January
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Bad news of the new year...it started out with a flood in the house! On the 16th about 12:30am our smoke alarms went off. Chris and I jumped out of bed and ran around with our hearts beating hard. As Chris stepped into the boys bathroom he stepped into about 1 1/2" of water! A pipe had come apart under the sing and was gushing hot water all over. It had leaked through the smoke alarm in Sharilyn's room which was also soaked and then down into the basement. What a night with the shop vac and doing the best we could until morning. Br. Gilliam (carpet cleaning business) came to our rescue with industrial dehumidifiers and fans. We had to move bookcases and furniture and pull up carpet. Huge task. We felt so blessed that the water went to the smoke alarm and set it off! The flooding would have been so much worse had that miracle not happened. On the 20th Br. Gilliam took away all the equipment and wouldn't even let us pay for it! He said it was a gift. He couldn't believe we had no damage - not even a stain on the ceiling. He said "your house must be blessed! I've never seen anything like this as far as so much water and drying so fast! If all my jobs dried this fast & no damage I'd go broke!"
I am loving being in the primary presidency and love getting sweet hugs and serving those little ones. We teach and are taught by them. They reflect light and have great faith and are full of love. They are forgiving and not proud or critical. I like this quote: "Children are like a sponge. They soak up all the love you can give them and then in just one squeeze they give it all back to you."
Emily had new beginnings. It was a fashion show and she was not thrilled ha ha! (She dressed in blue to represent divine nature.)
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| Drea helping me clean windows |
Chris went to San Diego for Sawtooth Conference and I worked in the office here while everyone was away; answering phones and directing messages to them. I also photocopied Afton Ofret's original William Kerswell letters to Maria Rimes in Australia so that we can return them to her. She was hesitant to let us borrow them. Friday I flew down to CA and Chris and I enjoyed the short weekend together.
Feb
Chris and I went to church in San Clemente and then headed to the airport. We got home Sunday night and found our amazing Emily and Aaron had the house so clean & dinner on the table. Chicken patties on rice-a-roni, mixed veggies & green salad. They even made spice cake for dessert and it was fast Sunday and they had not even broken their fast! How blessed we are to have such wonderful children. I am so proud of them. I hope they have children as wonderful as they are.
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| Making friends in a new place |
On Valentines day we heard the most wonderful news! The 100th temple was announced to be built in Palmyra NY near the Sacred Grove!! Isn't that the most perfect place for the 100th temple and a perfect day to announce it. Surely our world is brighter with 100 temples shining like a beacon of truth with the glory of eternity and spirit of the Lord!
On the 18th I was made Relief Society President. I've had a feeling about it for awhile now but would quickly shift into turbo rejection mode because "I am needed in Primary". I told the bishop that I sure hated for him to take me out of primary and he said "I hate to take you out of Primary too. I only wish I had 50 more people just like you." (So nice of him to say that) There are several funerals around the corner and many people with cancer. My stomach is in a knot and heart pounding and I can't sleep. Fearing about the unknown is a big waste of time and energy. I wish I would stop it. I say to the Lord "O my Lord, I am not eloquent, but I am slow of speech and of a slow tongue." But I know what the Lord says back "Who hath made man's mouth? ...go and I will be with thy mouth and teach thee what thou shalt say." As I sat on the bed overwhelmed and saying to myself "Oh what am I going to do!!!" I opened scriptures to find one for our family scripture tonight and they fell open to 2Ne32... "I suppose that ye ponder somewhat in your hearts concerning that which ye should do...why do ye ponder these things...remember that I said that after ye receive the Holy Ghost ye could speak with the tongue of angels? Feast upon the words of Christ and they will tell you all things what ye should do"
March
Chris is the Stake YM President. This Friday we have the stake priest/Laurel event in our home and we are preparing dinner for them. At first we were told there would be about 50 but we just got an update of 81. Oh dear! I calm myself by seeing the Lord reaching down to me in the drowning waters and lovingly pulling me up.
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| Mom Clarke & Aunt Anne |
house.
I was responsible for our RS birthday. The theme was "Put your heart in your hand" with a dinner. Our presidency put on a humorous skit (see journal). I have worked really hard making a video that I called "Heartprints". Chris dubbed music onto it for me and it turned out beautiful! I also made really cute handouts to put on the tables with daffodils and Debbie Gilliam volunteered to make cookies (hands with a heart cut out). After much work it all turned out well.
Emily was the photographer of a wedding this week! She is so talented and has such an eye for art and beauty. She and I attended the YW broadcast afterward.
APRIL
It's been so nice having the kids home this week for spring break. Em and I had a nice birthday. We made ourselves a scrumptious chocolate cake with fudgy frosting and decorated it with our names and flowers.
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| Happy 8th Birthday! |
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| Andrew got written up in the local paper! |
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| I got to go with the twins on a field trip to Point Defiance Zoo in Seattle |
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| Mrs Hebert's Class, Andrew, Josh, Kevin Beck, Dane, Andrea |
June
Emily is a 4.0. Her picture is hanging in the schools main hall as "Academic Student of the Quarter"! She's quite the photographer and if she could do whatever she wants, she would work for National Geographic and travel to remote places.
Also this month Aaron had two track meets. He is an amazing runner and can run the mile in 5:39 seconds!
Andrew had two little league baseball games & a day hike with cub scouts. Chris, Aaron and Andrew had an overnight campout.
Andrea had three dance performances. She's in Miss Heidi's School of Dance with tap and ballet.
Poor Drea. I was on the phone with Mom Clarke when I heard crying upstairs. As her cries got a bit more frantic I felt urged to go to her. I ran and found her stuck in our laundry shoot. She had put her bed quilt down and it stuck so she climbed up and tried pushing it down with her leg and slipped. She had one leg in and one out and was hanging on with her hands. I held onto her to calm her (while trying to calm myself) and called out to Aaron to go to the laundry room and get under her. He got a pole and pushed her foot up to release the wedge and I was then able to lift her out. We were shaking with adrenalin.
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| Port Williams Beach |
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| The beautiful purples and golds our our backyard window! |
July
Paula came for a visit. She is such a fun and choice and beautiful person. I wish we lived closer. We took her to Seattle and Paulsbo.
Jennifer is working at Sequim Bay Stake Park, Sharilyn works at a day care and Emily is working at Sawtooth.
Rosalind Sorenson, Dawn Christensen and I are still learning and studying more about herbs in "The School of Natural Healing". I just love it.
California
We (Mom C, Laurel, Chris and I and the twins) went to Ridgecrest California for the wedding of Tami and Val. I decorated their wedding cake, Chris sang a solo and Andrew was ring bearer. Chris and Laurel sang the Hawaiian War Chant outside their window that night. So funny.
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An outing to Mt Whitney in CA |
We got home to Sequim at 2am then Chris ran to QFC to get some supplies, slipped in a couple hours sleep and at 8am the boys arrived at our door for the week long encampment at Camp Brinkley. Because it had 2,000 boys they called it Helamon's Camp.
That same week Andrew had day camp in PA and I enjoyed helping on one of the days. The next week Em had girls camp.
For FHE we picked our bumper crop of strawberries and delivered containers of them to 8 different friends.
August
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| Our beautiful family in our beautiful backyard |
Picnic at Diamond Point, East Sequim Bay Beach with Beck's
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Twins enjoyed a week of MAD Camp once again this year. (Music, Art Drama). Andrea did hand bells and puppets and Andrew did cartooning and puppets.
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| Music, Art, Drama Camp |
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| We are building a playhouse! |
Jen flew away to BYU and that night as I went in to tuck Andrea into bed, she had the covers pulled over her head. I asked her if she was okay. She stuck out her hand and waved it in that "so so" fashion. I sat by her and asked "Is it that you miss Jennifer?" and she burst into sobs. Jen's presence was still so much with us I expected any second for her to walk into the room and whisper in her gentle cheery voice "Goodnight Principessa" or to Emily "good job Willis, you're so cute" or to Andrew "goodnight Monkeyboy". Jen is a light and delight in our home and we so miss her here with us. ...next we will be sad to see Sharilyn go back to school.
Em and Aaron helped the Bankston's in their yard for a couple days. Bankston's said "We must be dreaming because no one can really have kids as good as the King's in this world."
Emily got involved volunteering at the Raptor Center. She helped with cleaning and feeding animals, mostly rats and did photography for the man rescuing a baby eagle that fell out of a huge nest at the state park. The man actually laid in the nest - it was that huge!
Aaron completed his Eagle project. He cleared a three mile path of forest trails that had fallen trees and land slides blocking it. We are so proud of him. Pretty amazing to get your Eagle while only 13.
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| Aaron's Eagle Project Crew! |
On the 24th we drove to Rexburg to take Sharilyn to college. Jen came and then took Emily back with her to Provo. Emily went with her to her ward and first day of class and had a great time then went home via bus and was enthusiastic about her adventure. Chris flew home on Saturday but I stayed a few more days. We went to Green Canyon and picnic and took the kids to the Tarzan movie and just loved being gathered with family. Mom and Dad were getting a new Clavinova so I bought their old one and Dad fit it into our car! So exciting!
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| Hannah Davies, Shar and Drea |
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| David & Katie Birch, me, Marla King, Val Davies Jen, Chris, John King, Tamara |
Sept
On Chris's birthday we had a Sawtooth outing to a Mariner's game in Seattle.
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Our family did a musical number in Sacrament meeting (Love at Home)
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| Progress on the playhouse |
Mom Clarke came to visit. We took her to Seattle to visit Aunt Anne who was there visiting her son.
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| A moment of silence for nosey the gerbil who died. |
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| Try to find Emily in this picture! Beautiful fall day at our home on Spyglass Lane |
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| Ashley Bourns and Andrea |
Oct
Enjoyed the last general conference of the century and the last in the beloved tabernacle as a new one is being built. We are happy we get all sessions via dish network. Many of us took pictures of the beautiful organ pipes and Br. Ottley and Pres. Hinckley etc.
Sharilyn got to go with a group to Nauvoo and sent us a postcard. She just loved it.
Twins had a luau in their class and Chris brought his ukulele and sang Hawaiian songs.
So cute. I got up one morning and found Andrea had washed Andrew's hair and was brushing it for him. Such a cute tender scene. I'm so blessed.
We had fun for FHE at Chris's office playing a computer game that was linked to several computers. The kids just LOVED it.
I loved this comment from Jennifer to us as she was talking about the BYU devotional "Though the messages of devotional are important, even more important is being somewhere where the Spirit is and taking time out of the day to be there." That is exactly it! Though most of what we do in a day is important, "even more important is being somewhere where the Spirit is and taking time out of the day to be there." !!
From the church library, we checked out a video of the CES broadcast where Jen was singing in the choir and we got to see her!! The kids kept rewinding and pausing on her.
Chris had a business to San Fran. I helped with a service project. We (two wards combined) made 30 quilts and sent them to the church for the people of Kosovo to help them through the cold winter ahead.
Nov
I went on a field trip with twins to the art museum in PA and then Olympic National Park visitors center.
I took the kids to Science Night at the school. Emily was involved running a station with a microscope looking at and telling about the paramecia. Emily got to go to the elementary school to talk about this activity and get them excited to come.
Chris got a 2nd calling. In addition to Stake YM Pres. he is on the high counsel over YM. He is also the ward advancement chairman. His calling and mine (RS Pres) and our busy children...do you ever feel like a string puppet and everybody but you has ahold of your strings...making you go here and there? But it is ok...it's a small price to pay for all the ways we have been blessed.
Utah
Chris went to Utah to interview students at UU and BYU. I joined on a Friday. After getting the kids off to school I drove to PA and flew to SLC then bussed to Temple Square. I loved walking around the grounds and it gave me a flashback of when I was 8 years old and got to attend general conference and how thrilled I was to get shake President David O' McKay's hand! I finally found my way to the Provo Express which got me to Provo a little after 6pm and Jen, Shar and my Dad were there to meet me.
This weekend just happened to be on the weekend of Dustin's farewell! He is leaving on a mission to Lithuania. Sharilyn came up with Mom and Dad, Mike and Brenda, and Kevin and Karen! Aunt Carole and Shawn was there too. What a fun reunion! Was so good to hug Jen and Shar again and be with the family! How I long for that day when time and space does not separate us anymore. We all headed home in a snow storm and we made it home to find all things well there. Emily and Aaron took such good care of things. Aaron and Andrew stayed up late and organized the game cupboard. Andrea is such a good little cook! She made chocolate chip cookies. :)
DEC
Emily and I helped the YW learn how to make 16 point German Christmas stars.
Happy Birthday Aaron!
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| Happy 14th Birthday Aaron! |
Dec 31st 1999. Today is the last day of the 1900's! We have been watching the new millennium arrive all around the world via CNN on TV. All the world is excited and celebrating and partying and it just feels very exciting! Becks and Gilliam's came to celebrate with us.
Our Christmas letter
