Vivian & David

A couple of days before March began, I was in Minneapolis with Rebecca and David helping them clean, sort, and organize their house in preparation for getting it on the market. I came back home with a bad cold, but still went to lunch with Miss Frink as planned.

I prepared and shared my 20 minute Sacrament Meeting talk, including several stories about our mission that I was invited to share along with the general conference topic for the talk. It was good and I got to meet several ward members.

The food storage items got unpacked and put on the new shelves that David had built. Then I began working on the toy and game boxes which brought the reward of finding the two missing lamps I had been looking for plus some other missing items. I also moved book shelves and furniture around to make a play room area for the grandchildren to enjoy. It was a lot of work to get it ready before they came, but so rewarding to watch the children play there and helping them color a mural on the cardboard wall we had made.

One day I got the old dirty inherited frig/freezer cleaned out. It took most of the day, and I was soaking wet from using the hose, but now we are using it.

I attended my first new ward's Enrichment meeting of the RS Birthday dinner which was good. I know Rebecca's ward RS Birthday dinner was good too because I helped Rebecca on the phone when she was trying to decide which ones would be the best of her many good ideas. I also attended my first stake Relief Society Women's Conference in our new stake. The sisters were invited to join in the stake Priesthood Meeting with our stake president. We learned that Pres. Woods is dynamite.

On the 17th, my Mom would have been proud of me for what I got accomplished in her honor of her birthday. All of my hard work and endurance of unpacking boxes paid off. This day I finally felt like I had made a break through and the boxes that were left were ones that I can live with and take care of later; i.e. All of the boxes, mission books and materials sent home from Africa, scrap book/journal supplies, pictures, and photos both framed and unframed.

I began the move-in errands of picking up things from the hardware and discount stores to get things set up in a more completed way. Also began to start getting groceries for a more long term period.

Gregory and Melinda came down on the 21st and we got to have Amelia and Nicolas on our own for about 3-4 days before Greg & Mindy came back from being at Disney World for Melinda's birthday, and visiting St. Augustine and Savannah. While they were gone, Stephanie with Grant, Clark, and Natalie came to visit us during their Spring Break. So the cousins got to have 2-3 days of time together. Nicolas favorite thing was being at the airport watching the airplanes come in and go out!

Oh we had lots of fun and good times with the grandkiddleo's! We took them to the library and to the playground. We played outside in the good weather with balls until we were about to drop. During the rainy days, they all helped me make Easter cupcakes with green coconut and jelly beans on top. They decorated the delivery bags with stickers, too. Each with our umbrellas in the rain delivered the cupcakes to our new neighbors.

The children enjoyed the movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang with Easter popcorn balls and Veggie Tales movie with veggie tale fruit snacks. We also fed bread to the birds, played Uno, built a playhouse from a big cardboard box, blew bubbles, and because of the rain we used the garage floor for chalk drawings of tic tac toe and hopscotch. We made a strawberry pie to eat and made play doh to play with. Grant built a brite lite drawing.

With the grandchildren we read story books and played games together such as Sorry, Go Fish, dominos, puzzles, battleship, Hi Ho Cherrio, and enjoyed ice cream cones. Gregory & Mindy came back late at night and we got to play Clue. The next morning all three families went to Monkey Joe's before Greg & Melinda left for their home in Nashville.

With the Sorensen children I went to the photographers when they got their pictures taken. I even got in one pose with them. Their pictures turned out so good, it was hard to choose the best ones. Grandpa took Grant and Clark to play golf at the Atlanta Athletic Club. Then at night before they were to go home, we went to Chuck E. Cheese for some pizza and lots of fun games.

On the 31st their visit ended with a tender mercy at the airport. Grandma/pa were able to get an airport security pass to help get Natalie, Clark & Grant through security with their back packs, shoes off and on, the tram ride, and getting to the airplane to get on.