Easter Season

It's been an enjoyable Easter season. I loved having Easter so late in the year- it was a long season for Cadbury eggs!

I did other fun things too.

Like dyeing eggs with my fhe group:

Raelena, Kristin, me, Andrew, Kaitlyn, Tad and Eric

I didn't get into a dye fight like some people but we had a great time!

I got put in charge of obtaining the decorating goods- we used crayons and I had found NEON dye! I taught them how to dye eggs with onion skins, they found it interesting.

Wherever I go I am the art teacher! Ha ha.

We dyed eggs as a family, always a fun tradition.

This year I discovered that if you use crayon on a warm, just boiled egg (as opposed to trying to color ones that have been in the fridge) that the crayon goes on very smoothly and solid.

I was pleased!

This one got dyed yellow:

I did a random floral design and dyed it bright aqua!

Can you tell that I love Nightmare Before Christmas?

 Couldn't resist.

My family loves dyeing eggs, it's a great artistic medium.

Years ago I did pasanky (Ukrainian) eggs, I need to take that up again.

Church on Sunday as very nice. We had 39 people (including a few kids) in attendance, which was great for our little branch! It was so nice seeing friends and everyone looked great in their festive Easter pastels. I even had two YW in attendance, it was great! The spirit was really strong at church today, which was great. Outside it was a gloomy, overcast day, but in our hearts it was sunshine.

The PA tradition seems to be us kids hiding eggs and making Mom and Dad search for them!

One good use for a cluttered house- it's easy to hide eggs...in plain sight!

Mom and Laura were bored and I came home to Easter bunnies everywhere last week!

My dad, the big kid:

After hunting eggs, we had our usual Points and Butts egg game tournament and ate eggs and some homemade corned beef hash, yum! I then settled down for an Easter nap, it was great. I got two naps this weekend, can you believe it? Dinner was yummy ham and cheesy potatoes, always a fave. Anyhow, it was a really nice weekend and nice to spend time with my family. It was a nice opportunity to remember our Savior and what He did for us.

He is not here, for He is risen.

Sunday Will Come

I thought I was already thankful for the blessings of Heavenly Father and His plan for us. I thought I was already thankful for the Atonement of Jesus Christ and His sacrifice for us.

I was wrong.

Nothing has been happening to me personally, but in a very short span of time there has been a lot of heartache in the lives of those around me.

My friend's father died.
My friend will have a stillborn baby.
My friend's 7 year old son died very suddenly.

On top of all this, there are many who are very sick or needing surgery, including my jr field partner.

Don't even get me started on all the natural disasters that have happened lately. It's heartbreaking.

It's become rather overwhelming, especially when I can't be there to help.

Last week I had the opportunity to attend Gavin's funeral, he was 7 years old. Tomorrow would have been his 8th birthday. I didn't know him very well but I went to his funeral because I am friends with his mother and wanted to support the family in this hard time. His family says that it was just his time to go- he suddenly got sick and had cardiac arrest and then was brain dead and had to be taken off of life support. All totally out of the blue.

His funeral was the best and most touching that I've attended. Our stake president spoke very sweetly about the plan of salvation and eternal families. His father (a bishop) gave the eulogy and Gavin was just an amazing kid. He accomplished so much in his short time. He loved learning and going to school. He was an old soul in a young body. He had an amazing testimony. He was so looking forward to being baptized. Instead, he was buried in his baptismal clothes. So many touching and humorous stories.

The Primary children, including his two older brothers, sang "My Life Is A Gift". So sweet and touching. Another tender moment was watching Gavin's little cousin pat the coffin on the way up to the stand to sing.

Gavin was taken to the grave site in an antique firetruck, driven by a friend in the stake. He once got to ride that firetruck in a parade. I thought it was a sweet way to go. They also printed his testimony and put it in Books of Mormon to give out at the funeral to those who are not as familiar with our faith. It was nice to see that a lot were taken. A lot of people from his school came to the funeral, which was very sweet.

Gavin's tragedy gives several people the gift of life through organ donation. It's really a miracle that he could donate because he had cardiac arrest but when they tested his heart it showed no signs of damage. It went to a little girl who was going to die within a week if she did not receive a heart.

They say the only real tragedy is not death, but sin- it's hard for us to understand why Gavin was taken so young but we can rejoice that he was and is clean and perfect, and being a little child, he is without sin. He has been taken home to God.

Gavin did serve a mission- he touched many lives while on this earth and even in death he helped strengthen testimonies and share the gospel. I know that my testimony has been strengthened by attending his sweet funeral. I would not have been surprised if there were angels there in attendance. Gavin, thank you for being a force for good on this earth.

"Each of us will have our own Fridays—those days when the universe itself seems shattered and the shards of our world lie littered about us in pieces. We all will experience those broken times when it seems we can never be put together again. We will all have our Fridays.


But I testify to you in the name of the One who conquered death—Sunday will come. In the darkness of our sorrow, Sunday will come.


No matter our desperation, no matter our grief, Sunday will come. In this life or the next, Sunday will come."

-Joseph B. Wirthlin




I know that Jesus suffered for our sins so that we can through Him turn our hearts and repent of our sins and return to live with Heavenly Father. I know that Jesus willingly gave up His life and was resurrected so that we too can have the glorious gift of resurrection. His sacrifice makes it possible for us to live together forever as families and I am so thankful for the gift of our Savior and the peace that He brings. Someday Gavin and his family will be reunited in the eternities. Someday I will be reunited with the loved ones that I have lost. I am so thankful for temples and eternal families.

I am so very excited for Easter this year- while I do love chocolate, I am very excited to remember and celebrate what Jesus did for us. We celebrate Christmas because there was an Easter. Gavin's birthday falls on Good Friday this year, and I don't think that is a coincidence.

Hope you all have a wonderful Easter.

WV Conf: Take Me Home, Country Roads

I spent last weekend down in West Virginia for yet another YSA conference. It is starting to get hard to keep them all straight! This year WV opted to hold their conference at Jackson's Mill, a camp with some history. It's part of the WVU campus.

Truth in Advertising!

After months and months of sounding like a broken record  promoting this conference to the other YSAs in our group, it was finally time to go. I had a full car going down- my friend Kaitlyn sat up front with me and we had two guys from our fhe group in the backseat. If I wasn't driving, none of them would have had a way to WV! The trip down took about 5 hours, it took longer because of the rain and traffic and pitstops needed.

But we got there just in time for....stupid Get to Know You Games! Why, they're my favorite! {Sarcasm Sign}

I was forced to play, they had several teams rotate through activities. I am proud to admit that I did well during Musical Chairs- I lost out when four tried to become three. Out of a group of 14! We all have hidden talents. Oh, and I faked needing to do something with my phone so I could escape church-themed charades. How would you portray "Fishers of Men"? I don't know either and didn't want to try.

Once again, Get to Know You Games don't really let you get to know people. Although they let you see who's cool under pressure.

 Some poor girl dumped a ton of water on herself and all over the stage and floor during apple bobbing:

Running around with a kite attached to your hat- how sexy!

Is it now clear why I hate GTKYG? At least they weren't SFGTKYG.

No, I didn't participate in either activity. Though gosh, they looked fun. {Sarcasm Sign}

The real fun that night was the bon fire. Our speaker told the story of his first date with his wife- a bad date story that puts most bad date stories to rest! What an amazing woman to see past all that. It was fun to hang out with my friends and joke around. No photos of the bonfire- kindof hard to take pics in the dark.

Saturday was an early breakfast (7:30 am!) and then classes. First was a class where you covered a small military size Book of Mormon with fabric and doodads using irons and Wonder Under. It even has a magnetic closure. Pretty sweet.

Yup, mine's the aqua one!

Then it was finger-poking fun at woodcarving!
Here's what ours was supposed to look like:

Mine is *not* that far along. At all.

After lunch was Geocaching. I'd never done it before so it was fun to learn how to input coordinates and find stuff. My guy partner (not pictured) was less than desirable but I survived.

Then we got to watch an educational lecture from a raptor bird sanctuary/rescue place. They rehabilitate hurt birds of prey and use the ones that can't go back into the wild in their demos. It was an interesting show, it was neat to see the birds.

We saw a screech owl, "Owlice"

 A broadwing hawk named "Neo"

 ...and a tame red tail hawk named Annie that was probably stolen from the wild and tamed (illegal!).

This bird can really poop. Let me tell ya.

Later came free time and we walked down to the General Store. Saw a Civil War camp reenactment and people in period dress.

Reenactment with guns:

Fed the big koi fish in the pond:

After dinner, there was a speaker, the Mission President of the WV mission. He spoke about the theme and how there is really only one road to God and it's up to us if we're near or far. (Are you thinking about Grover at this point? I was!) It was a good talk and uplifting.

And since we were in WV, you gotta square dance. It's the law. I got roped into square dancing which was fine but I was so mad that I got tricked into having to be partners with a girl. And we were the only same sex couple in the entire room of 6 groups. They needed one more couple to complete a group and had run out of willing boys. At any rate, it was mortifying. And fed several complexes of mine. Probably other people didn't care that it was us girls, but I was mad that I was tricked/forced into it, mad that no guy wanted to be my partner in the first place and just mad. I have not been that mad in some time. Definitely the low point of the conference. Our group kept messing up too on account of our partnership- the guys kept trying to dance with me and would forget that I was "the boy". Or I'd forget that I was not supposed to do the girl part. I was so glad to be done with that! Other people looked like they were having fun, it was fun to watch my friends dance. Some groups did very well.

Then came the real dance, I was glad to groove my anger away. It actually was a pretty good dance and I did get asked to dance once. I did run away from some undesirable men, though. It was too dark to take a pic during the dance but I wanted to show off my new shirt so here you go:

We slept very well that night.

Breakfast again at 7:30 am and then Sacrament meeting. There were some really wonderful testimonies borne.

Sunday best:

Kaitlyn, Mitch and myself

The campgrounds were lovely. Spring has come to WV and it was great to have warm temps (could have done without the humidity), green grass and blooms in the trees. The cabins were really sweet looking and nice inside. Because it is Jackson's Mill, there are millstones everywhere.

Even in stone foundations:

The mess hall was a really cute building:

Our cabin, Marion:

Entryway of our cabin, note the two millstones above the fireplace:

 West Virginia rocks!

Some lows during the conference, but overall a fun weekend!

It was nice to get away and take a break.

Even though this conference served as a big reminder that I am not "young" anymore!

Sigh...

Random

Hmm...what have I been up to these days?

I am glad to report that I have been fine since my kidney stone.

Been keeping busy with school.

And really busy with church stuff.

Last weekend was great, I loved Conference. So uplifting.

The weekend before that was so FULL of church stuff that I was hardly home!

Singles dinner, RS luncheon, YW broadcast, Branch Council mtg, Church and YSA testmony meeting all in two and a half days!

Yikes!

No single guys came to the Single Adult dinner...just six gals including me and also a bunch of married leaders.

Anybody wondering why I'm still single?

Hmmm...in other news...

Dad cleaned out his coat pockets:

We keep getting dustings of snow:

The Jr High kids are doing great with the projects we do with them:

And Laura got another puppy to raise to be a guide dog a couple days ago:

Randy is very flexible! Let's hope he'll be a good puppy. Grant had the nickname "Tasmanian Devil" for a reason.

We don't have babies at the Chaney house. We have puppies!

I did get to be a mom for 30 min this weekend during conference- held a 6 mo old baby so his mommy could use the potty and get their stuff together. He spit up on me too, I got the whole mommy experience! And it was funny how many compliments I got when I was holding the baby in one arm and using the rug sweeper in the other! I can multitask. Sometimes.

His mommy said "Will you take the baby for me?" and I said "I will take any baby I can get!"

And yay I got my student teaching packet turned in! Gotta love paperwork. And paying for clearances. And taking Praxis exams. And gotta love it when your advisor forgot to sign a paper and you have to track him down or pay a $100 late fee!

My semester is over with in about a month!

I hope I have a fun summer!

That is, if Spring ever comes!