The Best is Yet to Be

Saturday, October 29, 2011

Heartland Film Festival

To the best of my memory we have never attended a real Film Festival until this month. We were free and the festival was within reasonable driving distance from Knoxville, so we took advantage of being able to see our son Brad in action at the Heartland Film Festival in Indianapolis. We were only there two days, but it was a great, educational experience, and we got to see some wonderful films---feature length and shorts. Brad’s film that made it into the festival was “Drum Beats.”

OK, Brad is our son, but hey! He is one fantastic film guy, and he very aptly fielded questions during Q&A as well as participated in the Q&A discussion of the film-makers panel of three which was held Monday evening. Thanks for the memory, Brad. Here’s to all film-makers. Thanks for enriching our lives.

Feature Films we saw:
1) Much Ado About Nothing, by Brandon Arnold (friend of Brad’s)
2) Mulberry Child by Susan Morgan Cooper

Shorts we saw:
1) The Country Club, by Jace Freeman
2) Drum Beats, by Brad Barber (our hero)
3) Gild, by David Yarovesky
4) The Girls and the Fox, by Tyler Kupferer
5) Dreamgiver, by Tyler Carter
6) Two Life, by Paul Symons
7) Le Jeu Des Soldats, by Lorne Hitser

Ready to go see some good films!

Brad and fellow panel members receive their instructions.

Q&A after "Drum Beats" was shown.

Time for one more film

Hospitality Center for filmmakers (and their parents) at the Canterbury Hotel

Check out other films Brad has made and shown at film festivals here.

Thursday, October 20, 2011

The Dahlquists visit Knoxville

Lincoln with cousins Emma, Ben, & Sydney

Lydia and Lincoln in FR hiding place

Two little boys from Utah came to visit us this month, and they brought along their parents, Cara and Will. It was so much fun to pull out the bouncy seat for Spencer (age 4 weeks), and even borrow an infant seat for car rides. We had a tiny baby in the house who slept in the same crib I slept in when I was a baby. Oh my, we love babies. We’re beginning to see what being great-grandparents will feel like in not too many more years. Spencer’s brother, Lincoln, had the energy every two-year old has and every parent wishes they had. Both were delightful, and we enjoyed their parents, too. Here are pictures of some of the stuff we did. We miss them already; can’t wait until we find occasion to visit them across the country so many miles away. We wish they lived right here in the heart of Knoxville, TN.

Emma takes her turn to hold Spencer

My turn!

Spencer (in stroller), Will, Cara, Sharlene, Lincoln (other stroller) enjoying Market Square

Lincoln and Afton
Hooray for someone younger
than Afton

The Great Smokie Mountains

Russ and Lincoln

Will, Lincoln, Spencer, and Cara

Spencer, Cara, Will, and Lincoln in the Sunsphere

Lincoln joins the cousins singing group

Russ, Sharlene, Cara holding Spencer, Will holding Lincoln - State Line in the Smokies

Spencer sleeps in the same crib I slept in as a baby

Lincoln greets us each morning at breakfast

Everyone's here except for Trey, Allie, and Afton -- Good times!

Friday, September 23, 2011

Grandparenting

I’ve been a grandparent since 1992, and anyone who is a grandparent knows the absolute overpowering joy that comes with that role. I used to have a plaque that said: “If I had known how wonderful grandchildren are, I would have had them first.” I can’t even find adequate words to describe the joys of grandparenting.
However, I have tried not to blog about specific grandchildren because I’m always afraid I will accidently favor one or the other. Writing too much about one and perhaps leaving someone out. But since it’s September and Grandparents Day was on September 11 (it’s always the 2nd Sunday), I’m sharing this picture of me, Russ, and our 19 grandchildren.

Our Grandchildren - July 2010

We have many, many, many pictures of them all about the house. I’ve even devoted an entire corner of the kitchen counter to displaying their pictures.

Various family members have given me nice “sayings” that express how my husband and I feel. Here are a few:

Since Trey was my first grandchild, his parents got to decide what I would be called, and they chose “Grammy,” which I love. We are Grammy and Grandpa.

Just one quick story that reminds us all how truly wonderful it is to be a grandparent. Our 2^nd youngest grandchild, Afton, slept over one night. She slept soundly in her little toddler bed upstairs. Because our bedroom is downstairs and we wanted to be sure we would hear her if she needed us in the night, we plugged in the baby monitor. We didn’t set an alarm for the next morning, knowing Afton would wake us up. We expected to hear crying or even shouting to us to get her up the next morning, but instead we woke to the most beautiful sound in the world: Afton singing. Yes, no annoying alarm clock, no yelling child, just this sweet, sweet voice of an angel singing one song after another. We jumped up and ran upstairs to give our little angel a big hug and “good morning.” Grandchildren! We are blessed.

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President Jimmy Carter first declared Grandparents Day as a national holiday in 1978. Who knew? For more information, go here.

Also, if you want to see what I published about grandparenting in the magazine LDS Living, you'll find my articles in the March/April 2007 issue, page 26, "Over the River and Through the Woods, Staying Close to the Grandchildren." And in the November/December 2006 issue, page 70, "Traditions for the Grandkids."

Saturday, September 10, 2011

The winner is........................

Congratulations to Lydia who has won our give away. I thought it was quite ironic that someone going to school for the very first time (kindergarten) won the back to school give away. And as a thank you to all those wonderful comments from the rest of you, I’m sending each of you a little something. We loved reading all the comments. They were so telling into the personality of each child. Happy School Days! Here's that Target commercial one more time. I could watch it every day.

Note: Lydia is even wearing her school T-shirt.

Congratulations, Lydia!

Friday, September 2, 2011

School Daze Give Away

Joel’s comment on my last post reminded me that it is probably time for another give away. But, sorry, Joel—it won’t be an air fare and football tickets—no can do. However, September always reminds me of the beginning of school, even though most kids start in August now a day. So in honor of all those cuties going back to school, this give away is for kids. Any child up to the age of 18 may enter. If you don’t have a blog account, ask your parents to enter you in the contest listing your name. If I don’t know where you live, leave me a contact (e-mail, phone, address, etc.) in case you win.

In entering, please list what your favorite part of school is this year. If you’re a pre-schooler and just learning to talk, that’s fine, just let Mom or Dad know what you like best about pre-school and they'll do the rest.

From a random drawing, the winner will receive a $30 gift card for Target. I LOVE their back to school commercials. This one is my favorite.

Contest ends FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9 at 6 pm EST. Oh, I'll also throw in some Silly Bandz.

Here are some “school-daze” first-day-of-school pictures from our family archives:

1973 - Troy's first day of Kindergarten

1975 - Lisa's first day of Kindergarten

1976 Joel and Julie join Lisa and Troy for their First Day of School Picture

1977 - Joel joins Julie- first day of Kindergarten; Troy 4th grade; Lisa 2nd grade

Getting off the bus: Julie had a good first day

1976 - First Day for Lisa and Troy

1979 -First day of School....Troy in 6th, Lisa in 4th, Julie in 2nd, Joel in Kindergarten - I love that Brad and Lori are in the stroller being part of this photo shoot. I also loved that I had four children all attending the same school: Bancroft Elemnetary. You have to look closely, but Lori is in that stroller--about 4 months old