IT'S RAINING-IT'S POURING...

Arizona has been so dry and everyone has been praying for rain. Prayers are answered ALL AT ONCE! This is considered a 100 year rain. Arizona has never gotten this much rain at one time before in the history of the state! We are seeing the I-10 freeway at 43rd Avenue with cars totally submerged. Also, Judy B's pool, or should I say mud soup! Last, but not least, the Windsor Shadows area, right next door to Marni's house. It is the green belt that is at least 4-5 feel deep. She said there is a barbecue in their somewhere!!! 

There are times when life kind of gets a person down. Thank you Heavenly Father that they are minor things in the scheme of life, but still they are "things". AND THEN YOU READ SOMETHING LIKE THIS! Oh, be still my heart! The innocence of a child is the best medicine for whatever ills a person might feel! It makes life worth living, makes the problems of the world seem less, and makes a grandmother's heart eternally happy for the grandchildren she has!!! 

Just thought you would want to know...

Most Christians today probably can’t imagine Christmas on any other day than December 25, but it wasn’t always that way. In fact, for the first three centuries of Christianity’s existence, Jesus Christ’s birth wasn’t celebrated at all. The religion’s most significant holidays were Epiphany on January 6, which commemorated the arrival of the Magi after Jesus’ birth, and Easter, which celebrated Jesus’ resurrection. The first official mention of December 25 as a holiday honoring Jesus’ birthday appears in an early Roman calendar from 336 A.D.

But was Jesus really born on December 25 in the first place? Probably not. The Bible doesn’t mention his exact birthday, and the Nativity story contains conflicting clues. For instance, the presence of shepherds and their sheep suggest a spring birth. When church officials settled on December 25 at the end of the third century, they likely wanted the date to coincide with existing pagan festivals honoring Saturn (the Roman god of agriculture) and Mithra (the Persian god of light). That way, it became easier to convince Rome’s pagan subjects to accept Christianity as the empire’s official religion

The celebration of Christmas spread throughout the Western world over the next several centuries, but many Christians continued to view Epiphany and Easter as more important. Some, including the Puritans of colonial New England, even banned its observance because they viewed its traditions—the offering of gifts and decorating trees, for example—as linked to paganism. In the early days of the United States, celebrating Christmas was considered a British custom and fell out of style following the American Revolution. It wasn’t until 1870 that Christmas became a federal holiday.

Just thought you might want to know...

We can trace this historic American Christian tradition to the year 1623. After the harvest crops were gathered in November 1623, Governor William Bradford of the 1620 Pilgrim Colony, “Plymouth Plantation” in Plymouth, Massachusetts proclaimed:

"All ye Pilgrims with your wives and little ones, do gather at the Meeting House, on the hill… there to listen to the pastor, and render Thanksgiving to the Almighty God for all His blessings."

This is the origin of our annual Thanksgiving Day celebration. Congress of the United States has proclaimed National Days of Thanksgiving to Almighty God many times throughout the following years. On November 1, 1777, by order of Congress, the first National Thanksgiving Proclamation was proclaimed, and signed by Henry Laurens, President of Continental Congress. The third Thursday of December, 1777 was thus officially set aside.

Just thought you would want to know...

(nice picture Marc)

• It came from the Catholic church in Rome. Hallowe'en is short for "All Hallows Eve". Hallow means holy or Saint in old english. So Hallowe'en is the Eve of All Saints Day.
  
  All Saints Day was started as a local feast in about 750 AD on Nov 1st to commemorate the dedication of a chapel in Rome to "All Saints" - all the saints but particularly those who did not have a special day. Over the following century it spread throughout Europe and became very popular with celebration starting the night before (the Eve or Vigil) and continuing through the next day. Nov 2nd was added later as "All Souls" day which made the festival even more popular. People used to go round asking for cakes in exchange for prayers for the souls of people's families (later changed into "trick or treat").
  
  Puritan protestants of course hated this sort of thing. It ws Catholic, it was about Saints, it included "begging" and other "pagan" practices. They attacked it as being evil, the work of the devil, unbiblical etc etc.
  
  Hence the associations with witches, devils, pagan festivals and all that sort of stuff.
  
  Some people believe that it brought in some elements of a pagan festival in Ireland but there is no historical evidence to support this theory.
  
  All Saints and, to varying degrees, it's Eve are traditionally celebrated in Catholic cultures all over the world  though American culture is all pervasive so some countries are picking up its bad habit there are several cultures that celebrate this day. it is supposed to be when the veil between the dead and the living is lifted and all the spirits and demons walk the earth. you wear the masks and costumes so the real spirits think that you are one of them and leave you alone.

"THE SHOE"

Marni Bringhurst ...once upon a time, about 4 years ago, we were up north visiting my Grandma in Holbrook. When we arrived, she was soooo excited to tell that she had found THIS SHOE!! Thinking it was Jackson's shoe and knowing that we had probably been missing it for quite some time, she was excited that she had found it for us. The "pair" would finally be back together. The only problem was, this was not Jackson's shoe. We tried and tried to explain this to my Grandma, that this indeed was not OUR missing shoe and we had NO clue where it came from or whose shoe it was. She INSISTED it was Jackson's and we MUST take it home to be the matching shoe. So, as a good granddaughter that I am, I put the shoe in my luggage to take it home. SOMEHOW it ended up in my mom's suitcase and when she unpacked from our trip, she found THIS SHOE in HER suitcase. I have NO clue how it got there!! I would NEVER do that! Since then, EVERY Holbrook trip that my mom and I take together, this DANG shoe ends up in one of our suitcases. When I unpack from our trip, sometimes I'll find this shoe back in my luggage or sometimes in my dirty clothes bag! WEIRD!!! So, every once in a while, I "gift" my mom back this shoe... sometimes I put a gift card inside of it or sometimes just a plant for her. I hadn't mentioned anything about the shoe for about a year, hoping that it would be a nice surprise for her once she found it back in her suitcase after this last girls trip to Holbrook. Dang if that shoe didn't end up in my mailbox a week later! I REALLY thought my mom would love my "gift of shoe" to her, but I guess she wants me to keep it for another year... the shoe lives on!

JAROM AND ADDISON 

TRIP TO HOLBROOK!!!

GGma needed to go home to Holbrook, so Moira-Lin, Marni, and myself too the opportunity to get away and have some fun AND take GGma home too. After dropping GGma off at home, we took off to Winslow to buy her some much needed tires for her car. As you can see by a few of the pictures, we had too much fun! Thanks girls for going with us and making the trip very memorable. 

Casual attire was the norm for the trip and Marni took full advantage of it. 

SUMMER WATER FUN!

We love to get together and so this summer, we decided to do a water slide. What a great time! All the kids and some of the adults went down and it was fantastic. We got wet, had snow cones, went swimming, and got into a dust storm and rain, all in the afternoon of our party. BIG thanks to the Whitmers for allowing us to invade their yard, pool, and house. Such memories. And, yes. I just had to go down the slide. The grandkids got a big kick out of the whole experience! 

I can still walk, so everything turned out great! 

Hot Shots

GRANITE MOUNTAIN HOT SHOT 

HEROES...

 Hot winds blew an Arizona blaze out of control Sunday in a forest northwest of Phoenix, overtaking and killing 19 members of an elite fire crew in the deadliest wildfire involving firefighters in the U.S. for at least 40 years – and the worst since the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on 9/11/2001.

The Granite Mountain Hot Shots, established in 2002, were an elite ground firefighting crew known for their innovative problem-solving and history of safe, aggressive fire suppression. Members of the crew were highly trained, came from diverse backgrounds, and worked long hours in extreme environmental conditions doing the most demanding of fireline tasks.

They carried 50-70 pounds on their back, hiked seven miles or more to where they needed to work, and worked up to 14 hours, sometimes longer. The average age of the men in the hotshot crew was 22-years-old.The firefighters were members of a “hotshot” crew – the ‘Granite Mountain Hotshots’, tasked with digging a firebreak and creating an escape route. ”A hotshot crew are the elite firefighters,” state forestry spokesman Art Morrison said. “They’re usually a 20-person crew, and they’re the ones who actually go in and dig the fire line, cut the brush to make a fuel break. And so they would be as close to the fire as they felt they safely could.”

They have now completed their assignments and will have eternal rest! 

I just thought you would want to know...

We celebrate America’s birth on July 4. Why? It was July 2 that the Continental Congress resolved, “That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States.” Shouldn’t that day, as John Adams predicted, “be the most memorable epoch in the history of America”? No.
On July 2, we effected our political separation. On July 4 we declared to the world the principles our nation is built upon – a creed that applies to all men and all times.

America celebrates July 4 as Independence Day because it was on July 4, 1776, that members of the Second Continental Congress, meeting in Philadelphia, adopted the final draft of the Declaration of Independence.

Following its adoption, the Declaration was read to the public in various American cities. Whenever they heard it, patriots erupted in cheers and celebrations. 

In 1777, Philadelphians remembered the 4th of July. Bells were rung, guns fired, candles lighted, and firecrackers set off. However, while the War of Independence dragged on, July 4 celebrations were modest at best.

When the war ended in 1783, July 4 became a holiday in some places. In Boston, it replaced the date of the Boston Massacre, March 5, as the major patriotic holiday. Speeches, military events, parades, and fireworks marked the day. In 1941, Congress declared July 4 a federal holiday.

Happy Independence Day!

LAST GARDENIA

My Gardenia plant is about 10 years old. It blooms twice a year and when it does bloom, the plant is coverd. It is in the flower bed right next to the front door and when it blooms, the fragrance is so strong, you can smell it every time you go in or out the door. This is the very last flower left after the plant bloomed this time. It looked so proud, I just had to take a picture. The sad thing is, the very next day it had already died and dried up. All things pass away in this life...

2013

We have a tradition for Father's Day that is one of my favorites. We always have a magic show! When we first started doing the magic show, we had several of the girls who wanted to make their brothers disappear! But, we have come a long way since then. We have our party on the Saturday before Father's Day and have a great time. This year, we had card tricks, "cutting" off a thunb with a rubber band, cutting a banana in slices without pealing it, mind reading, and taking a thumb off and putting it back on. It was so fun. Lots of food, fun, and a water blob (see above) to slide on. Miche' had made one at her house and it was such fun, I decided to try my hand. But, mine seemed to want to leak out the sides and before it was over, we had two large holes in the top. But, what fun we had. 

Happy Father's Day to all the wonderful men in our family. Everyone of the men are wonderful providers and great fathers. WE LOVE YOU ALL!!!