THINGS AREN'T ALWAYS LIKE THEY SEEM

April 25, 2020

I LOVE TO LOOK OUT MY WINDOW when the morning sun is shining in from the East. My neighbors lawns are all the same color of deep green; my Red Maple tree in front of my window sparkles red and green. The red being the frozen bud-lets of a late frost and the green being the healthy leaves that were smart enough to wait for Winter to grow into spring. And to my right out towards the road is my beautiful pink blossomed flowering peach tree wearing it's gorgeous pink dress. Yes I could spend all day enjoining this beautiful view. BUT I know that I have stacks and stacks of printed material that needs to be sorted and put in place (mostly in the garbage I think). And there are those important things like our Family letter to get off, prepare the story of Easter Falls for the sign to be put up near the falls, and more.... that will have to wait until ??? So I'm off to #1 with visions of the pictures of beauty out my window.

This is our Flowering Peach Tree  

Wallnut tree & Yellow  Forsythia

Tulips & Weeping Japanese
 Crimson Queen.
Peggy and I had a lovely walk the other day  around our house to see them all and much more. 

Here is #1: STORY OF EASTER FALLS.  Some of you are acquainted with Easter Falls, but most are not.  A long time ago when the Christensen family was quite small we used to take our children and a few grandchildren who were among the first to join our family.  (That would be some of Wendy and Mark's and Debby and Mike's children.)  Anyway, we would take those who came to our house for Easter on a hike up the mountain to see Easter Falls.  It was not called that in those days, however, it was just "The water Fall."  We all loved to get to the place on the hill where we could see the water up high on the mountain working its way between the rocks and bushes.  One year Mark Dupree took his daring boys to hike almost up to the top of the mountain and see the source of the The Fall while Mark took their picture from his Drone.  We too have taken a lot of pictures of The Falls but they were from down below.

Now I will tell you the story of how The Falls became known as Easter Falls.  Years ago when all of our children were young, just old enough to hike up to The Falls, we hiked up the mountain every year at Easter time to roll our Easter eggs down the hill and see The Falls.  One year I noticed that the water began coming down The Falls just a few days before Easter and continued to fall a few days after Easter.  This puzzled me and so for a few years we took note of when it started and when it stopped.  Sure enough it was consistant in its habbit.  So ......we began to call it Easter Falls.  After a few more years I got to thinking that it would be right nice to have it formally named Easter Falls.

So I called our Brigham City Government people to ask permission.  They refferred me to the county and they reffered me to the State office.  The state gave me permission and it was officially put on the next printing of the map of this area.  Sooo this year I checked with the state office to get permission to put a sign up near Easter Falls to give it propper identification.  They said a man had purchased the property and we would have to ask him.  We never could get in touch with him as he lived out of the state and we couldn't find him.  So we almost dropped our quest until we learned that his ownership no longer existed, he had turned it over to the State.  Yea!  We located it on the state map and got in touch with the kind gentleman at the state offices.  Right now he is working on getting approval from the committee in charge of things like that.

Last year just before Easter I talked to Kathy Jex, one of the school teachers in our ward who teaches   at the school where she arranged for one of the experts to make a sign to identify "EASTER FALLS".  The children were involved in its design and were very excited about that after Kathy and some of the other teachers led them on a hike up the mountain to see The Falls.  The sign is resting behind the sofa in my living room for the big day when it will be in it's real home.

⟵This is Easter Falls. (nap time).... I have had my nap so now I can tell you more about how you can look at the picture and see more of  the falls.    Using a ruler marked off in 1/4 in. , lay the ruler so the first 4th of an inch is on the top edge of the picture.  Then you will see the first tiny flow at 1/2 in., #2 at 3/4 in. #3 at 1 1/2 in.  #4 at 2 1/4 in.  #5 at 3 in.  Where it goes from there I can't tell from this picture.  But if you or I were up there we would find it for sure.  You can tell from what we do see it goes under ground a lot.  One year it went  under ground quite far and we ended up with a little lake at the base  of the hill.  I never get bored with discovering more things about this incredible act of Nature.

Peggy and Bruce Just finished baking bread and  Cinnamon Rolls  to take to those to whom they  are "Ministers" in our ward.   They are taking that calling seriously, as this picture shows.  However it does not show the whole story.  While I was napping they took them to each family.  

When we had our own Sacrament meeting peggy wore this lovely outfit and beautiful long hair that I thought was so gorgeous that I begged a picture of her for my memories.  

These cute toys that have been in the closet for a long, long time came out at my request the other day when Peggy and I were shifting things around to find room to put in Wendell's and my journals.  They now have new names: The BYU guy is Wendell and the Pink Pig is Rosalie  (me).  We sit together on my bed all day and we like it that way.  Wendell's picture sits on my dresser next to the bed...so he can enjoy memories with our buddies also.  Yes, you are right, I am a silly soul, but it helps me be happy and smile a lot.

I want to share my testimony with you today because I haven't done so in a long time.  I know that all the things that have happened to Wendell and me these last 3 years have been for our good in our progress to eternal life.  As Wendell finished his work on this earth and the day for his funeral came I was so releived that he did not have to go through the physical and emotional pain that I saw him bravely accept every day of those last three weeks at The Gables.   He even could smile about it until the last two weeks when he just laid there with no visible sign of being aware of what was going on around him.  It was those days I shed lots of tears as I prayed to Heavenly Father to take him home.  So the tears I shed at his funeral and burial were tears of joy.  And we are continuing our love for each other even now.  I know that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ helped him and me at The Gables and that they are still helping both of us now.  I feel their help every day and I feel Wendell close to me in many ways through emotions and words.  So ... "All is well."
In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.