OPENING BEAR LAKE FOR 2013

Dear Family,

We traveled up to Bear Lake property for the first time this year.  Here is a picture of the backyard with Bear Lake in the background, east of the property.  The weather was perfect and there were no mosquitos.

Doug brought Douglas, his friend Tracy, Tommy and his friend Andrew and of course little Izzy.  John came up with Grant.  They arrived later in the evening and helped to get the water system working.  The well and the water pump are getting real finicky.  Everything else worked great including the furnace which kept the house toasty warm during the chilly nights.  The next morning, we got the machinery going charging up the batteries and started a busy day of work on Saturday.

Before working, Doug and John went on a long run and here is Doug showing off his fancy running shoes.  John was pretty much limping around after the run

Doug and John were constantly repairing things.  I ran over some barbed wire and got a big flat with the mower but they fixed the flat with a tire plug

After we repaired this I cut down about 2 acres of lawn.  Douglas and Tracy picked up all the fallen Cottonwood sticks and branches.  Cotton wood trees shed sticks and branches like dandruff.

Here is the Dad doing his part.  The place looked great after this.  Douglas and Tracy  also ran the weed whacker over the entire place so it is nicely trimmed.

We of course had the shooting chore after the work was done and everyone got a chance to shoot including little Grant who was helped by John.  There was no one on the Lake so we shot in the backyard.

We had to trim some fallen large branches.  Douglas climbed up in the Cottonwood tree and with a chain saw severed the broken branch. Little nervous about that one.  Reminded me of the time the missionaries wanted to do some service in Michigan on our farm in South Lyon.  One, Elder Thatcher,  had saved for his mission by selling wood that he cut himself.  He was born with a chain saw in his mouth.  He asked me to raise the bucket on the tractor and lift him up to a large dead Apple branch.  I wondered if this would sail with his mission president but he was so anxious to help.  He was a great Elder who worked so hard that Mom went up to him after and said, "Would you please marry one of my daughters?"

Here is Doug taking Grant, Tommy, Izzy and 
Andrew on a 4 wheeler ride.  Little Grant loved the place and said on this Utah farm, there are deer and Mooses!

Saturday night, the gang left and Mom and I had the most peaceful Sabbath day. No radio or TV to disturb the peaceful quiet that one finds in Southern Idaho.  We went to church in the St. Charles ward.  There were about a 1000 there as everyone in Salt Lake comes up for the holidays.  On the 4th and 24th of July, they have two sessions of church with a 1000 in each session.  The lessons were terrific and we had the best day of rest in a very long long time. We closed up again and drove back to Salt Lake.

This week we travel to Michigan for another high school graduation (Sarah) and a baptism, (Michele).  We will stay at the farm for about 10 days and visit Al, Mary and Bryan and their families.

Our sister missionaries in the field  are doing well and their letters indicate they are taking their missions seriously.

We love you all. Mom and Dad