A Weekend of Fun

David graduating from our Bee School Preschool! We made it through!

To begin the weekend of fun, the children and Clark made a little treat. (Honey Milk Balls)

David has loved camping, so we decided to have a camp out in our backyard. Rebecca lasted half of the night... but the boys enjoyed camping the whole night.

At Sweet Berry Farm

David chatting with his favorite goat

Rebecca enjoyed petting the goats.

The children loved getting to see some real horses and getting to pet them. If you can see Rebecca's face, she is so excited to be next to the horses.

We had a fun time picking strawberries, we only picked about a cup full, but the children loved finding the red berries.

Clark and David picked blackberries too, but they were a little on the prickly side for David.

We had a nice time spending all together and seeing a new place, Marble Falls. We wanted to see a bit of the Hill Country of Texas. What beautiful hills. I wish days like these would last longer. (but perhaps a little cooler...)

Memorial Day for me growing up was always fun. We always seemed to live far away from family so were unable to visit graves that were our own ancestors. We would take a walk through the Salt Lake Cemetery and try to find an unmarked grave that we knew was one of our ancestors. We would also go and buy a tree and plant a tree in memory of our family that went before us. I hope to continue that tradition when we live in a place that we have control over planting things in the yard. :-) (we are renting...) Fun memories, fun traditions.

Title of the Book

Sorry, I didn't really put the whole name of the book on there if you were interested in finding it...

VICTIMS: The LDS Church and the Mark Hofmann Case
by, Richard E. Turley Jr.
ISBN-10: 0252018850

Here is a site that gives a limited preview of the book:
http://books.google.com/books?id=IqrDDrWR_X4C&printsec=frontcover&dq=

He has written it so you find out information as they did all along in the dealings, and then see the conclusion as it was played out to them at the time. I was very surprised at how much I was drawn into the story, and it is fun to hear some of the things my dad, Glenn Rowe, did to help in the end.

I hope that you might find it an interesting book as well.

Really Interesting Book

Over ten years ago my Dad gave each of my siblings and me a copy of this book. I was pretty young and didn't understand what it really was and thought, "Some day I will read it..." Well, ten plus years have passed and I saw it sitting on our bookshelf and I realized I am definitely old enough to read it now! As a child I thought it was going to be a really slow moving history of something really boring. As I started reading it, I found that it is very interesting and Turley really wrote it in a way that sucks you into the book and makes it more of a mystery than a history.

You might think it a strange gift to give all your children a book about the story surrounding Mark Hofmann, but my dad was involved in this drama (he works in the Church Historical Department, Turley is kind of my Dad's boss) and also helped with the putting together of the book. As I read it, I come to see all that my dad had to go through right about the time I was born. It really is an amazing story. If you ever have a chance and want to read a great mystery, that is true, this was a great book to read.

Some Videos

Here are some cute videos that Clark spiced up about the children, Enjoy!

http://studentweb.engr.utexas.edu/cds847/SilerFamily/videos/BestFriends.htm



http://studentweb.engr.utexas.edu/cds847/SilerFamily/videos/TheChase.htm



We are doing well, just going day to day. Not much has happened this week.

Saturday Bike Rides

We have had so much fun riding around our little town of Pflugerville. Today I took the challenge to see if I was strong enough to pull the children's bike trailer. I was excited that I made it for about six miles, then I had to switch and let Clark pull them. (the last mile or so had some big hills.) Here is the route we took. We stopped at a few places, and the nice Pfluger Park at 5 miles. I love these Saturday mornings where we can ride around on bikes together.

Here is a site Clark likes to use to map routes. We have a lot of fun!

Happy Mother's Day!

David melted my tired heart this morning. I really didn't get much sleep last night, or at least the good kind of sleep. David woke up at his usual time and I was wishing I had a snooze button to push on him. I decided to give him something to eat and then go to the couch for a little more rest. While I was lying there, David started sing the Mother's day song that he is learning in Primary. Even though I was really tired, it made me feel so happy. I felt that even if he wasn't feeling brave enough to sing front of all the church on Sunday, at least he sang it to me. He also sang the Family Prayer song. ("let us gather in a circle...") He is such a good little boy.

I made this picture for my Grandmother. I was hoping to capture a bit of the Texas wild flowers. I hope it makes her happy, even if it isn't done as well as I had hoped. I am thankful for the example of wonderful mothers, grandmothers, and great grandmothers, etc. I love learning from them the wisdom they have learned in all their days of mothering. Even if times change, mothering doesn't change all that much. The children still need love, patience, kindness, and good examples.

Here is a video Clark made on Mothers:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=rrUZhhijlw8


Happy Mother's Day to all.

Having Ups and Downs

I love Sundays. I love having the chance to go to church and to listen and learn, and to have a chance to teach the 11 year old girls. I was feeling down at a point during the beginning of church and was really worried about teaching my lesson when I was feeling so down. I had been praying that I would be able to teach the scriptures and principles planned even when I felt down.

Then as I started my lesson, a little shaky and nervous. Suddenly I felt good and we had a wonderful time talking about the scriptures and really trying to apply them to our lives.

Even though this was a small moment in time and perhaps a small matter, I am so thankful to a Heavenly Father who listens to our prayers. He will lift us and help us through our trials, even when we don't realize he is helping us. I am also learning more about Christ and his atonement and that he made an atonement for me and all of us not just for the things we do wrong, but to help us when we have trials and down times. He can give us the strength and power to rise up and move forward. He can do this because he has already been through it.

I am very thankful for our Heavenly Father's plan, that we can succeed in life and through Christ live with our families and Father in the eternities to come.

Feeling a Bit Busy

Sometimes it seems that time is ticking by faster than it normally does. Even with the days growing longer, my time is growing shorter. We have had fun here and there playing outside, now that the weather is nice.

David riding his bike

Yesterday we took our preschool group downtown to see the Memmorial Museum on the university campus. I think the children liked being together more than looking at the things in the museum. It was a museum of animals, dinosaurs, and rocks, and a few other things.

David and friends outside museum

Our preschool group

Clark turned in his thesis yesterday as well, and now he has finished his Master's degree! Yeah Clark! Now onto the PhD program for him. We will be here quite a few more years. I am happy with being here. Even though it can get hot, I really love all that I have seen of the beauties of Texas. There is so much space and so much to see. I could live here a long time. The only problem is that it is so far from our families.

Looking at the turtle pond on campus, right before Clark turned in his thesis.

We are getting my excited as the time draws closer to our new little baby coming into our family. David keeps asking if the baby is coming out today. Children are always cute in their simple thought. We have had many ultrasounds lately because I am measuring big... Not happy news to me, but everything looks pretty normal. We are very positive now that it really is going to be a boy. I am due July 23 and that is only about three months away or less now!!

Time sure is flying.