March, Part 1 - Branch Open House and Personal History Workshop

 I look forward to spring in St. George every year, because it is so glorious!  This year, March has had some false starts, but it's the between the false starts weather that I love best! As those who know me well know, I'm always saying that I have Viking blood that begs my body, "Take me to Norway!" - I would rather be cold than hot, any day! When we moved to St. George, I was definitely leery about the heat, but I've found that living here is still so worth it!  I just live from a.c. to a.c. when it's hot.

 Anyway, this is my favorite time of year here, because I love the cool weather that whispers of spring's promise.

Our branch does kind of a cool thing; every two or three months, someone in the leadership holds a Branch Open House so we can get even better acquainted.  We are called a Retirement Branch, though some of us are not retired. We have just under 200 members, and we have no Primary, Young Men or Young Women - just truly wonderful people, who are not trying to impress anyone with their greatness (which many of them have), just trying to endure to the end. The spiritual feast we enjoy each Sacrament meeting, with members sharing their life experiences and spiritual knowledge and wisdom, is lavish and humbling. We LOVE our branch!

The first Sunday in March, Don and Marilyn Vickers hosted the branch in their lovely home in Sunbrook.

 Marilyn putting on the final touches

 Chatting with Bill and Barbara Gordon, who served in Russia with Patty and Hal and live in our branch - lucky us!

 Branch President, Lorin Nielsen with Roger, his first counselor

I was asked to give a Personal History Workshop by the Relief Society Presidency. I thought, yeah right!  I don't have mine completed yet; it is an ongoing project. But they knew I had written, You Did THAT? - Childhood Tales of Pam and Roger, for my grandkids, and that I have made lots of books. The purpose of the workshop was to get people excited, either to begin or to pick it up again and continue.  It was a two hour meeting and eight other sisters shared ideas of what they are doing.  The time went fast!

We set up at the Crystal Lakes Clubhouse the night before. Roger and five other people helped; I showed Stratford Scoop and Pipes of Pam briefly on a big screen to demonstrate ways to write our ongoing history. It took awhile to get connected properly with WiFi, chords, etc. Thank goodness for techy people! 

When my wonderful sister, Patty, visited us in January, I knew I had this assignment and so she brought several of her treasures of family and personal history for me to share. There are so many ways we can create our histories, then use them as a resource, and I showed many examples. I have made over 50 books, 22 of them with the sticky pages method (Ugh!),some with the acid free backing and page protectors, and now, the digital ones.  Digital is such an improvement and the creative choices are endless! 

I showed and briefly discussed examples of personal journals, photo and memory books, family recipe books with family member photos, memories and anecdotes included, e-mail books, family newsletter and journal books, blogs, audio and video recordings and personal histories.

Note the missionary cut-off-tie quilt - Patty made three of these with their missionaries' ties from when Hal served as Mission President in Novosibirsk, Russia.

I showed each of my sisters' cookbooks and shared a little memory out of each! They loved them!

We were so pleased with the attendance. I think we are all feeling a real urgency of getting these memories down, to pass on. It's hard to be nostalgic when you can't remember anything! Well over fifty women and men  came - some of the sisters brought their husbands!  

I am explaining how I made the photo books to a good brother.

I was so surprised when Menlo Smith (who is on the left in the pic below and is Roger's old boss and past owner of Sunbrook) walked in at the beginning of the workshop.  We had a short refreshment and potty break at 11, and I thought he'd leave then, but he stayed until the very end!

Beverly Bradley, who is my wonderful choir accompanist, shared some great ideas she used in making her personal history. We talked about ways to organize your material and ways to make your writing more colorful.

I couldn't get the top two pics to give me space to write between, but above is a real expert, Marian Shipley, who has taught family and personal history classes up north.  She was inspirational!

I'm so glad I had this opportunity, because it really has made me get going again on my personal history.  I'm one to need lots of booster shots in the arm to keep on keeping' on with the things I should be doing, and I think we all benefited from hearing all of these ideas.