Good-bye Summer!

My summer is coming to an end. =(  For some reason that makes me feel almost panicky, like I'm losing my freedom in a few short days. I go back to work on Monday, and even though I'm excited at the thought of getting my classroom set up and meeting another group of adorable little kiddles, it's been a relaxing (but short) summer! I'd forgotten how great it is to stay up late, sleep in, and make my own schedule... garden in the cool mornings...

and spend all afternoon making a nice dinner for my men. Ha! Not that that happened very often! But it was nice to have the option!

I've been trying to get all kinds of doctor and dentist appointments taken care of before school starts, and I think I just have one more to go. Yesterday morning I had to get a couple of tests, and afterwards, I decided I'd just spend all day shopping some of my favorite stores. Mostly bargain stores- why do I love those? 

I did find some good deals, but I was in some unfamiliar territory without a map and got turned around on country roads.  I've always claimed to be a good navigator and have a great sense of direction, usually, so it was just plain weird when I'd been traveling awhile on what I thought was 74 north back towards York, and saw a sign reading 74 south.  No way!  Anyway, I was close to the Maryland border before I turned back and headed the right direction!

I guess I can't say I'm ALWAYS right!  =)  But luckily, I had nothing else on my agenda for the day, and rather enjoyed the drive through the lush green Pennsylvania countryside. It turned out to be a nice, relaxing day, and yes, I'm going to miss that sense of freedom!

Nathan's Summer in a Nutshell

Here's a picture summary of Nathan's summer in PA. He left Provo with a girlfriend, short hair and hopes to come home and make lots of money at BAE with his Engineering Internship. How things change! =)  Here he is with Robyn, but unfortunately, they broke up a few weeks later.

  

He got busy right away painting garage doors, organizing the basement, and building a ramp for poor old Phoebe who was having trouble getting up and down the back steps.  She loves it!


He set some goals for himself, including musical ones.  He's been learning to play Church Hymns on the piano so he can accompany when needed, and he's learned and memorized several classical and popular pieces.  He even played in my piano recital in June!

Nathan sang with the alumni York County Honors Choir in a beautiful concert at the Strand Theater on Father's Day.  I also had him sing a duet with me in Sacrament Meeting that morning.  Dad loved it!

He was called to be a counselor in the Elder's Quorum presidency for the summer, and that kind of forced him to get involved with the Single's Branch, which was great!  He's also had lots of great experiences with Institute, including a wonderful trip to Kirtland.  Here's a picture in front of the temple with his friend Becky.  They drive to the Branch together each week, and she's been so nice to share her family's new swimming pool with him this summer.

Here he is with Bree's friends Ann Marie and Sara, at a Branch Pirate-themed Murder Mystery Dinner, and a fun day at the beach.
Nathan has always loved a good bargain, and found a fun new tux (with tails!) at Goodwill with his friend Ashley. She's an old high school girlfriend, but they've remained good friends over the years. They had some fun times together before she left for the Dominican Republic on a "mission trip" for the summer.
While I was in Utah, Nathan and Curt had lots quality father and son time! They hiked and camped at Tuckahoe where Curt had hiked with the YW and would be going with the Scouts...
They watched the 4th of July fireworks from the mall in DC...
and then spent an entire day watching the Civil War re-enactment in Gettysburg. Dad was in heaven!

Nathan planned a last minute 2-day Branch trip to see the Hill Cumorah Pageant. Curt went along, and Nathan's best friend Alberto flew in from Chicago to go with them. They always have a great time together. Here they are before the Pageant with friends Rebecca and Amber...

...and in the Sacred Grove.
Couldn't resist adding this shot of the grove Nathan took- so beautiful!

This last week, Nathan took a couple of days off work to help Curt with rappelling at Scout Camp. It was an all LDS camp with boys from 8 stakes. Here he's teaching a group some gospel principles that relate to rappelling...and then a picture of him belaying Scouts off the cliff. His hips and hands were sore after two days of that, but Curt was sure glad he was there to help!

So, Nathan's been a great friend and help to both Dad and me this summer.  We'll hate to see him leave!  Even Phoebe had some bonding moments....here Nathan's holding her while Dad cut her toenails, and in the next one, they fell asleep on the floor.  Brianna would approve!

There were some days when Nathan had way too much time on his hands!  Here's a video he sent one Sunday while I was in Utah, showing the results of his hair that hasn't been cut all summer!  The song is one that he sang with Men's Choir- silly, silly.

Way too often he's come downstairs lately looking nerdy just to get my reaction...and this was a few weeks ago, so you can imagine how his morning "Kramer" hair looks now. I just shake my head...
Well, that's why we call Nathan quirky, but we sure love him!  =)  He'll be leaving in a couple of weeks, and he and Robyn are talking on the phone a lot more again....so maybe we'll be seeing more pictures like this from Utah....

But for now, this is what Nathan looks like tonight! =)

Our Missionary =)

Some of my friends have written that they loved seeing what Brittney and Heather have been up to, but wondered about Brianna and Nathan. So I decided I'd blog about them and use some pictures that they've sent (or members from Bree's area have sent!)

Brianna is having the time of her life, and is so happy being a missionary! She loves to teach and has had some wonderful experiences!  She's also been able to use her music alot and is singing or playing the piano or someone's guitar almost weekly.  Every week in her emails she talks about how glad she is that she made the decision to go on a mission. Here are a couple of quotes from this week's emails- the first to her president, which she forwards to us, and the second in our family's email:

"I love my time to study each morning, and I enjoy our companion studies as well. I love the scriptures!! I have learned SOOO much on my mission and would have felt completely inadequate going throughout the rest of my life w/out having learned what I now know. I never would have known the difference, but now that I do... I am SO grateful for it. I love my testimony and know it will only continue to grow and strengthen every day!"

"I love being on my mission... I hope to come home the same fun Bree... but SOO different as well! I'm amazed at how much I've learned, even something as simple as applying the scriptures. I just love them. I love being able to listen to a talk and as someone quotes a scripture I know where it comes from. I love the gospel and love the growth of my testimony!"

Here are a few recent pictures of our girl. Her name-tag used to say Hermana Toone, but I noticed she now wears a Sister Toone tag since she's serving in English areas. She loves when they find Spanish investigators though, and says that Spanish has become the language of her heart. =) She's been in Cheney since the end of January- and it's only her 2nd area! She thinks she'll be transferred in August and serve in one more area till she comes home November 17th. (Yay!!)

Here's member friend Celeste on the left (who sent us these pictures!), Bree and Sis. McNaughton, with new converts Echo and her daughter Heather (in front.) The next is with another of Echo's daughters. Her son Dustin was also baptized.


The rest are Brianna and Sister DeMarco- first at Zone Conference, then on P-day, and with friends.



                                             We love her new shorter hair-cut! =)

My Biggest New Fear!

I have to say that staying with Brittney for almost 3 weeks made me much more aware (and scared of) creepy crawly things!  She wrote a post on her blog about our spider adventure, which freaked us both out, but was pretty funny after the fact.  

So I came home and Curt left for a week at Scout Camp.  I was sitting here in the corner of our room using the computer, and finished for the night.  As I turned around I saw, out of the corner of my eye, my most hated creepy crawly thing of all- what I call a Moustache Bug!  And it ran right under my bed!   Aaaaagh!  They are so fast and feathery and just plain gross!  I've never seen one in my room before, but we've had them downstairs, and in the garage.  In fact, last week I saw one crawl under our fridge in the garage, which means now every time I run out to get something out of the fridge or freezer, I have to turn on the garage light and watch where I step with my bare feet!

So , here I am freaking out, trying to find a big shoe and a flashlight, and of course I can't find either one!  What is it about flashlights- they never work when you need one!  By the time I had a working one, one of Curt's big shoes, and a wad of toilet paper, and dared kneel down and look under the bed.....of course it was nowhere to be seen.  I ran around making sure the dust ruffle wasn't touching the ground anywhere, so it couldn't climb up onto my bed in the night.  I refused to think that it might be able to climb the legs of the bed- too slippery for sure!  And then as I'm standing there debating what to do next, here comes a moustache bug running (they're so fast!!!!) from under my desk toward the bed!  I got it with the shoe, scooped it up with the big wad of toilet paper and had it in the garbage before I even quit squealing.  (Nathan was sleeping in the next room- it's a wonder he didn't hear me and come running.)  But then I'm standing here thinking, okay, was that the same one, and he went under the bed and around the edge of the wall and out from the desk???  OR.....is it a new one that just came out of the vent that's under the desk, and he was heading to meet his friend (wife??) under the bed!  Nathan said the next day..".maybe he was heading HOME to their nest under your bed!"  Well needless to say, I said my prayers in bed that night- no kneeling by the edge! and am now sitting at the computer- days later- with my feel still up on a box of file folders.  Haven't seen a bug since, but you never know- one could run across my bare feet as soon as I put them on the floor!  

Last night Nathan and I did some research and discovered that my moustache bug, as I've called them since moving here, (since I'd never seen them before,) and they're feathery.....ew, did I mention that when you mash one, all the legs keep going?  And they leave a brown stain on the carpet!  Anyway, when I googled Moustache bug....I didn't see anything familiar.  Nathan's friend calls them Thousand Leggers, so I googled that and I there it was!

We found out it's actually a House Centipede!  Didn't know centipedes could be so fluffy and fast!  And we found out they're beneficial to homes cuz they eat other undesirable things....but I don't think so!! Now it makes me wonder what else is under the bed that it was feeding on, and did it lay eggs in my room?  I did NOT like learning that they could go anywhere- I wanted to think they were only on the floor.  Here's more info if you're interested!

                     http://bugguide.net/node/view/25

Well, even with my feet up on a box I'm itching all over just talking about it. So I won't be making friends soon with the House Centipede! =)

The Rest of My Utah Trip

Here it is- time to go back to Pennsylvania, and the last 19 days have flown by!  It's been a wonderful visit, and we've seen lots of people and places, and just enjoyed each other.  What a good family we have!  Here's us on Sunday night after Bob and Kathy's meeting.  Matthew and Claire came to play games with us, and then we saw them the following week too.  Bryan had fun watching for Matthew in the choir broadcast that morning, and they did a good close-up of him.  Hope all these Salt Lake "kids" keep in touch!

On Monday night we went to Millcreek Canyon for a fun FHE cookout.  It's the canyon where Heather and Jake got engaged and is beautiful.  I love that you can be in Utah mountains in less than a half hour.  Bryan loved playing in the fire- he'll be a good Boy Scout some day.

The next day we took a little road trip to see more Toones. First we stopped in Tremonton where we were able to visit with Conne and Greg, Darrin, Trent and Lisa and their 3 cute kids. (Forgot to take pictures there, and their newly remodeled house and yard are beautiful!) Then we went on to the farm and had a delicious lunch with Sherm, Peggy, Steven, Fred, April and Ben (and his 3 kittens.) It was fun to see everyone and visit for a few hours. 

 

That night we stopped in Millville and spent the night with Margo Miller. We missed Bob who was traveling- they've been good friends of ours since college. In the morning we ran over to see their daughter Charlotte and Mark and their 5 kids- so cute. It was a great little road trip- just gone about 24 hours, but did lots of visiting in a short time.

Wednesday night Jake had tickets to the Days of 47 Rodeo at the Energy Solutions Arena (Delta Center to us) where the Jazz play. Interesting to see how they turned it into a dirty rodeo arena. Pres. Uchtdorf was there, and his grandson was one of the calf ropers. Fun to see him in casual "rodeo" clothes. =)

Thursday we took the boys to the Children's Discovery Museum at the Gateway.  Such a fun place!  Bryan just ran from place to place, and Matty was fascinated by the water exhibit.  

That night Jake and Heather took Grandma and I to see "Footloose" at the Scera Shell, which was a fun musical.  We had great seats right up front, and it was a beautiful evening to be outside.  I stayed overnight with my mom, went walking with her in the morning, and helped with some chores.  Brittney and boys came down and we picked up Tootsie for a yummy lunch at Los Hermanos.  Then we headed to BYU to tour the new Hinckley Alumni and Visitor's Center and shop at the Bookstore.  Always great to be on campus.

Jake worked late on Friday so Heather came over to play games, and we "girls" did some shopping on Saturday.  Then that night we attended a cello concert on Temple Square called "In Toone with the Past."  It was a distant cousin playing Curt's great-great-great grandfather's cello that he brought from England and across the plains with him.  He told John Toone's story and played some beautiful Hymns and classical pieces that John probably played.  "Come, Come, Ye Saints" brought tears to our eyes, and it was just nice to be there.  Matthew and Claire sat with us, and we enjoyed a bite to eat in the Garden Room at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building afterwards.  Nice evening of culture!  =)

I spent the night in Jake and Heather's new home and went to their ward with them in the morning.  Looks like it'll be a great place for them to live.  The Yospes had us over for dinner and they're such a nice family- we had a great visit with Jake's parents, brothers and sisters in law and nephews and niece.  Jake even got a haircut from his Mom while we were there!

Last night we had a family dinner at Chris's with her family, Grandma and part of Jaymi's family and ours.  Wish we'd had more time to visit!  It's been such a fun time, and now it's time to go to the airport!  Looking forward to being together at Christmas in Pennsylvania!  =)