Hannah's family names

Hannah really wanted to do some baptisms/confirmations for family names so she has been busy trying to find them.  I still don't know how she does it.  After talking to my mom a week ago, she got a lead on a line to look down and was able to find more.  She had a few from Justin's side but most were from my side.  She found 22 names and I told her that was plenty for now.  Saturday, we took those names to the temple to do baptisms for them.  We each did 11 baptisms and confirmations. The baptistry was very busy as a youth group with 14 kids showed up that was not on the schedule.  Luckily, they let us go ahead of them but it still took a while with the scheduled group ahead of us.  I have not done baptisms since I was a teenager.  It was pretty cool.  After we left the temple and were buckling in the car, Hannah asked me if I knew how people said that sometimes you can feel the presence of those you are doing work for in the temple.  I asked her if she felt that and she said that she did not feel it when she was getting baptized but she said she felt it really strongly when I was baptized for someone.  What a special thing for her to feel.  I hope she will always remember that.  Tuesday was our Relief Society temple morning.  I asked Charlyce to come with me and we were able to do 15 initiatories out of the 22 with the help of one more sister in our ward.  I will have to go back to finish the last seven as they were so busy we couldn't go through with the rest of the names.  When I did one name, I got a really strong feeling that the person knew I was doing it for them.  I wonder if it was the same person that Hannah had felt a few days before.  I did remember the name.  Irene Parker.  Now I need to look up how we are related.  She was born in 1903 in Laurel, Mississippi which is where George grew up so I am guessing it is one of his relatives.  I am so proud of Hannah and her desire to be in the temple.  She studies her scriptures regularly and keeps a study journal.  She is pretty amazing.

Food drive and Laure/Priest date night

It is time for the stake food drive again.  We do the food drive to help different food pantries around.  They are usually low on food this time of year and the holidays are coming up.  Our word works to provide food to Must Ministries in canton.  It will run for a couple weekends.  Justin, Hannah, Isaac and I worked last Friday night from 7-9.  I always get nervous going but it is a lot of fun and people are so generous.  We get stand outside of Kroger wearing a helping hands shirt and hand out fliers to people coming in and say "Hi.  We are doing a food drive for Must Ministries.  Here are some items they are running low on.  If you can help with anything on the list, it would be great." Most people are very nice.  They go in and purchase things and then leave the bags of items with us in carts.  We then take the bags and store them at the church until it is over.  Some people donate money and then we go in and shop with it to donate.  Hannah and Isaac wanted to work one door together so Justin and I took the other door.  I loved seeing Hannah and Isaac be brave and have fun working together.  

It was also stake Laurel/Priest date night.  The stake leaders are trying to get the kids excited about going on dates.  They had a stake date weekend where the kids were suppose ask someone out (boys ask girls or girls ask boys), get a group and do something fun either Friday or Saturday.  Then, they were suppose to post pictures from their date on the Marietta East Stake Instragram page.  Awards will be given out from those submitted at the next stake dance.  The girls did the asking in Nathan's group.  He said the boys were coming up with a plan but the girls took over.  Sounds about right.  Ha.  Nathan went with his friend Cydnee who happens to be dating Josh but her parents won't let her only date Josh.  She has to mix in other people.  Nathan was cool with it.  I felt bad for Josh because that meant he didn't go.  They made pizza, played video games and something called Swedish twister and ping pong.  Nathan said they had a good time.  

 It started to rain really bad on the way home from the store.  We got home around 9:45.  Nathan was suppose to be coming around 10:30.  It was thundering and lightening and a downpour.  I was so nervous waiting for Nathan.  I text him before he was suppose to leave reminding him to slow down and drive safe.  The lines on the road just seem to dissappear when it rains here.  I thought it would take foever for him to get home.  I was very happy when I heard the garage door go up.  It is hard to be the worrying mom at home sometimes!

Allen and Cortney

Allen has been at some military training in Arkansas since April.  We were hoping he might make it over to see us on a weekend.  Thursday evening, Justin got a message from him asking him what he had going on the next day.  We guessed that meant he might be coming over.  I decided I better get the guest room ready and house cleaned just in case and Justin worked from home Friday.  Justin called him at lunch and he said that he and Cortney were in Mississippi and would be to our house in 3 1/2 hours.  That's Allen!  Ha.  They ended up hitting Atlanta traffic and getting to our house about 6 pm.  I had dinner ready for them.  Cortney had flown out to visit Allen for 10 days and they had decided to drive this way and get some National Park stamps.  Cortney was flying back to Utah Sunday so they would only be at our house for the one night.  We had a good time visiting that evening.  Saturday morning I made biscuits and egg gravy as Cortney had heard of it but never had it.  I messed it up so she really still hasn't had it.  Justin decided to take them to Kennesaw Mountain Battlefield to get a stamp.  The kids all had plans so just the adults went.

Then we drove by the Atlanta Temple.

Then, we went to the Chattahoochie recreation area visitor center to get them one more stamp.

 The river was sure muddy.

We decided to get some lunch and took them to Salt in Alpharetta.  Cortney owns a candy shop and loves baked goods so we took them to Alpine Bakery for dessert.  We got several things to try and had them boxed to take home.  Everything was good.  They left that evening around 7 pm.  It was a great day.  I'm so glad they could come visit even for a short time.  They are so cute.  I am so happy for both of them.  Allen will be in Arkansas until October so maybe we'll get to see him again.

Whirly Ball

For mutual we went to a place called Whirly Ball.  The deacons were in charge but I think the whole young mens plus bishopric helped with this.  We met at the church at 6:30 and then drove 30 minutes to the place.  Brother Rowley had picked up a bunch of pizzas and Krispy Kreme doughnuts for dinner so kids took turns eating and playing.  Only 10 kids could play at a time.  Everyone played one game each which lasted about 8 minutes.  The adults even got to play a game.  It was a lot of fun.  It was kind of a mix of bumper cars, lacrosse and basketball.  We got back to the church around 8:40.

Deacon campout at Red Top Mountain

There was a stake Deacons/EYO campout this weekend.  Isaac sure loves having JD (brother Hurdle) as a scout leader.  He tells me each week that Brother Hurdle is the awesomest leader ever.  He had a good time.  I don't think they ever get any sleep.  On Saturday, there were different merit badges the stake was putting on but all our boys had already gotten them so they came home after lunch.

Jordan (turned 12 that Saturday), Thomas, Tyson, Enzo, Wilson and Spencer.  Spencer just moved into the ward and fit right in.  JD and Spencer's dad were the leaders.  JD is over Deasons and Brother Warnick over EYOs.

First day of school

First day of school came very quick this year with the busy summer we had.  Not sure everyone felt ready to go back.  Nathan will be driving himself and Hannah to seminary and to school this year.  Since the youth just got back from youth conference, the seminary leaders decided to give them the first two days off from seminary.  It was nice not having to get up extra early.  However, Nathan and his friends decided they still wanted to get up early and have breakfast at Waffle House.  Josh will be doing duel enrollment so he will not be at Creekview for any classes but will be at Kennesaw State University but he had to go in today to get some formed filled out.  I think Nathan will be a little lost without him.  Nathan is starting his Junior year.  Seems so crazy!  Josh picked him up at 6:50 am.

Cydnee sent me a picture of them. 

I took Hannah and Isaac to school.  Hannah is a sophomore and Isaac is in 8th grade.  Last year of middle school.  Next year all three will be at the high school!

After dropping them off, I got a text from Nathan saying his side was really hurting like it did when he had a kidney stone.  He said it started haflway through breakfast.  I asked him if he needed me to come get him or bring him Advil and try and stay.  He wanted to try and go for at least homeroom so I turned around and met him outside the school.  On my way home from that, he text me again and said it hurt really bad.  I asked him if he wanted me to come get him and he said yes.  I turned around again and headed back to the school.  I got a text that said to hurry.  My original plan was to go to tennis practice after dropping kids at school so I was in my tennis skirt and a tank top.  I asked him if I could go home and change before heading to the hospital.  He said it would be okay but then right as we were getting to our neighborhood his pain was too much and he wanted to go straight there.  As we were walking in, he threw up in the bushes.  He said it was the best tasting throw up ever, waffles and syrup.  Yuck.  By 10:00 we were in the room and he was getting pain meds.  Thankfully, he was able to give them a urine sample.  The room was so cold!

This was the second stone that they had seen on the images before.  After it was comfirned with ultrasound and he was comfortable enough to go home, we left.  He threw up a couple more times and then was finally able to sleep for a while.  What a bummer first day.  The other two had pretty good first days.  They both came home smiling.  Hannah has very tough classes this year as she is taking all honors classes and one AP class.  She already had a good deal of homework.  I'm worried she is going to be too stressed out this year but she wants to do it.  I'm proud of her and how hard she works at school.  She definitely did not get that from me.  Isaac actually said he liked one of his teachers and he has that teacher for homeroom and two classes.  

I took Nathan to see a urologist the next day.  He passed his stone while at the office giving them a urine sample.  It was funny and also really good because now we don't have to have him strain his urine at home and then bring it back.  They took some blood and are having him do a 24-hour urine test so they can see what is causing the stones.  I really liked the doctor.  He says that there is one more stone.  Ugh.  I hope it doesn't come down....ever.

Youth Conference

We were home just long enough to do laundry and get a little school shopping done before Nathan, Hannah and I took off for Youth Conference.  We left Thursday morning, the 28th.  Youth Conference was in Copper Hill, Tennesse at White Water Express camp.  Jim and Erica Vincoli from our ward were put in charge of the conference.  They actually moved before the conference to another stake but they still did it. They did an amazing job.  We had about 150-60 kids.  Each ward was allowed to bring one YW leader and one YM leader so it was me at 23 girls.  We had six girls from another ward and their leader in our cabin as well.  The cabin slept 30.  It was basically a room full of bunkbeds and a little bathroom.  The kids had a great time.  Thankfully, everyone was on good behavior and we had no problems.  It was suppose to rain the whole weekend but ended up being perfect weather.  It was mostly overcast with a little bit of rain in the afternoon or at night so it didn't stop any of the activities.  Both Thursday night and Friday night they had special guest speakers come in to talk to the kids followed by a dance.  The speakers did an excellent job.  Friday, they had rotations of water games, service, lake time (basically a pond) and a high ropes course/giant swing.  Nathan and Hannah did not want to do the ropes or swing.  Saturday, they had four different classes to attend (fitting in at school but still standing out, dating, feeling the Holy Ghost and the good, bad and ugly of social media).  All were good.  Then, we packed up and came home.  One day until school starts!

 It was really beautiful there.

This was pretty funny to watch, especially when Josh Potter bounced kids.  He could send them flying.  It is called the blob.  One person jumps on and goes and sits at the end and then the next person jumps on it and it sends the first person up and into the water.  Most of the time, it looked like a follys video.  So many kids couldn't even land on the blob.

Sister Vincoli with Hannah, Izzy, Sam, Abby and Autumn.  She had these girls as Beehives and they love her.  It was fun to have her back with Hickory Flat for the weekend.