North Dakota Pumpkin!

Thank you Peter for the letter and your cute pumpkin--love it!

Our California Pumpkins!

Here are more of the great pumpkins our grandkids carved.  They are great!  Thank you Ava, Ellis, and Caleb.  I appreciate you taking time to participate!

Caleb's Pumpkin--Scary!

Ava's Pumpkin-So Cute!

Ellis's Pumpkin--AMAZING!

Madi's Missionary Moment!

I love this young woman because Amy talks about her all the time and loves her so much.  She just entered the MTC and will be serving in Equador for the next 18 months.  This was part of the letter she sent her family and Amy shared it with me.  I had to share it!  She is amazing and very insightful.  Best wishes Madi--you are going to be an amazing missionary!

Dear family and friends,

This place is amazing. I am seriously in awe everyday. Where else in the world can you find 1,500 young adults that go to bed at 10:30 every night and actually SURVIVE without a cell phone?! It blows my mind! This week has been absolutely insane. To help simplify all the craziness, I summed it up. I call it:

10 FUN FACTS ABOUT THE MTC (according to Hermana Bryce) :

1. The first day in the MTC is the longest day of your life. 

It never seemed to end! I would look down and be amazed that I was still wearing the exact same outfit I had been wearing on the plane that morning. I was so overwhelmed by the spanish and the Spirit and it was a relief to go to bed that night. They promised it would get easier, and it most certainly does! 

2. Elders are still just teenage boys.

It is just a fact. Sorry about it. 

3. Receiving letters is the BEST feeling in the world!! 

My district hates me because of how many letters I get. I am seriously spoiled! Even if it is just a little note to say hi, it makes my day! I LOVE LETTERS. (wink wink)

4. You will learn more Spanish in the first week at the MTC than in all of high school. 

It is so true. It is incredible how real the gifts of tongues is. I have already taught six lessons in Spanish, and we have another one tonight! I was asked to say the prayer in class yesterday, and I was SHOCKED when I realized I had just said a prayer in Spanish. Also, I no longer have the ability to say the word, "Yes." Everything is, "Si." It is actually really fun. 

5. Even when you think your lesson is a complete failure, the Spirit does amazing things. 

We taught a lesson last night, and we thought it was the biggest fail of a lesson ever. We were pretty discouraged because we had been SO excited going into it. After talking to our teacher, we realized what actually happened. He translated some things for us, and we found out that our investigator actually understood us and felt the Spirit touch his heart. SERIOUSLY SO COOL. 

6. First names do not exist here. 

I accidently said my first name out loud and it made me jump. It sounded so unfamiliar and strange. This places changes you. (In a very very good way!)

7. Yes, your companions will eventually get tired of you saying, "Wow. It is so cold here!" 

They will also get tired of you saying, "That mountain is AMAZING!" and "Seriously?! That tree is RED. Like RED RED. It is so beautiful!" In my trio, I am the only Hermana not from Utah. They think I am being silly, but they totally take this stuff for granted. It is gorgeous here. I LOVE it. Also, it is suppose to SNOW next week. SNOW. Soy pumped. 

8. Two companions are better than one. 

I am lucky enough to be placed in a trio. :) Hermana Davis is serving in Washington and Hermana Riley is serving in Ecuador with me!! They are seriously so great. I love them. We each bring something different and it makes our lessons go so well. We are having so much fun. We are also the only sisters in our district. I like to think we help the Elder's stay on track. ;)

9. Being apart of the MTC choir is the BEST!

Join the choir. Just do it. It is incredible. I actually just mouthed most of the song because it was was too high. It is even better when you get to sing for AN APOSTLE OF THE LORD. Neil L. Andersen came for our devotional on Tuesday night. How is that for a first week? :) He brought such a special spirit and some much needed motivation. EVERYTHING IS AWESOME.

10. I was wrong about my purpose as a missionary. 

I thought I knew what it meant to be a missionary. I have learned so much this week. It really comes down to love. Love for the gospel. Love for the Savior. Love for your companions. Love for the people. It is so important. We invite others to come unto Christ through love! 

I love and miss you all SO MUCH. Have an amazing week! 

Love, 

Hermana Bryce

**I do have to say that right now #2 is probably accurate but we have seen new Elders come and it is amazing how much they grow up in just a few weeks in the mission field.  You will be pleasantly surprised at the amazing young men they become!

The Monkey and the Organ Grinder

We visited Rhode Island on Monday so we could show Kent and Becky one of our favorite places. We spent some time on Newport which is one of the three islands in the bay.  We came upon this statue of an organ grinder and his monkey that was in a marketplace where we had stopped.  According to Wikipedia organ grinders showed up in the late 1800s.  I remember the organ grinders when I was a girl and loved giving pennies to the monkey.  He would run up and grab it out of our hands, put the penny in his pocket and then tip his hat. I wonder now how much the organ grinder made after a day of collecting pennies.

Covered Bridges

One of the things I have really enjoyed in our travels around the northeast has been the many covered bridges scattered around.  A few weeks ago we went to Vermont and visited Woodstock and Springfield and came upon a beautiful old bridge.

Grave Watchers!

We enjoyed visiting with Kent and Becky for a few days and one of those was spent visiting the gravesites of Scott and Kent's many great grandfathers in Acworth and Londonderry, New Hampshire.  Becky and I came up with our own entertainment until they finished!

Acworth

Londonderry

Happy Birthday Will!

Another great to be eight birthday! You are such a sweet boy and we are so excited that you are now old enough to be a Cub Scout.  I know you will have a great time and it won't be long before you are building your first pinewood derby car, and earning your wood chip card, and attending pack meetings.  You make us happy because you always seem to be happy. I know you are working hard at school and that you are a good and kind brother.  You are a great grandson and we love you very much.  Happy Birthday Will!

Happy Birthday Miriam!

It is hard to believe that our avid reader, ice skater, golfer, violin player, hard working student, beautiful girl has grown into such a lady. Fourteen years ago you were born and have been a blessing to us and to your family.  You have amazing abilities Miriam and we are so proud of the young woman you are becoming.  Keep making good choices, loving your family, and never forget that where much is given much is expected. I know that we will continue to be pleased by what we see you doing and we will continue to be proud of you.  Happy Birthday Miriam!

Utah Pumpkins are Here!!

Thank you for accepting the challenge!  The pumpkins are so cute and we can tell you put a lot of thought and effort into your creations.  Each year in Keene, New Hampshire they have a Pumpkin Plunking contest and everyone brings their pumpkin to town and they catapult them to see which pumpkin flies the farthest.  I wouldn't let them touch these beauties.  Good job grandkids--these are all winners!

Katie's Creation-Stupendous!

Meg's Pumpkin-Huggable!

Brigham's Pumpkin-A Howling Success!

Abby's Pumpkin-Creative!

Will's Pumpkin--So Cute!

Bruce's Pumpkin-Ready to Fly!

Missionary Moments #60--Oct. 24, 2015

Of course the big news this week is that Perry got his mission call and will be reporting to the Missionary Training Center in January.  He will be serving in the Kentucky Louisville Mission!  It was so nice to have been able to Skype so we could be a part of the big announcement with the rest of the family.  Apparently there were three Skypes going on along with us, Nana and Papa Dahlberg, and Amy and Christian.  Don't you just love technology?  We sure did Fridiay night. Perry will finish out his semester at BYU and then will be home a few weeks before he leaves for the MTC and then on to Kentucky.  Don't worry he is already starting to learn the language of the South and he sounded very Red Neck on Friday night!  I have to admit I loved seeing the huge grin on his face when he read his letter and know that he is going exactly where he is suppose to be. 

At work we decided to stop the camera and just get busy with getting documents ready.  We can barely keep up so decided that if we both just dedicated several days to document preparation that would move the work along a little more smoothly.   When we left on Friday we had six full boxes of documents and hopefully we can be more consistent in the coming months by staying ahead of ourselves.  I have to admit by Friday we were remembering how much we like having a little distraction each day by working on the camera between document prep. Variety is definitely the spice of life in this assignment.  

On Saturday morning our Stake had their 8th annual Family History Conference.  I was the welcome speaker but don't be impressed.  Well be impressed because I had only 10 minutes to share what has been happening in Family Search in the last year and I did it!  There was well over 100 people there and Grandpa and I were able to attend several classes.  They were really good and we learned a lot.  We attended one class that taught us about a program called Myheritage.com.  I can't wait to get more involved in using it.  After it was over we drove down to Nashua to celebrate with a (you probably already guessed it!) Chick-fil-a lunch.  After that we drove to the Manchester Airport just to make sure we could find it when we went back at 10:00 p.m. to pick up Kent and Becky.  We are so excited to have them here with us.

The temperature is dropping and we are finding ourselves doing more layering each morning. The yards are no longer green but are covered with beautiful carpets of orange, red, and yellow leaves.  We have enjoyed watching the ground crew work around out building blowing all the leaves into a huge pile (If I was 50 years younger I would definitely be jumping into it) and then hauling the pile away.  Two days later they are back again doing the same thing.  It is amazing how many leaves are in New Hampshire!  Hope you all have a great week! 

8th Annual Family History Conference

I spoke today at our Stake's Family History Conference and thought I'd share the talk since it tells about much that has been happening in the last year in Family Search.

Family History Day, Concord, New Hampshire

Saturday, October 24, 2015

It is such a privilege to be able to participate with all of you at the 8^th Annual Family History Day here in Concord.  We moved to Concord from California just over a year ago to serve as Record Preservation Missionaries and have been working at the State Archives since that time.  Besides the fact that we get to live in the most beautiful state in New England we have enjoyed being part of a wonderful project to photograph probate records. 

The new CEO of Family Search, Steve Rockwood said,

“In our discovery I hope we will all shine a light on the life-changing nature of family history.  All of our family and friends need to personally experience the emotion, understanding, and joy that comes from discovering family, both past and present.”  Since we began working at the archives we have had numerous opportunities to see the shining light of family dynamics when we get glimpses into their history, their family, their generosity, their religions, their successes and their struggles.  We have enjoyed little glimpses of love for spouses and children.  It has been amazing to me to realize that these aren’t my relatives and yet I have been uplifted by the beautiful words, and kind thoughts that have been expressed by so many of these wonderful strangers.  I often hope that their posterity will also have an opportunity to see what amazing ancestors they have.

Today I wanted to share what has been happening in the last year at Family Search and to tell you what the Mayville’s and my husband and I have done since this project began. 

Ø  At this time there are over 200 cameras and other archiving resources distributed around the world.  42 of those cameras are operating in the United State right now.  We have two cameras here in Concord.

Ø  Family Search image capture projects worldwide are currently producing over 80 million images per year.

Ø  In June it was announced that Family Search is partnering with African American organizations to help index records of the Freedmen’s Bureau, an agency organized following passage of the 13^th Amendment to the Constitution.  Between 1862-1872 the bureau gathered handwritten documents on free men, women, and children.  These records include marriages, family information, military service, banking, school, hospital and property records.

Elder D. Todd Christofferson spoke at the announcement and he told the audience, “One of our key beliefs is that our families can be linked forever and that knowing the sacrifice, the joys, and paths our ancestors trod helps us know who we are and what we can accomplish.”

Ø  In August there was a World Wide Indexing Event.  In that one week 12,251,870 records were indexed with the help of 82,039 volunteers.

Ø  As of October 2015—

o   10 million records have been added to the New York New York Passenger and Crew List

o   The Australia Queensland Cemetery records from 1802-1990 are now available on Family Search

o   The Illinois County marriages from 1810-1934 is now available

o   The Massachusetts Salem and Beverly Crew List and Shipping Articles from 1797-1934 have been photographed (tell the story of Herman Melville)

o   The Pennsylvania Historical Society Card Catalog from 1553-2015 is now available on Family Search

o   The Maine J Gary Nichols Cemetery Collection from 1780 to 1999 is now available

o   The North Dakota State Census from 1915 to 1925 and now available on Family Search

o   Florida Probate Records from 1874-1990 have been photographed and

o   The Billion Graves Index has added 562,082 names

At New Hampshire Archives we have been working with Tim and Phyllis Mayville who have been taking pictures (we call it capturing!) since November 2013.  During that time they have completed the Grafton County Probate Estate files from 1773 to 1899.  When that was completed they began work on the Cheshire County, New Hampshire probates from 1900 to 1959.  That project had about 16,000 files and Tim, Phyllis, and their son Jared took over a half a million images.  They have just started another project for Grafton County capturing probate files from 1900 to 1959 and when that is completed they will begin Merrimack County.

When Scott and I started at the Archives we began working on the Rockingham County probate files which we completed in August.  Those records were from 1850 through 1918.  We have opened 18,918 folders and took 436,242 pictures.  We are now working on Hillsborough County beginning in the late 1700s.  Rockingham County had 155 boxes full of probate files and our Hillsborough project has 354 boxes which will keep us busy until we return home in March of 2016 so there will still be work to be done after we leave.

It has been a great experience and although we do the same thing each day we have grown to love the work and appreciate more the wonderful people who settled this area so many years ago. 

On the Family Search website they have written—

·         Learning about our ancestors helps us better understand who we are-creating a family bond linking the present to the past, and building a bridge to the future.

I know that is true.  We are living in such a wonderful time because of all of the technology that has made it possible to be linked almost immediately to our ancestors.  To learn about them gives us immeasurable opportunities to be better people because of their good and even sometimes their bad qualities.

In closing I’d like to encourage you that ‘as you move along in your journey to discover the roots of your family never forget that your own story needs to be told’.  Each of us has so much to contribute and what you are doing is so important and so far reaching.  I hope you have continued success.

BYU Cougars!

Ellis, Ava, Perry, Caleb--October 24, 2015

So glad that Andy and Angela were able to take the family to Utah this weekend.  Of course the highlight was Perry's opening of his mission call last night but today it was a a fun for all king of day.  The family went to the BYU football game (BYU won!) and got to see the marching band perform with Perry in it.  I love that we are able to still keep up with all that is happening even when we are far away.

Perry's Going on a Mission!

The Kentucky Louisville Mission will be getting one awesome missionary in January--and I know that this same missionary is going to the most wonderful mission in the Church.  Love the gospel that provides opportunities for our young men and young women to grow in wisdom and stature as they serve the Lord.  Thank you Perry for all the years you have spent preparing for this great responsibility and one thing I know for sure--you will be an amazing missionary!

Concert for Rachel

Rachel and her roommate and some other friends went to a concert last weekend and got these cool shirts!  So glad they she is taking advantage of all the neat things there is to do in Salt Lake!  On top of that she just aced a big project in one of her classes.  That's my girl!!!

Abby's Spider Web!

Loved this cute design Abby made.

Glad this is just a pretend spider--it looks pretty scary!

Here's the Challenge Grandkids!

We decided to do something a little different this month and so instead of a Lego design we are inviting all of you little Gremlins! to send us a picture of your most creative pumpkin carving.  Grandpa and I even did one so you could see that we are taking up the challenge as well.  I admit we found the design in a magazine but we figured it all out without a pattern and I think it turned our pretty amazing!  You can send a picture of your completed carved pumpkins to us in the next two weeks and we will post them as they come in.  We know how artistic you are so  be creative and share the results.  This can be a family pumpkin of individual pumpkins. It is up to you.  A treat for each family is going into the mail this week to thank you ahead of time for participating in our latest challenge and to wish you a Happy Halloween!

Missionary Moments #59--Oct 18, 2015

I guess the big news for this week is that we now have a release date for our mission.  March 10, 2016 we will be heading home!  We got a call from the mission office earlier in the week letting us know they were getting everything ready for our release.  It is hard to believe that we do see an end to this great experience we have had.  Our Supervisor came in this week and gave us an assignment to find other couples who are interested in serving as record preservation missionaries.  He mentioned a number of areas where they need missionaries and one of them was Baltimore which would be very nice because you could spend a great deal of Saturdays exploring the wonderful areas around it.  Don't worry we are coming home! 

At the archives this week we have had numerous probate files for Duncans which we hadn't had before and they were in the area of Grandpa's family so I wrote all the information that was contained in the records and then checked to see if they were any direct relations to our family line.  Couldn't find any but it was still exciting to see Duncan on the folder.  I suspect we will find more in the coming months.  This county has 354 boxes of probate files and as of Friday we have finished about 20 of them. We won't finish this assignment before we go home so they will either assign another missionary couple here or have our co-workers, the Mayvilles finish it. They are paid for each picture they take and have been working at the archives for almost two years.  Without their help when we first came I think learning all that needed to be done would have been really difficult.  On top of that Tim always tells us interesting places to go in the area and we have followed his advice and seen some great things here in New Hampshire.

Yesterday we headed up the 89 freeway to Vermont to look at the beautiful fall colors and then came back down on the 91 freeway which took us to the bottom of Vermont.  The weather has changed quite a bit this week and so now most of the leaves are starting to fall off the trees and the vibrant reds, yellows and oranges are beginning to fade a little but it was a beautiful day with some amazing landscapes.  We visited Woodstock, Vermont and Springfield, Vermont, ate lunch in Laconia, New Hampshire and browsed in a big new Michaels store in Keene, New Hampshire.  We drove all around the areas on two lane roads and enjoyed the leisure trip since most of the time the speed limit is 30 miles per hour.  It is so interesting to go into these small towns and see great big factories, that probably provided jobs for most of the people in the town, now sitting empty with broken windows and worn brick facades.  That is one thing we have seen over and over in Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Rhode Island.  There was definitely a time in the history of this area where they were probably some of the giants of industry.  For us in Concord it seems that state government is the big employer since it is the capital of New Hampshire.  We hope you are all doing well.

A Veritable Bargain!

Found this gem at work today and had to share it with you.  To give some perspective I checked on Google and typed in average cost of a funeral in 2015.  For a coffin in 2015 you could pay on average $2,300. The wood grain coffin with a velvet liner in 1859 cost a whopping $7.00.  The name plate then cost $1.25 and a headstone now would run you $1,500.  Another expense in 1859 was the cost of the burial which I would suspect would be to pay the grave digger which ran $3.00.  If you needed a grave dug now it is going to run you $600.00.  So if you died in 1859 you would need to pay $13.25 for the basic service to be laid to rest. If you die now you will need an average of about $8,500.  That is certainly a reason to take care of yourself and live for a long long time!

This is a receipt from an undertaker in Manchester, New Hampshire

Our Building

January 2014

When I put Ava's picture on the blog with her new baptism dress I realized that she was standing in the same place that we stood at to have our picture taken for our mission paperwork.  It got me thinking about this building that we have attended since it opened.  We started attending church at the building on Hesperia Road when we first moved to Victorville.  From there we moved to Apple Valley to the Tuscola Building where Andy and Angela now attend.  We then did a short stint at the Ward Building in Hesperia while the new Victorville Stake Center was being built on Ridgecrest. and then we remained there except for a short time when we met at the Jeraldo building where Ben and Becky and Andy and Angela had their wedding receptions.

October 2015

With Ava's baptism on Saturday in that same building which is now the Apple Valley Stake Center we have had some wonderful memories within its walls.  Amy's baptism, seminary for the older boys, seminary graduation and talk by Ben, Primary activities, Relief Society meetings, conferences before we could watch from our own living room. Scouting, Saturday night dances, Scott's service as Bishop, my assignment to schedule the use of the building, wedding reception for Bill and Cathy, Scott's retirement party and the list continues to go on.  It is wonderful to realize that much of the best parts of our life have happened in that building on Ridgecrest.

Ava's Baptism Day

Ava was baptized on Saturday, October 10, 2015.  So proud of her for making such a good choice.  I know without a doubt that she will be a good member of the Church and I know that we are all proud of her.

     I like my birthdays, ev'ry one;
     Each brings a greater joy to me.
     But I can't wait until I'm eight,
     For then I'll be baptized you'll see.

     To be baptized as Jesus was
     By one who holds the priesthood true
     And thus obey God's holy laws
     Is just the thing I want to do.

     When hands are laid upon my head,
     Then I'll receive the Holy Ghost.
     And, if I listen carefully,
     I'll have the blessing I need most.

CSB Page 104 I Like My Birthdays

Amazing History

In the 1780s so much was happening that I am a little surprised that anything got done in the every day life of the citizens of the United States.

• 1780-Pennsylvania became first State to abolish slavery.  Benedict Arnold betrayed the United States.
• 1781-General George Washington beat the British at Yorktown.
• 1782-Congress approved the Great Seal of the United States and the Eagle as its symbol.
• 1783-The Revolutionary War officially ended.
• 1784-In a letter to his daughter, Benjamin Franklin expressed unhappiness over the eagle as a symbol of America.  He wanted the turkey!
• 1785-The US congress adopted the silver coin called a dollar as their monetary system.
• 1786-Daniel Boone was born.
• 1787-The Constitutional Convention convened in Philadelphia.  George Washington presided.  The Constitution was completed and signed on Sept 17.  It is the worlds oldest working constitution.
• 1788-The US Constitution went into effect as New Hampshire became the 9th state to ratify it.
• 1789-George Washington became the first President of the United States.

Missionary Moments #58--Oct 11, 2015

We are back to a regular routine again and it is feeling good to know that we are contributing to the record preservation of Hillsborough County.  Although we are not meeting the capture goal we were able to in Rockingham we are certainly able to understand how different the work is when you are working with documents from 1770 to 1830. 

It has been an interesting week for us.  The weather is definitely cooling down and I have retired my flip flops and capris that I was wearing on the weekend.  The leaves are almost completely changed to their vibrant reds, oranges, and yellows but I have to admit that knowing what is coming next does have me not enjoying it as much as I did last year!  Yesterday we spent the morning at Mack's Apple Farm in southern New Hampshire where we enjoyed seeing the wonderful bounty of pumpkins, apples, gourds, squash, and pears.  They had a gift shop with everything apple available for purchase with of course, maple syrups and honey products.  They had a pond on their property and the fish were jumping out of the water to eat popcorn that kids had thrown in the water.  I actually saw "fishes jumping right before my eyes!" From Londonderry we headed over for our treat of Chick-fil-a in Nashua before heading home for a nap.  After a short rest we headed towards central New Hampshire for the Columbus Day Event which is held each Columbus Day weekend in Sandwich, New Hampshire.  I have posted pictures for a couple of things we saw.  It was a big fair without the quilts and produce that I always love to see but they definitely had every food booth you could want and if you needed to buy a tractor you came to the right place.  My favorite was definitely the oxen as you will see if you check the blog.

Yesterday Ava was baptized in California and at the end of the month Will is going to be baptized.   Although we missed being at Jane and Ava's baptism and will miss being at Will's we are proud of each of you for choosing to be baptized.  I hope that you had a great experience Ava and I was glad that your Nana and Papa and some of your other relatives were able to come and support you!  I can't wait to see the pictures!

Before I close today I wanted to share an experience with you.  Scott has a real problem with a sore neck and by the end of the day I can always tell he is hurting even though he doesn't complain.  When I would see him rubbing his neck I knew that was because he was in a lot of pain but when I would ask him about it he always responds that he was getting by.  Since being here he has taken a lot of medication for the pain and usually needs a mild sleeping pill to sleep through the night.  One of the things that I have been working on while we have been serving is that I asked Heavenly Father to help me be a better person so I could improve.  In one of my conversations I asked for an understanding of what I could do to support Scott so that I could be kind and patient.  A couple of days later I started having terrible back spasms which made it almost impossible to sit for any length of time.  By the end of the day I felt like I could hardly take a deep breath and was exhausted as we left the archives each afternoon for home.  After two days of that it came to me that I now understood what he must feel like every day and yet he just keeps doing his job and doing it without a complaint.  I could now understand why he was so tired each afternoon and needed to take a nap to carry on.  I did express gratitude in my prayer that evening for helping me learn empathy and prayed that my back would get better.  The good news is my back spasms are gone and my appreciation for Scott is soaring high!  It has been a great week and we hope yours has been as well.

Oxen

In the morning we visited apple country and then in the afternoon we headed up to the top of the Lake Winnepesaukee to a town called Sandwich.  They were having an annual activity with animals, crafts, food, tractors and lots of people.  We hope to make it to an actual county fair before the snow starts falling but this wasn't one.  In spite of that it was very interesting.  I had never seen an oxen before and these were very impressive.  I thought they were about the size of a cow and was so surprised when I saw that they were huge.  Now I understand why they were able to pull a wagon across the plains.

First the Oxen

Then the Antique Tractors

And Finally a 550 lb. Pumpkin

Apple Farm

We haven't been out much for a couple of weeks so today we went to Londonderry to visit the apple orchards we had seen in the Spring when we were headstone searching for John Duncan.  What a beautiful area and so typical of New Hampshire. Not only did we find apples but hundreds of pumpkins, squash, and pears.  The best part of the day was when we got home and I bit into the first apple.  It was--Heavenly!

Just a few of the pumpkins!

Doesn't look very appetizing but I hear it is really sweet

They call these Ghost Pumpkins

You can pick off the tree but we chose the
easy way!

This pond was behind the apple barn--as you can
see we are enjoying the beautiful fall colors.

So Long Ago!

When we began working in Hillsborough County we definitely went back in time.  Our first records started in the 1770s.  I thought I would do a decade look at history during that time.

• 1770-Boston Massacre when British soldiers fire on Boston citizens.
• 1772-Samuel Adams writes his Rights of the Colonists document.
• 1773-Boston Tea Party begins at the Old South Church
• 1774-First Continental Congress is held in Philadelphia
• 1775-Paul Revere sees two lanterns in the old North Church--he warns "the British are coming."
• 1775-George Washington is appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army.
• 1776-The Declaration of Independence is approved!
• 1777-The Stars and Stripes becomes the national flag.
• 1779-Benedict Arnold becomes a traitor.

I Often Wonder

I haven't posted names for a while but thought I'd share some of the most recent ones I have seen.  The only sad part of this is that we can't talk to the parents to find out why they named their children such unique names. I'm sure it made perfect sense to them!  Enjoy!

                                              Shubel, Ganis, Elucipe, Hudger, Vioannah,                                                                                                   Alburn, Ai, Amaziah, Achacy, Beriah, Therza,                                               Climena, Orenda, and Jabez

Happy Birthday Ava!

It is always so fun to say "it's great to be eight!" So glad you are getting baptized.  I know you will work hard and do your best to be a good member of the Church.  You are such a sweet and kind girl Ava.  You work hard at school and do good things at home for your mom and dad.  I love what a sweet big sister you are to Caleb.  He is so lucky to have you!  Although Grandpa and I are far away I hope you know that we think about you every day and when we pray we always try to ask Heavenly Father to bless our family.  You had a busy last year with soccer, piano, gymnastics and on top of that you were the spelling bee champ for your grade--I wonder what this year will bring!  Have a wonderful birthday with lots of yummy cake and ice cream.  Keep doing your best and keep being the sweet girl that you are.  Happy Birthday Ava!

Missionary Moments #57--Oct 4, 2015

My one of two favorite weekends of the year--Conference weekend!  What a wonderful opportunity to hear from our Prophet and apostles and to think of the great men who had served in that position just a year ago.  Excited to have three new members of the quorum called and sustained yesterday.  I loved Elder Hollands talk about mothers and it had a profound effect on our two elders because they both asked if I would text their moms and tell them that they love them.  I hope all of you grandkids will take a minute to thank your moms for all the amazing things they continually do for you!  Grandpa and I had another great experience when we took the Elders out for dinner.  This is what is known as "transfer weekend" and if a missionary is going to be transferred to another area they will receive a call from the Assistants to the President letting them know to pack their bags and meet on Tuesday in Manchester for their new assignment.  We knew that at least one of our missionaries would probably be transferred and so we told them we wanted to take them out to dinner one more time.  We enjoyed dinner with the Sisters on Tuesday night and then last night we had dinner with the Elders.  We picked them up after the second session (which ended at 6 p.m. our time) and took them for sushi (their choice--definitely not mine!).  While in the restaurant their call came and watching their reaction was priceless.  The best part of it was that when we got to the restaurant they put us in a little room and closed a rice-paper screen so we had complete privacy.  Elder Poe received the assignment to be a zone leader and Elder Butler will be staying in Concord and have a new companion.  The sweetness of the experience for me was watching them humbly accept their assignments and then after hanging up tell each other how bummed they were that they weren't going to be companions any more.  The good news is the sisters will both be staying.   Missionary service isn't for wimps!!

We got back to work on Monday and although we are still not as fast as we had been we are consistently increasing our time.  It is so interesting to pick up documents realizing that they are over 200 years old.  We have encountered several that are so fragile that they are in envelopes that tell us not to remove them and whoever wrote the note has taken copies of the original. These particular documents are in alphabetical order which wasn't the case in our previous county.  In fact we started out this assignment with taking pictures of only name change requests which was a surprisingly large amount of documents.  Those took up two and a half full boxes which is significant because the majority of the information was on just one page.  When we completed them we found that the regular probate files had been put in ABC order.  They began in the 1770s and seem to end in the 1850-60 time period.  On Friday we were taking pictures of the names ending in C.  I am interested in seeing what will happen when we finish these up.  When we started in Rockingham they were numerically filed started in 1860 and went through to the 1918s.  I haven't had much time to peruse the documents because we have been trying to get a substantial amount of document prep ready so we never have to wait at the camera for work.  We have wanted to stay about five boxes ahead and right now we have only three boxes waiting.  With the help of the missionaries who come in and work with us once a week we are getting closer to our goal.  Once we are a little ahead we can spend more time looking over the wills and other interesting information that these probate files contain.  I have to say that when you see these old documents you definitely think of a pirates treasure map.  The paper is so worn and the edges have literally been worn away.  They have ink stains, and blotches, (and I think blood!) and often time water stains on them.  It is such a great thing to know that we will be preserving document records that would in time probably be impossible to even pick up.  Proud to be part of such a great cause!  I hope you are all doing well.

Lego Creations #6--Airplanes

We only had three participants in our Lego contest this month.  School work has to take priority!!  Thank you Brigham, Bruce, and Abby for participating this month.  Check the mail early next week--a treat is on the way!

Brigham--Most Yellow! Plane

Bruce--Best airport to go along with his plane

Abby--Cutest Plane