Merry, Merry, quite contrary. . .

How does your garden grow?

With silver bells

And cockle shells, and pretty maids all in a row.

It's almost summer. Enjoy!

To Market, to market to buy a fat pig. . . .

Living on the border I should have known that when I was as sick as a dog two weeks ago and only wanted to crawl into the covers and die, I must have had Swine Flu. I knew I didn't have the flu because I had had my flu shot, but I couldn't think of anything else that would make me ache all over, feel like I had a really high fever, and that my head was about to explode. Luckily I recovered and now that I am once more thinking clearly I realized that I may have had the very first case of Swine Flu, but am now invincible.

Isn't that great?? All those antibodies. I guess I can go anywhere without fear. Just to test the theory I went across the border today, bought a metal zipper to fix my purse for all of 22 cents and came home. Everyone who lives in Nogales Sonora was wearing a face mask. The tourists were easy to spot--they had faces.

I did see the scariest person ever while there--an oldish gringo man who was either bald or had completely shaved his head and then tatooed his head black. I mean all black, no skin showing on the back, and black on the face with blue and red lines strategicly placed under the eyes and on the cheeks. Then he had let his pure white beard grow out about 1/2 an inch so you could see his black tatooedness under this weird white hair on his chin. His neck was just regular old pale man color. I think it may have been the devil loose right there in Nogales.

I am telling you, I sometimes talk to strangers on the street, But not this guy. Uh-uh, no way. There is stranger and then there is strangest. The shop girl and I were in complete agreement. Spooky.

Activites Committee

The key is delegate. The talent show is over and done with and it was great!!! We had over 150 people in the audience, we had 18 acts and I mainly only put the program in order and MC'ed. A friend in the ward called and asked me if she could help. We got together and she laid out her great ideas--like 100's of great ideas. So I said, this is fabulous. You run with it. I am asking you officially to be the coordinator for the Talent Show. And she ran. And we had fun! Thank heavens it's over. I think that's how the head of the Activities committee is supposed to feel after every activity, right???

Family Tree!

Okay. So this tree is actually in Mexico!

So here we are, casually browsing the internet the other night, looking up Hopkinsville, Kentucky to see who it was named for--just in case it leads us to an unknown ancestor. We know our Hopkins lived in Virginia, passed through Kentucky. Anyway, it's not named for our Hopkins, although a 8th or 10th great aunt lived in Kentucky. It was named for Samuel Hopkins, a Revolutionary War General. Now our direct descendant, John Hopkins was a Revolutionary War Lieutenant and could possibly distantly be related to Samuel. But that is not the important thing that we found. How do I know about Lieutenant Hopkins? Because in our idle searching I opened a site called "A Chapter of Hopkins Geneology 1735-1905" And lo and behold the entire 218 pages were about our Hopkins, ending with Otis Launcelot Hopkins, your greatgrandfather. The book--yes I printed out the entire book--has literally thousands of Hopkins ancestors starting in Albany New York, which we didn't know and extending all over the entire United States including now Arizona, Arkansas, New York, Washington, Oregon and beyond. Cool huh. So far I have added about 100 people to our family groups. Change just keeps on coming. Archibald Hopkins--I think he is your 9th ggrandfather--had 16 children, 10 boys and 6 girls. He moved his family to Kentucky, but was uncomfortable with slavery so went on to Red Oak, Ohio. The Hopkins children all married, raised large families of their own and settled on properties surrounding the parental homestead--none with less than 100 acres. What a deal! They were church going people. They left Scotland to escape the Church of England and left Ireland to escape the Catholics. But in Red Oak they filled up half the church.

The didn't drink whiskey and they didn't smoke tabbacky which may account for them leaving the South!! I still have a lot of book to puruse. But, you just never know where good things will turn up next! Love you all. Wish there were 8 more just like you!

Out and about in Baja Arizona

Well, Ari, Alon, Nola and Talia drove out from NYC for a visit and a good time was had by all. We had Easter baskets on Sunday, went up to Sabino canyon on Monday, and ate at Guero Canelo on Tuesday. Then off to the airport. Quick, but fun. Maren and Justin came down for a Sunday afternoon visit. Graham palled around with us on Monday. I only wish we could have a full reunion someday!! The weather was great. Wednesday the winds returned and blew everything not tied down across the yard. The temperature dropped into the mid 30 degrees and I wondered if the wind hadn't blown us quite a ways north. But then Megan said their was snow again in Flagstaff, so I knew we were still at the correct latitudes. Love you all. MOM

Here come's Peter Cottontail

It's Easter in the morning. The most sacred day in all Christendom.
So what can I add to that?
Yes, Jesus is the Christ! He broke the bands of death. He is our Savior and Redeemer, the very Son of God. And He will come again as our resurrected Lord. That day is not far distant. It is evident to all who accept the Savior’s literal resurrection that life does not end at death. Our Lord promised, “Because I live, ye shall live also.” (John 14:19.)
Have a wonderful weekend.

It's General Conference Time again!

Eliason family Bible from Denmark, brought by
Mike's great grandfather in the 1860's to the USA


To quote Elder Jeffery Holland:

To all of you who think you are lost or without hope, or who think you have done too much that was too wrong for too long, to every one of you who worry that you are stranded somewhere on the wintry plains of life, this conference calls out Jehovah’s unrelenting refrain,
“[My] hand is stretched out still. I shall lengthen out mine arm unto them,[though they] deny me; nevertheless, I will be merciful unto them, if they will repent and come unto me; for mine arm is lengthened out all the day long, saith the Lord God of Hosts.”
His mercy endureth forever, and His hand is stretched out still. His is the pure love of Christ, the charity that never faileth, that compassion which endures even when all other strength disappears.
I testify of this reaching, rescuing, merciful Jesus, that this is His redeeming Church based on His redeeming love, and that, as those in the Book of Mormon declared, “there came prophets among the people, who were sent from the Lord . … Yea, there came prophets in the land again.” (end of quote)

I listened to the Conference sessions in the morning and afternoon and then I listened to the news. If ever we needed a prophet in the land it is now. Thank heaven, literally, for family, for the scriptures, for a prophet, for repentance and the Atonement. Have a wonderful Sunday.

This one's for Michael

Is this man smiling????

So, I'm sitting in the doctor's office reading Discover Magazine (1997) and I find this great if somewhat dated information:

"Adults Rule. Because we rule we get to do mischieveous things to our kids. Like tickling them. It's one of life's small pleasures to sneak up behind a guileless child, tackle him or her to the ground in an affectionate, roughhouse, big-lug kind of way, then attack armpits, ribs or neck with wiggly fingers.

The little moppets just love it too. When I pounce on my sons they howl in laughter. The curl into a fetal position. They beg me to stop.

Turns out they aren't kidding. They really want me to stop. At least that's the conclusion C Harris a PhD candidate at UC San Diego has come to after conducting two studies on tickle. Laughter and tickle indeed go together, says Harris, but not because people enjoy the activity. It appears that people's hee-hawing reaction to tickle is a reflex, just like the one produced when a ball-peen hammer strikes the knee. Which means that I, a big bully, was inflicting what she calls TICKLE TORTURE on these kids. Oh dear."

First, Michael invented the term Tickle Torture long before Ms Harris even dreamed of getting a PhD in tickle. (In California you can study any thing.) And second, I don't think the ball-peen hammer thing applies. I do not burst out laughing if someone strikes me with a hammer. But, you get the point.

So there you have it. Vindication Michael. As if you needed it at this point. We have believed in tickle torture now for nearly 30 years!!