Inspiration for Monday morning

I was looking for scriptures that had the word "Truth" in them and found a couple great ones so I thought I'd share them. Who doesn't need a little inspiration on Monday morning?

2 Kings 20:3 "I beseech thee, O Lord, remember now how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in thy sight"

(Hezekiah, King of Isreal, is sick and dying and has tried to lead the people from wickedness to righteousness. Isaiah is the prophet. God hears his prayers and tears and is told his life will be lengthened 15 years)

Psalms 85: 7-13 (my favorite part 10-11 in bold print)

Shew us thy mercy, O Lord, and grant us they salvation.

I will hear what God the Lord will speak: for he will speak peace unto his people, and to his saints: but let them not turn again to folly.

Surely his salvation is nigh them that fear him; that glory my dwell in our land

Mercy and Truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.

Truth shall spring out of the earth; and righteousness shall look down from heaven.

Yea, the lord shall give that which is good; and our land shall yield her increase.

Righteousness shall go before him; and shall set us in the way of his steps.

John 8:32

"And ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free"

What to do when maps & GPS fail you....

Just keep driving!

That was the lesson I leaned this week on our trip to visit the Kennecott mine in South Jordan.

I tend to panic, hyperventilate and just generally freak out.

but being the grownup with a teenage driver I really don't want to pass on my bad habits so I tried to be calmer and found that calm works much much better than

FREAKING OUT

So it all started when...

My friend Heather and I decided to take advantage of Kennecott's advertised "visit us free in July" deal.

There is usually a small fee per car. I always look over at that mine when I drive to Salt Lake and think "I'd like to go there someday"
With my friend on board and the word "FREE" involved...
Those were 2 very good reason to get out of the hot house and take the kids somewhere interesting and educational even...

We decided we wanted to go early. They open at 8. We said "lets leave at 7:30!" Then we were both silent as we contemplated getting our respective households ready by 7:30 and somebody mumbled "maybe we could leave at 8:00" There was a quick agreement. That extra half an hour made everything much less daunting....

Heather didn't think we'd be there longer than about an hour & 1/2 or so after perusing their website. I didn't pack any food for the kids which is unusual for me. I did get water bottles filled for everyone.

We set off with Carly at the wheel trying to add more time to her driving log.

The map on the website told us to take the 10600 South exit To Bangerter Hwy. Heather's hubby told her she could just take the Bangerter exit but since neither of us are very familiar with the Salt Lake area and we couldn't get Kennecott mine or the address given on their website to show up on the GPS unit we had...

we decided we'd rather follow the map exactly then to take Bangerter and try to figure out how to coordinate that with what we could see on the map provided on the Kennecott website. How could we go wrong with a map provided by the Kennecott website we thought....

Well.... Let me tell you.
You can go very very wrong.

First, because of construction, my car missed the 10600 S exit. It was labeled with an exit # and not the name. Heather was behind us and made it so Carly and I headed up and took the next exit which was 9000 S. I thought we could do a quick turnaround and get back on the freeway. Nope. No quick turnaround. It just kept heading west.
Oh Crap! Those of you who know me well know that I have absolutely no internal compass. If there is a wrong turn to be made, I will make it.
I called Heather. She said "I think if you keep heading West you'll run into Bangerter Hwy and we can meet up from there." I started breathing more normally and had Carly pull into a side street so we could switch me to the driver's seat, because when you're lost and you're trying to give directions to a teenage driver and make quick decisions like "oh...um..go straight... NO.. TURN HERE!!!!!" it doesn't work so well. I called Mark and he agreed that we'd run into Bangerter Hwy if we kept heading West and then I felt really calm. He has a very strong internal compass & lots of experience driving in SLC.

We found Bangerter and found 11400 S which was the next street we were supposed to turn on. The map told us it would make a little jog and turn into 11800 S. That little jog on the map turned into a whole development called "Daybreak". There were roads, houses, parks, lakes, businesses, roundabouts with 6 exits. Where to go? what to do?

We drove around looking for 11800 S, taking the roundabout, calling Heather, trying to meet up with Heather. We finally found each other after both going through roundabout after roundabout. She had to stop the car for her daughter to puke in a parking lot and Rachel was looking a little green too.

We finally found 11800 S and started heading towards the mine. Then 11800 S ended but it did not end in HWY 111 as our map indicated it would. We pulled off to the side of the road, her daughter puked again, the kids started exploring the weeds on the side of the road and stretching their legs while we discussed what to do. We could see the mine so we turned left and kept going.

After heading on that street for a while (I can't remember what it said at the turning point) We noticed that the signs said we were on 11800 S again. Does that make any sense??? Well this time when 11800 S ended it did intersect with Hwy 111.

At that point we finally knew where we were on the map and the mine was just down the street a ways.

It was a little stressful but the air was cool, the kids were quiet and hey! now we have a great story to tell so all's well that ends well.

The biggest problem we had was now it was 10:00 am and we were just arriving at the mine and I was starting to hear "I'm hungry" and "dont' you have any food" To which the answer was "No" and "No"

I crumbled and bought one $1 package of starbursts and split that between them. 2 little squares of fruit flavored taffy and everybody was happy. Not bad.

We did see some house-sized trucks carrying rock and ore

And who doesn't want a picture in front of a giant tire?

That's something worth driving for!

The open pit mine

It was a good think I loaded my purse with loose change so we could all get a closer look

And who....

doesn't want to stand in a giant ore carrying bucket

or get their hand caught in a giant drill bit?

The visitor's center is fairly interesting but not amazing. The microscopes were cool. They had a very informative 16 minute movie about their whole mine process that was fascinating and informative. I felt like I learned a lot. The visitors center's displays just seemed to repeat the information in the film for the most part but overall I think it was interesting and worth a morning's drive.

Including letting the kids check out the gift shop we were there only about an hour and a half as Heather predicted. I was glad we got there early because as we left we could see the parking lot was twice as full as when we arrived.

Eyewitnes account

Every day you read stories in the news. Little blurbs about people you don't know and make assumptions based on the words you read. It's quickly read and usually quickly forgotten.

Like this little story on my KSL newspage. It's pretty short. No names are listed. Just a man in serious condition after a motorcycle crash. Except I can't stop thinking about it today because I was there.

Carly, Jacob and I were also traveling south on I-15 at 7:30 this morning. Carly was driving. Her 3rd go at freeway driving. She's trying to rack up her 40 hours of driving needed to get her drivers license. She needs a total of 30 daytime driving hours and 10 night-time driving hours. We're at 2 1/2 night and after today, 23 daytime hours.

We were driving to Cove Fort to meet my brother, who would be there to pick up Jacob, who will be spending a few days in Southern Utah with his Aunt and Uncle and cousins.

Traffic was light. I noticed the motorcycle as it passed us because he was the quintessential biker. He had the bandana donned head in lieu of a helmet, the rough-hewn face, leather jacket, serious bike, loaded up with tricked out saddlebags. He looked like he'd been doing this for years. We were in the middle lane of traffic. He passed us and was in the far right lane. About 50 feet in front of us, I suddenly saw him veer across all the lanes of traffic and just as I registered he was going fast and at a weird angle, he smashed into the concrete barrier. It looked like an explosion. It didn't seem real. We all gasped.

I was proud of Carly. She held it together really well. The car in front of us hit the brakes and she did too. I only had to remind her he was not just slowing but really stopping so make sure she was braking enough to keep safe. Another truck behind us stopped as well. I saw the drivers of those cars getting out to check on the biker so I felt safe to have Carly get out of traffic and I coached her into pulling over to the right shoulder as soon as it was clear. We called 911 and were put through to the HWY patrol. I didn't realize how shaken up I was until I heard how my voice wobbled as I gave my report to the dispatcher. My hand holding the phone was shaking too. They took my information and said I could leave. They would contact me if they needed me as a witness.

I felt a little guilty for not getting out of the car but I knew others were helping and honestly, I was a little afraid of what I'd see. I knew I didn't want my kids to see anything horrific either. Mark was in a multi-car accident a couple of years ago where there was a fatality. He went to check on the woman in the car who died and said it was something he has a hard time getting out of his head.

It was a relief to get my children out of there and back on the road. We couldn't see a body on the road and saw the other drivers who were out leaning over the barrier so we figured the biker had flipped over the barrier. We prayed for him, grateful we could do some small thing. We were very grateful we had not been hit by any of the metal debris from the bike. It was really amazing that no other cars were damaged at all and that he was not hit on the northbound side of the freeway.

I was glad to come home and read in the article that he had not been killed although I know he must be hurt very badly after what I saw. I still don't know his name but he'll be in my prayers tonight. I will not quickly forget this story.

Unsubscribe!!!!

Do you know how annoying it is to see a little red circle pop up on my email icon, indicating somebody loves me and wrote me an email, opening said icon and finding out it's Wal-mart?

I ordered a book from them a while back and now they want to send me lots of updates.

I need to unsubscribe.

On a scale of 1-10.....

11

Seriously Annoying!

A Whole LOT of Bocanegras...

On Memorial day, we had a get-together with our Bocanegra cousins...

There are more Bocanegra's out there than you thought.

We are prolific!

The big girls..

The medium sized girls...

The boys (plus one med. sized girl)

and the baby girl!

We had good food

Some big stories..

really

big

stories!

There was rock throwing

and wading in the water

Ava was a great skipping rock pointer outer

Jacob found rock skipping talents he didn't know he had-

well.. he probably was pretty sure he had them.

He tends towards confidence in all things.

Rachel took this beautiful picture. She has the patience to capture things in nature. I'm always impressed because when I try, they always turn out fuzzy.

I have a hard time calling this beautiful creature a moth. Moths, to me, are brown and fuzzy and freaking me out at night while they bounce stupidly at lights or my screen door. However, there are some like this-
Delicate, beautiful and basking in the sun.


That outing up Provo Canyon brought to pass a mega-sleepover 2 weeks ago. On Memorial day, the girls talked about getting together later in the summer. We moms kind of forgot but, with the magic of facebook/email, the girls made their own plan and then told us what they had set up. It sounded okay to us and with a little tweaking here and there, it came to pass. Carly drove the family up to Heber on a Sunday afternoon. We dropped off Carly, Rachel and Samantha and visited for a while. Monday night, Aunt Abby drove everyone down for Kei's birthday party and went home leaving her 3 oldest girls behind. They stayed the next 2 nights & days and Abby came to pick them up on Wednesday.

There was NO fighting. No fighting. 4 Teenage girls. 2 9 yr old girls. They were together for 3 days and nights. And did I mention........
No fighting.

Lots and Lots of movies though.
I think they were trying to set a record for junkfood consumption and # of movies watched in a 48 hr period.
There was some Dragon-training. There was some Jack and Rose sinking on the Titanic. Don't worry 'cuz Carly informed me she knows e'sactly where to press forward.....
Mark said we need to throw away our old VHS copy and get a DVD so we can use the clearplay and not Carly's intuitive forwarding skills. I think he's right.

Besides the movies...
There was playing outside and walking to McDonalds and trying to float down a canal on innertubes that kept sinking.

There was lots of laughing. Lots of talking.
Lots of running.
Lots of cousins.

It's a good thing when you like your family!
:)

Prerequisites

Last night I went to bed early with a horrible stomachache and headache. It came on suddenly and within seconds it seemed, I became a sad, needy woman with my children bringing me coldpacks for my head and my ipod so I could listen to soft music while I tried to fall asleep. Falling asleep with a tummyache is kind of hard.

The kids were so solicitious, Rachel and Jacob especially....

"What can I get for you? Anything else mommy?"

Such sweet kids. It was so nice to have someone taking care of me a little bit.

As I laid there I wondered what was wrong with me. It wasn't a typical-feeling tummyache.

Was it stress?

Was it the 90 minutes of driving I did a few hours before with my 16 yr old daughter who had a couple of close calls when we practiced Parking next to cars?

Was it being gone several days to Wyoming for my grandma's funeral, getting back Friday afternoon, and trying to get back into the swing of things?

Was it that my husband was sustained as a counselor to the new bishop in our ward that morning?

Was it that, for the life of me, I can't figure out how to spell the word that means "the group that a bishop and his 2 counselors form. I usually pride myself on my spelling skills. This time, I'm stuck.....

Is it

*Bishopbrick* as in compound word? as in the bishop needs two bricks for his counselor so they can make a strong wall of leadership for the ward members to lean upon?

*Bishoprick* as in Who's Rick and why are all Bishops and their counselors named after him?

*Bishopric* as in nothing at all.... as in there doesn't seem to be enough letters to make all the sounds when I say the word but it does seem vaguely familiar.

I have a feeling I should know how to spell it. It must be a prerequisite to being able to support him...

This morning I felt a little better, still a little queasy but no headache. I got better as the day progressed. I could relapse however unless somebody tells me how to spell that word!!!!!

Help.

Aloha and Happy Birthday!

We had a little family birthday party for our college girl niece Kei~

She's far from her Hawaii home and turning 20!

I first met her when I was the same age she is now. I had been dating this cute boy named Mark all summer and headed to BYU-Hawaii. His sister lived there with her handsome Hawaiian husband and her little one year old babygirl. They picked me up from the airport, let me stay with them for a week until I got a dorm room and showed me around their island. I fell in love with them & their little brown-eyed baby as I dreamed of her uncle and babies of my own!

Now she's just where I was then. An ocean away from her home and trying to figure out what she wants from life and who she wants to share it with.

(and who she DOESN'T!!! Whiny, presumptious boys need not apply-)

We celebrated with

Shoyu chicken, rice, pasta salad, potato chips, blue Kool-aid,

Strawberry Cheesecake Trifle and vanilla cupcakes

from her Aunties

&

Lots of advice on boys and what they're REALLY thinking

from her uncles

WE love you Kei.

Happy Birthday!!!!!!!

p.s. Kei is an incredible dancer. She worked at the polynesian cultural center on Oahu for several years and is starting a polynesian dance class for girls next week. Samantha will be attending her class. If anyone is interested in joining the class let me know, I'll get you the details on time and everything. I believe the cost will be around $30 a month and the class will be on Thursdays. We could carpool!