Month: November 2021

I think that I want to formalize this hour of Family History so that I have a little more structure. Mondays I will do searching and finding names to take to the temple. Tuesdays I will do more searching to follow up on Mondays names. Wednesdays I will do indexing. Thursdays I will work in Memories uploading pictures, writing stories, exploring. Fridays will be Rootstech, reviewing talks and classes, etc. Saturdays will be exploring Activities section and involving others in my FH. Sundays I will work on my personal life story.

Today using Ordinance Ready tab, 5 names were found for me to do Initiatory work on this Thursday. I need to help my mother-in-law find 5 names to take also. I think we also have sealing appointment that day at 4 pm. I already have 6 names for sealing ordinances and 1 endowment which is next week on Dec. 8.

I reviewed the names for initiatory today and they are women who were wives of my cousins 3 or 4 times removed. Some lived in the States and others in England and Scotland. One of them was born in Scotland but died in Singapore. That sounds like quite a story.

One of the talks in church yesterday was on Family History and the speaker, Bro. Padilla, said that it is estimated over 110 billion people have lived on the earth. We have a lot of work to do! What an amazing task to connect all of those people to the Family tree of the earth! No wonder Pres. Nelson has said that gathering scattered Israel is the most important work we can be involved in at this time.

It has been 21 days since I started this iteration of my journey! I have missed posting only 1 day! I am pretty excited about the changes I am experiencing in my life. I have become a weekly temple attendee. I notice more people around me being interested in Family History..I am not claiming that it is my influence that has caused that. I know it is the Spirit of Elijah working to encourage all people whatever their religious beliefs to seek for connection to the past, to hear and tell stories, and to share love and concern.

This holiday weekend has been so memorable! Jessica, my oldest daughter, was here for Thanksgiving Dinner and the whole weekend. I hadn’t planned on her at all because she had to work on Thanksgiving Day but one of her co-workers volunteered to work her shift! It was so wonderful to see her walk in the door on Thursday afternoon. I think it was a blessing from the Lord. Nicole came home for Thanksgiving also and she helped me with pie-making on Wednesday and a lot of cooking on Thursday. Samantha helped out a lot with cooking and running errands on Thursday. We got to spend time with Cassandra on Friday and Saturday.

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Last night, all of our girls, Gil, Dan (Samantha’s boyfriend) and I met at Schmidts Christmas Tree Corner and picked out a Christmas tree. That has long been a family tradition to buy a fresh-cut Christmas tree. The girls will run around the lot in between the trees playing hide and seek whatever the weather. There was no running around last night but we were all together and got a picture together. The tree is still in the garage and not decorated but we will get to that tomorrow night hopefully. We have never bought our Christmas tree this early but we were all together and it seemed important to do.

Tonight, I had the opportunity to listen to Gil senior tell about playing Santa Claus for a family in Phillipsburg, Pennsylvania when he was in the Navy. I wish I would have recorded it on Family Search. I am going to write it up and then have him edit it and maybe then I can get him to record it while reading it.

I have learned a lot about using this blog and I know I have a lot to learn but it is coming. This week I will be getting up at 4:15 to do my Family History. I do so much better in my day when I give my best to the Lord early in the day.

Well, I made it almost 3 weeks without missing a post until yesterday. I did post my Day #18 late because of some issues with uploading the media files. On Friday, Day #19, I didn’t get my hour of Family History done in the morning. Then right after I finished work we left for bowling with the Parkins. I fell into bed later that night exhausted.

Today has been a great day! Jess, Samantha and Dan went with Gil and me and we climbed Squaw Peak in Utah County. We had a lot of fun and made some great memories.

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Hiking is something my family and I greatly enjoy doing together. We have hiked in Zion National Park, Bryce National Park, Yellowstone National Park, Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument, Grand Teton National Park, Grand Canyon National Park as well as numerous state parks in Nevada, Utah and Idaho. We have never taken our girls to Disneyland but we have amazing memories of some of the most beautiful places on earth.

I didn’t write on this day. It was extremely busy with work and then time with the Parkins at the bowling alley and I was exhausted when I got home.

Wonderful day making memories with my family on Thanksgiving Day. Nicole and Samantha did the Utah Human Race with Gil and Nicole’s friend, Owen. I had to work and so I didn’t do the race so I could start work at 7:45. My plan was to be done with my list by 3:30 and I was pretty close, got done at 4:10.

Nicole and Samantha and Gil did last minute grocery shopping and cooking. They really worked well together though it got stressful at times. One of the best moments of the day came around 2:20 when Jess walked through the door!! I hadn’t been expecting her because she had told me.she had to work on Thanksgiving. Apparently, a co-worker wanted to work so she switched shifts and decided to surprise us. It has been wonderful to have her here. Liz came with her and had dinner but then Liz had to go back k for an appointment tomorrow. Jess is staying until Sunday.

We had a very nice Thanksgiving dinner at Steve and Tracy’s home. It was so nice to see nieces and nephews that I haven’t seen much lately. Some us played the game Relative Insanity,..very fun game that made me laugh a lot.

It is so fun to hear memories shared between siblings, cousins, in -laws, etc.. Especially while eating such good food prepared with love.

Today I got a chance to make some history or rather memories with my daughter, Nicole, and my mother-in-law, Brenda. We spent afternoon making apple, cherry, and pumpkin pies. I have been helping my mother-in-law make pies for many years. I use my Grandma Baldwin’s Never Fail Pie Crust recipe that truly has never failed for me. Sometimes the pie filling isn’t good but the crust is always light and flaky.

It is fun to see the way Nicole enjoys making pies. She did some great designs this time leaves, hearts, turkeys, braided crust, lattice crust..she even made a smiley face on one of the cherry pie. I will post some pictures tomorrow.

I also got to talk to Brenda about her holiday memories. I was driving at the time so I couldn’t write things down. I am going to try and use the record feature in Memories tomorrow. Brenda talked about sharing Thanksgiving dinner with many of her Brady family relatives. They actually lived on the same street in a little enclave in the Fort Union area called Bradysville. She didn’t remember a specific dish that was her favorite but she remembers not liking bread pudding or head cheese. Brenda told me that she wishes she had written down her mother’s recipe for some sweet pickle/relish that she loved to eat but hasn’t been able to find a recipe for it.

This conversation made me realize that I really need to write down some of the recipes that my family likes and that I like of my mother’s and my mother-in-law’s or those favorites will be lost.

We also made Grandma’s macaroni and cheese casserole and cooked sweet potatoes for sweet potato casserole and those who eat plain sweet potatoes.

Today I went to the Jordan River Temple and did sealings. I did them for cousins living in the 18th century in British Colonial America and Alsace, France and Indiana. I love hearing the words of the sealing prayers.

Nicole just got home from Dixie State University with a couple of friends. They are eating the white bean corn tomatillo soup I made this evening. Nicole was welcomed home with the first snowfall in the valley of the season.

Today I posted about my Grandpa Watt’s 111th birthday on Facebook.

This is what I posted on Facebook:

Today is Grandpa Watt’s 111th birthday! November 22, 1910. Grandpa is now as old as Bilbo Baggins in the Lord of the Rings series. Grandpa kind of looks like a hobbit because he wasn’t very tall. One of my favorite memories of Grandpa Watt is his smile when I would come in the house to visit. He always seemed to be sitting in his favorite chair in the living room. I remember being so proud of him and Grandma when they went on their mission. Before they left on their mission (I think this is the right timing), my parents had Grandpa and Grandma and many of Grandpa’s brothers, sisters, in laws as well as my aunt and uncles over to our house for a party. I remember listening to them share stories about Grandpa. That is where I learned that he used to go out on the desert by the Big Butte and hunt coyotes in the winter. The story was told of making white gravy from the snow outside the tent and realizing after it was made that it had rabbit droppings in it! I wish so much that that whole evening had been recorded and pictures taken. There were so many wonderful stories.

I was also able to email my Uncle Bill Watt regarding the letter on Family Search written by George D. Watt.

I am excited to participate in the Light the World program this year. I made myself a calendar of activities on Light the World .

I want to take my in-laws and Nicole up to the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers museum this Wednesday. I have always wanted to go there and see what ancestors I can identify.

Had a fun visit with my sisters today about the Storyworth project for my parents. I have committed to work with my brother-in-law Aaron to get pictures and articles scanned that will be put in my parents’ s Storyworth book. I also committed to talk to my aunts and uncles and get their stories about my parents.

I spent a lot of time today working on getting the Angel Tree for the ward ready. Such generous people in our ward..most of the 60+ gifts were taken in just 15 minutes.

A sister in the ward has a contact with a lady who distributes toys to foster kids so I am going to share that opportunity on the Bugler for donations as well. I feel very humbled by the kindness of so many people.

Troywo

My second to the last day of clinical at the University of Utah Medical Center. It has been long day but good day.

I haven’t done much FH today but I did spend some time on Family Search. I worked on a change locations in Thailand. I also worked on some hints. I looked for a great great great great grandmother on the Watt side.

There have been quite a few entries on FB about Grandpa Baldwin. I need to go on tomorrow and figure out how to get them moved to Family Search and send that letter to Uncle Bill.