A Slow Start to September

Nick and I have had a wonderful, but rather uneventful start of September. On Labor Day, we had originally planned to go to Johnson's Shut-In's State Park with our friends Brigham and Janette. However, on the eve of our trip we found out that the park had been shut down early on rather short notice so intense reconstruction could commence. (The park was damaged by a dam collapse a few years ago.) While we were trying to confirm that the park closed, we viewed their out-of-date web page. From that we got their phone number. Their hot line recording referred us the web page. It was quite the useless paradox.

Once we found out for sure it was closed, we made new plans. We went to the Japanese Festival at the Missouri Botanical Gardens. We didn't actually do any of the Japanese Festival stuff- we just walked around the garden like we usually would, only there were way too many people. We love going to the garden with Janette because of her gardening background. I always learn something new. Not to mention her recently-turned-two daughter is so entertaining. She loved climbing on everything and playing in the fountain with her dad. Later, we had a small but delicious barbecue at the Douglas's house.

The day before we had a larger and even more delicious barbecue with Stanlee and Patti. There we learned why Josh and Jess hadn't made it to church that morning. Their apartment complex was a scene out of "Grand Theft Auto 4." A group of underage thugs had attempted to steal several cars (including Josh's), then succeeded in stealing one car, ramming it into another, and then get into some kind of shootout with police. One suspect was under arrest. Two or three others managed to escape. Way too much excitement for one morning.

We just returned from eating dinner at the Smith's again. Patti made a Peach Crumble from The Pioneer Woman's recipes. Delicious. The occasion for another great meal was the ordination of Alex as an Elder. It's a very happy event to gather people together. Uncle Hyrum and Cousin Ron came to town for the ordination. It was good to see everyone, including Byron, whom I don't often see. And the Peach Crumble- that was really good.

P.S. These are straight out of the camera images. That's the actual color of the water lilly.