42nd Wedding Anniversary

JUNE 1, 1967 to JUNE 1, 2009

It was 42 years ago today that we said our marriage vows as we knelt across the alter in the Salt Lake Temple. It’s been a wonderfully exciting 42 years, and yet we both believe “The Best is Yet to Be.”

We’ve cried, we’ve laughed, we’ve worked, we’ve played, we’ve danced, we’ve sung, we traveled, we’ve grown, and still we believe “The Best is Yet to Be.”

We’ve raised six children, enjoyed 18 grandchildren and look forward to #19 in October; we traveled to all 50 of the United States; we’ve traveled to Europe, China, Mexico, Israel, Canada, and South America, and yet we know “The Best is Yet to Be.”

We look forward to many more years together and can’t wait to celebrate the big 5-0. Meanwhile, thank you all for your part in weaving the tapestry of our lives together.

Sweet Day in June

Sweet Day in June

It’s right around the corner: the first Friday in June is National Donut Day. It was first celebrated in 1938 by the Chicago Salvation Army. The day was dedicated to raising funds to honor Salvation Army women volunteers who served thousands of soldiers doughnuts and coffee during World War I.

The women who fried doughnuts for the troops were called “doughgirls” and the men who ate the donuts were called “doughboys.” Who knew!!! Could this have been the forerunner to our now famous “Doughboy?”

Currently, the U.S. alone consumes about ten million donuts a year. (Which spelling is best: donuts or doughnuts?) The most popular variety is the traditional yeast-raised glazed donut.

If you want to join the nation in celebrating National Donut Day, you can get a free glazed doughnut at your local Krispy Kreme store on Friday, June 5. Or, participate in our GIVE AWAY and win more than a dozen if you are the lucky winner. We have written down numbers one through ten and then randomly drawn one from a hat and whoever is that number to comment gets a Krispy Kreme gift certificate. Hmmmmmm. I can taste those donuts already! Rule #1—one comment per person. Rule #2 -- no more than two comments per family.

All “give-aways” will not be FOOD! So if treats are not your thing----stay tuned. Eventually there will be something different.

Family History Trivia

As many of you know, I have spent considerable time the last several months researching our roots. In addition to using the church sources, I also subscribed for a month to Ancestry.com and found tons of information. I plan to subscribe again, but wanted to first compare the information I obtained from their website with information I previously had and that on the church data base. One thing I have looked at is where our roots are, so I looked at where our great grandparents were born. The following is a little trivia I found interesting.

Of the eight great-grandparents on my side, only one was born in the United States, while on Mom’s side, all but one were born in Utah. Obviously, Mom’s roots in the church go much further back than mine.

Of my great-grandparents –
- Barber, Crowhurst, Bennett, Ellison were born in England
- Dawson was born in Scotland, Fowle in Wales, and Erickson in Sweden.
- Casper (my grandma Barber’s father) was born in Ohio and two generations back the Casper line goes to Germany
- Joel discovered that a branch of the Casper line (Durbin and Litton) goes back to the early 1600s in Maryland before coming from England.

Of Mom’s great-grandparents -
- White was born in Wales
- As stated above, the rest were born in Utah but all but one trace back to England.
- Thorpe, Bradshaw, Stratton, and Brown came to Utah from England in the mid 1800s
- Knight and Cheever were in New England for many years and go back to 1600s before coming from England
- The Egbert line goes back to Indiana, New Jersey, and New York, but I could not determine when the first person came to the US. The last Egbert I have was born in 1604 in Flatbush, New York.

Below are pictures of three generations of my line including the 8 great grandparents and pictures of Mom’s great grandparents Newel James Knight and Eliza Stratton with their children (Mom’s grandmother Maude Brown is in the front right) and Mom’s great grandparents John Brown and Mary Cheever.

Barber parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents

Newel James Knight and Eliza Stratton family

John Brown and Mary Cheever

Bean to Bar

For some reason the words "Bean to Bar" drew me in to read an article in the Spring issue of BYU Magazine. However, I was totally surprised to find it was about Art Pollard (BA '96), creator of Amano Artisan Chocolate. I learned that "amano" means both "by hand" and "they love." (Is that right Troy, my Italian language son?) The company has only been in business for three years, and yet I've seen their famous bars line the shelves of ..........hmmmm. I can't remember. Was it at an airport gift shop? I thought perhaps Fresh Market and ran there only to find every other kind except Amano. While reading their blog I learned that they were in San Francisco in March at the San Francisco Chocolate Salon.

So for love of chocolate, we'll have our first GIVE AWAY be chocolate---the "by hand" and "they love" kind, that is. The picture below shows an example of one of the two bars that will be given (sent) to the lucky winner. The first three people who comment using the word "chocolate" will have their name put in a hat for the drawing. One lucky winner gets not just one, but two magnificent bars---that is "bean to bar."

If you want to check out this delicious website go to http://www.amanochocolate.com/



Other random thoughts on chocolate:

"The first law of dietetics seems to be: if it tastes good, it's bad for you."
--Isaac Asimov, Novelist/Humorist (1920-1992)

"If God wanted us to be skinny, he wouldn't have created chocolate."

"Chocolate, it's not just for breakfast anymore."

Grow old with me, the best is yet to be

"Grow old with me, the best is yet to be"

It was a three year project that was finally finished just in time for Christmas, 2008. Researching old diaries, journals, calendars, scrapbooks, etc. helped as we wrote our personal histories. We each proofread our own and each others' histories four times, and yet after publication, a few errors still appeared. But the project is done, and we hope it will benefit those who come after us. Perhaps a great grandchild will wonder what life was like for us and will find those answers in our histories. So, we pass onto our posterity the story of our lives, but we both believe "the best is yet to be." And so we begin something new: blogging. Our blog title was inspired by Robert Browning's words: "Grow old with me, the best is yet to be." This is our first post, and from here, we hope to cover many topics. A little of this and that, a little wisdom, a little experience, the lighter side, memories, and whatever comes to mind.