Ash Friday

This is a picture my brother Chris found of our city. It looks so horrible, almost Biblical. It doesn’t seem this bad living in it. There is a great metaphor in this for life too right? You get used to the dimness when you’re in the middle of it.

School has been canceled for tomorrow because of the ash and unhealthy air conditions. The fire is moving away from us into the more mountainous areas, so we are not in danger here. Friday we are planning to hunker down and watch movies, and maybe sneak in some extra cleanup jobs. Here are the latest stats on our fire:

Acres burned: 26,000 / Containment: 30%
Destroyed: 14 homes, 12 outbuildings
Damaged: 8 homes, 12 outbuildings
Injuries: 4 firefighters
Time of Start: 5:55 p.m. 10-21
Official cause: Arson
Point of Origin: Silverado Canyon and Santiago Canyon roads, then crossed Hwy. 241 to the west; moved toward Portola Springs, Northwood village of Irvine.
Firefighters: 1,000
Evacuations: 43,000 people
Location: Silverado Canyon and its 700 homes are “far from being out of the woods,” fire officials say; firefighters have had success keeping the fire away from Trabuco and Live Oak canyons, the most endangered communities. Modjeska Canyon appeared safe for now (5:45 p.m.)
Costs: at least $10 million in damages

My Quarterback

Rob’s office encouraged costumes today as a warm-up for the big family Halloween party they’re having tonight. Here is Rob in his costume. I wonder where he got this idea. 😉 I expect he’ll win first prize!

Last Minute Costumes

I am a big fan of the Family Fun magazines and web site.  They always live up to their name with unique ideas for crafts, activities, trips etc.  I was just thinking about how Halloween is approaching and thought I’d check there for last minute ideas in case Rob and I decide to join in on the dressing up.  Here are some quick ones that I thought were really cute:

Black Eyed Peas

Quarterback

Road Trip

Smartie Pants

Local Fire

Last night around 6 pm a large fire started about 8 miles from our house by what is now believed to be arson. We received a call shortly after that to be ready in case there were any necessary evacuations. The church stake leaders were immediately communicating via a ham radio network and checking in on high risk members. It’s so nice to have such an organized system for safety.

These are pictures I took this morning around 9:00 from our front yard. The sky is an ominous orange, I didn’t do any touch ups to these photos. I was in Costa Mesa this morning and returned around 11:30 to find that things are still just as smoky and dim. To read up on us check out this ABC story. You can also see another guy’s cool pictures here on flickr.

Preserving our Blessings

At the last General Conference I just loved the talk that was given by Elder Henry B. Eyring. He always has a wonderful talk, and I look forward to hearing him speak. This time he spoke of the importance of preserving memories of the blessings we see in our lives daily. At the end he sums it up by saying, “Tonight, and tomorrow night, you might pray and ponder, asking the questions: Did God send a message that was just for me? Did I see His hand in my life or the lives of my children? I will do that. And then I will find a way to preserve that memory for the day that I, and those that I love, will need to remember how much God loves us and how much we need Him.”

I would like to get these sorts of memories recorded for my family too. Whenever I think of it I like to ask the kids to tell about their happiest time from that day while we eat dinner. Tonight:

Hunter said: “During the Primary Program at church.” Which was very cute. The kids sang their little hearts out, and had their parts all memorized.

Emma said: “Making presents for Sabrina.” After church the kids were playing they were in a little clubhouse under the stairs. Sabrina was the queen and they made special gifts for her and a paper crown decorated with glitter and beads.

Hannah: “Thinging in a pogam.” Singing in the program- The soon to be sunbeams came up front and sang with the primary,”I’m trying to be like Jesus.” Hannah didn’t sing any of the words, she just stood there and smiled; happy to be standing with her best little friend Krista looking at all of the people smiling back at her.

Sabrina: “Happy.” She loves this new word that she learned a few days ago! Today was the first time she was in her nursery class for the whole time without Mom or Dad there too. Big day for her and us!!

Rob: “Making the apple pie, and snuggling on the couch with Mommy watching TV.” Rob has not baked a pie in a very long time. In fact, it’s been about a year I think. It was so delicious too. We always love his pies! At least three of us do. Hunter, Hannah, and Sabrina all gave their slices away after a few bites, but the three of us were happy to eat their leftovers. We had our short together time watching “Ebert & Roeper.” That’s always nice.

Amy: “Watching the primary program, walking to my visiting teaching appointment, and eating Daddy’s pie.” I love seeing the kids do their program and it brought back happy memories of when I was doing that last year as the secretary in the primary presidency. I miss that calling. -It was a nice day so instead of driving the half mile to see my sister, I walked.

One Night, Two Adventures

Adventure Number One:

So, last night, on a bit of a whim, and with some prompting from my secretary, I took Hunter and Emma to see our very first live NHL game. We saw the Anaheim Ducks play the Nashville Predators. It was tons of fun. My firm has a suite at the arena that’s mainly for “business development” (i.e., schmoozing clients) but if no one is taking clients to any particular event (which seems to be the case fairly often) then any attorney that wants to can use it.

We had a great time and Hunter and Emma really got into the spirit of it, cheering whenever the Ducks scored or had a great save. I did my best to explain the rules and everything else I knew about the game but I’m not sure how well I did. I don’t think I lived up to my Canadian heritage very well. “Daddy, why did the referee blow the whistle and make everyone stop playing?” “I don’t know, son. I don’t know.”

Is it just me, though, or is it weird that the Ducks started out as a marketing tie-in for a Walt Disney movie? And how weird is it that they won the Stanley Cup last year? Anyway, it was a great time. We watched the Ducks beat the Predators 3 to 1, we ate some nachos, took some pictures, and when it was all over, headed out for the approximately 20 minute drive back home, which leads us to…

Adventure Number Two:

It’s 10:00 o’clock at night, we’re about half way home and cruising along the freeway when I look down and notice that the tachometer on the dashboard is showing 0 RPM’s. I realize this would only happen if the engine is no longer running (hey, I’m a bright guy). I test my theory by pressing down on the accelerator and, sure enough, nothing. We’re in the car pool lane but, fortunately, we’re right at a spot where there’s a wider than usual median on the left. I pull over, we glide to a stop and I put on the hazard lights.

This now is where a nice mix of modern technology and good people turns something that could have been a really big problem into a bit of an inconvenience. I call the highway patrol on my cell phone and get a really helpful officer on the other end. He gets our location, dispatches a patrol car and then conferences in a AAA dispatcher. The woman at AAA was really helpful, too. She orders a tow truck and tells them it’s a priority call, figures out the closest repair shop to tow us to and orders a cab to be at the repair shop to take us home.

Hunter and Emma were great, too. They made a contest of who could spot the police car or tow truck first and then compared notes with each other over everything they’d have to tell their friends at school the next day. As for the car, we’re still waiting to get the whole story on what caused the breakdown. At first the mechanic thought it was just a problem with the distributor, but they replaced it and it’s still not working so they said they’ll dive back into it tomorrow and see what they can figure out. Yikes! We’ve had this car since our BYU days and I’m really hoping we can squeeze a few more years out of it before it totally bites the dust.

So, basically, it was just another day around the old homestead. Mostly fun, with just a little bit of crazy thrown in to make things interesting.

Barbie on Money Management

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvZRcJHRtOE

It’s true, I am a consumer of Barbie products. We have a house full of Barbies and their accessories, but I was shocked when I saw this commercial for the Barbie Shopping Boutique. Not exactly the best way to teach your kids about financial responsibility: “You Never run out of money!”

On a related note, Nana is once again the cover article for Meridian Magazine (!!) with her article titled Teaching Children to Live Within Their Means. Good stuff in there!