Last weekend Clyde and I flew to Maryland to see the 4 week old triplets born to Emily and KC. I was so happy to see and hold these special little miracles. They are so perfect! Every moment with them was a new thrill. Each night I try to memorize and recall each sweet face: Alex, Bennett, and Ruby. I could not contain my tears of gratitude for this long prayed for miracle.
This week was a marathon work event. My responsibility was to oversee the implementation of a new product for communicating with graduate prospects and applicants, and newly admitted students. One person came out from Cincinnati and I spent 9 - 5 with her every day, intensely building content for web pages, 7 emails for 55 departments, filters for sending all the emails on a schedule, figuring out data issues and more. Imagine trying to manage it all - 55 departments, 7 emails each, 7 areas of content for each program web page, 4 communication plans, 97 users. I can't even do the math. I am bushed!!!
And, I don't know how to find photos on the internet without the stock photo logo. oh well. On to my NAP.
Last night I had looked at my Google reader list (for the umpteenth time), just in case there was a new post about the triplets. There were no new posts but I saw a recommended link to a blog that I sometimes read - Light Refreshments Served. It is a group of different ladies who are all Mormon, but I'm not sure how they got connected.
I started reading the blog listed called How great shall be your joy The name in the story, the description of the person in the temple sounded all too familiar. By the end of the story I was sure she had written about my father in the Denver temple. I could visualize him exactly as she described him, and I knew about these few new names he had recently found that needed temple work.
It was a dear sweet tender experience to read the words of someone who was deeply touched by my father's pure intentions and desire to serve. It was a tender mercy for me, a reminder of my heritage and great example of my father. It made me thankful for many things - that my brother takes my dad to the temple, that my dad still wants to go to the temple, that he loves the temple, that he has no fear when in the service of the Lord, that I am his child and witness to his example.
I found her email address somewhere on the blog and I wrote to her.
Here is what she wrote back to me:
Dear Janice:THIS IS WHY I LOVE THE INTERNET!!!I am certain that you are right - another member of the group mentioned that he was 93, that he had been a sealer in the early days of the Denver Temple, and I believe they even said he served as the Temple President (?) at one time?Or maybe a member of the presidency?Anyway, it was a really neat experience for me, and I meant what I said about feeling like I was witnessing something special.I almost felt irreverent even being in the room.It was really good for me to witness, because attending the temple is sometimes hard for me.But watching him that day really strengthened my testimony of temple work. Sounds like you were a very lucky girl to have such a wonderful dad!
Today we became grandparents. See this great post. I kind of wander around trying to do my Saturday stuff, but I keep coming back to the computer to gaze at the photos of KC and Emily's TRIPLETS! What a miracle we have witnessed. I can't stop the tears of happiness.
I've been very busy these last few weeks getting ready for the New Graduate Student Info Fair and Dinner. Preparing emails to be sent, inviting 27 booth participants, gathering donated prizes (we had 120 this year!), shopping for stuff, setting up the RSVP, etc. We had an overwhelming number of people tell us they wanted to come - 1240 this year! That is a lot of folks to feed...tables to set... name tags to print...name tags to be picked up. With 11 years experience under my belt and fantastic students and staff in Graduate studies we managed to have two great events. We learn something every year and try to improve in little ways. This year we added the Museum of People and Cultures - did you know they sponsor a date night in the Museum twice a month? And host FHE? cool. The favorite giveaway was the holographic drink cup by Dining Services! We ran out of small T-shirts by 2 pm. I had to wake the person hosting the Statistics consultation booth - he was sound asleep and 2 students came back to us and said they could not get his stamp because he was asleep! I had to nudge his feet under the table to wake him. Ha Ha. We had 400+ students come to the fair and we talked to every one of them! They get so excited that they are getting more chances at the three tuition prizes by visiting the booths. There are lot of details to remember and I always blank out on something. This time I got my evening outfit from the car, and changed in the restroom around 5 pm. I handed my bag of clothing and make up to a student and told her where to find my car - just to get one thing out of the way that I would not have to haul out later. 5 minutes later she called to say she could not find the car, so I explained where it was once again. OK she said, I see it. Another call 10 minutes later and she Still could not find the car. OH. My. gosh - I NOW recalled that Clyde was picking up the car at 5:15 to go home and change! OOPS! I felt pretty silly. Thank goodness my student worker was not mad... We started on time, had plenty of seats, even for those who did not RSVP and had a delicious meal with a new dessert: chocolate molten lava cake. Dining Services out did themselves this year. We were done by 7:55 pm, cleaned up by 8:30 and I was home and in my pjs by 8:55. Clyde gave me a sort of foot massage (can anyone teach him to a do a real massage?) After the very long day my feet hurt! This year Dustin and Alicia got to come and I found out they are in the ward of the VP over Graduate Studies. I wish I could take a long break, but there are two more huge projects that are overdue and ready to take my time. Onward. My goal is to have these done before Emily and KC have the triplets!!! Hang on Emily and grow those babies. Photos maybe later - or not.
Hello all! My 93 year old father and my brother are visiting for the 4th. They wanted to see the place where I work so we stopped by at noon on Saturday. I was startled when I saw what looked like an ugly owl stuffed figure on the wood furniture under the Calf picture. It did not belong and I thought someone was playing a JOKE! My brother always has his camera with him and he looked at it with a zoom and said, "IT'S ALIVE..." We were sure it was alive when I noticed a few spots on the wall paper that looked like it had hit the wall. I finally gathered my senses and called security and they promised to send someone over. We continued our tour and the owl did not move from it's spot and we walked very carefully through to the dining room and upstairs. The officer arrived about 12:15 and noted that we were upstairs. He made noise and the frightened OWL flew around the living room a bit, until the officer was able to scoop it up in his hands and send him out the door. He said it was just a baby and did not seem to be injured. There are 15 spots on the walls and ceiling that the owl hit and left marks as he tried to get out. He also left bird POOP ( gross!) on four pieces of furniture. I placed pink sticky notes where we saw the poop, but I'm not sure we saw it all. there are a few owl feathers around too.
How did the owl arrive inside the house? I am pretty sure he came in through the chimney flue. There is a knob there and the directions on the fireplace state to turn clockwise to open. The knob seems to be turned to the open position!! I don't know how to upload this to link to picasa, so try this. for more.. http://picasaweb.google.com/jkrobinson2/OwlVisitsFormerPresidentsHome?authkey=Gv1sRgCKry96329sPVpQE#
Quite a few years ago Clyde purchased a used car for KC to use while going to school. It was a good car, a good buy, and it was purchased from a young couple in Salt Lake City. Clyde mentioned that he was a BYU professor and when he showed up to pick up the car, the man's mother had included a long red umbrella from her workplace - the University of Utah. Clyde accepted graciously and that long tall umbrella has been in our coat closet ever since. It looked like it was a huge umbrella with a U of U logo - something we'd feel uncomfortable taking to BYU campus on a rainy day, but it's always good to have extra umbrellas around the house. You never know when Michelle and her buddies might have wanted to wanted to play out in the rain and puddles. Fast forward to Saturday, June 20, 2009. Clyde had just purchased a new BBQ grill and it was RAINING a lot! So Michelle and Cisco offered to put the new cover on the grill, but first they had to dry it off a bit. Michelle looked for a large umbrella and could only find this red one.
Take a look at what we found when we opened the umbrella! We had this hilarious thing at our house for so long and never knew!HA! A helmet umbrella! Hilarious.
HA! A helmet umbrella! Hilarious.