A Very Special Pic

This photo appeared on INSTAGRAM recently with the caption:

I GUESS YOU COULD SAY THAT WE ARE BEST FRIENDS.

Our beautiful granddaughter, Sadie, 

and her very special brother, Blake, 

are walking hand and hand down the beach.

A picture can be worth a thousand words.

Little Kids - Big Choir

Last Thursday night, the Linds came a'visitin' 

(my Grandma Peterson used to say that).

Jeff and Mindy were on their way through St. George 

to attend a two-day wedding affair 

of a friend from Jeff's Wall Street days.

Jack, Addie and Charlie stayed with us 

and their parents left Friday morning.

Some of the activities over the next couple of days included 

lots of walks to the waterfall and to the park 

and all around Sunbrook looking for golf balls. 

Charlie loves it outdoors 

and he would stand at the front door saying, side, side, side.

Grandpa took Jack to Target 

to pick out a present for his upcoming birthday.  

Addie and Grandma had a tea party and painted toenails.

We had to refuel the treat plate 

after Addie devoured the strawberry shredded wheat bites.

Chocolate milk was the requested beverage

On Sunday, because our Church meeting time is at 1 PM, 

we played with the kids in the morning 

and took some Grandpa Roger and Grandma Pam pics.

Our INSTA-CHOIR practice was at 12:10, 

so I hurried over to the church 
and Roger stayed with the kids 
until Mindy and Jeff arrived.
  

I had mentioned in my email to core choir members 

to be on time, as we were having a one-time-only rehearsal, 

then we were to sing in Sacrament Meeting. 

Almost every core member was there right on time. 

We also had a guest violinist from DSU 

coming to rehearse with us, and she, too, 

was right on time, and we were all 

waiting in the fourier, 

because we rehearse in the Chapel - waiting and waiting.  

A zealous returned missionary was speaking 

in the ward meeting before ours 

and speaking, and speaking . . . 

When he had gone 15 minutes over, into our rehearsal time, 

we hurried down to the Relief Society room, 

even though we knew that 
as soon as their Sacrament meeting let out, 

their Sunday school class would be coming to use the room.  

We got through our hymn once, 

a gorgeous arrangement of "Did You Think to Pray?" 

then here came the people for the Sunday School class.  

So we hurriedly shuffled through the halls to the Chapel, 

and were able to practice for about ten minutes.  

I explain all of this, because, honestly, 

it was one of the most beautiful choirs we have ever had!  

 Well over 40 sang - 30 core members came to practice, 

and several more came up from the congregation.  

The Spirit was so strong, 

there were tears in many eyes, including mine!
  

It is rather ironic that our hymn's message, 

especially the second verse, was so appropriate for the situation.  

I was sending up many silent prayers throughout.
They sang the hymn beautifully and flawlessly!
  

The Lord wants His music sung in Sacrament meeting.  

It invites His Spirit in a most pure and honest way.
And He wants us all to sing it.

How silent the forest would be 

if the only birds that sang 

are the ones that sang best.

A Star Is Born!

A couple of months ago, 

our cute little granddaughter, Abby, 

told us excitedly that she had 

won a part in, "Annie,"

as Lily St. Regis, 

Rooster's (Miss Hannigan's brother) girlfriend.

Rooster and Lily team up as fake parents of Annie 

to get Daddy Warbuck's money.

If you're like we are, you're saying,

"Oh, yeah, now I remember."

Anyway, we couldn't miss Abby's acting debut,

so we headed to Salt Lake to stay with Rick's family.

On Saturday, we got to watch Josh play in a tennis tournament.

He won the first game and lost the second,

and we were so impressed with how well he plays. 

He just started playing a couple of years ago.

Jodie invited her folks, Bart and Kathie, 

and Grandma Stratford over for dinner before the play.

We had homemade Cafe Rio pork salads - 

a family favorite.

We remembered to take pics after we had it all cleaned up.

Kathie, Lois and Katie

"Annie" was performed by the 3rd and 4th graders 

at Legacy Elementary Charter School.

The sets and the staging were so well done.

The excited theater-goers before the play

Abby as Annie's "fake" mom

As far as we were concerned,

Abby was the true star of the show!

We asked Abby to go put her wig back on 

that she wore when she first came onstage as Lily, Rooster's girlfriend.

Here she is posing with Annie and one of the orphans. 

Posing with a couple of orphans, Miss Hannigan, Annie and Daddy Warbucks

Abby played her part of Lily St. Regis to the hilt - 

so cute!

The other proud grandparents, Kathie and Bart

We got a kick out of watching Rick and Jodie 

watch Abby onstage and hearing them laugh and cheer.

Abby's "Groupies" in front of the stage after the show

We love our sweet little Abby!

Grandma Strat said she was so glad she came,

and it made Abby really happy that she was there.

Proud Big Sister, Sadie, with Abby

Sunday, after church, Mindy, Jeff and kids came over 

and we had a delicious dinner. 

Rick spends virtually all day at the church 

with Bishop's duties every Sunday. 

Roger grilled the marinated chicken, mushrooms, 

peppers and onions and we had roasted potatoes,

 broiled asparagus, Jodie's homemade breadsticks, 

fruit and Jodie's famous fruit dip 

and corn on the cob.

Mindy brought amazing Symphony bar brownies - Yum!

We spent a fun evening with the Linds and Rick's family - 

the cousins love each other so much!

Wish we had pics of the kids!

Jessica did my hair Monday morning 

and Sam put Roger's crown on his tooth.

We haven't gotten together with my dear friend, Karleen, 

since she came and visited us for the Shakespeare Festival.

We usually go north before or during Christmas, 

and make a date to have lunch with Karleen.

But we didn't do that this year 

because we spent Christmas in Mesa.

We met her on Monday for lunch 

at La Jolla Groves in Provo.

We had a very delicious lunch and I had Roger 

take a pic of my blackened salmon salad 

because it looked so good, 

but then we forgot to take a pic of us.  

Just one more senior moment!

It was so good to catch up with her.

So, we had one more fruitful trip up north!

Now, on to March Madness!

Aggie Night Is Back!

Hooray!

Our dear friends, Mary and Bob Brady and Anne and Jay Taylor,

are back from their LDS missions 

and USU Aggie Night has resumed!

Our friendships with each other go back to college days.

We met for a pizza dinner at the Brady's.

Jay is taking the pic.

I have been waiting for an excuse to try this cinnamon roll cake . . .

. . . so I baked it and brought it to Aggie Night.

Anne brought a delicious Ann Romney salad 

from her new cookbook.

And Anne was the grand champion of Five Crowns,

which we played with vigor after dinner!

In Five Crowns, you play 13 hands, 

and I was ahead all of the way through round 12,

then, one bad hand, and I came in third!

Curses!

Not really, Anne makes a beautiful champion!

I think she came back from the mission field 
even more gorgeous! 

Anne holding up her prize 

Sunday, Roger and I spoke in Sacrament Meeting.

Our assigned topic was, 

"How to Obtain Revelation and Inspiration 

for Your Personal Life." 

We each shared personal experiences of

when we have felt the Spirit of the Holy Ghost

when it has helped direct our lives, such as when

we decided to marry each other, 

when confirmation was received 

of the truth of the Book of Mormon, 

and when Roger had the opportunity 

to donate a kidney to his brother, Gordon.

It's amazing how tender feelings 

of memories of important happenings in our lives, 

long ago, are still so close to the surface.

We have had about a month to prepare and study, 

and we found multiple resources from the scriptures 

and General Conference talks and other articles.

Elder Richard G. Scott's talk in April, 2012,

is an excellent one.

Much of what we shared is so personal, 

but we each feel such a closeness 

to members of this branch.

We both felt a huge sense of relief 

after that Sacrament Meeting, 

but very gratified that we had shared 

and that we had learned a lot in our preparation.

My net from the research, remembering and pondering?  
The Lord is always there to help us, 
if we only will ask.

"I Played my Best for Him, Pa-Rum-Pum-Pum-Pum"

Tribute to Balladier Drummer, Rob Fackrell

Last Wednesday, February 26, my dear friend 

and The USU Balladier's drummer,

Rob Fackrell, passed away 

after a 7-year battle with prostate cancer.

He and Craig Jessop were our "babies" in the group.

(The USU Balladiers were formed in 1963 by Utah State University 

as a proselyting group to promote the university.

I auditioned and was accepted into the group in 1964.

Rob was a mere freshman when he auditioned - 

at that time, the rest of us were juniors, seniors or were in graduate school.

Craig, who, as many of you know, went on to become 

the Director of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir,  

auditioned to get into The USU Balladiers in the spring 

of his senior year of high school, 

knowing that he would be an entering freshman in the fall. 

We needed someone to fill in for Nathan Day, who was drafted, 

to go on the USO Tour.) 

The Balladiers were into their third year of performing 

when it was decided that we should add drums 

and electric bass to our music and to go 

from purely folk music to doing some folk rock.

Man, could Rob play the drums!

After we held auditions to find a drummer,

Rob was picked and I remember thinking,

"Wow!  That kid radiates happiness - 

what a great smile!"

And he was so darned much fun!

Craig and Rob on the USO Tour,

wearing Carol's wiglet and my fall

When you travel with someone for ten weeks,

as the Balladiers did together on our USO Tour 

to Southeast Asia during the War in Vietnam

 to entertain our troops,

you get to know each other pretty well.

What an upbeat, kind and happy guy he was!

Now that I'm old, I can't even remember

when we didn't have drums with our music; 

it added so much!

I looked through my old pics to find 

ones with him in them. 

He's the one in the olive green shirt.

On a tour to southern California,

we traveled in two vehicles, and someone in one of them

realized that the chord progression in two of our songs, 

"Georgie Girl" and "Windy" was similar.

So when we stopped at a gas station in St. George,

we gathered around and tried it out.  Magic!
Roger was on this tour with us and he took this pic.

This is taken at Disneyland, before we sang.  

Rob is next to Doug's wife, Nan, in the center. 

Baladiers singing at the Carnation Plaza at Disneyland

Rob is the guy bending over in this pic taken on the USO Tour.

Roger took this pic when we landed back home in SLC

from Hawaii on our USO Tour.

(Isn't my hair something? My fall was 

looking pretty bad by the end of our tour.

In those days, the highest hair WINS! Ha.)

 I looked and looked to find a pic of Rob playing his drums - 

he is always covered up by the rest of us.

This one was taken after we returned home from our USO Tour

and performed a concert in the USUB.

Balladiers have a unique bond - 

such an over-used word,

but that's the best I can come up with to describe 

the feeling we have, one for another.

That bond has become 

even stronger through the years.

We have gotten together 

through these almost 50 years since, 

as regularly as we could. 

 In the early years, we were more scattered 

throughout the country, 

but we all made the effort to be together, 

if at all possible, whenever we 

scheduled a dinner, a retreat, etc.

Always on the agenda was our music.

We would sing through all our old favorites 

and we would play around with new ones 

that someone would bring - 

sitting in a circle, singing, strumming and 

listening for our harmony until we had 

the sound and blend we wanted.

And also, always on the agenda, was the fun - 

the stories repeated over and over through the years,

the jokes on each other,

getting bigger and bigger.

Rob totally scored when he found Stephanie!

She is as upbeat, happy and positive as he was.

About three years ago,

Balladiers had a reunion/concert in Logan.

Craig (now the  Dean of the Cain College of the Arts)

and Don Gardner, our Music Director, 

set it up for us to do a concert where we

performed most of our songs we had sung 

on our USO Tour in the USU Performance Hall.

Around 400 people attended.

Roger took this pic of Rob and Stephanie at our dinner/roast the night before the concert.

Rob in rehearsal for the concert

Stephanie and Jon Bouwhuis's wife, LeNore, were our Groupies.

Stephanie has a bigger-than-life personality,

and she would hoot, holler, and cheer for us all throughout our rehearsal time.

She was so proud of Rob!

Balladiers sent a large wreath to Fackrells.

with our pic from the USO Tour 

and drum sticks on it.

It was next to his coffin at the funeral.

The family asked us to sing at the luncheon. 

We had a quick rehearsal after the funeral 

in the Relief Society room.

We thought, well, maybe we'll sing, 

"God Be With You 'Til We Meet Again."

Rob's kids requested that we sing, "Denver"

and "Georgie Girl/Windy."

They said, "We grew up listening and dancing 
to the recordings of those songs, 

and those two are our favorites."
We didn't sound quite like we did
"in the day" . . . 
Click on the red arrow button to hear 
The Balladiers on the USO Tour:

. . . but we did our best, and we ended with "Liza Lee."

We have no recording of "Liza Lee,"

but the words end with, 

"Sure as the sun will rise again,

I'm coming home to you."

I have included, "Turn Around Babe,"

because we featured Rob in this song with a drum solo.

Morris Angell and Lewis Rawlinson wrote the song,

and I sing the bit solos.

Don, Mark, Kent, Kay, Carol, Marilyn and I 

were able to come to the funeral.

Other members expressed deep regret, 

for various reasons, that they couldn't make it.

What an outstanding family the Fackrells are!
Each of his four kids spoke,
and each told of what a wonderful father Rob is.
Special memories were shared 
of one-on-one times with their dad.
Rob loved to go on rides! 
And he traveled quite a bit 
to other communities for his job, 
and the kids told of how each time he would go, 
he would go get one of them out of school to ride with him.
What they learned during those times being with their dad
far outweighed what they would have learned
 in the classroom.
Rob's top priority was always his family.
Sweet stories were told 
of how he so kindly treated and adored his wife.
And of how he loved and served the Lord,
helping and cheering up others.

Chatting with Rob's kids, Joanna, Caroline, Jake and Andrew,
sister, Karen and wife, Stephanie, after we sang.

Why did I entitle this tribute 

with a line from, "Little Drummer Boy?"

I am confident that the Lord was so very pleased 

with how Rob lived his life,

knowing that he "played" his very best for Him!

Oh, how we will miss him!