Cousin Russ, Alex's mission call, my new calling

My kids have 25 first cousins. Glen thinks he has 15. I have 2, Chandel and Russ.

Chandel was 11 years older than I was and Russ was 8 years older. They grew up in California and I grew up in Massachusetts. I don't even remember ever meeting them until I was an adult--and I only saw them once or twice. There is a home movie of me with them at the beach when I was maybe 3. I don't remember it.

Anyway,  Chandel passed away almost 13 years ago. We found out last Monday that Russ had passed away on Saturday, September 14th. It's funny how even someone I had such little contact with can make me feel so sad at his passing. He just seemed to be such a great guy.

He was a musician and played the trombone--he would sometimes play in the band on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. I remember seeing him a few times on TV playing.

Later in life, Russ became a nurse. He had just retired and was traveling with his dog Max. Part of the plan was for him to drop Max off with my parents for a week in October so he could explore further.

Good bye, Russ. You are missed.

So, the looooooong awaited day finally arrived. Alex had warned us last Sunday that if the call came Tuesday that he wouldn't be opening it until Wednesday (because there was too much happening on Tuesday). Sure enough, it came on Tuesday and we had to wait until Wednesday evening to open it. Tuesday morning I was not wanting to wait, but wait we did, which allowed more family and friends to be with Alex as he opened his call...

...and if you haven't heard, he is called to serve in the Utah Salt Lake City Mission to report to the training center on Wednesday November 6th! Seven weeks to get ready. Wow. (by the way, Ryan is the only one who guessed Salt Lake City. Riley, a friend, guessed Utah in general. Good guessing, boys)

As you can see from the map, his mission includes part of Wyoming (about 1/6th of the state?). Alex has noticed that though there are many temples near his mission boundaries, none are actually in his mission boundaries. I said that the Salt Lake Temple is...and he reminded me that the Temple is its own mission (the one his cousin Madison served in)--and it's closing down in December for renovations anyway.

Today Alex was given the Melchizedek Priesthood and ordained to the office of an Elder. He won't be set apart as a missionary until just before he leaves for his mission, though. He will be going through the temple for the first time this Saturday morning at 9:30 am. Another big step in his life!

Bishop Sommer, Grandpa, Gary, Alex, Glen, Brother Polish, Eric, and Alan

Today I received a new calling. I am now the second counselor in the Young Women's (YW) presidency. I was a tiny bit surprised as it wasn't on my radar, but I'm very excited. I'll be working with wonderful people--both the other adults and the girls. The YW program has changed a bit since I was last in it, and come January even more changes will be happening. It's an exciting time to be working with the youth.

And Alex and I have played 5 games this week (Alhambra, Istanbul, Viticulture, 7 Wonders Duel, and Caverna). He not only won 4 of them, he creamed me. I managed to win 7 Wonders Duel, but according to him it was not because I was a better player, but because Alex didn't pay attention to the fact that I was collecting the different science symbols. In many games, he clearly is the better player, but I'm not convinced that 7 Wonders Duel is one of them.

mimicking Andrew and Heather's picture from last week

quantity leads to quality story, Alex update

This story is from the book Art & Fear by David Bayles and Ted Orland.

The ceramics teacher announced on opening day that he was dividing the class into two groups. All those on the left side of the studio, he said, would be graded solely on the quantity of work they produced, all those on the right solely on its quality.

His procedure was simple: on the final day of class he would bring in his bathroom scales and weigh the work of the “quantity” group: fifty pound of pots rated an “A”, forty pounds a “B”, and so on. Those being graded on “quality”, however, needed to produce only one pot – albeit a perfect one – to get an “A”.

Well, came grading time and a curious fact emerged: the works of highest quality were all produced by the group being graded for quantity. It seems that while the “quantity” group was busily churning out piles of work – and learning from their mistakes – the “quality” group had sat theorizing about perfection, and in the end had little more to show for their efforts than grandiose theories and a pile of dead clay.

So write, paint, pot, compose, create...no excuses.

UPDATE: Alex saw my blog post and suggested I add this video to my blog. It's sort of like the story above.

Not too much news this week, though next Sunday after church, Glen, Eric, Grandpa P, and Uncles David, Alan, and Gary will place their hands on Alex's head and confer the Melchizedek Priesthood on him and ordain him to the office of an Elder. This is preliminary to him going to the temple and being ready to serve his mission. His mission call will hopefully come this week.

Oh, this morning about 1 1/2 hours before church was to start, Alex was asked to give a short talk at church on prayer. He did a smash up job...basing it on a talk he had recently given. Excellent meeting.

Heather sent us 2 pictures this week. They played the game Alhambra and she said, "Guess who won." I'm going with Andrew losing. 

Lesser items:

The last few days we didn't have to run the swamp cooler and I put the blanket back on our bed. I even had some herbal tea and Pero to warm me up. 

Oh, the speed limit through town is now 30 instead of 25. Big thrill.

Ryan and Angeles moved to a different house in Rexburg, so if you need their new address, let us know.