4/14/17 Family Birthday Parties

This morning for Good Friday we all headed over to Gram and Papa Connelly's to celebrate TJ and Sarah's birthdays. If you haven't already, go check out Papa's blog for some fun pictures. A couple of highlights include grocery shopping for recipe ingredients for Sarah and eating ice cream on the porch. We very much appreciate the gifts, time and thought from the grandparents and Becca B.

Here is a shot of Joseph and Peter from the grocery trip. As you can see they are stoked.

In the afternoon we joined Matt and Sharon and family and Doug and Heather and family at the pool. The water was a little cold for all except Rebecca and Lauren to stay in very long. The water bottle rocket launcher extended the watery fun. Heather coordinated an Easter egg hunt. For dinner we had some Costco pizza.
At both events we took a moment to remember and talk about the Savior and His sacrifice so that we can be an eternal family. What a wonderful blessing.

4/13/17 Line of Sight

This morning, after Humanitarian, we investigated to see if there is "line of sight" or LOS between the buildings in the Stake. This would be required if we wanted to set up microwave transmitters for Stake Conference.

It turns out seeing a church spire from 1.4 miles away isn't easy. We used our telescope and still couldn't see it. We later found out that the elevation between buildings changes by about 40 feet. That could be the reason we couldn't see the other building.

In the evening Rebecca and Sarah got invited to a "late night" at our friends the Sagnimeni's. A late night is what some families do in place of a sleep over. While the girls were out Heidi and I took the boys to the Pequeno Park near our house. Joseph practiced riding a bike with training wheels. He was not super into it. He did fine though. Maybe he'll like it more as he gets older. Peter enjoyed having David push him on the swing.

4/12/17 3rd Grade Mission

Today TJ knocked off the final 1% to complete his 3rd grade math mission. It's been challenging for him but he has been persistent. For the record he is wrapping up 1st grade next month so this puts him two years ahead on his math. We are super proud of the effort that he has put in.

Earlier in the day Heidi did preschool with Amy, Peter and Joseph. Here they are at the pavilion at the grassy field.
While she did preschool I did a CPE class on non-profit strategic planning.

4/11/17 Temple, Training, Card

This morning it was Heidi's turn to go to the Temple. She reports that she did initiatory. She and I both feel that we are headed in the right direction. Our weekly family counsels have begun bearing good fruit. Today we did our daily chores and no one complained. By planning specific things to do each night (still working on this one) we make better use of our time. This evening, for instance, we followed the plan and filled the green can with leaves and then played at the grassy field. It would have been easy to have simply watched a movie on the iMac but this felt much better. It's still a challenge coming up with things for each night but the practice is making it easier.
This morning Vickie Rock came over and Heidi and I did some training on how to do some complicated transfers. There may be some additional follow up needed but I think it helped with her overall understanding.

This afternoon a card came in the mail for Sarah and TJ from Grammie and Grandpa Mangum. They are both very grateful.

4/10/17 Inspection and Resurrection Rolls

Our first exciting thing of today was the inspection at the house near Gilbert and Southern. As it turns out there are some minor issues that shouldn't be too tough to resolve. The roof is in good shape as is the water heater. The AC units are not new but they are much newer than the ones on the first two houses we looked at and appear to be working fine at this point. I tried testing the projector out but it was unplugged and the power cord I had available was three inches short of reaching.

For FHE we made Resurrection rolls. You take a large marshmallow, roll it in butter, cinnamon and sugar then wrap it in a roll. When you bake them the marshmallow melts out and creates an "empty tomb". The kids all got excited and helped out.

David was also a big helper. Here he is entertaining Peter.

The rolls were yummy. We took some to our neighbors and our home and visit teaching families. One of my families moved so we'll have to track them down.
After FHE I met Dennis Slade at the Adobe building and did some internet speed tests. It varied a lot from "very good" 50 Mbps to "good enough" 6 Mbps. Both should have been more than adequate for Stake Conference but it was a low traffic time. It's not hard to imagine a scenario where it drops below acceptable. Anyhow, we're learning for next time.

4/9/17 Rough Stake Conference

This graph describes about how my day felt. We had some rough technical issues. Heidi reassures me that they were not as bad as I feel they were. Still, we did not succeed at being invisible as was my goal. We worked so hard testing and fixing any known issues and still we had new ones today. Gratefully we had a solid team so we were able to handle the challenges as quickly as we did. Another plus of the issues is that we are now seriously considering better options. Even General Conference had some glitches when we watched at our house. The technology just isn't as stable as older tech like microwave or satellite. Anyhow, it was a bit of a rollercoaster but I have faith that Heavenly Father has a plan.
Something fun that happened this weekend was that we figured out how to use the Sony DVMC DA1 to record our VHS and DVDs so we can back them up. It's not perfect. Sometimes the recording will stop part way through. Still, it is the best we've had since the G5 went down. With little ones who can get into DVDs and scratch them up and VHS players that can eat tapes it's good to have a backup.

4/8/17 Stake Conference

Today I pretty much lived at the Stake Center. Heidi dropped me off around 7:15 am and we got home between 8:30 and 8:45 pm. I got to be involved with a solid team. First we set up and tested. Then in the afternoon and evening we had the Priesthood Leadership and Adult sessions of Conference. Largely things went well though we still have bandwidth issues at times. So far we don't know of any way to prevent buffering issues happening periodically in the feed. I feel prompted that things are going to be ok tomorrow.
While I was at the stake center Heidi and the kids mowed Grammie and Grandpa Mangum's yard. David and Rebecca did it actually. Heidi patched holes in the walls left by previous renters. David and Rebecca helped with this task as well.
At conference we were counseled to be kind, attend the temple, not take ourselves too seriously and to keep doing the little things like reading scriptures with the kids. Even when it seems like they aren't listening they are.
Roger Hallsted took the above picture. Putting up words with the hymns is our new trick we're trying for conference this time.