Milagros!! Its Spanish for "Miracles from Puerto Rico!"

This is the Provo temple several weeks ago. I liked the last rosebud that I found.

This is my roommate Derek. He got hit on the nose in rugby and had  two black eyes. The bruising looked a little like a butterfly because it extended down and up around the inside edge of his eyes.

 Yesterday  I went with the boy I mentor to the classic skating center in Orem. I tried out the classic roller skates. I still need a lot of practice. I am a bit envious of those Sonic employees.

 A friday night volleyball game! We won in three sets. It was way fun.

 A scary shadow....

 A cool wall. There was a piece of glass overlaying the pieces of wood. It was fun. I sent a picture to Chrystal.

 Last week's football game.

 Sunset from the back side of our apartment complex.

I watched some of the face to face interview of The Piano Guys. It was broadcast on lds.org for the youth.

This week I was going to go on a a date to play racquetball. I only had one racket, so I decided to borrow one from my roommate. Unfortunately at 7 in the morning yesterday, I found out that I didn't have my racket. I only had my roommate's. My racket was gone... I guess I must have loaned it out at one time, and then forgot who I loaned it to. Anyhow I was agonizing over what to do. I could go on a date with just one racket... NOT! So I said a quick prayer. I considered  switching to a different activity... but the only thing that I could think of was running. (I know many people who have racquetball rackets, but they were all asleep this early on a saturday I was sure) I took my roommates tennis racket thinking that at least I could fake it. As I started my car, I saw a girl in my ward who was coming back from working out. I got out and asked her if she had one that I could borrow, and She did! It was so nice. I went and played racquetball and we had fun. And that was a Puerto Rican Miracle. haha.

Jared came and visited. That was fun.

I went on a date to a play yesterday evening. That was fun too.

The end...

Blogging

I desperately needed to update my blog.  I shared a few posts from my blog, but if you want to see some more pictures check out my blog.

daltongang06.blogspot.com

Anna

You all know that Eli love horses and Lydia loves clothes and all things fancy

But Anna... She love her hair done, but with only pink hair ties.  She likes watching only princess movies, especially Princess Sophia or Frozen.  The only other think she will watch is football. She loves to cheer on the teams.  She will sit and watch and shout lets go! Go! Go!! Go!! while she claps her hands.  She is such a Daddy's girl.  Tonight I asked her to let me help her wash her hands. She looked at me and said, NO. As if she was saying come and make me.  Two seconds later Ben looked at her and said, "Lets wash your hands."  "Okay," she said, and came  straight  over to wash her hands.  This doesn't just happen every once  in a while but all the time.  She will cheerfully do anything for Ben. She sleeps better, and enjoys life better with dad around.  Just another testament to me why a family needs a mom and dad.

This little girl loves having her Dad around. 

I put an new pillow case on Eli's pillow. It was a basketball pillow case. She wanted so badly.  I told next time I washed it, it was hers.  She insist on doing things herself.  She can buckle up her self and put on her own clothes, pants and shirt and shoes.  She even sits on the potty by herself. but won't let me help her.  Potty training is going to be interesting.

Pose for the camera.

Sleeping Beauty.

When Eli was home with his arm we watched The Man From Snow River.  After we watched that she hopped on this panda, stuck the gun to the side and rode it like a horse.

This is her face when you tell her to smile.  Shes squishes her eyes just right.

Eli and The Curse of the Trampoline

For those of you that want every detail of a story.

When Ben was about ten he dislocated his elbow jumping on the trampoline. He had to have a cast for a long time.  He still has nerve damage from the accident. Well the other day Ben got home early and was jumping on the trampoline with the kids. They often play together. They love it when Ben comes out and plays with them.He is such a big kid. I was in the kitchen making dinner. As they were jumping Eli caught a bounce and dislocated elbow and broke his arm. Ben described that when Eli was coming down from his bounce that he hyper-extended his elbow. He didn't really land on his elbow that hard.  Right away Ben knew that it was either broken or dislocated. He scooped him up and ran in side. He said "We got to go!" I grabbed the girls some shoes and keys. I drove and Ben held him. He was crying a little bit, but Ben was able to talk to calm him. We sang some songs.  In the Er room they took exrays. The girls and I  had come back home and I found a friend that I could drop them off  at. I thought it would be a couple of hours. On my way back to the hospital, I talked with Ben and found out that Eli had to go to surgery. What?!   I was shocked. I was glad to be there with him. And it was comforting to know that the girls were well taken care of. His arm was laying to one side of him and he had to be still. He was crying off and on trying to deal with all the pain. We tried watch a show on TV but it wasn't distracting enough. He had several doses of pain medication each dose would last about 15-20 minutes.  With what seemed like an eternity in between. Another friend called and asked what she could do to help. She went and picked up the girls and kept them the whole night. I often have her oldest two babysit and they sure treat our kids like family. This was the first time any of my kids had stayed overnight with any one but family. I knew they would be fine and Lydia would still be able to go to school. The wait to surgery was difficult. We came to Er at 6:00 and he didn't go until 10:00. Ben had called a friend to find Eli a priesthood blessing.  He is also a doctor. He's a radiologist. It was very comforting and kind.There was a doctor that kept checking on him and was worried about his finger movement and capillary refill. He also came and splinted his arm. Which was super painful for him. In the ex-rays it showed the bone placed about an inch to an inch and a half away from where it needed to be and there was a main artery that they were worried about.

Right before surgery

 They also could tell that the arm would need to have pins placed in it. When he finally calmed down about nine and slept for a few minutes. That's when I started crying. I'm kind of a delayed reaction kind of a person. And it hit me
 It's one of the hardest things to see your child go through so much pain and to not be able to take it away. They moved us upstairs for surgery. We talked a lot about horses and I able to pull up the sound track from The Man from Snowy River on my phone. He listen to it right before they gave him the anesthetic.  The surgeon, Dr Allaire, took about 30 minutes and was done but Eli didn't wake up until 11:30 or 12:00. It was a relief that all went well. I opted to stay with Eli for the night. Ben would have but I knew that if he could get to sleep he would be able to sleep deeper than I would. I knew that if I went home I would only sleep worse. Eli was starving and so after a snack if frosted flakes, I laid next to Eli and  we got a couple hours sleep here in morning the nurses coming in and out.

The surgeon brought me photos after  surgery of the pins in his and how it was set.

                                     

The morning after surgery. He was feeling better but if was a rough night.

After we got home.

He was feeling less pain, but over the last couple of weeks he has been waking up at night. Sometimes at he would wake up twice a night for a hour or so at a time.  I would tell him lots and lots and of stories. Scripture stories, Family History stories, and all the horse stories I could think of.

He is doing great no and I can't believe that in a week he gets his cast off.  If it looks healed than he will be good to go. If its not ready than he will have to get it recast for another two weeks.  The doctor has assured us that children heal quickly.  We will also get to tell if the growth plates have been effected.  Its been an adventure!

A little one armed fun. He only wore the sling for a about a week a he hasn't been letting that arm slow him down.  He has been playing soccer and football.

Jared came home... It was his "Comehoming"

Today in our priesthood meeting we talked about pride. It basically comes down to enmity... with God. Symptoms of pride include competition, comparison, shame, etc. We seek to establish our self-worth by what others think of us. We worry more about what others think than what God thinks. We spend more time thinking about ourselves than we do thinking about the needs of others.

I don't think that most of our family has a problem with pride in the sense that we think we are better than other people (maybe), but I do think that some of the symptoms that I explained apply to me and to us all. 

I realized that a prideful attitude can be reflected in our approach to church. We can think, "What's in it for me?" We can ask our Father for help and blessings without being grateful. We need to have a balance.

Recognize that we are not all prideful just because we can see some pride in our attitudes. It is not all or nothing. What we do for ourselves isn't prideful, it is necessary to keep us healthy and strong to help others. If we are serving beyond our capacity, then perhaps we don't understand that God wants us to take time to strengthen ourselves. Like it says in Mosiah 4 we should not run faster than we have strength. What motivates us to do that?

I see how us brothers often talk about who is stronger, who is "better", who is better-looking (it's Jared... for now).

I hope we all know that it is just fun and playful, but at the same time I see how it is a form of comparison. We just need to recognize people for the good they do, and be happy for them, but not let ourselves become unhappy as a result.

A fun soccer game. BYU won 2-0.

James and I at the football game.

Esther was there too!

 Esther and Jared showing some love.

Jared's former mission companion, Scott.

 Here they come!

 Seconds before Jared throws all his baggage on the floor and gives Mom a great, big hug!
 More football.

https://goo.gl/photos/Z9kV91y1BPasqWVy8

How I'm trying to blog like Joshua

I thought I would try writing a blogpost like Joshua. I looked back through pictures and found 4 different angles on a recent turf burn that I received. Since I don't want to be 'that guy' on Facebook I decided to post them here. Here are is beautiful wound I received playing flag football. 

The real struggle of this turf burn was figuring out a way to cover it. There wasn't a bandaid big enough. It would have taken a box full of the smaller ones. The first day I applied lots of Neosporin and wrapped my leg with gauze. Unfortunately, it stuck like glue. Eliza ripped off a whole layer of pain when she pulled it off. After I stopped crying, I looked for other ways that would be non-stick. Certain hygiene products were unsuccessful, but nursing pads worked great. I had to make sure and buy another box though before the baby came.  

Intramurals have been fun, and although they have come with a few scrapes and bruises, I have enjoyed being active and playing on a team. Our intramural frisbee team lost by one point in the semi-finals to the Creighton University club team. It was good to know that I can catch multiple long touchdown passes over the club team. Maybe if I wasn't so old I would join the team. It was a disappointing loss, but we'll get 'em next year.

PS. If you were expecting lots of pictures of Emmaline, stay tuned. Her time will come.  

For everyone that like an Ensign story.

So people like stories like that.  Although I believe they are the exception to the rule--The happily ever after miraculous type stories.  Most of the time you suddenly realized that you may have just lived through something kind of hard, and you think wow, huh, I guess I did that.

But here's the Ensign story.
As the firefighters were running in and out of the house,  I turned and said to Scott, "Babe, the load that was drying in there was all our garments."  I actually kind of chuckled, thinking, Do I have enough regular underwear to get through the next couple of days until we got new ones.?  Scott said, "I have no bottoms in my drawer, they must have all been in that load."  Oh, well what do you do.
When we came back inside to view the damage it was significant.  And the whole basement smelt like smoke.  However, when I opened up the dryer to see how crispy the garments were, They were not. They were tinted grayish in color, but they still smelled like tide.

I was teasing John, that if he had been downstairs reading his scriptures like normal, we may have caught the it sooner.  And he said, "Yep and I would have started singing, The Spirit of God like a  . . . .
Ha!