Dad, Tell Me About the Time (48)

 Friday, March 21, 2025

Are all of your children your biological offspring?

Lisa and I had no problems having children. We always planned ahead, picking what month we wanted a child and that was the month that we had a child. Lisa did miscarry once between Ben and Alycia but that was the only problem we ever had. We wanted our children spaced about two years apart and they were born as follows:

     Kira            1982
     Brandon     1984
     Ben            1986
     Alycia        1989
     Alex           1991
     Sarah         1993

While we had no problems conceiving and bearing children, several of our children did struggle. Kira couldn’t get pregnant and ended up adopting her first three children. They were then blessed to be able to give birth to a sweet little girl. Ben and Sharley had no problem conceiving but were unable to carry the child to full term. They finally figured out what was wrong and then with proper medication she gave birth to two more children. Sarah also couldn’t conceive until they figured out what was going on and with proper medication she gave birth to two beautiful children.

We have been very blessed through both adoption and the foster system. They both come with inherent problems and heart ache, but they are also great blessings. Kira and Justin’s oldest three are adopted and Ben and Sharly chose to foster two sisters at two different times. While they only fostered one at a time, for all practical purposes, they are now fostering the entire family of four girls.

Are any adopted?

See above

How did you react when you found out you would become a parent for the first time?

When we first got married, we wanted to have children as soon as possible. We were married July 11^th but come October, when I was back in school, Lisa decided that maybe she would go to school and get a university degree also. As far as we knew, she wasn’t pregnant yet, so she quit her job and started submitting university applications. In November she missed her period. While it was a bummer that she had quit her job (the maternity leave would have been helpful) we were ecstatic. We never regretted starting our family early and every one of our children was planned and wanted. 

Oranges

Monday, March 17, 2025

Less than a year ago we bought a Valencia Orange Tree for the other corner of our yard. We now have an Owari Satusma Mandarin Orange on the south side of the yard and a Valencia Orange on the north side. The Mandarin is easy to peel and great for eating while the Valencia makes great juice.

This is the second year for our Mandarin and it produced a ton of small mandarins. They were delcious and we started eating them around Christmas time. I have since learned that if I give them plenty of water they will grow much larger oranges.

Our Valencia is less than a year old but it still had several large delicous looking oranges on it. It is difficult to know when oranges are ripe because they turn orange early and the color is not a good indicator of ripeness. Everything we read said the Valencia should be ready in March.

This weekend we checked the oranges. They were ripe and maybe a little too rip so we picked all six oranges. It looked funny with these six huge oranges on a tiny little tree. We juiced them all and enjoyed some very delicous and very fresh orange juice.

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The color "orange" is named after the fruit and not the other way around. Before the orange was introduce from China in the 1,300's the color didn't have a name.

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Human Foosball

Wednesday, March 12, 2025

Every month for mutal we have one week that is a combined activity. This month the Deacons were in charge of the combined activity. We decided to play “Human Foosball”. 

What a blast. We had the scoreboard up and had two announcers.

The kids had a lot of fun.

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A mature Giant Sequoia can use 500-800 gallons of water every day during the summer

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A Great Weekend With Half The Family

Monday, March 3, 2025

Late in January, Sarah & Sam and Family were going to be in Arizona. Well Sarah & Family didn’t make that trip and it got postponed until this last weekend. We couldn’t get any of the cheap tickets so we drove out. It was a quick trip but a ton of fun.

Mom left work early last Friday and we arrived not too late but the kids were all in bed so we visited with Kira and Justin for a little bit, said goodnight and went to bed ourselves.

Saturday we all did the Renaissance Festival and it was a ton of fun. While it was a ton of fun, it wasn’t all that conducive to visting with each other. Ben and Sarah and their families arrived just before 1:00 and we hugged and kissed and then separated based on the varying interests of the eleven grand kids and several of their friends.

Even when we were able to hook up, it was usually to watch a show and so it was hard to visit and everyone was worried about losing a kid.

In any case, the shows were (for the most part) great and the jousting was fun and the plan was to end up at Kira and Justins for a pool party. Unfortunately, Mom and Kira’s car ended up leaving at the worst time, and it took them over an hour just to get out of the parking lot and another hour to get home. The party didn’t happen, but we put all the kids to bed and Kira, Mom and I headed to Bens to get in a proper visit.

Sunday was Kira’s stake conference so mom and I met up with Ben and Sarah and their entourage for breakfast at “Joes Farm” and then we all left just after 10:00. Sarah and Sharly left for their tatoo appointments and the rest of us crashed at Bens house.

Around noon we all headed back to Kira’s for that pool party and lunch. Mom and I headed for home shortly after 3:00 and had a great drive home. The only mishap was when I did a canon ball into the pool with my hearing aids in. About an hour later I realized that I hadn’t taken them out. We found them on the bottom of the pool and quickly put them in a bag of rice. I need to check them this morning to see if they still work. I really hope they do.

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The population of London went up 500% between the 12th and 14th centuries

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Magrath Cardston Marching Band

Tuesday, February 25, 2025

Happy Birthday Ben!!!

This morning, I was scrolling through some more of the pictures Lisa took when she was in Idaho, and I saw this picture of the band I was in when I was in ninth grade. This picture was taken the year I was in the band because I clearly remember playing in the half-time show during an Edmonton Eskimos football game. It was freezing. I thought my mouth was going to freeze to my mouthpiece. What the article doesn’t say is that we were also invited to play in the Rose Bowl parade, but we couldn’t afford to go.

We had the best drumline. All the other bands had a simple cadence, but our drumline played a beautiful and complicated rhythm, and they played it so loud that when we were practicing before a tournament, we would mess up other bands who were practicing in the same parking lot.

Our conductor was Boyd Hunter, and he was a very strict and traditional conductor. He would have been horrified by the modern marching bands with all the fluff and flags and gimmicks. We didn’t do anything simple. Our patterns and even simple turns were done with a flourishing and looked amazing. I really wish I could see one of our field shows.

I would have loved to play in the band during high school, but I had to choose between band or auto mechanics and drafting. It wasn’t much of a choice. Those 4:30 mornings were rough, but I did love marching.

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The earliest marching bands that historians have documented were from the Ottoman Empire in the 13th century.

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Family History

Monday, February 24, 2025

It seems like Family History has been a big part of my life for the last month. Lisa is now the Relief Society Activities Chairperson and she planned an activity called “We All Have Something from Grandma”. As she prepared for this activity there were all these picture of her grandmothers floating around the house.

Last week she was in Idaho helping Melissa and Kristan go through Jackie and Ross’s old papers and organizing items that might have some family history value. So all last week there were pictures popping up on the family chat. Here are some of the pictures that I have seen in the last two weeks.

Lisa with her Grandma Kesler (Ashmead).

Grandma Kesler (Ashmead) with Alvin Kesler behind her and their scotty dog under the table.

Grandma Kesler (Ashmead) and a friend.

Lisa’s Granny Neidig

Morgan Lybbert is my mom’s first cousin

If I made one of these for my boys, it would have six generations of Leavitt men.

I loved this picture of my family in 1968.

I realized right away that this is the same picture that we did of my family. It is one last picture of the family how it was just before the oldest child left home. Greg went on his mission and Kira headed off to college.

What a cute little boy.

My dad while on his mission in New Zealand.

This isn’t family history, but this is the weather Lisa had while in Idaho. I think she shoveled that long walk three times while she was there.

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Hitler is partly responsible for the tradition that pink is for girls and blue is for boys. Gay men were imprisoned, and forced to wear a pink triangle to identify them as gay.

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Colonoscopy

Friday, February 21, 2025

Almost four years ago I submitted a poop test and they found blood in my stool. The doctors quickly got me in for a colonoscopy. Normally when they do this test they put you under, but I figured it couldn’t really hurt that much so I asked if I could go unsedated. The doctor was thrilled. I guess adding sedation creates all kind of complications. I just wanted to watch the test on screen.

They found one polyp and it looked just like the one in the illustration but much smaller. I remember in the test I was amazed when he threw a lassoo around the polyp and snipped in off. I figured it should have hurt but I didn’t feel a thing. They then sucked up the polyp and tested it for cancer.

It was the type that could become cancerous but wasn’t there yet. Because I had one polyp, they told me to come back in three years. Three years would have been last summer but I kept forgetting. I finally called to schedule an appointment but they had no openings in the next three months and told me they would call me back when April opened up for appointments. I have called several times since then and it became obvious that they weren’t calling me back. When I called on Feb 7 they said they had no openings but that they had just had a cancellation for the following Monday, Feb 10. I took it.

I was not allowed any solid foods the day of the procedure or the day before the procedure. As everyone was pigging out at the superbowl party Lisa and I we went to, I realized why the guy cancelled his procedure. That was rough.

The procedure went great and once again they were thrilled, and a little surprised, that I wanted no sedation. This time they found two polyps but both of which were much smaller than the last one. The polyp is that little bump on the far right just below center. Since they couldn’t lassoo it, a little mouth extended out and literally bit the thing off. Please excuse the little pieces of poop still floating around.

I love the sphincter muscles in the colon that contract sequentially to move your poop along. The body is an amazing thing. I think it is beautiful.

The second polyp is in the second picture in roughly the same location. They both tested the same as the one three years ago. They could potentially become cancerous but not for a long time. I need to go back in five years.

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One in every 5,000 babies is born with a condition known as “imperforate anus.” This means the baby is born without an anus and has to have one created manually in the hospital.

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Birds

Thursday, February 20, 2025

One of our favorite things about living on the canyon is the sounds of nature that surround us. At any time of the day we can hear birds singing and in the evening we can hear the frogs and crickets. We hear the cayotes howling and sometimes they can get quite excited. Probably when they’re eating someones cat.

In addition to hearing them, we have seen the following animals in our backyard. Racoons, Cayotes, Possums, Gophers, Rats, Mice, Lizards, and countless birds. About the only thing we haven’t seen in our yard is a Rattlesnake. I’ve seen plenty of those in the canyon though.

Lisa especially loves the birds. She has an app on her phone that can listen to a bird call and tell you what kind of bird it is.

There is a Red Tailed Hawk that is always flying up and down our Canyon and Lisa acts like they are best friends. Maybe they are, because the hawk frequently lands on our deck railing and will sometimes lay down like a chicken. It is pretty cool. The hawk isn’t afraid of us, but at the same time we can’t get too close to her either.

I remember one day I was working in the yard next to the deck and the hawk flew in and landed on the railing not fifteen feet from me. It looked over at me and I could read his mind. He said, “Oh, you’re here. This is a bit too close for my comfort”, and then he flew off.

Last Saturday Jeff and Tiffany came over to complete the Christmas gift they gave me. We have had too many people walk into our sliding screen on the back door and it is ripped completely off. For Christmas he gave me the screen and rubber bead to repair it, but I haven’t gotton around to fixing it. Last Saturday they repaired it and we were all sitting on the patio enjoying each others company and the beautiful weather. 

A humming bird had been harassing us all day and we just assumed it wanted to get to the humming bird feeder but as we were sitting there Jeff noticed that it had a nest not two feet from our back door. There are a few dead twigs remaining from the vine that used to cover our patio and this nest was built in the fork of one of them. It is pretty cool. I’m watching it every day looking for a couple of pea sized heads to peer over the edge.

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Newborn babies have no knee caps

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A Quick Trip to Arizona

Thursday, February 20, 2025

A few weeks ago Sarah told us that her and Sam would be in Arizona for a few days. It is so difficult to get to Wyomeng that we jumped at the chance to see her and her sweet little family. We were excited to see her. Unfortunately, a few days before we were to go, her kids got sick and she didn’t want to travel with sick kids. She postponed the trip. Our tickets were cheap, about $45 each, round trip, so it wouldn’t be the end of the world if we just didn’t go but we decided that we should just go anyway. It would be great to see Ben and Kira and their families. So as soon as Lisa was done work on Thursday, January 23, we headed to the airport.

Since our temple has been closed for so long, Lisa loves to turn every trip into a temple trip if at all possible. Just to give you an idea, Friday morning at 8:00 we did an endowment session in the Gilbert Temple with Kira, Friday afternoon at we did an endowment session in the Mesa Temple while Kira went to meetings and other commitments and then Saturday morning we did sealings in the Gilbert Temple with Kira and Justin.

So Friday morning, after the temple, we met up with Ben and Kit at this cool barbecue / antique store.

This huge building is filled with all kinds of antiques but in one corner they have this amazing barbecue place. The barbecue place uses buns and bread that are made in a bakery that is also located on site. It is a pretty amazing experience except that I’m done with the antique store after about ten minutes. Perhaps the best thing I saw in the antique store was this sign.

After we were done, Ben went back to work, Kira headed to an appointment and Lisa and I headed to the Mesa Temple.

We’ve always wanted to go to the Mesa Temple but it has never worked out before.

When we’re in Arizona we want to spend as much time as we can with family so we only go to early morning sessions but the Mesa Temple doesn’t have early morning sessions.

We all gathered at Kira’s on Friday night for dinner and hung out with each other.

Saturday, we got up early and Kira, Justin, Lisa and I did sealings at the Gilbert Temple. We weren’t able to do much after the temple because Lisa and I had to get back for the adult session of Stake Conference. We would normally have skipped that but Lisa was singing in it, so, after the temple Justin had to go be with his kids and we had a few hours to kill before our flight so we went to the hole in the rock.

The hole in the rock is an interesting place. It is right in the middle of the city but you feel like you’re in the mountains. It is a short walk from the parking lot to the hole and there were a ton of people, but it was amazing.

While there we also checked out the George Hunt pyramid. George was a very popular governor of Arizona in the early 1900’s. He decided he wanted to be entombed in a pyramid, so, he built himself a pyramid. He and his wife and a few other family members are entombed here.

The pyramid and the hole in the rock are located right next to the zoo. It was funny to look across the fence and see several zoo animals.

Do you see the mountain goat on top of that big rock?

From there Kira dropped us off at the airport and we headed home. We knew the timing would be tight so we packed our Sunday clothes in the car ahead of time so we could head straight to the church. We changed in the bathroom and Lisa was just in time for their short rehearsal before the session started. They had a couple of women from each ward, and they sang beautifully.

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There are over 200 corpses on Mt Everest. Many of them are used as way points for climbers.

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