Let the summer begin and other thoughts

Today is the first day of Summer and it finally feels like it. It's only taken like forever. Even yesterday with the 40 mile an hour winds (o.k. I exaggerate) But it was really hard. It was a cold wind which caused me to be cold wearing a jacket all day. This morning I woke up hoping for no wind. I hate jogging in the wind. I hate hills too and I have both. But this morning it was a calm, sunny morning. My friend, Teri Gilk, came and Britni and Teri and I went jogging. Teri is injured so she did very little jogging but once she gets to the Chiropractor then she will be unstoppable and beating Britni and I. Today I pushed myself to 3 miles. I still had to walk up 3 of the 4 hills and I had around the same time as the 5K that I did a month ago. So I haven't gone backwards but I haven't improved my time at all. But I have improved my mileage. Small baby steps is what I have to take or I will not keep doing it. So my baby step today is the 3 miles instead of the 2.5 that I have been doing. My body really hurts though. I have found that if I eat refined sugar that my body gets arthritic type symptoms. I have been eating sugar for the past couple of weeks. And I now hurt a lot. So I am back to Sugar Free and I will be the rest of my life I have decided. I need to go buy some sugar free pudding cups. I still need to have my treats. I am so glad that there are so many options for sugar free now days. It makes it so much easier to do this. It will take about a week to get it all out of my system though. But I am not going to quit exercising. I have to do this. No Pain No Gain!! On the day that my husband was called as Stake President, a friend of mine called and said I want to give you a car. It's a 93 Honda Civic. Perfect for Britni to drive. She just has to learn to drive a stick. We found out yesterday that it will cost over $300 to fix the brake problem and it also needs new tires. But if that is all it is going to cost for Britni to have a car and be able to help take kids places when Lynn is gone then I think it will be worth it. We have already used it for this purpose. I hope that is all we are going to have to do to it right now. For a free car we can't complain. Jacob and Daniel leave for their Washington D.C. trip very early Saturday morning. (Like 1:30 a.m.) We are letting them spend the night (which they won't be sleeping at all probably) with some friends who are going on the trip so we don't have to take them to the school that early in the morning. They will be going to D.C., Philadelphia, Boston, and New York City. It will be quite an experience for my little hickster boys. :) I really wish that I could have gone also but it just cost too much. Maybe they will do it again when Benjamin and Samuel get older and then I will be able to go. Have a Happy Summer Day today!!!

Daniel's 8th Grade Graduation

I am still amazed that the school my kids go to is so small that they hold 8th grade Graduation. The Middle School in Goldendale doesn't even do that. Here are some photo highlights. Daniel didn't look up or smile much through the whole thing. I don't think he liked all the attention. However, he got a nice gift card from the school for doing the School's Website all year long. That was very nice of them. He was escorting Cheyenne Dove on the processional. Now Summer is here!! Let the Chores Begin!! :)

Stake President What?????

Pretty shocking Stake Conference last weekend. I will confirm that my husband, Lynn is now the Stake President for The Dalles Oregon Stake. Here is the News Release from our Public Affairs people that they put on their blog. New Stake Presidency Called to Serve The Dalles Stake This weekend at our stake conference, Elder Yoon Hwan Choi of the First Quorum of the Seventy and Elder Brad Risenmay, an Area Authority Seventy for the North America Northwest Area, reorganized The Dalles, Oregon Stake. Acting under the direction of President Boyd K. Packer, President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Elder Choi and Elder Risenmay released Thaynan Knowlton, Duane Francis, and Jason Corey, and after interviewing bishops, high councilors, and other priesthood leaders in the stake, called a new stake presidency. At the general session of stake conference on Sunday morning, members of The Dalles Oregon Stake were asked to sustain Lynn Bischoff (Goldendale) as the new Stake President. Troy Whittle (White Salmon) was sustained as the First Counselor, and John Brennan (Hood River) was sustained as the Second Counselor. While sharing their testimonies after the releasings and sustainings, President Francis said it had been "a singular privilege, a great honor and blessing" to serve in the stake presidency. President Knowlton said that, as a stake president, "You kind of look at the whole stake as your family," and told of how he and his counselors had prayed for all the members of the stake. After speaking of his youth milking cows, President Bischoff said he wondered, "What can I have to offer?" Then he humbly said that the "spirit confirmed to me that, for whatever reason, the Lord has called an Idaho farm boy. . . to be here." He then shared his testimony of Joseph Smith, saying that in 1820, the Lord called another farm boy to do His work. The conference also included powerful testimonies by both Elder Choi and Elder Risenmay that Heavenly Father knew who He wanted the new stake president to be, and that they had come to The Dalles not to pick the new president themselves, but to receive revelation from the Lord on His choice. "And we have received it," Elder Risenmay confirmed. We are all still a little shocked and getting used to Lynn being called President Bischoff. Dad is wondering if this is the start of the next trend for the Morgan Family. As in all my brothers being Bishops at the same time??? Wouldn't that be interesting!! :) Best get going. Have a Super day!! :)

Where is Summer??

I don't know about the rest of the country but here in Goldendale we get teased a lot with the weather!! One week it is beautiful with 70's and 80's weather. Then it is cold, rainy and icky for the rest of the time. In my opinion that is just not nice. It has been a couple of months since I have written so I will try to catch everyone up. O.k. I can't remember that far back. So sad. My memory is going. I will give highlights though. Britni went to an LDS Prom in Vancouver. She was quite beautiful. She borrowed her dress from her cousin so she saved some money there. :) The boys have been boys and are growing up way too quickly. Daniel is almost 5'11" now with a shoe size of 13. Jacob just is wishing himself to grow. His time will come but not yet. They are excited about the end of school. Daniel graduates from the 8th grade on Monday night. Then school is out for the boys on Tuesday. Britni however, has to go until Friday of next week. Lynn got his IPAD for his Birthday. He loves it, the kids love it, I love it!! It's well loved. It's nice to be able to check e-mails and get online anytime, even if the kids are on the computer. His company recently got him and the stalwart workers the new IPHONE. So they took my old icky cell phone away. Lynn decided that I need a cell phone so we got a tracfone for me. It's nice and I get to text. Which is fun. So now Lynn is all techy!! I had a dental procedure done at the end of April. I had a part of my gums removed from my top front teeth. My crowns were impinging on the gums and they always were swollen. Now no swelling. However, I had had to wait 3 months to get new crowns put on. So my front teeth look icky until then. That will happen next month. My dentist assures my that I will love it. We will see. I FINALLY was called in to sub as a para pro at the Middle School. One day a month ago, they couldn't get a hold of Carmine who usually does the subbing in the Library there. So they called me. I went in not knowing what I was doing but I learned and enjoyed every minute of it. So on my own, I went to the librarian and got trained to do the job. They called me a couple of weeks ago to sub while MAPS testing was going on. What was suppose to be a one week gig ended up being a 10 day gig!! It was great and not so great. I had to teach lessons which is like teaching Sunday School. Some classes were better than others that is for sure. But in the end the kids seemed to like me. I hope to be called in again sometime. I did realize though in that time frame that I don't want a full time job right now. I ended up missing my boys Spring concert that they do because I was working. All I can say is it was a good experience for me. Not much else going on. The rest of this month will be kids going and coming. Britni has Basketball camp the week after school is out. Benjamin has Cub Scout Twilight Camp that same week. Daniel and Jacob leave for their Washington D.C. trip the week after that. And Britni will have Youth Conference. I really wish that Daniel would be able to go to Youth Conference but he will be in D.C. at the time. The rest of the Summer will be unknown pretty much. I need to figure out something fun to do with the kids as a family. Maybe end up camping. We will see. Have a great summer!!

General Conference

I love General Conference. However, I am sad to say that I remember the time when I didn't like General Conference, which was when I was a teenager. I think it all changed when I was a Junior in High School and President Ezra Taft Benson gave his talk on Pride. I was so affected by that talk and the spirit confirmed to me that Ezra Taft Benson was a Prophet of God. Since then I have gone to conference or watched on our T.V. or from our computer every year.

I love to hear what topics the prophets and apostles feel we need to hear for the next 6 months. Then I love getting the Ensign and reading and marking all the talks with the things that I need to remember. However, another confession, I am sad to say that I just barely finished last conferences Ensign this passed week!! I will do better this time. I promise.

What was even better this time with General Conference was the fact that my Son, Daniel, decided that since he was 14 years old, that he should watch all the sessions of Conference and take notes!!! He is such a great example for his brothers. Britni has watched Conference for several years now. It is great to have such faithful children.

We also borrowed the movie 17 Miracles from some friends and watched it the other night. It was such a good movie. It was so sad yet it made me think. It made me think that maybe I have little miracles occur each day that I don't realize are miracles. I am truly grateful to those pioneers who sacrificed their lives and families for the gospel. They were strengthened so much. Just as we are strengthened when we need to be.

Truly an uplifting weekend!!

Parent /Teacher Conferences

It's that time of year again when we get to go to Parent Teacher Conferences. I really do enjoy going to these conferences and talking to the teachers about my children. I really appreciate all of the teachers that my kids have. They work so hard for our children.

Yesterday was the boys conferences. Usually the school will put the conferences either youngest to oldest or vice versa. Not this time. We started with Jacob. Jacob still has pretty good grades. He barely squeaked by with his reading grade (for our family that's not having a C). But at least he made it. I think he's my procrastinator.

Daniel was suppose to be next but his teacher was a whole conference behind schedule. So I walked to by Benjamin's teacher who was in a conference and then went downstairs to Samuel's teacher who was free. She fit me in so I didn't have to wait.

Samuel is doing very well in 1st grade. He keeps saying how easy 1st grade is. So I told his teacher who made a note to give him some extra work that will challenge him a little more. He is excited for that. He exceeds in Math and Reading. And he does very well with the other subjects as well.

I was able to do Benjamin's next. Daniel's teacher wasn't done with the person before Daniel. His teacher this wouldn't take too long. Benjamin does very well in all areas. She is mainly just happy to have a student who completes his work and doesn't cause problems. It must be a pretty rough class.

Now for Daniel. Daniel has the highest GPA in his class a 3.55. That is pretty sad. His teacher is a hard teacher but he prepares the kids very well for High School. All the kids who have had this teacher has said that High School is easy compared to his class. He advised Daniel to retake Algebra next year. He is getting a B in Algebra but doesn't seem to understand the concepts. He also advised Daniel to try Cross Country Track in the Fall to get him in shape for Basketball. He also advised Daniel to take weight lifting. hehe!! We will see what Daniel chooses when the counselor from the High School comes to sign them up for classes for next year.


Today was Britni's conference. I wonder why I even go to her conferences. She does a Student Led Conference. It's suppose to help the kids be responsible for their grades and their future. Britni is such an over achiever that I really don't worry about her so much. She has straight A's again. She's well on her way to Valedictorian. Way to go Brit!!

Over all pretty good conferences. I must say Congratulations to my niece Kliss who just had a beautiful baby boy!!!

Next week is Spring Break here. Enjoy!!

Blogger's block or something like that

I guess you could say that I have bloggers block. I'm always a little shy about what I write. I mostly write for my family and friends that live far away. So I am now trying to figure out what has been happening in our family since I last wrote. We are done with sports for a while. It's nice to have a break from the craziness of it all. However, the boys are crazier than ever. I have come to realize that sports really do help with all that pent up energy that boys have. I am so happy that Lynn finally got the basketball hoop up last year. The boys are out there all the time on the nice days shooting hoops. Our soccer net however has seen better days. We will have to fix it one of these day. The Parent/Kid basketball game is tomorrow night. I will be home, I hope. I only played the year that Britni was in 8th grade. Lynn played last year and had a good time. He loves Basketball.

Lynn was gone for part of the week last week. His Grandmother passed away. He drove to Idaho on Wednesday and came home on Friday. During that time, I scraped the wall paper border off of my bathroom and then painted my bathroom. I also had my haircut while he was gone. So Lynn had quite the surprise when he got home. I just wish that I could have slept while he was gone. I never sleep when he is gone. I was hoping that with all the work in the bathroom that I did that I would be so tired that I would sleep. That didn't work.

The greatest thing that I did this past week was go with my friend, Carollynn, and her family to the Temple. They were sealed to their daughter, Kayla and son, Patrick. Now they are an eternal family. I was also there for their daughter Tiffany to be sealed to her husband. Tiffany is very pregnant and wanted to be sealed before her baby was born. It was a great day!!!

This week will be parent teacher conferences. I enjoy going and visiting with the teachers and seeing what my kids have been up to in their classes.

Well, I hope that everyone has a great week.