One Week 2 Weddings 1800 Mile Round Trip (and other amzing feats)

I saw this title from Aunt Donna on Facebook and thought it was cool so I stole it (and because I can't think of anything original either) but it captures our Holidays pretty well.

Last year we got the wonderful news that Kristan Bond our niece was getting married on the 22 of December and made plans to attend.  After that Chantel decided to change her name to Nowlen (that's pronounced KnowLan for anyone who doesn't know Brian yet, which means that pretty much all of my daughters have changed their last names to names that prove that spelling in English makes no sense at all).  We told her that she needed to plan her wedding in a way that wouldn't mess up Kristan's wedding.

So here was our schedule.  Karen, Linda, Brian and Chantel all left for Lake Jackson to arrive on Monday January 19th  to help with Kristan's wedding.  I stayed home because I didn't have enough time off to take off the whole week so I flew to Houston on Wednesday morning.  The ironic thing was that I was planning to drive to work on Tuesday so that I could get home early enough to visit with my mother Tuesday night before someone drove me to the airport Wednesday morning.  Monday that week work was canceled because of snow but usually the roads after a snow are terrible in Santa Fe and I didn't want to deal with the stress of driving up and I was feeling pretty cocky about silver water keeping me healthy so I took two days off sick leave which meant that I didn't go to work that week at all, but spent the first two day's at home.  (What does it say in Bible about pride?  Oh yeah pride goeth before the fall, but that's a story for later.  I'd planned to take a day of sick leave anyway but decided to take another because of the roads.)  Kiora was supposed to drive up for the wedding as well, but she and her kids were sick so she didn't come.  Karen and Chantel and it seemed like everyone wasa sick.

Karen, Chantel and Brian picked me up at the Houston Airport.  It was the smaller airport.  I was late getting off the plane because we were parked on the tarmac for half an hour while our slot was cleared out.  I was standing on the curb waiting for them to pick me up and Chantel called me to ask where I was and I said I was standing on the curb right as the van they were in drove up and Chantel and I were looking at each other about ten feet away.  The wonders of technology.  So I jumped in the van with Karen, Chantel and Brian and we drove about 100 miles to pick up Teda and Mark who had come and visited Mark's brother then we drove back to Lake Jackson.  The next day was Kristan and Zach's sealing and it was wonderful to see a new eternal family created.  Then we all went to lunch at a barbecue place and then we went back to Lake Jackson for the reception.

The next day we took off for Dallas, all 7 of us, Karen, me, Chantel, Brian, Teandra, Mark and Linda.  We were supposed to have two vans at this point but since Kiora didn't come we had only one van.  I was thinking that we needed to ask Donna and Greg to bring some of our stuff with them but Karen said that she could load everything.  Have I ever mentioned that Karen is the greatest packer in the world?  Now I think she she's a wizard like in Harry Potter with a tent that has an extra dimension.  She was able to pack everything and we were able to drive 6 hours to Sherman without killing each other.  This in itself is a testimony of the Gospel and that family's are forever.

We spent Christmas with Kiora's family over Christmas and it was a lot of fun.  It's always nice to have Christmas fall on a Sunday.  This year I thought was especially special that Pres. Monson said that we only needed to go to Sacrament Meeting.  It was very nice to take the Sacrament and remember the Savior in a special way on the day we celebrate His birth.

The next day, Monday, we drove back to Rio Rancho in two vans.  This time we had Kiora, Alex, Chio, Ryan, Karen, me, Brian, Chantel, Mark and Teda and the Gospel's still true.  Tuesday we had the Sealing of Brian and Chantel as an Eternal Family.  By this time Greg and Donna had made the trip from Lake Jackson to witness the sealing and help with the wedding (thus the stealing of the title for this blog), Shawn and Barry had come from Utah to witness the Sealing, Lisa, my sister had come from Arizona to witness the sealing.

It was a wonderful ceremony and Chantel and Brian were ecstatic.  However, I came down with a cold.  Remember the pride thing.

Then we had to prepare for the Friday reception.  Teandra did an amazingly miraculous job decorating the cookies and the cake for the wedding.  She was wonderful.  And she did an amazing hulu during the wedding for Chantel and Brian.  All the family gathered Friday for the decoration of the cultural hall at 9:30 AM.  We were extremely grateful for all the help from our friends and family in getting everything arranged.  (I'll get some pictures up.  I sorta promise.  This web stuff is not that hard but it can be confusing to figure it out.)

The Ring Ceremony and Reception was pretty awesome.  All of Chantel's sisters were there, and their friends.  Brian's brother was there and Brian's mother, friends and family.  There are always a lot of family and friends at these things but at this one there were more than usual because it was Christmas.  Also, Kristan and Zach showed up for the reception which was cool.  I told them that they had to hurry and tell Chantel and Brian all their marriage experience because they were married twice as long as Brian and Chantel were but they would never be in that position again.  It just seemed like everything aligned just right and it was a wonderful party.  Brian actually had to tell everyone to go home at 8:00.  It was kind of funny because I was talking to someone, who I was pretty sure was non-LDS, and I said it looked like the party wasn't dying and he said I would find out at 1:00 when I  was trying to get people to go home, and I was thinking that he obviously didn't know about LDS receptions.  Iwalani even said that it was her favorite reception, even better than hers.  That's a pretty high recommendation. 

That Sunday, Jan 1, 2012 everyone got to bless little Corry.  That Sunday night we'd invited the missionaries over for dinner and it was the first Sunday of the month so it was the night that we have our family over for dinner.  Brian still had his brother visiting and his mother came by and we invited her as well and we ended up having 15 people over for dinner that Sunday night.  Then we played "Catch Phrase" and that was a ton of fun. 

The only problem was that the cold that I'd caught on Tuesday hung on and I almost totally lost my voice on Friday, the day of the reception, then the cough started.  I'd hoped that I'd dodged getting sick this year but I got sick after hanging out with sick people for a whole week.  You know, sick people like my grand kids that I hold on my lap and play with (at least that's my excuse).  Saturday I tried to stop talking to everyone to handle the coughing then I didn't go to anything but Sacrament Meeting on Sunday so that I wouldn't have to talk to anyone, and that didn't work really well Sunday night during all the family game fun.

The long and short of the story is that we had a Holiday filled with family, friend and lots of traveling and everyone came through it sane and happy.  We went from a home filled with 15 people Sunday night to just me tonight.  Sadly one of Karen Aunts died over the holidays so Karen and Linda left to Utah for the funeral.  I'm home alone tonight with that crappy cold that I get every year, but I went to the doctor today and he said it hasn't gotten into my lungs yet, so it's not bronchitis but sinusitis or something like that.  That's good.  If I can get over the cold this week and only be sick for a couple of weeks I'm going to count this as a win for the silver water even though I did get sick.

Am I a Cultural Mormon?

I've wondered about this pretty much my whole life.  While I don't doubt my testimony and I've felt that it was a marvelously great blessing to be born into a family where the gospel was taught, I've always wondered if I would have joined the Church if I hadn't been born into it.

Recently as I was reading the Book of Mormon one day I was thinking about how I seem to always believe in things that are a little on the edge.  Tell me about the Electrical Universe and let me do a little reading about it and I become convinced that the Sun is not a nuclear furnace but a ball of plasma that is part of a great web of electrical energy that drives the cosmos.  Tell me about eating low carb to control diabetes and I'll read tens of books about it and start doing it no matter what people tell me about how it's impossible to stay on the diet or is bad for me.  Same with colloidal silver (silver water).  As I was thinking about this it occurred to me that if I hadn't been born in the Church and someone gave me a Book of Mormon to read and some tracts, what would I do with them?  Of course I'd have read them, I read everything someone gives me, and then the Spirit would have had a chance to work on me.  Of course this would have depended on someone wanting to give me a Book of Mormon which might not have happened, but I'm sure now that I would have read the book.

It's funny the thoughts that you have answered while you read the Book of Mormon.  I'm not sure that I've ever formally prayed about would I have joined the Church, but it's been in the back of my mind for ages and now it's not.

Another Grandbaby and no Jury Duty

Well this blog has a new look, and the last post was obviously about some things that happened a while ago.  I'd written that post and then when I got ready to post everything on the Google Blogging site had changed and it took me a while to get a chance to figure out what had happened.  Actually the changes were not that great but it took a while to figure things out.  Anyway when I went back I found that I had already written that last post and forgotten about it and just got around to posting it.

We've been blessed with another grand baby.  This one is Corry Arron Nichols.  He was born 12/2/11 exactly one month after his cousin Jonathan Ryan Nield.  I think that's pretty cool.

Here's is the account of Corry's birth.  He was supposed to be induced the day that he came in to the world naturally.  However, that day the hospital was so full that they couldn't induce and Iwalani was very upset, but later that day she went into labor naturally and I was glad because that meant that I was able to go to the hospital and be there when Corry was born.  Brian was there with Chantel and he asked me something and I said that I wasn't that experienced with babies being born, and he said that I'd been there when my kids were born and I said that the last time that happened was 20 years ago when Chantel was born.

Anyway it was a super cool I thought.  There was one funny thing that happened.  Right after he was born I was talking to the other Grandfather and some how we decided that his name was supposed to be Corry Ryan.  I thought it was a little weird that he had the same middle name as his cousin.  It didn't occur to me I was full of smelly stuff and I sent out a text message to my family with the wrong name.  I didn't realize what I'd done until the next morning when Kiki called and asked if kidding about the name, or if I'm just really dumb.  I had to admit that I'm just dumb, and then tell all my sisters and brother that I'd screwed up.

Here's a health report, that deals with silver water somewhat.  So far this winter I haven't caught my annual bout with bronchitis/pneumonia and that's great.  That's also meant that I've been exercising regularly since after the surgery, and I was riding my stationary bike up until just a week before the surgery but I had to stop the body weight exercises sometime before that.  I'm thinking that this is good and I was thinking that my Phase 1 physical (which is the physical I get every year with my job that proves how reliable of a person I am).  So I'm having my EKG and then the nurse calls in a "Truck on 115653."  I'm thinking 115653!  That's my Z number, what the heck is a truck?  Are they calling an ambulance on me?  Then the nurse tells me that my EKG is abnormal and I can't leave until a doctor (or PA) looks at my EKG.  Then the nurse tells me that it's probably not a problem because my heart beat was low and that sometimes causes a low voltage which is what the EKG said.  So this is the second abnormal EKG I've had in 4 months.  No one told me anything about why I had an abnormal EKG last time so hopefully it was the same thing and there's nothing wrong with my ticker.

I'm finishing this up this Monday morning.  It's snowing pretty hard here and the Lab closed.  It's pretty funny what happened.  I drove to the train station this morning and before I left I checked to see if the Lab was on a delay or closed and nothing so I drove to the train station.  Right before I got out of the truck I checked again and they had put the Lab on a delay.  I came home and went to back to bed.  I got up and it was really snowing and I thought the roads would really be sucky to drive on so I called the Lab and they were still on a delay.  So I drove to the train station again and right before I got out I called again and the Lab had been closed for the day.  So I drove home again.  Then Goose called me and I told her the story and she said; "Wouldn't it be ironic if I had both these days off?"  That's what I was thinking as well, but the thing about this type of a day off is that if you had already scheduled the day off you can't change it to "Report Pay" (which is how we report the day on our pay report) so I had to have been planning to go to work to get the day off.  Unfortunately with my hernia operation and Aaron's funeral and everything else I've barely go enough vacation time to cover going to Kristen's wedding and the time between Christmas and New Years when the lab closes.  Anyway I thought it was pretty serendipitous that each time I got out of the car the message for the day had changed.

Jury Duty and a Grandbaby

A few months ago I got a letter in the mail that said that I was called to federal jury duty.  Well after I got that letter I filled out everything online, then I got a hernia.  Then I got a summons about two weeks before my hernia surgery, and on the day I was supposed to get a colonoscopy.  So I freaked out and left them a message that I needed to have these medical procedures taken care of and when I called back they said that I didn't need to show up.  That was nice of them.

However, I got another summons on 10/31.  That's right Halloween and the last day of my jury duty, but this time I got picked for jury duty, federal jury duty.  Actually it was not that bad of an experience and it was pretty enlightening but the situation at work was pretty tense so I was hoping that I wouldn't have to serve.  But I did get picked.

First of all it was a civil case not a criminal case so there were only 8 jurors.  It was a skiing accident where someone uphill hit someone who had stopped downhill and broke his hip so that he had to have a hip replacement.  The first thing we wondered about was why it was a federal case at all.  I asked and it was because the plaintiff and the defendant were in different states that it was a federal case.  So when someone says don't make a federal case of it they're being realistic you really can make a federal case of something and this is what happened.

We decided that it was an accident and that no one had been negligent.  At the end of the trial the judge invited us up to her chambers and we all went up, the jurors that is.  This was probably the most enlightening part of the whole experience.

Actually it worked pretty much the way that I thought that it would with the information that I picked up from TV and John Grisham novels.  A jury pool is called, there was 28 of us, and they put everyone in random order.  I was 12th which is not a very good position to be in.  The lawyers ask us questions which is a process called "voir dire" which is a French term meaning "to tell the truth" at least that's what they told us.  After they ask us questions the judge and lawyers go in and decide which jurors they will use.  They lawyers get to challenge a certain number of jurors for whatever reason they want, and the judge said that the lawyers always challenge lawyers in the jury pool because no one wants a lawyer on the jury.  After that they dismiss jurors for cause.  After that they take jurors numerically.  However, when they called us they again called us randomly so I didn't know it until the judge told us.

We don't really know how they picked us.  There was one juror who said that he owned his own business and that if he wasn't there he didn't earn an income.  However, during the trial we learned that he had family that was visiting from Germany.  When the judge learned about that she said that she would have dismissed him for that but that she couldn't dismiss him for financial reasons.  I admitted that I'd tried snowboarding once and hurt myself in the first 1/2 hour.  I was trying to be honest, but I was kind of hoping that they would thing that I would be biased against snowboarding, but apparently that didn't work.  Turns out that 5 of the jurors said something, 3 didn't, and we were a cross section of society; young, old, middle age, and seemed like a cross section of economic means as well.

I did find one thing interesting about being a juror.  In the movies everyone stands for the judge.  We stood for the judge at the beginning, but after we were called as jurors everyone stood for us when we entered or exited the court room.  I thought it was pretty cool.  On a personal level I didn't have to commute to Los Alamos so that's always a plus, and I got to go see Halloween and Trisha's house.  Trish said that they didn't even put that much stuff out for this Halloween.

Thennnnnn.  Kiki brought little Jonathan Ryan Nield into the world Wednesday.  Yeah.

It's Been a While

It's been a while since I've written and things have been crazy.

Well I guess the first thing to say is that Chantel, my baby, is engaged to Brian Nowlen.  He's a nice guy and Goose seems ecstatic when she's around him.

I've been doing some reading that I'm really excited about and I hope that I can get caught up on on my other blog. 

However, things have been going crazy around here, and at work at the same time.  Karen left to help Kiki because she's have trouble with her pregnancy.  A couple of weeks after she leaves Nini starts having trouble with her pregnancy.  She starts having contractions and is admitted to the hospital.  'Remy texts everyone that she's in the hospital while we're in Church.  I decided to go home after Sacrament Meting because I wasn't going to be able to concentrate.  So I pick up Chantel and Brian and we're on our way to the hospital while Chantel is talking to Karen when Karen finally realizes that Nini is in the hospital, and Chantel stops talking to Karen and turns around and asks if anyone told Mom about Nini.  I thought it was pretty funny.

So now we have two problem pregnancies going on.  This has been a bad pregnancy year for the Evans' family.  Hopefully for Christmas this year we will be celebrating with two new little additions to our family.

My job has suddenly turned crazy.  Actually, it's not all that bad and it's probably a blessing.  Two of our DBs became corrupted somehow.  I kind of think that we were set up, but the problems that we've had have forced us to really learn how our systems are running, and how we can keep them running.  I keep thinking that if we get through this patch we'll be able to get the system running smoothly and then we'll have a chance to catch our breath and things will calm down.

The Surgery was Successful

Well the surgery was successful I'm told.  The surgeon told Karen that the hernia was bigger than expected and there were two kinds of hernia, or something like that.  I have a follow up appointment with the surgeon next Thursday.

Work has been crazy coming up to this point.  I guess things could be crazier but it would be hard to imagine.  It all started in April when we had a V&V which means verification and validation.  What that meant is that a auditor came to look at our computers at work that handle letting people into buildings.  The computer that they looked at ended up being the worst computer that they could have picked.  Our team had written a security plan (SP) that assumed that we were running an application on the network that the Laboratory provided us.  However, they never looked at our application but only looked at how we did network stuff.  Suddenly we were running a network.  So that meant that we had our jobs all redefined for us.  Then we had to get our computer system certified and our team leader had me help with that.  Then suddenly we learn that our primary system administrator, the guy that basically built everything, is taking a new position.  The first week he's off is the week that I'm off for surgery.  So why am I saying all this?  Because my stress level seems to have been heightened, and I keep getting the canker sores but because I have the silver water they haven't become a great set of sores in my mouth.  I think I've had about seven canker sores start and then not get bad because of the silver water.  Well I think it's the silver water.  So I'm trying to get everyone using it.  However, the test, for me, will be if I can get through the winter without getting bronchitis or pneumonia.

We Said Goodbye to Aaron

Monday morning Karen called me at work and told me that her Dad had died.  It wasn't expected or unexpected, but Karen was with him when he died, and that was unexpected.

Sunday I'd brought the priests over to give Aaron the sacrament and that was very special.  Matt Vigil was one of the priests and he was at the funeral.  I mentioned it to him and he said that he'd already thought about it and was glad he'd been able to administer the sacrament for him the last time.

Aaron was a very special father and father-in-law.  At lunch I shared with Shawn, Barry and the twins how shortly after Karen and I were married Aaron told me about how people had asked him if he was worried about me marrying his daughter, and he told me that he'd told them that people could change.  I know that he'd had to convince Norma that things would work out with me marrying her daughter.  I always thought that he was in my corner in the Bond Family.

The thing about LDS Funerals is they always seem to be a joyous/sad event.  Joyous because they are like a family reunion, sad because we are not going to get to meet or talk to Aaron again in this life.  However, Kiki and Chio came from Texas.  Teandra flew in from Indiana.  Chantel took some time off from school, and her "friend" Brian came out.  Iwalani is always here so all my girls are together again and I decided to take off work so I get to spend time with them so that's joyous for me.  Shawn's family all came, without wives, which is sad because I like their spouses, and Kelsey and Josh brought their kids.  Greg and Donna brought their kids, and Rachel brought little Carson "CB" Ethington.  Carson is the cutest kid.  He's small for his age so you don't think he can walk then suddenly he pops up and takes off walking like a pro.  "CB" stands for Charlie Brown because he has this round little tow head, just like Kiora used to have, except he has more hair that Kiora had.  Shaun and Rachel came down and Darby and Eddie brought their kids.  So it's like a family reunion and a lot of fun but it's a sad occasion as well.

Writing this gives me some insights, as the last few funerals have given me insights.  First, I used to suppose that those on the other side were not lonely, but why wouldn't they be?  I suppose Aaron will miss Karen as much as Karen misses him.  Second, we're having a good time with family and reminiscing and I suppose Aaron's having a "family reunion" on the other side as well where Aaron will be having a good time as well meeting people he hasn't seen in a very, very long time, and he could be telling Jaden about his Mom and how special she is.

I believe the phrase is "on Earth as it is in Heaven."

The funeral was a good one.  Greg did a great job on the eulogy.  He got the tone just right especially about Linda.  He said that Aaron meeting and marrying Linda was a miracle, and that she probably saved his life.  I'll always be grateful to Linda for what she did for Aaron, and I'm pretty sure that Karen feels similarly.  I remember the first time Aaron saw Linda.  He was introducing me as a speaker at a single adult activity, and he forgot my name.  He later said that as soon as he saw Linda he forgot everything else, including my name.  Apparently he'd had a dream of a woman and Linda was that dream.

Now we enter a new phase in our family and I'm not sure how it's going to work.  I guess we've always been a blended family, but now I'm beginning to realize it.  Here's a perfect example of what I mean.  Tonight I was talking to Chantel, and said that she was now down to one grandparent, but she didn't say anything.  I asked her how many grandparents that she thought she had and she said two right away.  I then asked Kiora how many she had and she said one right away, meaning that she doesn't really think that Linda is her grandmother but Chantel does.

We're going to treat Linda as a part of the family.  We always had to be sure that we told Linda what was going on with our family if we wanted Aaron and her to show up.  If we invited Aaron he never came.  We never figured that one out.  Anyway we're going to tell Linda (Nan) that she's invited to come over to our family dinners every 2nd and 4th Sunday, just like she and Aaron have always been invited.  Chantel is an adult and she'll invite her grandmother to whatever is going on in her life.  Karen see's Linda more as a friend than a mother, someone she's grateful for what she did for her father.