HAPPY 5TH BIRTHDAY, EMILY!!!

Yesterday was our Emily's birthday and I didn't get a chance to enter this until now. We hope she had a great day! What a fun grandaughter she has been.

This was taken this summer when Lee and Karyn came to take Whitney to EFY at Utah State University. It was a hot day and Emily found shade under a big tree. She likes to carry her things in a little purse Grandma crocheted for her.

This is one of the Barbie outfits I crocheted for her birthday this year. I hope she has fun with her presents. Emily, we love you very much!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ANDY!!!

Oh, yes! This is what I discovered just a couple minutes after I had left this little guy alone. (Never do that!) It was cleanser, which wasn't the easiest thing to clean up on our new laminate floor.

He must have had fun looking at his trail behind him. But it was easy to track the evidence.

See how similar Andy looks to his Raidon when he was a baby. Both darling! (I don't know how that dot on his nose got there.)

There's no doubt who his father is. We love you, Andy. Have a happy birthday!!!

I don't know what Sarah meant about not good pictures of her on the last blog. She's always cute! But after getting the pictures I wanted, here are a few that I would have posted before.

Of course, this is a few minutes after she flew in from Ukraine. She looked like an angel in white.

This is by the Draper Temple that we attended a few days later.

Diane is happy to have her sister back, as we all are!

Sarah's Homecoming

I've been slow in getting a blog out about Sarah being home, but I was waiting to get pictures from her camera and I still don't have them. So for now, these are the ones from mine. We had many family and friends over for her homecoming sacrament meeting and dinner after. She gave an excellent talk on her mission. I know she touched many lives. And she speaks Russian very well!
This is how we see her quite often now, chatting with friends from Ukraine or studying, as she has started classes at the "U". She is majoring in Russian and International Relations.

She made Borche for us one night and it was delicious. I will have to make it regularly now. She says people in Ukraine eat it all the time because it is inexpensive and good for you.

Sarah was asked to speak at our ward's family home evening group a couple weeks ago. She took some souvenirs and told about her experiences. Great job, Sarah.

As an added bonus to the homecoming day for Sarah, we presented Bruce with his diploma for finishing up his bachelors degree. We made it official with Andy's cap I noticed we had in one of his boxes.

Here's the group shot of those who stayed for the ceremony. Thank you to everyone who made an effort to be with us. We know that many more would have come if they could.

We're especially grateful for Mom and Dad Garrard for driving all the way out here for Sarah's homecoming. We loved having them with us for over a week.

This was they day they drove off to go back to Alabama in their new Ford Hybrid. We were happy to hear they made it home safely. Thank you so much for coming! We enjoyed your visit and we love you!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JARED

Oh, those were the days of raising little boys.... and there were some interesting things they did!

Jared was our little clown and we want to remember him today on his birthday.

He made good choices all his life (so far) and now has a beautiful wife, Candace, who we all love.

Here are some of his birthdays from the past.

I seemed to always reach for my camera when the birthday cake came out. Have a great day, Jared and remember you are loved and appreciated very much!!!

Sister Howard's Last Companion in Ukraine

I'm having a hard time sleeping tonight (it's 2 AM). I think it's because I'm so excited that our Sarah is coming home in a week! Hope to see many of you at her homecoming on August 9th. Be safe if you are travelling far. Love, Jeri

TAYLORSVILLE TALES IN JULY

There's a lot of work to be done at our house. Thanks to Jared and Lee we learned how to lay down laminate flooring.

This is what the kitchen floor looked like before Lee tore it out. Candace is working in the background. We appreciated the help!!!

Before Lee, Karyn, Zachary and Emily arrived to Utah, Whitney and her cousin, Jade, flew in to attend EFY at Utah State in Logan. They came to the Choir broadcast on Sunday before it started.

Here they are ready for their week at the dorms.

While Whitney and Jade were having their fun, the rest of us had some fun at Bear Lake. We had famous raspberry shakes with our lunch and did some water jet skiing. Grandma (me) was happy just to enjoy the sunshine and watch.

We walked the 800 or so steps inside Minnetonka Cave which is a cool 40 degrees. We enjoyed having this part of our family together for a week. Thanks for coming!

CHOIR TOUR

I got back over a week ago from the Central States Choir Tour. It was mostly bus riding from one town to the next. We sang 7 concerts in 13 days. This is Karen Barker and I in a city bus in St. Louis seeing some sights.

There was some pretty amazing scenery. This was taken from my bus seat, who knows where, at sunset.

I got to sing with a group of about 20 at a care center and two other groups sang in two other locations for older folks. It was very special. Our new associate director, Ryan Murphy, is on the far right in this picture.
We stopped at historical sites in Winter Quarters, Nauvoo, Kanesville, and Independence. I thought about our Bingham and Mortensen ancestors who crossed the plains and went through so much for us.

My roomate, Sylvia, and I had a lot of fun together.

The Choir had a photo shoot in St. Louis with their famous arch in the background. We had to stand in the same spot on a grassy hill for about an hour and a half singing the same 2 songs over and over again while the camera crew took pictures and videos. Then from above, a helicopter flew around and took more pictures. We had another photo shoot by the Missouri River.

In fact, camera crews were everywhere we went. They are putting together a 5-part series of a documentary about the tour.

In one of our dressing areas Beth Elmer and I found a couple of massage tables and made good use of them before a concert. It paid off.

In Kanesville I found plaques naming the Mormon Batallion companies and guess who was in Company B? Erastus and his first son, Thomas Bingham.

I visited the Murrah Federal Building site in Oklahoma City that got bombed in 1995. This is the tree of hope that survived in the middle of the memorial.

There is a field of chair-type markers for each of the 168 lost persons. The children lost had smaller chairs.

My favorite concert location was the Red Rocks amphitheatre outside Denver, CO. The scenery was breathtaking.

These seats were filled plus others totalling over 15,000 in the surrounding hills. President Monson made a surprise visit and came to the concert.

We gave each other back rubs on the bus as the end drew near. It was an enjoyable trip but we were glad to be back in Salt Lake City again. For more pictures and news about our tour, go to http://www.mormontabernaclechoir.org/.