FAMILY LETTER 11.18.18

Dear Loved Ones,                                                              

Another wintry week in Livingston! We had ourselves a (hopefully once in a lifetime) big adventure in the snow this week, we spent time with lots of people we love, and did lots of preparation for ALL of the upcoming holidays.

Monday 11/12 was all about Wendy Tyner’s funeral. I did a few chores in the morning (recovering from the weekend) and then I picked up the girls from school so we could attend the funeral at 11am. Adeline and I sand “In the Garden,” that sweet old hymn. Wendy had asked me to sing it a year ago when she got her diagnosis. It was a privilege to do it and I was so dang proud of myself for not crying (I had to stare at the back wall because faces would do me in). Robyn and Jake both gave awesome talks with stories and testimonies about their mother. President May from our stake presidency gave the closing doctrinal message, which really touched many of our neighborhood friends who attended. Wendy had planned out every detail of the service, so of course it was 60 minutes long on the dot, and her whole family attended, all wearing something in her favorite color (bright green). It was thoroughly uplifting. I’ve come to truly enjoy celebrating a life well-lived, even though the emotions of grief are hard. They are also beautiful and sacred. By the time the luncheon was over, it was time to pick up the other kids from school, make dinner, and have family night. We watched Elder Gong’s BYU devotional  from October 2018 and it was really sweet.

Tuesday 11/13 (Happy Birthday Dad) I forced myself to go shopping first thing in the morning after I sent the kids to school. I had been putting it off since my AZ trip and it was just time (no eggs, milk, produce…). I also did some preliminary Christmas shopping as well as rounding out Addie’s birthday booty. It was draining as usual, but I was able to get home and get the food put away and get gifts wrapped before I had to go pick up kids—yippeeeee! At 5pm, I met Lisa Orback at the Shane Center to watch the movie “Wildlife” starring Carey Mulligan and Jake Gyllenhall. It was filmed here and it was fun to recognize almost every scene. The story line was sad; hit a little too close to home cuz the year I was 14 was an awful lot like the year the boy in the film experienced. Paul Dano did an awesome job using shadows and silence to convey the tension of the storyline. But mostly it was just beautiful to watch. Our town is spectacular.

Wednesday 11/14 I scurried around doing chores and errands and made up a bunch of cookie dough to bake over the holidays. Heidi took some of the cookies to her YW activity. I went to bed early with the little boys. Thursday 11/15 was another marathon day of just getting stuff done. This is a busy season in all four of my church callings, so I spent some time working on my Music Chair responsibilities and my public affairs responsibilities. I also FINALLY mailed the two missionary boxes that have been on my desk for like 10 days (sorry Maggie; we are so glad you were born, we celebrate post-Magvent, too;)). Thursday was Heidi’s bff’s “Golden” 15^th birthday, so they celebrated here with a yummy Asian dinner and a huge Costco chocolate cake. Heidi went the extra mile decorating and making good food to show her love and appreciation for Sophie. I had to leave just as they were getting started because I had stake meetings in Bozeman. Public Affairs meeting was pretty fun, as we kicked off two big initiatives in our stake—improving JustServe and celebrating Light the World 2018: Give As He Gave. We hope to be better coordinated between those two huge initiatives by next year so we can plan truly meaningful Days of Service in our units. Exciting stuff. Heading home, it seemed so dark outside and I was totally freaked out by these huge bucks running alongside my car—not running in front of me, but just beside me, like we were racing. Weirdos!

On Friday 11/16, all the kids were out of school except for Niles. Since the girls were home, Addie and I decided to run some flowers and a card over to a cool lady we minister to who was celebrating her birthday Friday. As we were leaving town around 11:15, the morning rain began to get a little sleety. Part of me wanted to turn back and get the Outback, but I thought we could beat the snow since we were only driving about 5 miles. We were clearly wrong. We got to the Wilton’s driveway & realized it was too slick, so Dravyn delivered his mom’s flowers and message to their house on his motorbike and we tried to back out in our tracks. Then we slid 2 wheels into a ditch. We tried every trick in the book. Four snowy hours later, a tow truck pulled us sideways out of the ditch and sent us on our merry way, muddy but unscathed. It was a happy disaster, we ended up visiting with Michelle on the driveway when she came home and got stuck, too, and Addie was great company! I love our (mis)adventures and her encouraging attitude. We had a full tank of gas, jerky, water, and we would watch Friday Night Lights on Prime on our phones, so really, what’s the downside? Lol. That little outing ended up being about a six hour trip, so we came home and we were in for the night!

Saturday I woke up ambitious to get my turkey thawed and make a massive batch of gluten free Chex Mix. I got that all done and cleaned the kitchen then headed to Mystic Coffee at 10am to get tea and learn to play canasta with Addie and our ministering sister, Adair. At noon, we had to wrap up our canasta game without even finishing a round, but we had a great visit. We headed home and picked up the whole family to head over to Bozeman and meet up with Sam and Will, who had driven up from Utah to pick up a truck and drive it home. So we met them at Whistle Pig Korean and had some tummy-warming Bulgogi Bibimpap bowls. Gavin (Sam’s 7yo son) came, too, so my boys were THRILLED, even for just an hour together. We were tempted to kidnap them for Thanksgiving, but we let them go so they wouldn’t have to slide all the way home on icy roads. We headed back to Livingston to catch the 4:30 movies. Rich and the big kids went to the new Fantastic Beasts movie and I took the little guys to The Grinch. We came home and had chicken noodle soup and cheese toast, and I went over to Robyn’s house to practice singing harmonies with her for a musical number at our Primary Training meeting after church today. I got home around 8pm and pretty much went straight to bed, asleep by 9:30. I woke up at 6:30 am and saw the sunrise from my bathtub Sunday morning (11/18)—it was glorious. I was singing, “Welcome, welcome, Sabbath morning! Now we rest from every care; welcome, welcome is thy dawning, Holy Sabbath day of prayer.” Today was the Primary Program at church, and the kids did not disappoint—entertaining little talks and beautiful little voices singing, and lots of visitors. Our training meeting was very sweet, our leaders were so thoughtful and made us a lovely lunch and just gave us instructions for implementing the new curriculum in January and which classes we would be teaching. I get to move up with my 7/8yo to senior primary 9/10, which means my awesome niece Lexi will be in my class, along with the kids I have now (who are the best, just sayin). I really truly love ministering to brilliant little humans. They are my favorite. And they were Jesus’ favorite, too.

I had a cool thought this afternoon as we talked about the inspired new home-based church and they trust God has placed in all of us to follow the Spirit to teach our children AND our classes what they need most. I thought back to how my generation has been so carefully prepared “For such a time as this.” I vividly recall a night in the MTC when a bunch of friends came to the dorm room I shared with my two companions. We had microwaved popcorn and we all took turns catching up on each other’s lives. You see, we had all been friends at BYU the previous year and not one of us had ever mentioned serving a mission, and yet somehow the Spirit had called us, and there we were in October, heading out all over the world to teach the gospel. I think we were more surprised at ourselves than anyone, since it was 1992 and the first wave of sister missionaries was just swelling…we were the forerunners and felt a little bit disoriented, but excited at our prospects. As the conversation got more serious, we all discovered that at the heart of our choice was the prompting from the Spirit to go and serve and learn the gospel inside out SO WE COULD TEACH OUR CHILDREN MORE POWERFULLY. Every single one of us got that message. And every single one of us did that. And here we are at a time where God and the times we live in DEMAND that we use the doctrine AND the skills we learned (remember HOFRS? Help others feel and recognize the Spirit?) to bring our children and grandchildren closer to Christ, because without building upon The Rock and recognizing and acting upon promptings of the Holy Spirit, “it will not be possible to survive spiritually” our coming days. This is pretty much the most exciting period of my life because I can see all the things I have learned and experienced coming together. I can see “The Whys” I couldn’t see before. And all of it—the good and the bad, the joyful and the heartbreaking—makes me feel so grateful! I mean, it is no coincidence that the very first Women’s session of conference was held right after my 8^th birthday, and the prophet’s WIFE gave his talk for him (Camilla and Spencer Kimball). She made such an indelible impression on me, and President Kimball’s call for strong, fearless “sister scriptorians” to lead in the last days has followed me the rest of my life. And I love being able to minister to my sisters here and honestly tell them, there is NOTHING you can tell me that will shock me because I can guarantee something as bad or worse has happened in my family, and yet we surivived. And yet we still love each other… you cannot make me stop loving you and you cannot make the Savior stop loving you or void his atoning sacrifice. THESE ARE WONDERFUL THINGS TO KNOW! They come at great cost, but they are so worth it. The cleansing AND the enabling power of the atonement are real. I am grateful to live in a time when the prophet hears and obeys the Lord’s commands to strip his church of all the cultural fluff and to “talk of and rejoice in and preach of and prophesy of Christ that our children may know to what source they may look” not just for remission of their sins, but for strength and for comfort and for revelation to see the way forward in the darkness before us.

I’d better wrap this up before I start singing hosannas ;) We sure do love and miss you all. My heart is full of Thanksgiving and a desire to gather ALL my loved ones around a table and share in my favorite holiday. You will for sure be with us in Spirit! Have a wonderful week and a blessed holiday!

Love, Jamie and Rich and Family

I didn't write much about he California fires, but 10 days ago a fire tore through the mountains east of Chico, CA and destroyed the town of  Paradise. My mission brother Loren Lighthall is the principal of Paradise High School, and lived in this pretty house with his family of  9 (their oldest daughter is in the MTC).

This is what's left of their house after the 11/8 fire. Both church buildings in town burned down, as well as much of the School and 90% of town. It's horrific. If you get the chance to do SOMETHING to help these fire victims, DO IT! They have NOTHING LEFT!

Ammon eating gingerbread on 11/14

Niles made a gingerbread pilgrim 11/14

22 POUNDS OF TURKEY, YO!

Triple batch of gluten free Chex Mix!

Ministering in a ditch 11/16

Jerky and streaming Friday Night Lights #survivalskillz

Friday we watched The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, the Coen Brothers most recent production on Netflix.
It is a thoroughly Coenian anthology of crazy Old West tales. Buster was my favorite though.

Sam, Me, and Willy...and James and Niles 11/17 in Bozeman

James, Niles, Gavin, and Ammon 11/17
Cousins RULE!