Spanish Fork Pioneer Cemetery Pictures by Janene Baadsgaarad

The restoration of the Spanish Fork Pioneer Cemetery has been a dream come true for me. Each time I go there I feel peace and joy. I feel so grateful that I was able to be part of this wonderful project. I hope you enjoy these pictures that show the remarkable transformation of this sacred site. I hope you are able to visit some day. For an article about the re-dedication click here.

Spanish Fork Pioneer Cemetery Story by Janene Baadsgaard and given at the Rededication on July 21, 2009

WE REMEMBER

A tribute written for the Pioneer Cemetery Re-dedication

given July 21, 2009

by

Janene Baadsgaard


I would like each of you to close your eyes for a moment and imagine you have suddenly been taken back in time to the 1850’s. You are a Spanish Fork pioneer. A number of years ago you were driven from a comfortable home and have since made a difficult journey to the Salt Lake Valley. Then you were called by Brigham Young to settle here in this area.
You possess only a small wagon and team with scanty food supplies. During the summer you live out of your four-foot-wide wagon box or in a tent. There is little to eat: jack rabbits, fish, and pigweed. You cook your food over an open fire. Without the means to construct a log or adobe home, you dig a hole in ground and pray for a mild winter.
In the first few years of colonization many families gather to this area and become your neighbors. Some settlers live along the river bottoms just below this site and others about three miles west. With so many dug-outs this settlement is soon called gopher town. Your sod roof becomes dripping mud in wet weather. Mosquitoes, snakes, flies, and mice are in your food, hair and blankets.
Most of your crops have been destroyed by a grasshopper plague and you don’t know how you are going to make it through the winter. You hope for mild weather, but soon discover that this winter is cold, harsh and filled with tragic accidents and disease. Cattle are dying; typhus fever and cholera are spreading.
Yet even in these trying times you fall in love, marry and work hard to provide for your new family. You are now expecting your first child. Then suddenly one day during a blizzard your wife screams your name you know there isn’t enough time to call for the midwife. As you desperately try to comfort your companion, you fear you are about to lose both your wife and child. Then, your tiny son slips into the world. You clear his mouth with your finger and listen to his first cry break the frigid air as you wrap him tightly in your own coat.
Wind howls outside your dug-out. You have only an old quilt between you, your family and a severe storm. Your wife is weak and tired so you huddle under the blankets with the baby safely between you. You speak of spring and warmer times ahead. You silently pray the whiteout will cease so you can go for help, but the snowstorm rages on. Then finally in sheer exhaustion, you, your wife and baby fall asleep.
When the first stream of sunlight breaks into your dug-out the next morning you wake and notice the wind has stopped. You are relieved the storm has past. Then you glance over to your wife. She is still asleep, but you notice your newborn son has grown cold. You try desperately to blow warm air on his face but your breath drifts like smoke into the frigid air. Your tiny newborn’s face is blue. And then you know for sure what you think you cannot bare . . . your child is dead.
Later, when you leave your wife’s side to go for help, a kind neighbor assists you with the burial of your only child by keeping a fire burning all day and night so he can get his spade into the frozen earth. The bluff of the hill just above your dug-out is your child’s final resting place. As your newborn son is slowly lowered into the earth, you look out over the snow covered river bottoms and raise your eyes to the majestic view of rugged mountains to the east. Then you kneel in the frozen snow beside his grave, whisper your last goodbye and weep.
This is the story of one person who is buried in the Spanish Fork Pioneer Cemetery. There are many more. Because I did the research to find the names and stories of those buried here, I now feel I should take off my shoes when I walk here; for this is sacred ground. This pioneer cemetery is the final resting place of those who lived and died struggling to survive during the difficult early years of building a new settlement in Spanish Fork. Their lives deserve to be remembered and honored.

So, to the dead who were laid to rest here we say . . . we remember you . . . we remember your name . . . we remember your bravery in the face of hardship. We remember the babies who died in your arms. We remember your pain and tears. We remember all you gave up for us. Yet we also remember your joy and your boldness to begin anew in spite of trials and hardship. Because of you we also desire to find new courage to move ahead with our own lives in spite of the challenges we face today. Because of you we remember spring follows the winter and a new dawn always follows even the darkest night.
We remember each of you with hope, optimism, love and deepest respect. We remember you . . . and we will never forget.

SPANISH FORK PIONEER CEMETERY IS REBORN - by Janene Baadsgaard (Stay tuned for transformation photos and re-dedication program soon.)

A few years ago I was asked to be the chairman of the committee to restore the original Spanish Fork Cemetery. This invitation sparked my interest because I had an ancestor who died in Spanish Fork in the early 1850’s who is not listed as being buried in the current cemetery. Each year on July 24th, I’d hike a weed covered hill to the site of the original cemetery on a bluff overlooking the Spanish Fork River. There were no headstones there and the place was overgrown with weeds. The only way to tell this site was once a pioneer cemetery was by an old rock and mortar monument that listed fifteen names. I had to wonder, “If my ancestor’s name is missing from this list on the monument, who else is missing? It didn’t seem right that the earliest settlers to this area were all but abandoned and forgotten.

When I took this assignment I was told there was no known list of the people buried there and it would impossible to compile such a list. So plans moved ahead to restore the cemetery and turn the surrounding area into a memorial garden with a life size bronze statue of a pioneer family, a walking path and story boards. Generous Spanish Fork City leaders, community members and volunteers gave of their money and time to help in the effort. Yet something inside me couldn’t let go of the idea that I had to try to compile the most complete list to date of possible burials at this abandoned cemetery.

I heard conflicting stories about the old headstones. No one knew what happened to them. One day I was looking at the monument and noticed some of the old headstones had been used like decorative bricks in the monument. Several markers were placed along the top. Two were loose and when I removed them I could see the initials of two deceased persons – (W. G. E. and H. M. G.). It was an electrifying moment that tugged at my heart. I knew I had to do everything I could to locate the names of all the burials.

So I searched old sexton’s records, Deseret News death notices, family histories, local history books, original LDS church ward records, and web sites dedicated to family research. I invited any person interested to help me in this search. Because records at that time are incomplete and spotty at best, the search was long and complicated. I found some bodies had been buried in this original cemetery but later disinterred and moved to the current cemetery. Some bodies were not moved but new headstones were later placed in the current cemetery. I also found that both the original and the current Spanish Fork cemetery were used concurrently for a period of time.

During my research I uncovered many touching stories about the earliest settlers. These courageous people lived in tents, wagon boxes or dug-outs. They dealt with hostile natives, crop failures, inadequate shelter, starvation, illness, tragic accidents, poverty and disease. I read the story of a young mother and father huddled together under a blanket on a freezing cold night trying to keep their newborn alive inside their primitive dug-out. When they woke in the morning, their tiny child had frozen to death during the night. I learned about a volunteer sexton who kept a fire burning all night so he could get a shovel into the frozen earth to bury the dead. And through it all, I learned to truly reverence and honor the people who lived and died here.

I have now uncovered over 100 names. Names that have been forgotten and lost but are forgotten and lost no more.

We will be having a re-dedication ceremony on July 21 at 7:00. If you can't make it to the ceremony come by another time . . . and soak in the peace and hope that reside at this place. The panoramic view from this sacred site is perhaps the most majestic in all of Utah County. I hope you will visit some day. And may you find the courage to move forward with your life in spite of the challenges you face.

A Home For ALL Decades

I’ve read all the interior decorating books where they inform novices like me to select colors and furnishings that all go together so one room of my house will flow into the next without abrupt changes in styles and hues. I understand all that - but I don’t always do it. I don’t do it because I can only afford to fix up one area of my house per decade.
When you walk through my home you’ll find the styles and colors of the seventies in some rooms, eighties in others and the nineties in a couple more. Because I just updated my kitchen I now have a new decade represented in my home. Walking around my house is definitely not like taking a Parade of Homes tour - but it is a trip down memory lane. Sometimes when my grown children return home, they say it feels like walking back in time when they go into their old bedrooms and see everything the way they left it.
It’s not that I’m overly sentimental when it comes to all the stuff in my house; I just don’t see the point of frequent changes any more. This is what I’ve learned after being alive for over half a century. Everything goes full circle. The rooms with seventies colors and styles are actually back into groovy now. So, if you hold onto your things long enough, eventually they come back in style.
I remember walking into an older woman’s home when I was in my twenties. I had bought into our culture’s idea that being trendy and up to date actually mattered. I knew precisely what was popular in home furnishings and clothing.
“Doesn’t she know she is so sixties?” I remember thinking.
Now I’m that older woman with the out-of-date house. I can answer that question for young people this way, “Yes, I know I’m out of style but I really don’t care any more. If the couch is still comfy and the colors don’t drive me crazy, why hurry and change things? If I wait long enough I’ll be in style again in about thirty years anyway.”
I’ve also learned that styles and trends aren’t the only things that return after thirty years. All our small seemingly unimportant thoughts and actions eventually create our reality and eventual destiny. In other words, what we send out into the world returns to us a hundred fold. We cannot reap what we did not sew. So day by day we plant the thoughts and deeds that will grow into our life’s story.
If we desire to love and serve more than we desire fame or fortune we may be out of step with our culture’s measure of success but we will in step to the law of the harvest. Thought and action is real; possessions and recognition a slippery illusion. Ultimately we keep only who we have become, what we’ve learned, and the gifts we’ve willingly shared.
The most important journey of life is finding our true self by losing our selfish self. What we embrace, create and share becomes our eventual reality. We finally find our way back home when we relish the simple things in life and we are at peace with our self. And that’s how we truly make a home for the decades.

Why Babies Never End

For June 24th 2009

On a bright sunny day in June a beautiful baby girl was born. Her mother took one look at her new daughter and instantly fell in love. She hugged and kissed her new baby over every square inch of her tiny plump pink body. She noticed her rich brown hair, deep dark eyes and the round softness of her checks.
The nurses at the hospital felt they needed to take the baby away from the mother to weigh, measure and bathe her. The mother reluctantly agreed but her arms felt empty and she missed her daughter as soon as their skin wasn’t touching any more.
Before long the nurses came back into the mother’s hospital room and told her that her baby wouldn’t quit crying.
She misses me too, the mother thought.
“Just bring her back to me,” the mother told the nurse with a knowing smile.
The nurse brought the baby girl back into the mother’s room and her mother’s arms. She immediately stopped crying, looked up at her mother and sighed.
As the mother looked into her infant daughter’s eyes she knew instantly that she was extraordinary. The mother had heard a song where the lyrics described her new daughter so well, she decided to name her Arianne.
Arianne grew and grew. Her brother and sisters fought over who got to hold and play with her. Even as a small child Arianne had the aura of a queen – calm, noble and wise. She would snuggle with her mother for hours while they rocked back and forth. When her mother couldn’t hold her, the girl found her thumb and a soft blanket - but they were never quite as good as her real mom.

Arianne soaked in the world with singular attention and awareness.
She sang like an opera star, noticed every new bird, wild flower or interesting cloud. She observed the colors of the sunset and breathed in the scent of lilacs and cinnamon rolls. Everywhere she went she recorded the wonders of her life on a pad of paper. She drew pictures or wrote stories about all the beauty she saw.
One day the little girl discovered a neglected place in her yard. She had a vision in her head about a beautiful garden. So she worked and worked all by herself. When the garden was finished, Arianne discovered she could also create beauty. She found her mother and took her by the hand to show her the secret garden because she knew she’d love it as much as she did. Then Arianne presented her mother with a book filled with her visions of a secret garden filled with fairies and flowers.



Days turned into weeks and weeks into years and the little girl grew up. One day the mother and Arianne went on an outing. All the way there and back they talked and cried because they both knew Arianne was going to get married soon. It felt like that day in the hospital when the nurses wanted to separate them. That night they sat together at the piano and their skin touched again and felt so warm.
So Arianne got married and moved away. But she kept looking for beauty all around her and found it everywhere - in people, nature, knowledge, and wisdom.
Then one day Arianne went to the hospital, had her own baby and fell in love.
Now when she comes home, she fills her mother’s arms with new babies. Then they sit on the sofa and share their visions of beauty. . . and of joy of love that never ends.

FAMILY VACATIONS?

We're back from our family vacation and this is what I've learned. We should not call family vacations . . . vacations. We should call them family . . . experiences. The word vacation brings to mind rest and relaxation which family vacations do not provide.

Family experiences, on the other hand, include such events as:

Teenagers who drastically change their mood every two seconds.
Wanting to go on a 4-wheel ride SO BAD you ignore the fact that it has been raining all night.
Trying to figure out what to do with an entire family covered to the kazoo with mud.
Children who need to go to the bathroom in the wilderness when you told them to go before you left civilization.
Ground squirrels who get to the food before you do.
Sudden thunder storms that strike just as you get 33 zillion miles away from the cabin.
Children who want to go swimming SO BAD they don't care if the pool is heated and their teeth chatter.
Windy canyon roads that make you want to barf and your ears pop.
Bodily smells from the back seat when you are trapped inside your car for hours going there or coming home.

Yet, family experiences also include:
Laughing in the jetted tub filled with bubbles . . . and all the children.
Eating a succulent dutch oven meal cooked by your favorite chef (your husband).
Watching the clouds roll through the pines, listening to the river rushing over rocks while you fall asleep and feeling your child slip her hands into yours.
Telling scary stories in the dark.
Being presented with a wild flower bouquet.
Reading scriptures or saying prayers by firelight.

. . . And walking back through your own front door knowing home never looked so good.

Whether the experiences are frustrating or fabulous, challenging or cherished, family vacations release us from our usual routines and give us the opportunity to make memories that last a life time.

Just One More Time

Children raise parents as much as parents raise children. That’s why our little ones know the precise moment when we are trying to make a good impression - then teach us not to take ourselves too seriously. For example, my daughter often instructs her four rowdy boys on proper guest manners before visitors arrive at their home.

“Every time the men from the church come over and the conversation turns serious, my boys disappear,” my daughter said. “Then they make a grand entrance marching down the stairs with their underwear over the head - their eyes peeking out the legs holes. If that isn’t enough, they stuff their pants with pillows. It’s so embarrassing.”

I laughed because I recalled the time that same daughter used the Sears display toilet (which was not hooked up to plumbing) right in the middle of the store in front of everybody.

“Libby climbs on everything!” my grown son laments. “We don’t know what to do with her. She never holds still.”

Of course I chuckled because I can remember this son climbing up on the stove, placing his diapered bottom on the burner then turning the temperature knob to high.

Parents remember their children before they remember themselves. We know each child in personal ways even they have forgotten. Yes, we were there when our children were born, learned to crawl, walk and say their first word. We were also there when they picked their nose through the entire Mother’s Day program, ate dog poop and stepped in a gallon of paint. We were there when they had croup, sliced their finger with the scissors and flooded the toilet with twenty-seven pounds of toilet paper.

Then as our children grow up we observe them gravitating toward their personal gifts by building with blocks, writing stories, digging in the back yard or collecting coins. Later we watch them become builders, authors, archaeologists and bankers. If we are paying close attention, we witness each child become their unique self day by day. What a grand privilege it is to observe little people we love morphing into big people we love right before our eyes. We’re never quite the same because of our parenting journey.

One day the girls in my daughter’s third grade class were discussing their comfort items from babyhood during recess. Alisa found out that some of her friends dragged blankets, sucked on their thumbs or couldn’t give up their pacifiers or stuffed animals.

“What did I use?” Alisa asked me when she got home later that day.

I thought about her babyhood and smiled.

“Me,” I answered. “You used me. Whenever you got tired, bored or scared, you found me, crawled up in my lap and went to sleep.”

I know playing the role of a soft blanket might not seem like a very important position in life, but of all the roles I’ve filled, being a comfort to a child was probably the most important of all.

Children in our midst keep us young and humble. They never stop learning or needing us and we never stop learning or needing them. Though most of my children have grown up and left home, nothing takes away my deep primal urge to wrap them in flannel, hold them close and rock them to sleep just one more time.

Emily and the Lady Bug

For May 29th, 2009

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Emily who loved to go exploring in the great wide world. Emily was fond of all the seasons, but she especially loved springtime. She crawled through the tall weeds on her hands and knees in the vacant field behind her house. On Monday she found a yellow spider. On Tuesday she found two brown baby snakes. On Wednesday she found a fat black beetle. On Thursday she saw a green lizard and on Friday she found a red lady bug with black spots resting on a yellow dandelion.
“Lady Bug, lady bug, fly away home. Your house is on fire, your children alone,” Emily said repeating a phrase she learned at school.
But the lady bug didn’t fly away. She flew right into the Emily’s opened hand and the bug’s tiny legs tickled her palm. Then the lady bug crawled up her arm and stopped near her shoulder. Emily tried to pry the lady bug off but it was stuck.
Maybe she wants to be my friend, Emily thought. I’ll bring her home and take good care of her.
So Emily brought the lady buy home, found a glass jar and filled it with grass and leaves. She pocked holes in the lid with a screw driver so her new friend could breathe. Then she put the lady bug inside and placed the jar next to her bed. Each day she checked on her new friend and gave her fresh leaves. But she noticed the lady bug never spread her wings to fly any more.
One day Emily was running through the weed grass with the wind pushing her blond hair behind her. Then she thought about her friend in a jar in her bedroom.
“I feel sorry for my lady bug,” she told her mother after she went back home. “She is trapped. But I don’t want to set her free because I love her and I’ll miss her.
“Sometimes,” her mother answered, “when we really love someone, we choose to set them free.”
Emily thought about what her mother said. The next day she took the glass jar far out into the field and opened the lid very slowly. Then she watched as the lady bug crawled to the top of the jar, stopped for a moment and flew away. That night Emily looked at the empty jar next to her bed and cried.
The next morning when she was slipping on her sweater for school she saw something that took her breath away. A golden lady bug with diamond spots and two sparkly emerald eyes was pinned to her sweater near the shoulder right where her old friend used to rest.
“I love your lady bug,” her friend at school said that day.
“Me too,” Emily answered.

Happy Birthday Emily. This is a story I wrote just for you because I love you so very much.

love,
Grandma Baadsgaard
P.S. Check your mailbox every day. You might find something sparkly in there.

Graduation Speeches

I’ve been to a lot of graduation ceremonies in my lifetime and I’m sure I’ll be attending many more before I die. I’ve heard dozens of graduation speakers offer their advice and vision for the bright futures of the graduates. I’ve tried to listen attentively to each talk but mostly I’m secretly hoping the speaker will be brief because there are hundreds of candidates waiting to walk across the stage to receive their degree.
There has been a few times when I’ve wondered what I would say if I was the guest orator. I mull around in my mind the few concise words that capture what I believe creates a meaningful life. For a few moments I look more intimately at my personal journey and the journey of countess others I’ve observed over a life time. Then I try to make sense of it all and formulate a few sentences that capture what really matters after the pomp and circumstance are over and we all go home.

Bill Cosby, a famous comedian, once addressed a graduation with these few words. He walked to the podium, took a deep breath and said, “Get a job.” That comment brought the house down. When the audience quieted he said a second time, “Get a job.” The audience was really listening when he leaned into the microphone the third and final time and said, “Your parents have done enough. Now get a job.”

No one hands parents a diploma when they send a child off into the world after twenty something years of labor and love. No one hands a devoted husband or wife a diploma after they’ve nursed their spouse through cancer. No one hands an ordinary breadwinner a diploma after they’ve gone to work every day for thirty years to support their family. We never get a diploma for the most important things we do with our life.

So, this is what I’d say if I were the graduation speaker.

“Congratulations graduates. You have accomplished a wonderful goal. But remember this opportunity was made possible because millions of common ordinary people are willing to pay for your teachers and your educational institution with their hard earned tax dollars. You have been a taker. Now it is your turn to be a giver.
You might desire to do great and noble things for society or to become rich or well-known but your conduct at home with the people closest to you will be the final summation of your life. Look into the faces of the people who sit around your dinner table. Your love and sacrifice for those people is the most important contribution you will ever make.
If your career, leisure or prestige becomes more important than your spouse or your son or your daughter, you lose your greatest power to influence the world for good. Don’t give away your power for a mess of pottage. Create a loving home. Everything good follows.”

SUPER LIBBY

For May 18th, 2009

Once upon a time there was a super hero trapped in a little girl’s body. Her mother and father thought she was a typical two-year-old but she was really Super Libby in disguise.
Whenever her parents turned their backs, Super Libby climbed up on top of dangerous tall objects in her house.
“How did she get up there?!” her mother often gasped.
“I don’t know,” her father answered. “I never do that sort of thing myself.”
Super Libby knew she had secret powers but she didn’t know how to tell her parents because she didn’t know how to talk yet. So, her wonderfulness remained a mystery. Libby knew she had sticky feet that allowed her to hang upside down on the ceiling. She knew she had retractable wings that allowed her fly from high furniture to the floor. Only sometimes her super power apparatus didn’t work – so she fell a lot and got lots of bumps and bruises.
Sometimes her parents worried that she might not live to be three. Sometimes they scratched their heads and rolled their eyes. Yet somewhere deep inside, both parents knew she was really an extra-ordinary child.
Late at night Libby’s parents stepped softy into her bedroom and looked at her sleeping peacefully in her crib.
“We kept her alive for one more day,” her mother sighed.
“How can such a little rascal look just like an angel when she is asleep?” her father added.
One day Super Libby’s family went to Grandma’s house. As soon as her father turned his back for just a second, Libby climbed up on the dining room table.
“She is just like her father,” Grandma said with delight. “So full of curiosity and courage.”
That’s when Libby turned and smiled.
Grandma took Libby into her arms and said, “I know your secret. You’re really Super Libby in disguise.”
“How do you know?” her father asked.
“Because I raised her daddy,” Grandma answered. “And look how super you turned out.”

Happy Birthday Libby! You’re super. I love you very, very much.

Love,
Grandma Baadsgaard

When We Are Each Other's Angel

I lived next to my best friend Edna for eleven years. This is how I found her. My husband and I had been driving around town for weeks looking for a place to build a new home. We felt drawn to a vacant lot next to a small white frame house on sixth east in Spanish Fork. We stopped the car and knocked on the door of that house to see if the person who lived there knew who owned the lot.

A petite white haired woman opened the door. We introduced ourselves and she told us she owned the lot. Then she looked at us, really looked at us as if she were seeing through our skin into our hearts. After a long quiet moment she told us she would be happy to sell the lot to us and offered us a fair price.

Later we found out from the other neighbors that many people had been trying to buy that lot for years but she wouldn’t sell. We never did figure out why she decided to sell it to us, two total strangers.

In the next few months we built our new house and moved in. Before long my children or I were at Edna’s house on a daily basis, my husband was tilling her garden and we became best friends. She helped me through my miscarriage and I helped her through her son’s unexpected death. When my children went to visit her, she would play games with them, read them stories and always send them home with a piece of candy. She became their second grandma.

When my growing family got too big for our house, we put a for sale sign up in the front yard. Edna told me she cried for days. We bought a larger house up on the bench but we still invited her to all our birthday parties and holiday celebrations as usual. Some people define family as those who share the same genes. I define family as those who love each other. Edna was family.

Later Edna’s children decided to put her into a residential facility for senior citizens. Now she had only a small bedroom to call her own. She had help with meals and cleaning but she wasn’t very happy there.

“Janene, I can’t carry on an intelligent conversation with any one who lives here,” she told me. “I miss you.”

I offered to have her come and live with me but she declined. Before long Edna was in a nursing home. My family and I went to visit her and bring gifts. After I located her room, I found her resting in bed. Soft evening light streamed into the room from a window above her head and made her face and white hair glow. She looked like an angel.

I walked quietly to her bed, knelt on the floor next to her and kissed her on the cheek. She turned and kissed me back.

“Oh, Edna you look like an angel,” I whispered in her ear.

“Janene, you see me like that because you love me,” she answered.

She spoke the truth. Those we love become shining and beautiful to us. It doesn’t matter what they look like on the outside because we see the exquisiteness of their soul.

“Remember that day when you knocked on my door for the first time?” Edna asked me before we left that day. “God told me you were my angel. That’s why I let you build next to me.”

I spoke at Edna’s funeral. I still miss her.

The Rooster at my House

There is a rooster at my house.

It all began innocently enough. My daughter’s second grade class was hatching eggs for their science lesson. Pretty soon the teacher asked her students if they wanted to take the cute fluffy chicks home with them.

My daughter begged.” Just one . . . please. Then it was, “Just two . . . please.” Then, “Just three . . . please.” You get the picture.

I’ve done chickens before. I know that cute little fluffy chicks turn into large hens and roosters that need to be fed and given water every day. So I told my little girl that she could have the chickens if she agreed to take care of them.

She promised. So the brood came home. We set up a big box, warm light, water and feed. I barely turned around before those cute little fluffy yellow creatures were sprouting feathers and flying out of their box. So we moved them to the barn.

Before long my daughter grew weary of taking care of her new pets and my reminders were met with wines.

“I warned you,” I told her. “I told you that they would require daily care. I told you that pretty soon it would be winter and you wouldn’t want to go out to the barn in a blizzard to feed them.”

“You should have warned me harder,” my little girl answered.

So today we have a huge rooster who pretty much rules and roost around here. The problem is – this rooster is way sneaky. He acts nice while you’re facing him, but if you turn your back he takes off running after you at lightening speed. You can hear him coming up behind you - so you turn. At the exact moment you turn to face the approaching beast, he stops . . . acts innocent . . . and begins pecking at the ground like he wasn’t really running after you at all. Then, if you turn your back again, the whole scenario starts over again.

I don’t like having a pea-size brain rooster who is smarter than I am around here. He likes to crow and wake me up at obnoxious times. He waits until the garden tomatoes are red then gorges himself. He chases the grandkids. It’s time for him to go . . . but we can’t bring ourselves to get rid of him. He’s become one of the family.

Keep Shoveling:There's a Pony in There Somewhere

Once upon a time there was a king who had two sons. One son was optimistic and grateful for everything the father did for him. The other son was pessimistic and never grateful for anything the father did for him.

One day the king decided to try an experiment. He gave his ungrateful son a brand new pony. Then he gave his grateful son a room full of manure. Several hours later the king went to check on his two sons.

First he found his ungrateful son. The boy was crouched in a corner frowning and grumbling to himself.

"What's wrong? the king asked. "I just gave you a new pony."

The son answered, "Now you probably expect me to feed it and clean up after it."

The king left the grouchy son and went to check on his other son. He found him smiling, happy and shoveling manure over his shoulder as fast as he could.

"Son," the king said. "What are you doing? Face reality. Don't you realize you are in a room full of manure?"

The grateful son answered, "Oh father thank you. With all this manure in here, there's got to be a pony in here somewhere."

At days end the king took the pony away from the ungrateful son and gave it to his grateful son.

So you see . . . there really was a pony in there somewhere.

How April Got Her Name

For April 23rd, 2009



Once upon a time, there was a woman who was going to have a baby in June. The woman thought about many names for her baby but she couldn’t seem to settle on just the perfect name for her first child. After all, they hadn’t officially met each other yet.

On the first warm day in spring several months before the baby was due this woman went to the park with her husband and had a picnic with their friends. After they finished eating, everybody played catch with a Frisbee. The husband leaped in the air to catch the disk, but when it came time for the woman to jump, she couldn’t. The husband and the friends laughed at the woman. She told them to stop laughing.

That night the woman woke up and rushed to the bathroom. She told her husband she couldn’t quit leaking so he rushed her to the hospital. When they got to the hospital emergency room, the nurses rushed the husband to the admission office. Then they took the wife into a room. A nurse started asking lots and lots of questions.

“Could I lie down?” the woman asked.
After the woman was on the bed, the nurse checked her then screamed, “Don’t push!” then rushed from the room.
A sleepy doctor rushed into the room, checked her then yelled, “Don’t push!”
The woman was confused . . . she didn’t feel like pushing anything.
Then the husband rushed into the room wearing a hospital gown that made him resemble a space alien. Just then the doctor rushed toward the woman and caught a tiny five pound baby who was rushing into the world.
“It’s a girl,” the doctor said.

The woman was tired of so much rushing so when the nurse put the baby girl in her arms, she took a deep breath and sighed. Then she looked at her infant daughter for the first time. At that exact moment, her heart sang for joy. A heavenly choir was singing the Halleluiah Chorus inside her. She wondered if the doctor and nurse could hear it. Then her baby looked up at her for the first time and smiled. A sudden explosion of sunshine burst inside the new mother. She wanted to get up and dance on the bed because she was so happy but the doctor said he had to sew her up first.

After the sewing was done the mother, father and baby snuggled together for the first time. The father said his daughter’s skin was so soft he couldn’t feel it through his callused fingers. The mother said she’d found the pot of gold at the end of her rainbow; her new baby was a golden treasure and dream come true.

When the mother brought her new baby daughter home from the hospital, she saw red tulips and yellow daffodils by her front porch. That’s when an angel touched the mother’s heart and said, “Your daughter is springtime - light, hope, warmth and joy.” That was the moment the mother knew the perfect name for her newborn daughter because an angel whispered it in her ear . . . April.

Now the baby girl has grown up and she has golden treasure babies of her own. Where ever April goes she spreads sunshine, happiness, love and joy because she is springtime just like her name. Now the woman who leaked on the way to the hospital is a grandma and she knows for sure she picked the perfect name for her baby girl.
Happy Birthday April. I love you.
MOM

Muddling Along

The dishwasher had malfunctioned, flooding our house all night as we slept. We didn’t know until one of our sleepy-eyed children came into our bedroom early in the morning and said, “Mom and Dad! It’s raining in the basement!”
The room that was hardest hit was the storage room where we’d recently carefully stacked and dated our pride and joy, a two-year supply of food. In a mad dash to save anything we could, every member of our family hauled each bucket and box out into the back yard to dry out. It took hours.

Just when we finished, we heard a clap of thunder, looked up, and felt several drops splash in our eyes. Then the heavens were opened and the few drops immediately became a downpour. We regrouped and quickly hauled our soggy mess into the garage.

When we finally got every box and bucket into the garage, my son came running to me in tears, informing me his pet rabbit was dead. After finally getting the children off to school, my daughter called from campus saying she couldn’t remember where she’d parked the car at BYU. Then my other first-grader had an accident that required a change of clothing. You get the picture.

“I can’t handle any more,” I said to my husband.

“You don’t have to handle it,” my husband replied. “There’s no rule book somewhere that says you have to go through life handling everything. Just muddle, Jan. I’ve been muddling for years and no one can tell the difference.”

Muddle, I thought. I think I can muddle.

Now every time I’m feeling overwhelmed, I remember my husband’s timely advice. Frankly, I’ve been muddling ever since and so far no one can tell the difference, just like he promised.

I remember a day when I walked into the kitchen to find my young son surrounded by the large white buckets where I stored our flour, sugar, and pasta. He was busy scooping— sugar into the flour—rice into the sugar—pasta into the rice. The whole kitchen looked like a white billowing cloud except for my son’s innocent grin and two large blue eyes staring up at me. “Look, Mom. I’m the bread maker!” my young son said as he looked up at me.

Suddenly it dawned on me that whenever I made bread I pulled out all the white buckets and started scooping. He was trying to be like me.

My feelings of frustration melted into love. I was so proud of him for trying. As we got busy cleaning the kitchen, I realized God loves us like that. No matter how big the mess or mistake we’ve made, God helps us clean it up. That is the essence of muddling.

Muddling is not mediocrity. Muddling allows us to stop keeping up appearances or worrying that we’ll never measure up. Muddling is accepting our humanness and inadequacies. Muddling is realizing there are some messes only our Father in Heaven can clean up. And muddling is seeing our worth through God’s eyes and never giving up hope that things will work out.