MaeLyn's Musings

Peter loves drama, and he's good at it too. This year he has been in production after production, developing his talents. In March he played the munchkin mayor in The Wizard of Oz. ( See here for my blog on that ).  In April he played a lead role in the one act play Abra Cadaver. ( Here's my blog on that. ) At the end of his Junior year in high school, he was elected as co-president of the drama club and was granted stewardship of the traditional Kermit the Frog doll for acting. (There are four stuffed frogs that are passed from a graduating drama student to the drama student that student feels best exemplifies that role. Josh received the "Kermie" for tech while he was in high school. Other Kermies are passed for costumes and light/sound.) In July he performed in the community theater production of The Servant of Two Masters. ( Blog post ) In October, Peter performed as the narrator in the high school production of Puffs: Seven Increasingly Eventful Years at a Certai...

When Hannah was a missionary in Brazil, she met a guy. Elder Moroni Torres was another missionary, from Recife, Bazil. When Hannah returned home from her mission in March 2020, she and Moroni continued to communicate. Since then, they have continued to talk, pretty much every day, and Hannah even returned to Brazil twice to see him. (See here and here .) Eventually he moved to Portugal in order to get a better job. In April of this year, Hannah moved to Portugal. ( See blog post here ) At the time, we didn't know how long she would spend there. After two years of a long distance relationship, they needed to figure out where it was headed, whether they got along well enough in person to get married, or whether they should break up and move on. When she left here, she had a round-trip ticket for just in case things didn't work out, but the date of potential return came and went and she continued on. She got an apartment and a job in a restaurant. At church she was called as secr...

Early in 2022, Josh got a job working for a guy in our stake who does tile work, remodeling bathrooms and kitchens. He cuts tile, lugs boxes of tile up and down stairs, fetches things for his boss, and learns the ins and outs of tile laying as well as bits of plumbing and electrical work. He helps to install tubs and hang doors. At the same time, he has been taking one class at a time from our local community college, the most recent being an architectural drafting class.  To aid him in his travels to and from school and his various job sites, in August Josh purchased a truck: The Beast. It is a 2007 Ford F150 with over 200,000 miles.  Since his purchase he has learned the questionable joys of paying for his own car insurance as well as for car repairs, but he also enjoys the freedom of being able to hop in his car and go whenever he wants to. When not at work or school, Josh attends the young adult ward and institute, goes on dates (a couple nights ago he took his friend...

 On the evening of December 6th, Steven, John and I went to the stake center to meet with our stake president and John was released from service as a full time missionary.  It has been a rocky three years since he was first called.  September 2019: We dropped off at the airport and sent him off to Brazil. ( See blog written at the time ) He attended the MTC in Brazil, and then continued on to the Brazil, Sao Paulo West mission where he served until... March of 2020: ...when he returned home because of the pandemic. ( See blog ) He decided to defer his mission for a year in the hopes that the pandemic would subside by then, and meanwhile he attended a year at the Colorado School of Mines. July of 2021: John left home again, this time to the Florida, Jacksonville Mission, with the hopes that it would be temporary and he would be able to return to Brazil before long. September 2021: Due to anxiety issues, John returned home and transitioned to a service mission. (see  b...