June 2025 has been a Hot, Dry, but Fun, Month 

3 cousins celebrate their birthdays with family: Kelly Amsden (21 on June 10) Nick de S.(21 on June 9), Ming Lu de S.(20 on June 8)

It's always fun to have visitors: Ken and Sue Allen came for the weekend, and Sara and Paul Gilman came for dinner. We go back a long ways in Palo Alto, California.

I joined Ken and Sue and Richard and Diane Taylor (living in Provo), who took over from them in the Durban, South Africa mission office.

Spectacular performance of An American in Paris at the new Ruth Theatre in Pleasant Grove. The old Orem Hale Theatre has a new building and location. There were traveling dance companies participating with local performers.

   I enjoyed the production with friends Ramona Miller and Gae Rose

The mountains are still green, but without rain they will soon be brown

June 26 was the last day of the term for ESL classes at the Community Resource Center. Morning classes are always smaller than the evening classes but most of these students are very dedicated.

                            The morning English students
                                           The morning students with teachers

Swedish people celebrating Midsummer (the longest day of the year) in Sweden. I wish we celebrated this festive holiday in the US, and that the world could come together peacefully, acknowledging and appreciating our differences, rather than exercising hatred, greed, and competition. It starts with us in our families, among our friends and associates, listening to other points of view and in small gestures of caring.

 Kelly and Luke's Wedding, Hannah's High School   Graduation, Art and Friendship, and D-Day

MmandamaWesomgo (from Kelly and Luke's Iowa City, Iowa mission) from the Congo drove out with friends for the wedding. I hosted him and showed him around the Provo area. He loved the mountains which he missed from his native country. Iowa is flat! With Cosmo the BYU mascot, Provo City Center Temple (where I spend a lot of time), and Sundance ski and summer resort in Provo Canyon.

Miriam, Peter, Rebecca, Emily, Kelly, Hannah, Anne, Julie, Alan, Fernanda, Nick, and Marc after the dinner at Jeremiah Lodge in Ogden (where Luke is from) the night before the wedding

              Fernanda, Marc, Nick and Hannah de Schweinitz

            John and Luke Carlston and Hannah de S.

Kelly with a huge bullfrog (not a wedding guest!) caught by her brother Aaron, who went off to the pond to get a snake.

Fernanda, Anne, Emily, Julie & Rebecca (daughters/daughters-in-law)

                                 Phoebe, Cordelia,Stephanie, Evie, Elise

     Mr. Luke and Mrs. Kelly Amsden leave the Orem LDS Temple

                       Watching the bride and groom exit from the temple

      George, Andrew, Aaron, Kelly, Luke, Ken, Emily, Lucie Taylor

   The girl cousins (all but Ming Lu who is doing Japan study abroad )

                                        Kelly and her bridesmaids

                           The de Schweinitz side of the family

       Parents Ken and Emily Taylor with Kelly and Luke Amsden

  Reception held in the Taylors' back yard on a hot Saturday afternoon.

      Peter and Julie Carleston, Anne, Hannah, Fernanda, Nick de S.

Marc was a funny, perfect MC. We all enjoyed watching the shoe game. Bride and groom back to back held up shoe : who most likely to, etc.Below, Kelly dancing with her dad, Luke dancing with his mom

Granddaughters were first on the dance floor after father-daughter, mother-son and couple dances

Bubbles and cheers to send them on their honeymoon to Big Sur, CA

  

     Taking down the canopy (needed on a hot afternoon).

          And here's the texted photo from my beloved Big Sur!

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Hannah de Schweinitz graduated with about 700 other Bingham HS, South Jordan graduates, The Utah Valley University gym was packed!

Above w/ parents, below with Lima grandparents & Grammy Miriam

Leis. Gold medal is for State, National and World championships!

She will attend BYU in the fall and plans to study nursing.

Hannah and grandparents

        The girls after graduation lunch at Molly's restaurant in Provo

My friend Celine Rol from the Netherlands and I served as Temple Missionaries in Madrid, Spain, and hadn't seen each other since 2013. She is a currently a Family History missionary in SLC. We are both art lovers and enjoyed the BYU Art museum and lunch together.

Here are a few of my favorites from "Crossing the Divide" from the permanent exhibition.

Minerva Teichert (1888-1976) Immigrants to NYC (more than 300,000 Jewish refugees applied for US visas in 1938). Only 20,000 were admitted, as the vast majority of Americans apparently opposed welcoming more Jewish refugees. Teichert's son was serving a mission in Germany at the time.

 Joseph Paul Vorst (1887-1947) 1930 immigrant to the US from Germany, Family Mule-Drawn Cart on way to church passes gas pumps (modernity out of their economic reach)

    Navajo Land (1932) by Swedish -born artist Carl Oscar Borg (1879-1947) He traveled around a lot, settling in California and was called by the Hopis "the man who comes in spring." The US was quite subject to xenophobia and forcibly removed 10,000 of the Navajo Nation, until an 1868 law allowed them to return.

To Them of the Last Wagon (1954) by Lynn Fausett (1894-1977). The focus is on the challenges and resilience of those who arrived late, rather than those who arrived first in the Salt Lake Valley in 1847.

No place to Go (1934) by Maynard Dixon (1875-1946). Reaching the Pacific Ocean during the Depression: displacement, poverty, precarity)

Harry Watrous' Still Life (1957-1940)

The Family (2002 bronze) by Elizabeth Catlett (1915-2012)

After the Fire by Charles Chapman (1879-1962) depicts the massive wildfires destroying millions of acres in the Great Fires of 1898 (North and South Carolina) & 1910 in Montana,Idaho,Washington St, & more

High in the Morning (1933) by Maynard Dixon (1875-1946) in Zion National Park (opened in 1919) portrays the majestic rock formations of Angels Landing and the Great White Throne. 

View of Turret Arch in Arches National Park by John Heber Stansfield (1878-1953). If you have not visited S. Utah, please come see!

1939 Desert Grandeur by Mabel Pearl Frazer (1887-1981) depicts the Grand Staircase in S. Utah (each step represents distinct geological periods over 200 million years).

Navajo Woman and Herd (1924-30) by Mahonri Young (1877-1957) painted western scenes, especially Hopi, Apache and Navajo Nations

The American Battle Monuments Commission will commemorate the 81st anniversary of the D-Day landings at Normandy American Cemetery on June 6, 2025. The ceremony is in remembrance of the American and Allied service members who landed on the Normandy shores June 6, 1944, and fought to liberate Europe and sacrificed their lives in the name of freedom.  I was moved when I visited with my French students 20+ years ago. At the time of this amazing landing I was 4 months old, but gradually learned to be grateful for the sacrifice of thousands of British, American, Canadian, Australian, New Zealand and others who fought to end World War II. Germany surrendered on May 8, 1945. The War in the Pacific did not end until Japan formally surrendered to the Allies on September 2, 1945, following a period of intense pressure and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The official surrender ceremony took place aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay.I don't always agree with the wars we wage, but thank the courageousmen and women who give and have given so much.                                           ***********

The BYU campus and Wasatch Front Mountains are especially beautiful and green in the late spring. The campus hosts many summer camps and "Especially for Youth" week-long gatherings for teenagers.

When I saw this "M" in the museum I was pleased to share an initial with Southwest artists Mahonri Young and Maynard Dixon, and was equally reminded of so many memories that have filled and enriched my life, as well as reminders of all I owe to my ancestors and others who have paved the way for my opportunities and amazing life. I also never want to forget or ignore those all over the world who have passed and those who are currently passing through wars, famines and unbearable suffering today. They are constantly in my thoughts and prayers. I applaud all who courageously defend our Constitution and the rights of our citizens and all human beings, my brothers and sisters, throughout the world who are all beloved children of our Heavenly Father.