comedias/plays from the time period than anyone I know about, but he also wrote plot summaries for many of them. I spent a good part of the summer scanning thousands of 5 in. by 8 in. cards on which he had typed summaries with his typewriter.

For those of you who are not familiar with Spanish comedias, I will briefly summarize them for you. In general they are fairly lighthearted with all sorts of twists, turns, and coincidences. Often they address topics such as honor and nobility. Okay, so that was comedias in a really, really small nutshell. Richard Tyler also wrote summaries to tragicomedias, essentially a play in which the protagonist or protagonists face a dreaded outcome either because of their own actions, because of fate, or because of their conniving rivals.

So just how many Spanish plays from the time period did Richard Tyler summarize?
Answer: about 1,700.

About how many lines do each of the plays contain?
Answer: about 3,000

Are the plays written in prose or poetry?
Answer: poetry

How many five inch by seven inch cards are in this collection of plot summaries?
Answer: approximately 7,950

How many playwrights are represented by these plot summaries?
Answer: about 190 playwrights can be identified by name; however, many of the works are from an anonymous playwright or of doubtful origin.

What playwright is most represented by this collection of plot summaries?
Answer: Lope de Vega--the collection contains OVER 300 summaries of plays written by or attributed to the "monstruo de la naturaleza" ("monster of nature"--this is a title that Miguel de Cervantes, the author of Don Quixote, gave to Lope de Vega because of the inordinate amount of works that Lope generated)

So if these plays are in Spanish, why should I care if some professor wrote all these plot summaries?
Answer: Richard Tyler wrote these plot summaries in English. Therefore, they are a great resource for a wide variety of people. They can be used for comparative studies. They can be used for someone trying to find the next play they want to study. Sometimes Richard Tyler read a less-used version than the one that you get in your Spanish class. Consequently, some of his plot summaries may slightly differ from the "canonical" version used today or may even have an additional character or two. For those of you don't care to do research, you can simply read them for the fun of it...well, when I manage to make them more widely available. I think you will find that the summary alone is fun to read and shows just how creative and colorful these playwrights were. I am including a random example from among the plot summaries. It is not really a "canonical" work by any means, but it gives you an idea of the twists and turns you can expect. NOTE: Take a little time and try to get all the names straight! Amor secreto hasta celos by Lope de Vega

Did Richard Tyler do anything but read comedias and write plot summaries?
Answer: If 1,700 plot summaries weren't enough, Richard Tyler also kept a prodigious number of cards with bibliographic information related to specific playwrights and topics--well over the number of cards used for plot summaries. While we can get bibliographic information at the click of a mouse on the internet, all he had to do was sit down at his card file. It is difficult to find other references to some of the works mentioned in this file on the internet or elsewhere. Additionally, Richard Tyler also has "idea files". These files contain cards with a word or a phrase on them as well as the bibliographic information for the comedia from which they originated. For instance, numerous cards address how comedias refer to "eyes". Sometimes eyes are used as darts or cupids arrows. Other times they send out venom, etc. etc. etc.

What other fascinating things can you tell me about Richard Tyler's life work?
Answer: You don't have the time, so let's just leave it at that!!!

Remodelling by an amateur

2008-06-22T19:39:00.000-07:00

For some time Deb has been trying to get me to put in a ceiling fan in our living room. A few weeks ago I ran out of excuses, so I scraped away all the popcorn texturing in our living room, which we were happy to be rid of. Then came the painstaking tasks of learning how to create the type of knockdown texture that we wanted, fish wire through the walls, etc., etc., etc.

Unfortunately, we forgot to get some before pictures, but here are some pictures mid-project along with some of the end result. A project that would take an experienced person a few days took me weeks since I wanted to make sure I did everything right the first time. There's nothing like spending hours on something just to realize you not only have to do it differently, but also fix the problem that you created by doing it wrong the first time. It's amazing what a project like this can do for your confidence. I started out thinking I would need to get help from more experienced friends, but when I realized they didn't have much time to offer, I decided I'd just have to find out how to do most everything using the internet and books. Well, it worked, and I learned a lot in the process. Now all I can hope is that the next project goes a little faster!

Picture 1: Holes in the wall/ceiling to fish the electrical wiring to the center of the room--plus the mess of the living room.

Picture 2: A close-up of some of the holes and wiring before adding nail plates to protect the wiring.

Picture 3: The walls and ceiling after patching everything up and painting.

Picture 4: The newly installed ceiling fan.

Picture 5: The room after finishing!

Setting Traps for Thy Neighbor...or Two...or Three...or Four

2008-06-08T16:38:00.000-07:00

No, I'm not trying to ensnare my neighbors, but I am setting traps for their benefit as well as our own. Two weeks ago we set some mouse traps next to the fence that separates our back yard from our neighbors back yard. We had noticed a few mice coming over from the neighbor's yard and nibbling on some of our garden plants. I was somewhat lackadaisical about resetting them or putting fresh bait on them after we caught a mouse. Consequently, we only caught five mice that week.

At the start of this week I thought we would only have five or six mice left, so I decided to wage an all-day war against them and rid ourselves from the small infestation creeping in from next door. I grabbed a particular food--which I won't mention here--from the fridge and baited four traps. When I checked them, there was a lizard and three mice in the traps. I began to wonder if indeed we were halfway if I had caught three mice that quickly, so I baited and set the traps again...and again...and again. For a while I was able to just stand back about twenty feet and watch as the mice crawled over from our neighbor's back yard. Some of the mice were so small that they stood on the bait without springing the trap, which I must admit, frustrated me to no end. Fortunately in some cases an adult mouse would come and eat and it would catch the two simultaneously. All told we caught fifteen mice this last Monday.

After I had caught nine, I went over to our neighbor and told her how I had been watching mouse after mouse meander into our yard from her side of the fence. I'm not exactly sure why she acted so surprised because her back yard is absolutely filthy, but she assured me that she would notify her husband as soon as he got home from work. The following day we caught five more mice and we have caught a few since then. All told we have caught about thirty mice in less than two weeks. As you surely can imagine, I have had a hard time eating the particular food I used to bait the traps after all that carnage. Additionally, there is no "mouse talk" during mealtime. Who could have possibly imagined catching thirty mice using the old-fashioned traps. If I had it to do over again, I probably would have put a barrier up and set up some bait so the mice would eat it and then have to go right back to the neighbor's back yard to die.

I have been told that mothballs work well at holding mice at bay, but I would love to hear other suggestions since the mice breeding ground next door seems to have no supply shortage.

P.S. Don't mention this to my daughters! A few weeks ago we watched Ratatouille. I'm sure you can imagine the rest! One evening my youngest daughter came out with me while I was watering the garden. She saw a mouse going for one of the traps and started trying to coax him over to her by saying "Here mousy, mousy. Here mousy, mousy." Meanwhile, she had the palm of her hand facing downward as she used her fingers to signal that she wanted the mouse to come to her. I discretely made enough of a disturbance to scare the mouse away from the trap. Imagine that, I set up all those traps just to find myself obligated to shoo one away from an almost certain death!

The Games Our Sisters Play with Us

2008-05-25T19:04:00.000-07:00

When I was younger, my five older sisters must have had a blast playing all sorts of games with me. Fortunately, there is little photographic evidence of their escapades. However, one time when I was two, they decided to dress me up as Prince Phillip (according to the captions in my picture book), and as you can see, the camera was out.

For them to get a mustache and a goatee looking like that, I must have been a very willing accomplice, but I also must have thought I could improve upon their artistic efforts. When they finished, my sisters left the mascara within my reach, leaving no limits to the expression of my artistic genius.

Fast forward twenty-six years. My son is just two and a half months old and only has two older sisters. Little, however, has changed. Just this last week they managed to get him to hold a tea cup while they pretended to pour him tea. At first, he didn't seem to know how to respond, but before long and with his mother's help, he was thrusting out the cup for more.

It was probably the same day that my wife and I happened to look over to where our son was sitting. His sisters had decided to make him a patron saint. Forget about recording and authenticating specific miracles performed by the saint-in-waiting. No, they decided to cut through all the red tape and just declare him to be a saint based on his angelic appearance.

Could you dispute their case? Besides, who needs all the paperwork to be considered a saint!?

On second thought, perhaps it would have been nice to see some more photographic evidence of the creative things my sisters used to do and thus recapture some of the innocent creativity and ingenuity of our own childhood. Oh to be young again!

Thanks, sisters, for all the games and fun!

Jumping the Gun

2008-04-27T18:05:00.001-07:00

As anyone that ever looks at this blog knows, I hardly ever update my blog. That's probably because I write a weekly e-mail to my family giving them more information about what is going on in our lives than they could ever care to know about. Today I got halfway through it when I had to go do things related to my church calling. I told my wife to write her part of the e-mail and I would finish it when I got home. However, when I got home, she had jumped the gun and already sent the message. That should save our families from having to read everything, but I figured they would at least want to see some of the pictures we took at the Pima County Fair this last Monday. Both Gabs and Bells got to go on two rides. They both rode the carousel to start...and loved it!

Gabs then rode in the tea cups...and loved it.

Bells still had one ride left, which didn't go over too well with Gabs, who had used up her quota of two rides already. Here's a look at her from the carousel.

The good thing about kids is that while they have amazing memories, they get over things quickly. Once the carousel started going and Bells started waving enthusiastically every time it went around, Gabs started to get over her tantrum. We then went to see the animals and they had about as much fun with that as they did with the rides themselves.

As you can see, I love to share pictures of my wife and kids, but aside from sharing a few pictures and stating the simple fact that we went to the county fair, I thought I'd share some of the things I observed and learned from the evening. My wife and I rode the carousel, but not on the horses, etc. Instead, we stood alongside the mounts our children rode (for free) to make sure they didn't fall off. As a kid, I don't think I could have ever understood being able to go to the fair and being able to enjoy watching other people enjoy their rides. On a student budget, our kids only got to go on a few rides themselves, and if we had gone on any rides ourselves, we would have been taking rides away from them. We didn't buy any hot dogs, cotton candy, or ice cream. We didn't buy any trinkets or toys or visit the booth asking whether or not we would be "saved". Instead, we just watched our kids enjoy their rides. Having said that, I think we enjoyed the fair just about as much as they did. In fact, if we had turned the camera on ourselves, maybe you would have seen the same expression on our face as our kids had--sorry the pictures of them don't do it justice. I am still trying to figure out my wife's camera (I'll have to start carrying mine around a little more).

After the rides and after our budget for the fair was spent, we went to the animal barns to see the llamas, goats, sheep, chickens, cows, etc. Our daughters were chattering non-stop about each of the animals we passed. Gabs quickly forgot that her sister had the last ride. Looking at them, you'd think they were on another ride. As a parent, it's tough to top moments like that. So why as adults and as a society do we forget to enjoy the simple things? Why are we getting so caught up in ourselves and our professions that we forget our families? Why are kids seen as a burden? Why do some people think young couples who have several children could have enjoyed their lives more if they would have put off having children for several years? My theory: we as a society are too selfish and self-centered to look outward. Instead, we opt to ask how such and such can benefit me rather than how it can benefit others. I have my wife to thank for getting me away from my work for a few hours for a Monday night with the family to remind me about the things that are truly important in my life.

Sleeping Quarters

2008-04-06T15:08:00.000-07:00

During the last few months of 2007, my wife kept prodding me to make the girls a bunk bed. Finally, in mid-December I started on it and continued to work on it with my father-in-law when he and his wife came to visit over the Christmas break. We wanted to have it done before our little boy was born in early March, but it was not to be. During the month of February, Bells, our youngest child--(at the time as my sister so aptly notes in a comment for this post), refused to sleep in her bed anymore, so we let her sleep with Gabs in her toddler bed. That didn't work very long since they started to constantly blame each other for keeping them awake.

One of our final solutions in the days leading up to our putting the bunk bed together was to lay their two mattresses close together on the floor. As you can see; and with due cause, we had doubts that they would be able to stay on their new bed without bars or a side rail to keep them in. This picture was taken about a week after their brother was born. A few days after this picture was taken, we got the bunk bed set up and ready for the two to sleep in. Fortunately, Gabs' top bunk has a side rail and she hasn't fallen off yet! The same can't be said for Bells on her bottom bunk.

ELK

2008-03-08T19:41:00.000-08:00

After two days I finally have a few minutes to sit down at a computer. At 11:10.35 a.m. on March 6, 2008, our first son was born. He tipped the scale at a hefty 8 lbs. 15 ozs. and measured 20 inches. I understand that's the information I have to give out first, so people can just skip to the pictures after getting the measurements.

On the morning of the sixth, we got to the hospital at 6:30 a.m. so Debra could be induced before the baby got any bigger. We had a talkative, but great nurse and everything went smoothly--perhaps even more so than with our two daughters. My mother-in-law was in town and has been a great help--allowing me to spend most the day at the hospital with my wife and newborn. In the evening I came home to sleep before heading back to the hospital in the early hours of Friday. With the exception of a couple hours I spent biking to the university and going to a meeting for my teaching position, I was at the hospital for the entire day again. However, this time I stayed the night to allow my wife to get a little rest. Apparently she didn't get any sleep the night before because of our hungry, vociferous boy. Over the previous two days I hadn't got a lot of sleep, so by 3:00 a.m. this morning I was beginning to understand my wife's exhaustion. Fortunately, our son slept for a little bit after that and the nurses took him for a few quick tests, which allowed me to immediately fall asleep on the hard reclining chair by my wife's bed. Despite the accommodations, I haven't slept so soundly in a long time. It ended up being a short night, but at least we all got a little sleep.

As far as positioning the images is concerned, I'm still learning, so bear with me!

Our son doesn't seem to have any problem
with his vocal cords.

Remembering a Prophet

2008-02-03T18:08:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I sat in our office at home with my wife and daughters to watch the funeral of our beloved prophet, Gordon B. Hinckley. For thirteen years he has inspired us to "stand a little taller" and be a little better. I watched with a little bit of envy the thousands in attendance--thousands united to honor the passing of a prophet of God. But the minor pang of sadness at not being present in person to wave farewell with a white handkerchief was replaced with the knowledge that he is with his wife again. What a blessing it has been to have a prophet to guide us in these troubling times. What a blessing it is to know that God has not forgotten his children, that he has restored his gospel in its fullness in these latter days. As in days of old, his church is led by a prophet, and as in days of old, he leads us through the wilderness, he stands on the watchtower to warn of impending spiritual dangers that seek to destroy the very fabric of our society--the family. This said, Proclamation to the World on the Family couldn't have been revealed at a more appropriate time. While we have lost the company of a dear friend and prophet for a season, the Lord will continue to lead his church through a prophet. Our prayers should be full of thanks for the prophetic guidance that our Heavenly Father proffers us.