Our family gathered for a wonderful, fun, and very memorable family reunion in Paradise, Utah, and I felt like I was truly in Paradise. We had stayed at the Bear River Resort before, but it was not fixed up so nicely by new owners that made the whole experience just great. We try to have our immediate family reunion at least once every two years. It's a sacrifice for everyone to come, especially Dallin & Janelle, and now Meredith & Bryan's family as they live on the east coast, and we usually have our reunions in Utah.
We deeply missed Meredith's family this year as they had just moved from Hawaii to Maryland. Hopefully, they can be with us next time.
Dad and I starting driving to Utah on Thursday, July 26 and arrived on Friday afternoon. We arrived in time for Gary & Alice-Anne to take Kenna to a production of "Newsies" for her birthday. We loved the chance to be with our cute Johns grandchildren.
It was a busy few days preparing for the reunion. We were glad we could be there to give some assistance. Dad especially helped Kenna on her "Relative Race" project for the reunion. It was based off the BYU-TV by the same name. She assigned each family to research a family member from a particular line of ancestors. They sent in their stories, along with a picture and then Crismon formatted them and had them printed. He helped Kenna make the huge wall display of all the ancestors that would be talked about in the Relative Race. It was a huge project for Kenna, fulfilling one of her personal progress projects.
Monday-July 30
We headed to Logan around noon and met Geoff at Roger's Mac Store to leave Dad's computer that needed attention. Geoff & Peggy let us borrow their Instant Pot and 5-gallon water jug. He offered to bring out their popup tent, which was a huge blessing for Crismon & Danielle that were going to have to camp in a tent. When he showed up several hours later, Geoff also brought his bouncy house and his golf cart for me to ride around instead of having to walk so much. It was a hit with the grandchildren, and those two items added lots of fun for the children.
Alice-Anne & Gary put on the first meal that evening. It was delightful to see the families begin to gather and lots of hugs and laughter began. I was especially happy to see Dallin & Janelle's family as we hadn't seen them for a year.
Austin's family joined us for dinner and for the baby blessing of Dallin Glen. We love the Doutre family and we were happy that both families could be represented for this special occasion. He received a beautiful blessing from his father. Standing in the circle were the two grandpa's, Julia's brothers, and Austin's brothers. It was a sweet FHE. Angela Doutre and myself both shared a few thoughts and our testimony. Julia also shared her feelings. It was a tender, teary time as we have all been fasting and praying daily for years for this precious one to join their family. Little Dallin seems to have a calm, sweetness about him. Not surprising as his parents are that way, too.
We closed the evening with lots of flavors of of Aggie ice cream. Then Jackson gave our scripture devotional. After the children were settled, the adults joined back in the lodge for the FRED talks (Family, Religion, Education, Development) where Gary Vance gave some good advice on "How to have Crucial Conversations." On the spur of the moment I volunteered to do mine on "Energy Medicine," by showing them the tapping and other exercises I do each day.
Tuesday - July 31
I did a scripture study with all the family after breakfast. I wanted to keep the children engaged, so we read some scriptures on unity and then I did a demonstration. I had Ruby come up and try to crush a sturdy paper cup. She had no problem doing it. Then I had 12 paper cups lined up in a block form and placed a cookie sheet on top. This time we had some of the boys step on it and it held well, showing the strength that comes when we work together and support each other. We then gathered in a big circle and we tossed a ball of yarn back and forth expressing something we loved about that person. Each time the yarn connected us to each other and it formed a web, a symbol of looking for the good in others so we can stay connected.
Kenna's Relative Race was next. It was a huge success. It was so cute to have Spencer make an announcement before we started, "Just so you know, Kenna has worked so hard on this." What a supportive, good brother. With the cute rhymed clues that Gary had put together for us to go on a hunt for our packet and instructions, it kept everyone very engaged and trying hard to figure it all out. The activities we did at each station were fun. Reading the stories of our ancestors was inspiring and touching. A great idea so well planned out. Definitely a highlight of the reunion.
I wanted to include what Emily shared on her blog about Relative Race activity:
"This event was by far my favorite - the clues were often riddles that took time to decode - and it was so fun that everyone got involved to solve them, even the kids. As we took turns reading about our ancestors, I read the summary of my grandma Phyllis Cook Smith, my mom's mother. Halfway through, I was overcome with emotion and paused as I tried to gain my composure. My sweet nephew Isaac, 7, who was sitting on the other side of the table than me, didn't know why I had stopped, and said, "uh aunt Emily you are right here," pointing to where I left off. It was too cute. I learned stories about my grandparents, and great grandparents I had never heard before and made me even more grateful for my family heritage I come from."
In the afternoon the teens and some of the adults went on a hike in the Winds Cave up Logan Canyon. It ended up being a little more difficult than they expected, but a great outing, while the women in the lodge visited and enjoyed baby Dallin.
Emily prepared a very fun Jeopardy game that we did in the evening. Sydney did the scripture thought and prayer that night before Cracker Barrel.
Wednesday - August 1
The day began with Grandpa doing scripture study. He is a master with the scriptures. He shared how he has been learning about how the Savior ministered by carefully going through the four Gospel's, and identifying how the Savior ministered to others.
In the morning their were classes by age group with Emily teaching the teens about photography and videography. Ondalynn & Gary taught the middle age group how to make pancakes, and Dallin & Janelle taught the younger children how to make paper airplanes. Each group was having so much fun.
During the afternoon we held an adult meeting where we discussed future family reunions and Dad and I handled our a copy of our love story to each of the couples that Emily compiled and designed earlier that year for our anniversary. Afterwards everyone went swimming, except a few. Amazingly, we were able to get some family pictures taken before the sun completely set while visiting with Uncle Randy & Aunt Norene and Lauren, as well as Uncle Geoff & Aunt Peggy who stopped by to see everyone. Then our friends Wayne & Julie Dymock came by to say hi. They had just returned from serving as Mission Presidents. It was great to see them. The talent show got started late, but it was so fun! They all performed so well. It's amazing all the talent in the family. I loved seeing the grandchildren perform and to have everyone cheer for them. Brett is a great MC, and the Caudle's did a good job organizing this. The night ended with Addison doing the scripture and prayer, popcorn and sweets for Cracker Barrel, and everyone staying up very late. The siblings and spouses, most of them stayed up and played Code Names until 2:50 am. Glad it wasn't me! They had so much fun, with the girls winning 4 of the 5 games!
Thursday - August 2
Grandpa and I prepared breakfast. Thanks to leftovers, cold cereal and Instant Pot steel cut oats, it wasn't too hard. Aunt Meredith came around breakfast to visit with me as we were packing and cleaning up. She was a big help cleaning the kitchen and other areas. Everyone worked really hard getting the lodge, the bathrooms, the kitchen, the cabins and the surroundings in good order. It looked great when it was time to leave. We gathered one more time for Emily to use her drone and capture some more great shots of the beautiful retreat site and our family saying goodbye and all the hugging that was going it. We also got a picture with all the doubles, two Crismon's, two Vivienne's, two Gary's, two Julia's and two Dallin's. What a joy it was to be together and feel of the love for each other. We have the best family! We so appreciated Alice-Anne & Gary putting on such a great reunion. They worked so very hard! After all the cleaning was done that morning and the good-byes, Emily, Dad and I met up with Roger & Andrea, Geoff & Peggy, and Meredith at a restaurant in Logan to visit for lunch. It's always a treat being with my siblings. We were glad to head back to the Johns home as we were exhausted! Having fun can be exhausting but wonderful.
Friday - August 3
Emily made arrangements to use the scanner at the Family History Center at the BYU Library. Thanks to Emily who had started the huge project of scanning our family pictures, she knew just what to do. I had spent weeks prior going through all our photos and organizing them in preparation for this big scanning project. We worked all day scanning the pictures. Before arriving at the campus that morning, we were able to visit Grandma Julia in Orem, and Emily visited with her friends from her previous work. Then in the evening, as we were heading back to the Johns, we stopped and saw Kathi and most of her family. Amy and her children had come down from WA, so they were having a mini-reunion.
Saturday - August 4
Emily stayed over night in Provo and got an early start on more scanning, but we had car trouble just after getting off the freeway. Our tire hit a huge sharp object that came off someone's car in the other lane and popped our tire. Fortunately, Ondalynn & Gary were not far away and they came and rescued us. We brought Kenna down with us, and she was a great help with the scanning. We spent a total of 18 hours and scanned 4,099 photos. It was a huge project! But so grateful for all of Emily's help. It wouldn't have happened without her, and we were so grateful for Kenna's good help.
Sunday - August 5
Always good to visit the Johns ward. In the afternoon Julia, Austin & baby Dallin came over for dinner. We loved spending more time with them. They were going on to Austin's family reunion. We had a Fast and Testimony meeting as a family. That night Emily taught her "FRED" talk since we didn't have time to get to all of them at the reunion. And she taught how to create family home videos in 2018.
Monday - August 6
Alice-Anne fed us another yummy breakfast and then Dad, Emily, and the children went on a walk to the nearby middle school to ride bikes, roller blade and play around. We soon packed up, dropped Emily off at the airport, and met niece, Sierra, just off the freeway to pick up Dad's new computer from Roger's Mac store. We drove on to the Boise area and stayed with Ron & Ellen Hansen. They are some of our Reliv customers who we had never met, but they invited to stay with them overnight if we wanted. That was so generous of them. We made our way home the next door, stopping in Arlington to visit John Salley. His wife Connie died a few months previous. He is doing well, serving people all the time. It was so interesting hearing his stories and how the Lord guides him to help people. He is serving in the YM's in the church. He is a rough character, but with a heart of gold. We were so happy to finally be home. We were blessed to go safely without too many problems. What a great reunion we had together.
