Meeting With the Bishop

When I was younger, a phone call from the Bishop's house meant one of two things, and they were both bad! Times have changed. Our very good friends the Cluff's invited us to go up the canyon for some family night fun this week, and it was a blast. Bob happens to be our Bishop, but he is still willing to hang out with us. See how grown up I am Mom and Dad! No, actually, we have been friends with the Cluff's much longer than Bob has been our Bishop. I first met Jill when we had just moved into our house. I was invited to a baby shower for a woman that I had just met, and barely knew. I felt kinda weird about the whole thing because I did not know anyone there. I sat across the table from Jill and listened to her talk, and I immediately knew that I had to make friends with this woman, because she was my kind of girl. We have since become very close friends ( she was called as my visiting teacher shortly after that baby shower, so she really had no choice but to talk to me) and I consider myself lucky to spend time with her and her cute family.

Side note here: After Jill and my other great friend Natalie had been my visiting teachers for about a year and a half, I leaned over to Natalie in the middle of a lesson on visiting teaching in church one day and asked her who she was assigned to visit. She looked at me like I was some kind of an idiot, and it took me a full 30 seconds to figure out why. I wanted to die, I was so embarrassed. I am always saying stupid stuff like that before I think. All the treats, all the long talks, all the laughing, and I just nullified it all with one comment. We laughed so hard in the middle of that class I almost had to leave. Jill and Natalie still spoke to me after that, and for that I will always be grateful.

This is the gang, they all got in the river the second we got there, and of course caught a snake. Maddie is Hyatt's age, and Will is close to the the same age as the twins. They all play together so well, I love it.

Jill is the best kind of friend, she is tons of fun, and super thoughtful, AND she lets me gripe to her about anything, and she still likes me the next day. Griffin loves her! She is also the best cook I know. She brought her "secret" lemonade (as Maddie called it) to dinner, and it was delicious. You know you are a good cook when you even have your own special lemonade, the stuff I brought came in a 2 liter bottle.

Here is the latest addition to our wild animal collection. It is starting to look like an episode of Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom around here. Just once I would like to go on an outing and NOT come home with a new member of the family!

Bob and Matt cooking the grub. By the time we got around to dinner it was dark, and the kids were freezing. We made a valiant effort though, and the food was still delicious, even if we couldn't see what we were eating. I like THESE meetings with the Bishop, I think we should have them more often.