June 2012 FHE Billion Graves

We had a joint Family Home Evening (FHE) activity with two other families where we used smartphones to take pictures of tombstones at the local cemetery for Billiongraves.com. This is a great genealogy activity that younger kids can participate in also. It went pretty well and was a fun experience. I have taken my kids to cemeteries several times to take photos since then. We may not do more than 15 minutes of photos, but it is service. :)

There was a stone table and benches that we used for treats.

Watermelon and popsicles and a quick lesson first.

Here is my friends' 7 year old taking pictures with her moms' phone.

Princess helped some and explored more.

Baby just followed me around mostly. He is such a cute little shadow.

Vicksburg visit

Dinoguy wants to stop at Vicksburg now every time we drive by. So on the way home we stopped in Vicksburg for the night and visited the park the next morning. It turned out to be national parks week and free admission which was awesome except there were more people in the park than usual.

I do like this park. Its beautiful and peaceful and a lovely reminder of the price of liberty. Plus now I am more familiar with its layout, its not quite as overwhelming. We visited the visitor's center watching the videos and presentations on the siege. Then we drove along the union siege lines and then along the confederate lines. The kids worked on the packet of questions for the junior ranger thing again. Though its different this year because of the 150th anniversary since the Civil War started. We're going to visit some other Civil War National Parks later this summer and by visiting 3 they will get memorial patches.

Over 150 cannons in the park

Kids like to play with cannons

White house remodeling project still in progress

Big Greek style memorial for Iowa

Running thru a tunnel dug during the siege

The USS Cairo

Yeah for Texas!

How cool is this statue?

It was set a ways back off the road. But this statue honors in part my GGG Grandpa's service. Had to get a picture!

The Florida memorial in a roundabout in the city of Vicksburg

Since our last visit, I have researched and found that my great great great grandfather was part of the confederate army that surrendered at Vicksburg. He was part of the Georgia Infantry. So I made special effort to see the Georgia memorial. The small loop had been closed last time we visited so it was neat to see the memorials on that loop that included Texas and Georgia. Then I looked for Florida's memorial and discovered its outside of the park in the city of Vicksburg. Apparently the park had to sell some of its land at some point and a bunch of the smaller memorials aren't inside it anymore. But we went and saw those memorials too this time. Here is the note of surrender from my ancestor. Note that it says "his mark" above and below where his name is signed around a small x. That's part of why his name is mispelt.

As far as fun, I think the most excitement on the trip was when we arrived at the USS Cairo (the ironclad ship) exhibit and taking Baby out of the car I realized he'd had a huge poop explosion. Went to the bathroom to clean him up and discovered that basically NONE of the poop was in the diaper. It was all in the onesie and on him. Of course the park had no paper towels so it was me and a ton of diaper wipes and trying to rinse out the onesie in the auto flow sinks. It took a while and I thought I had it all cleaned up but several hours later found dried poop smears on the side of my upper arm.

Grandpa!

Grandpa the Fun Actuary came to visit! We had a lovely long weekend with Grandpa the Fun Actuary. The boys showed off some of our new tricks to Grandpa the Fun Actuary, including a sampling of all of Dinoguy's favorite TV shows. This was fun because it allowed for lots of good cuddling time with Grandpa the Fun Actuary.





We also took him letterboxing with us, visiting a fun park.

Here comes Trainboy, racing toward the letterbox, counting stripes in the road as part of the clues.











Watch out for that speed bump!














What the world looks like when you are short? Dinoguy's camera skills are improving quickly, most of his photos are in focus now.











We also spent some time doing family history. We found a group of relatives who lived about an hour north of where we live now and a library that had indexed all of the local obituaries for 80 years. (I love local libraries!) Then it was off to a small local cemetery filled with more interesting names.




Can you spy Dinoguy in this photo? He's hiding. ;)

8 Things About Me Meme

Stephanie at Happy and Free tagged me for this meme.

Each player lists 8 facts/habits about themselves. The rules of the
game are posted at the beginning before those facts/habits are listed.
At the end of the post, the player then tags 8 people and posts their
names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them
know that they have been tagged and asking them to read your blog.

Here goes:

1. I love doing family history work, because I view it as a giant logic puzzle about my family. I do several volunteer things with it, including Find A Grave photos, The Obituary Daily Times indexing for the local paper, Family Search Indexing, and The US Census Transcription Project.

2. I have run 2 half marathons, but haven't done a full marathon yet (my goal). I keep getting injuries in my knees/ankles/feet. Le Sigh

3. I was in the newspaper on Wednesday for a cooking article: Salt Lake Tribune

4. I'm growing my hair out, wearing it curly and happily learning to style and care for it, thanks to all I've learned at The Long Hair Community

5. I love to play The Sims 2, and other simulation games.

6. I had to look up the word meme to really know what it meant. (My guesses were pretty accurate.)

7. I played the Tenor Saxophone in high school and also play the piano. My three favorite genres of music are classical, jazz & country.

8. I am crocheting my first afghan!

Okay, I tag Jessica, Kimber, Widdison, Brandvolds, Linda, The Rob, Hope. That's all I've got. We'll see if they do it!

Memorial Day

Memorial Day was yesterday. We spent most of it at cemeteries in Idaho visiting family graves. It was a nice way to spend memorial day, the number of people leaving flowers for family members at the cemetery was wonderful to see. Some were also heartbreaking - those leaving flowers for children and babies. People were cleaning up their family graves, decorating them, talking and praying with them, leaving memorials. I really recommend Find A Grave by the way. Here is David L. Duff's memorial.

Today was my due date. I had two miscarriages last fall, one due on Easter and the other due today. The losses of those pregnancies was really hard. It has changed me, as adversity does. I hope that I have become a better person and learned more compassion for others and patience from my own losses. I hope that I am more understanding and loving to others, realizing that I personally do not know what kind of trials they are dealing with. I did write a poem last fall that I want to share here now. Normally I don't talk about these things and yet I think that it is healing to talk about them and that they should be talked about a little more, so others also know they aren't alone in the loss. I am so grateful to friends who were kind and supportive to me then. Here is the poem:


Everybody says it'll be okay
and I just smile and nod
I'm screaming on the inside though
They say I'll get you back
and next time things will work
out It just Wasn't the right
time. I stare and wonder
how could they tell me
that? I've lost a baby
not a job or phone.
You can't replace
a person's soul.

I have to believe you are in heaven
now I have to think you only
needed a short time to live
And though I never held you
in my arms alive you
lived inside me and you're mine
I know some people think I'm
crazy now because to me you
were a child. But you
were my baby and my hopes
and dreams as soon as I
saw the two pink lines.

I don't know why you had
to leave so soon. I know I
would have been a loving mom
Anything that made you
different would not have changed
a thing. Please - I can't believe
you're gone.
(10-26-06)