It's already June!

May came and went so fast! From snow to heat, nice stay with daughter Emily and family, end of the school year activities, visits with friends, baseball, soccer, plays, movies (in person), and finally getting settled after four months in Utah bouncing from family to Airbnb's to family.

Vaccines are now available to 12-15 year olds. My grand-daughter Ming Lu received hers. Please join her! It's easy and smart!

Lunch at Marlene's residence with LONG-time, former Palo Alto friends: Dawne Hollis, Marlene Meshinski, Miriam, Nettie Wise (who is doing great at 97!) We are all vaccinated!

As peaceful as life feels in our "bubble" there is still much unrest and tragedy in our world. I came across this interesting chart.

After several years (since 2014) of relative calm in Israel, violence between Israel and Gaza, between Jews and Muslims has escalated. It was the night of April 13, the first day of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. It was also Memorial Day in Israel, which honors those who died fighting for the country. The Israeli president was delivering a speech at the Western Wall, a sacred Jewish site that lies below the Al Aqsa Mosque, and Israeli officials were concerned that the prayers would drown it out and sent police in with tear gas.

The following NYT article does a pretty fair job of laying out both sides cases, I think. There has been an agreement reached, which hopefully will last??

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/FMfcgzGkXSRLwpcQtblDzXtWMTkNwxfn

This blog is late, as I have finally moved into my new home in Provo, Utah, and am getting very happily settled. My favorites are the kitchen, large windows with views of the mountains, and rose bushes. I'm anxious to do some planting in both front and back yard, though the weather is getting hotter than I'm accustomed to. 

I would love to grow flowers like those in the beautiful bouquet grown by my daughter Julie with the green thumb!

There is a great walking/biking trail which runs for miles behind my house....and view of the mountains

.....and the pastures with or without cows and horses in the neighborhood. The snow has just about disappeared from Mount Timpanogos

I'm enjoying being part of my grandchildren's life, such as Kelly and boyfriend on the right and their friends before the prom. And spending time with the 4 kids who live here and their families.

My daughter Emily hosted a fun party for son Andrew's 6th grade party, complete with bouncy house. There was rapt attention for a slide show of class members!

Marc and family in beautiful Daybreak with lake and great views

It's great to be with almost the whole family for Mothers Day at Carlstons in Millcreek. The kids are busy playing while the adults chat.

 

It was fun to attend Zoe Taylor and Marshall Gibson's reception and get together with so many Taylors, who grew up in Palo Alto.

Amy Taylor Ringer and Megan Taylor Clawson 

Miriam, Sara Gilman, Colette Taylor, Marian Bennion Taylor, Deanne Welch, and Katy Taylor (all friends from Palo Alto, California). Sara and Paul invited me to a show in Provo.

I was pleased to have a short visit from my friend Kim Johnson (and her mission companion from Ecuador) who served in Madrid at the same time as I did. She then came to Ecuador, where we enjoyed excursions and meals together. She also came to visit her wonderful mission president Scott and Ruthanne Jackson, my across the street neighbors and our stake president, to be released this Sunday in order to serve as Mission Training Center leaders in Lima, Peru. We will miss them! Below is our Edgewood I ward and stake center, where we now meet in person each Sunday. Zoom is still available.

Our family enjoyed the recently released film "Witnesses" about the key witnesses to the ancient records on gold plates given to Joseph Smith from which the Book of Mormon was translated. Some left the church, but none ever denied that they had seen the plates.

After the show we met the actors playing the following characters: Oliver Cowdery, older David Whitmer, young David Whitmer, (guest), Joseph Smith, Emma Smith, Martin Harris

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Memorial weekend my daughter-in-law Rebecca de S. invited me to Heritage Days in an old pioneer town, Spring City, 1 1/2 hours southeast of Provo. We stopped first to put flowers on her grandparents' (grandmother's parents from Sweden, immigrant grandfather from Denmark) graves in a nearby town. Ming Lu was close to her great-grandmother Christensen.

The drive was lovely through very green spring hills, and Spring City was charming. It was settled beginning in the mid 1800's by Mormon pioneers, mostly immigrants from Scandinavia.

We enjoyed all the art in various barns, and music at the school and in Rock Church dedicated in 1914 (organ concert given by Palo Alto friend Jim Welch, also recently moved to Provo, and "period songs"sung by his sister Barbara Cramer.

We loved the ambiance, paintings, weavings, and pottery

Joe Bennion is a popular local potter with relations to our friends Dave and Connie Bennion. He also studied with our Tuscarora, Nevada friend Dennis Parks! It's a small world.

We loved the Milky Hollow Goat Farm, where Cordelia fed a newborn lamb. Some were only a day old.

A generous farmer loaded me up with beautiful rhubarb. He also had built a fantastic yurt!

These brilliant orange poppies were prolific and so spectacular!

May you enjoy a happily memorable, safe and peaceful summer!

 Happy Mothers Day to moms around the world!!!!

I am grateful for my mother and grandmothers, for the wonderful legacies they have left me. I appreciate all the amazing women who have inspired, taught, befriended and supported me as a girl and as an adult. I love being a mother to my 5 children, now incredible adults!. Thank you!

• “When you look at your mother, you are looking at the purest love you will ever know.” —Mitch Albom
• “There is no way to be a perfect mother, and a million ways to be a good one.” —Jill Churchill
• “Mother love is the fuel that enables a normal human being to do the impossible.” —Marion C. Garretty

Coraima in the Dominican Republic is focused on her education so she can help support her mother when she needs it. “My motivation [comes from] my mom and being able to help her in the future. I always do things thinking about her.” (Photo by Carina Cruz, Agency Journalist, Dominican Republic)

My wonderful new neighborhood is gorgeous with flowers and trees in full bloom, quickly leafing out!

Fernanda, Julie, the younger girl cousins and I visited a native plant garden in West Jordan, ate tacos and drank horchatas, and then stopped at Gardner Village with cute shops and old houses.

It has been so much fun to watch grand kids play soccer, baseball, disc golf, football....just like when my kids were growing up!

Emily and I enjoyed an amazing production of Les Miserables at the Hale Theater in the round in Sandy....always a favorite! I was thrilled to see Mary Porter there from my ward in Palo Alto, now in Carlsbad. I love the small world in which we live. Connections are so fun!

Meet some of my new neighbors

Some of the flora is most welcome, others like the ubiquitous dandelions are not!

Lucie, Ken and I did a 1000 piece puzzle. Did the dog eat the missing piece?

George (bottom row second from left) and Kelly (center) sang in a fabulous Timpview HS choirs concert

University Avenue with Mt. Timpanogos very near my new house. The walking/biking path is great.

Kelly and her boyfriend Clay (on right) and other friends posed for photos before the junior-senior prom at their high school. So nice that some events escape all the Covid restrictions. 

And speaking of Covid .....

Japan’s Covid response has been so successful that it achieved a remarkable feat: Overall deaths declined in 2020, even as they were surging in the U.S. and much of the rest of the world. Japan kept its Covid toll low, and its pandemic measures caused a decline in some other fatalities, like those from the flu and vehicle accidents.

What did Japan do right?

It already had a culture of mask wearing to prevent illness, and masks became almost ubiquitous early last year. (This article by Motoko, from almost a year ago, compares mask habits in Japan and the U.S.) The government also virtually closed its borders. And it was quick to focus on the settings where the coronavirus was most likely to spread, warning people to avoid the “three C’s” — closed spaces, crowded places and close contact.