Thank you, Erin and Whitney, for your comments. I know at least two of my children read last week's post. Here's another...

We enjoyed stake conference yesterday and today. The principal theme was related to the Temple -- worshipping faithfully in the Temple, being worthy to enter the Temple, being prepared to have our own Temple close by in about a year. Like I suspect all stake conference are, the messages were timely, well-prepared and worth our attention. Our stake conference schedule here in Thatcher has always been within two or three weeks of General Conference. It makes for a good period of reassessment and review of where we are individually and as a family in relationship to where we should be in the most important areas of our lives.

Jake and I worked all day Saturday digging trenches and preparing for the installation of the new lawn's sprinkler system. I've put a couple of sprinkler systems in now and I enjoy the tasks of designing the system, choosing the parts needed and putting it all together. It's a bit like putting together a puzzle that, if done correctly, results in the intended purpose -- getting water to all parts of the area in the right amount and at the right time.

We are hoping to be ready to plant next weekend or possibly the weekend thereafter. Ground temperatures must be consistently above 65 degrees and I don't think we are quite there yet.

I mentioned last week about some very windy days we have had. That has moderated the last few days which have been very pleasant indeed. Thatcher has what I would consider an ideal climate, but for the periods of wind. I don't care for high winds. Spring winds are especially bothersome because the farmers are just getting their fields ready for planting cotton so the freshly plowed fields provide lots of dust for the wind to spread around.

Mom has been playing with her new pressure canner this weekend. She canned a dozen or so bottles of chicken meat and seven or eight quarts of pinto beans. It all worked out nicely. We opened a can of the pinto beans just to be sure they tasted good and they were very good. After smashing them up a little, they were better than store bought refried beans.

We are thinking about getting half a beef from a local slaughterhouse. We would freeze some of the cuts and can some other parts. That would be good for our food storage. They only problem with that is that we don't generally eat very much beef so getting that much would almost force us to eat more which may not be a good thing from the standpoint of overall health.

I hope you are all doing well. Enjoy your young lives with your young children. These years will fly be much faster than you might imagine and before you know it you are at home all alone or with your last child wondering where all the time went and wishing, in some ways, you could go back and teach your children a little more, spend a little more time with them, read them a few more books, carry them on your shoulders a few more times, go on a few more walks with them, visit Home Depot with them tagging along a few more times, going to Daddy-Daughter parties a few more years.

Thank you all for who you are and for what your are making of your lives.

Love,

Dad