AUTUMN, VISITS, EAGLES AND CONFRENCE

Dear family,

I have been getting over the  flu so I have not kept up as well.  Autumn has arrived and the mountains are beautiful. The west has such a charm and this little picture was taken on top  of immigration canyon.

We had a visit from John, Kaley adn the boys, Grant (I call him Grantli) and Garrett.  Kaley's brother was married in the Salt Lake Temple.  Her uncle by marriage, Elder Andersen, performed the ceremony.  There was a dinner the night before at the Joseph Smith building and here is a picture of John leading a chorus of the William's grandchildren  There is Grant front and center singing with enthusiasm.

I always have fun with the grandsons.  Grant played with me almost non stop when he was at home.  Here he is in the Basement.  He calls me Poopa instead of Opa.  He said, "Look, I built a Temple!"  He builds temples instead of forts with the big blocks.  It was good to see them even if briefly.

Then there was the Eagle court of honor for Mike's son, Joseph. This was a great court of honor as Joseph completed his  Eagle award just before his 16th birthday.  We are proud of his accomplishment.  We have a growing Eagles Nest in the family with all eight sons having earned their Eagle awards in addition to now, Aaron, Johnny, Josh and Douglas.  Others are in the loop. Here we are with Mike, Rayanne, Joseph the star, Oma and Opa.

We had a great General Conference of the Church..  We watched at home.  The Counsel and direction was on the point and very uplifting. All the guys came up for Priesthood meeting that was broadcast in our stake house.  They came from Mapleton and Cottonwood Heights.  There were twelve of us on a row.  This is a tradition that goes to my youth as well.  I al;ways went with my father for as long as I can remember.  After the meeting, we gathered at our house for the semi annual steak barbecue and a great time was enjoyed by all.  Part of the deal is that I quiz the boys on each talk given in the meeting and they did pay attention..

Then we made grape juice!  My friend, VL Kesler, is a master horticulturist, and has this great vineyard in Holliday.  He had a bumper crop of grapes and invited us over to pick. I got sick and could not go but Mom went over one moring and came back with a load of grapes.   We had purchased a Victoria Steamer in high hopes of our three vines doing something but alas that will be in the future.  You fill the top container with grapes, start the steam and the juice comes out the plastic tubing.  It is ready to be sealed in a Mason jar.  You get about 5 quarts from one filling.  We ended up with 35 quarts of the best grape juice.  Interesting that now Al and Cathy are doing it also.  Cathy says that canning grape juice "is easy, Pete does it!" I did the first batch and totally trashed the kitchen,  We figured out a better wat to avoid a lot of mess.  It is one of those,"Sweet is the work"


Well that is about all for now Alles Gute, Opa u. Oma