U of U VS BYU FOOTBALL GAME

Dear Family,

Well we went to the Uof U  BYU football game yesterday.  As I mentioned before, we are conflicted in our loyalties.  Mom and I graduated from the University of Utah and 15 of our living children graduated from BYU where they received multiple degrees. Paul's family have given us seats in their box up high on the 50 yard line and it is so much fun.  Mom could not find the tickets yesterday but Cheryl told us to come over right away.  Emily took us through the traffic and dropped us at the stadium where we met Cheryl and Paul  They were able to get us tickets reprinted and we went in.  There is always a meal served on the five floor where the box seats are.

The game was a riot and very odd.  The U played well the first quarter, BYU caught up.  I was going a little nuts carrying on each time the U scored and getting very upset with the referees who seemd to be on the BYU payroll.  The stadium was packed for this game and it started at 8:00 PM.  by 11:00Pm we were sort of wishing the game came to an end.  It got very excited right up to the last minute.  Paul thought we should leave early to beat the rush and we left with a minute to play.  Those who stayed to the end got home at 1:45AM.

It seemed the refs gave BYU every chance to catch up and win.  They had a chance on the last second to kick a field goal and tie the game in the last ten seconds.  The field goal was blocked and the game seemed over, fans ran on the field and the referee called foul and gave a penalty to the U for having fans on the field and gave the Y another chance to kick a field goal, this time from about 20 yard out which should have been a chip shot.  The poor guy muffed tje kick and will forever be the "goat"  of the game so the Utes ended winning!!!!!  The picture above is a Desert News shot of the crowd hoisting the quarterback and celebrating!  At halftime, some guy from the stands was invited to kick a field goal and if he made it, everyone therel could get a free hair cut at Great Clips and by golly he made the kick and there will be thousands of free haircuts as well, me included.

Of coursed we all dress up in colors.  Here is a picture of Madeline with one of her college friends all decked out in red.  Maddie took me to the Uof U bookstore and I picked  up a sweater, jacket and  flag for the car.  The rest of the family is total decked out with blue and Big "Y"'s and i think they even put the little kids in BYU diapers!  Everyone looks sharp and it is great fun.

That's all for now,

Love, Dad and Mom

... "Oh I am a Utah man sir and I live across the green, Our gang it is the jolliest as you have ever seen...." goes the song my Dad who played football on the U team in the 1920's would always sing in the car.

BRIGHAM CITY TEMPLE OPEN HOUSE

Dear Family,

Yesterday we traveled to see Cathy and go with her to visit the open house of the Brigham City, Utah Temple.  It will be dedicated next week.  There were huge crowds going through the temple on each day of the open house.  One worker thought there were from 1100 to 1800 people going through each hour.  On the opening day of the public invitation, they thought over 30,00 went through and there were more on Labor Day.

Here is a pic of Me and Mom, (taken with the iPhone) at the back end of the temple.  It is a lovely structure in the classic design of many of our temples.  i am glad they are going back to that design a bit more.

Here is Mom, Henry, Amelia, Lilli, Phillip and Cathy before we started the tour.  One goes through single file starting on the lowest level in the Baptistry and ever ascends  upward.  It is a beautiful structure.  I looked like it would handle about 50 for a session.  One senses a good spirit even before the dedication.  We will miss the dedication as we are up in Spokane next week.

It was quite a drive up there and we felt like we should just keep on going up to Bear Lake.  I think we will go up there after General Conference with Mike and his family to close our place there for the winter.  We drove back to Cathy's and had Salt County hamburgers and had the best time chatting with Pete and Cathy.  We hope many of you will be able to attend the dedication.

Love, Dad and Mom

TRIP TO MICHIGAN AND MORE FAMILY FUN

Dear Family, We are finally getting around to document the great events of the summer.  After the reunion we travelled back to Michigan for a week of further reunion and fun.  Here is what Mom did for a long time.  We are still moving from Michigan.  Here is Mom going through the remaining boxes from the barn.  She found treasures as displayed on the mantel in the farm house.  We found all the trophies from Junior High and High School.. things like Rob's pinewood derby trophy, Cheryl's debate trophy, numerous most valuable player awards from all the teams and it was one giant memory lane. 

We stayed at Mary and Mark's for a few days and also stayed at the farm.  There were more mini reunions.  Rob showed up for his 20th High School reunion at Andover (Mary went also).  We went to Leo's for old times sake and here are Mom, Rob, Mary, Kati, Mark, and David.  We went to Leo's multiple times on Telegraph and in South Lyon. 

We went to watch David at his Karate Dojo.  We went to Al's farm in Munith and that was so neat.  I have somehow lost the pictures but we watched Al milking the goats wearing her baby.  They have a working farm with calves, sheep, goats that are milked, chickens and ducks and a large hay field that Paul cuts and bales.  They have a vineyard and a large garden and we sampled the produce.  This was so fun and amazing to watch Al at the farm as she hated working on our farm as a teenager.  They are almost self sustaining.

I gave two Patriarchal Blessings on this trip, one to James and one to Scotty.  Here is James who is taking online high school and college courses.

We did James at Al's farm and it was a wonderful event.  We also visited with Scotty in his home and here is a picture below.  He is one tall strong young man and we enjoyed this experience with his parents.

We spent a lot of time at the farm.  As Mom sorted through boxes and shipped individual treasure collections to the kids, I got on the
John Deere and brush hogged the 20 acre hay field to keep it from overgrowth.  Bryan and
I spent a lot of time together and we seem to work as a natural team.  We cut grass, trimmed trees, checked on the bees,  and spent a lot of time exploring his new 40 acres to the south of the farm.  Bry now has one mile of property between eight mile and seven mile roads.  He has fixed up the new barns, raised a dilapidated house, planted hundreds of trees on the lower forty acres, and constructed a bridge across a swampy part.  Al and the kids came out and here is a shot of the Kybota which is the best taking the kids around the farm vehicle.

Here are Al's  kids at the haunted Oak tree.  I had forgotten how beautiful Michigan is in the summer;  there are so many trees and everything is so green and healthy.  Here is the path to the back woods at the farm.  There were several barbecues at the farm.  I was surprised to see Stefan Mueller and his family in the Bloomfield Hills ward.  We knew him and his family in Stuttgart during our mission.  We had a barbecue at the farm  and Stefan, wife and kids, father in law (from Landshut) came and we had a Feldschiessen event that was a lot of fun.

These is a lot of game on the farm and we saw deer every day.  The kids did not want Opa to find out about it.

Bryan had the old Ford Tractor restored and here he is on it.  It purrs like a kitten and is as old as Bry himself.

We seemed to party every day; we have such a good time being together.  Jeff and his family also came to the area. Tammy's father passed away in Ann Arbor and we attended the funeral.  Jeff, Tammy and their kids were there as well.  Before we left, we had another barbecue on Wing Lake with Al, Mary, Bryan, Jeff and their families attending.

Here is Mom in the background, Mary, Opa, Al and friends. There was canoeing, swimming, water games, fishing, tree climbing, retriever dog training and more barbecue.  We had such a good time in Michigan.  It was great to go to our  old ward and visit our neighbors, the Breers, as  well.  I had a great time working with Bryan.  It was the best trip to Michigan .

Thanks to all there for the wonderful time,

Mom and Dad

VISITS FROM FRIENDS AND FORMER MISSIONARIES

Dear Family,

I am catching up on all the summer events.  We had our great reunion and after this there were some great visits from all over.

First Steffi and her husband Robert came to visit the USA and indeed Salt Lake City as well.   They came from Berlin, Germany.  Steffi was one of our great sister missionaries and we went back to Germany to attend her wedding couple years ago. Here she is with stepsons Ryan and Riley, husband Robert and their new baby, Rico.

They stayed in the apartment downstairs and used this as their home base while they toured and visited in Salt Lake.  We went to the Church History museum with them and toured all the exhibits.

Here is Steffi trying out the berth on the model of the ships that Church members used to come to this country from Europe in the later 1800's  Then went to the food court at the new City Creek mall and had a good feed.

We had a get together with some of Steffi's companions and that was really fun.  Here is Kristi, Steffi, Rachel, Julie and Elizabeth.  Steffi reminded me that she had a lot of companions and I countered that it was the plan to expose many of the younger missionaries to her so they could benefit from her language (aus Preusen), discipline  and her ability to present the message of the Church so succinctly in German.  She was loved by all.

It was great to see her and her family and I think they had a good time.

We also had a visit from Katje, formerl;y Muench,  Now
Davidson and little Mark and Talita.  Katje was my German Tutor provided by the MTC and she struggled with me for many months getting my pronunciation and sentance structure straight.  She went to Russia on a mission, came back and married Daniel who is also a whiz with languages.  He works for the Defense Department and now they live in Maryland.  She is expecting her third child any minute.  So great to see her and the kids.  LittleTalita is fluent in German and English. Mark Twain said that German was easy as little kids could speak it and dogs understood it.  Talita spoke to Mom in English but addressed me in German.

We visited her mother, Marita, when we went over to attend Steffi's wedding.  We spent time in Cotbus and I did a fireside, (auf Deutsch) in their ward in Howerswerda.  I lovedg going over there.

We we had such great visits from family and  friends this summer.  We are richly blessed and grateful for all we have enjoyed.

Will catch up on some more summer stuff.

Love, Oma and Opa