AIT

On October 7th we flew out to Misery for James' Family Day and Graduation from his Advanced Individual Training. The weather was nice getting there but then it rained the whole time. I'm not talking sprinkling rain or even steady rain... it was a downpour the whole time. Fortunately the rain let up to a light rain for our drive back to the airport from the base on Friday.

Since it was raining so much on Family Day (Oct 8), we didn't get to do much. We spent some time at the USO on base where they had ping pong, pool tables, snacks, tvs, and computers.

During one point the rain let up a little so we drove over to see James' barracks (from the outside only) and he grabbed some cool shirts he bought to show us.October 9, Graduation Day... finding James in this crowd is like finding Waldo!

James has been pinned by this Drill Sergeant. Notice that nice shiny new Engineer pin on his collar!Sonia and Hillary flew out for Graduation Day. They loved on brother for a few minutes and then were off in their rented convertible for fun in St. Louey! James, dad and I flew home after the graduation. It was so nice to be home out of the rain!!

Trippin'

This last Tuesday I hopped the Fire Marshall express and played in St. George for the day. (This is me at the hot tub.) Hubby had meetings in both St. George and Cedar City which were relatively short so I went along. Shortly after arriving in St. George we checked into our hotel. Cousin Judy picked me up and we went out to lunch, the copy shop and even got an ice cream sundae! When Judy asked if we should get one for my hubby I said, "Oh, I think we can have ours eaten by then!" Hee hee!

Back at Judy's we visited and she showed me some of her wonderful quilts. She didn't know I was into quilting and was so excited. Judy has one on display in her home that fills a two story wall. It has some dimensional features that make it quite striking. This picture is taken about two streets away. I thought it was interesting that every street in the neighborhood was something Hills... Desert Hills, White Hills, etc... and then in the middle of the neighborhood is Ducati Way. Of course I thought of Sonia and Shawn and just had to take this picture.

It was a fun, although a whirlwind trip. I'll have to do it again. Next time I'll make sure to call Joann myself. She'd also wanted us to come visit and I thought hubby had made contact before we went. He hadn't so although we kept trying to call, we didn't ever find her home and were forced to go to a ritzy restaurant (The Painted Pony) for dinner instead.

My Stripling Warrior

My friend, Donna, sent me a link to some new posters (http://www.realheroposters.com/) of Book of Mormon heroes and it reminded me of so long ago when I hung up the pictures of Captain Moroni and the 2000 Stripling Warriors in James' room with an accompanying scripture (Alma 48:17). Posters have come and gone (like Green Day and skater stuff) but these have stayed.

Then today we got this picture in the mail from the branch along with a form letter of info. (Your heart kind of jumps when you get an envelope with the return address of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints!) The letter led me to graduation info (October 9th, just like James said) and generally telling families what time church is for the soldiers and stuff like that so you kind of feel like you know what's going on . Today was James' 1st day of actual training and as excited as he's been to start training, he's more excited to be done with it and go on a mission. He has been able to call home a few times and tell us how wonderful it is to use the Priesthood. Needless to say, I'm one proud mamma!

Let's party some more!

I guess the family party wasn't enough... Sonia and James planned another dinner at Magic Wok for Tuesday night. We had a nice big table back by the kitchen which was a bit noisy but warmer than the front of the restaurant which was freezy! We have a tradition handed down to us from the Moseley grandparents... when you read your fortune out of the cookie, you add "in bed" to the end. That usually turns even the lamest of fortunes into funny ones. I think James has quite the Sly Stallone look going on here with the game peg in his eye. We always enjoy that little peg game where you try to get all but one peg off the game board.

The next evening James reported to the airport Radisson. The latest he was to check in was 1800 hours (6pm). Richard/Dad and I took James out to Sizzler first. Our original plan was to take him to Magic Wok or maybe the new Sakara restaurant but we'd all pretty well had our fill of oriental food. James had made sukiyaki style tofu for about a week and he had Magic Wok a few times too so steak was a nice change. James and dad both had steak and all you can eat shrimp with salad bars and strawberry lemonade. I had just the salad bar and then two skewers of broiled shrimp. It was very good, just enough and a nice change from the usual bacon wrapped steak & potato I usually succumb to.

We left the restaurant just after 5 and had plenty of time to arrive early at the Radisson. About two blocks away James remembered he needed shaving cream so I quick pulled into the Sutherlands parking lot and we headed for the Albertson's on 9th west. James ran in and back out so fast I would have wondered if he'd paid for his can of shaving cream if I hadn't seen the receipt in his hand too! We were back on the road and were still 20 minutes early. It was good timing too because 'Private Hemsley' was just finishing up his check-in. His folks were there and both James and Pvt. H. seemed glad to have a pal to go on this adventure with. Then it was hugs all around and a quick exit so dad could get back to his conference. I forgot to mention that... dad had a Haz-Mat conference all this week and had to sneak out to see James off. It was nice that dad had a couple hours at home so he and James went plinking out in the backyard with James' new airsoft rifle.

James called from the USO room in the St. Louis airport on Thursday and then again today from Fort Leonard Wood. He seemed excited that they will probably start training this next Tuesday. I'm glad he has a few days to acclimate to the wake up early and go to bed early gig before the real training starts.

Elder Moseley

We had planned a family party for yesterday to celebrate a few birthdays. We always have dinner, presents, cake and ice cream and a whole lot of fun (as seen below in pictures). Saturday I went shopping for the dinner items I needed and came back to a message from the stake executive secretary. He'd called for my husband who was working late but I had this feeling I should call him back so I did. To my surprise, he said that our son James' paper to receive the Melchizedek priesthood was going before the High Council in the morning and that if he was approved, he would meet with the stake president and most likely be ordained that next day. I didn't think this would happen until October and with such short notice, it was a blessing that everyone was coming already! James was approved, the meeting with the stake president went well (he even said he'd 'push the button' on the mission papers) and the ordination time was set. The wonderful High Councilor assigned to see this was done agreed to come back at 5pm to do the ordination. I just had to tell our family members who were already coming at 5pm to meet at our stake center instead of at our house. What a crazy wonderful weekend!

Everyone enjoyed the salsa and chips I put out as an appetizer. Thanks cousin Joann for such yummy salsa!!

You can see how much fun we have... it's all over Adelyn's dress!

It's rare to get our precious grandparents out for these family parties. It's just too much commotion for them but they do love the kids.