Weekend

We had a great Memorial Day weekend. Usually we go on vacation in May but we decided to stay in Utah this time.
On Friday after work we drove down to Mt. Pleasant to see Sara Jo. Spring is the best time to drive down Highway 89, all the fields are green, the mountains are still covered in snow and the wild flowers are starting to bloom.

Sara lives in a great, pre-electricity house just a couple of blocks from her school. (Actually, in Mt. Pleasant EVERYTHING is only a few blocks away)

When visiting friends and family I always like looking through their books. Sara has some quite interesting books on her shelves - Modern Stellar Astrophysics, Elementary Differential Equations and Boundary Value Problems, Principles of Electronic Instrumentation, Introduction to Electrodynamics, and my favorite, Practical Dynamics of Particles and Systems. I think Lance will never call my books boring again.

We aren't sure, but we think this is an experiment Sara is doing from her book "Principles of Electronic Instrumentation."

On Saturday, we drove the five short miles to Spring City for the "Heritage Day Historic Home Tour." We got to see sixteen of the twenty-two house on the tour. Grandma Annie Call lived in Spring City for several years after she was orphaned in Salt Lake City.

We went to the Post Office to talk to the Post Mistress (also the town historian) - she told us where Annie's step-mother's house was. It wasn't on the home tour but it was still interesting to see.

On the left are Grandma Annie Call's step-mother, Anna Wilhelmina Backman Malmquist Nilsson Peterson Billington Jensen with her fourth husband, Zeke Billington. On the right is how the house looks today.

It's surprising that a tiny town like Spring City would have such a large, beautiful school. Grandma Annie probably never studied here, Dad said she only made it to 2nd or 3rd grade.

One of the more interesting buildings we saw was the Endowment House, built in 1876. Annie's Grandfather Christen Nilsson may have married some of his plural wives here.

Inscription in the stone over the doorway of the Endowment House showing the compass, square, beehive and building date along with the words "Liberty and Virtue."

Construction on the church started in 1902 but Grandma Annie probably never attended services here. It wasn't dedicated until 1914, about five years after she moved to Chesterfield. By the way, it was dedicated by Anthon Lund, the apostle who talked Annie's father into leaving Sweden to join his wife, children and parents who had already immigrated to Utah.

We also found the graves of Annie's grandparents, Gertrude and Christen Nilsson. They both died before Annie moved to Spring City.

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Spring City is becoming an artists' colony, most of the houses on the tour were full of works done by Utah artists.

After the Spring City home tour we drove to Ephrium for "Scandinavian Days." There were booths for Mexican tacos, Chilean empanadas, and Lance bought two African frogs but we didn't see anything Scandinavian.

From Ephrium we went to Manti for a few minutes. All of the towns on the scenic byway Highway 89 are intriguing for their style of Mormon architecture - if you aren't interested in architecture it's still worth going just of the malt shops!

We had planned on going back to Salt Lake on Saturday night but when we went back to Sara's to pick up our things we ended up chatting with her and some of her co-workers until midnight so we decided to drive back home on Sunday.

On Monday, Memorial Day, Lance had to work but Glenn and Aunt Faye drove up to Ogden to put flowers on the graves with the rest of the family.

Another Family Look-a-Like

Out of all the grandchildren, I think Eric looks the most like Dad.


There are a lot of similarities between Margery and Erin (I think their personalities might be alike too.)



Margery and Erin



ALI and her great-grandmother ALIce Bruerton aren't "look-a-likes" but there is still a strong resemblance.


Ethan and his great-grandfather George Wallace Bruerton



And maybe Ethan and his great-great grandmother Ann Steele Bruerton.



Definitely Bryant and Ethan, too.



And of course Ethan and Jonas.


And then there is Devin and Glenn

Family Look-a-Likes

For quite a while now I have been scanning all the old family pictures I can find so that hopefully they can be preserved forever. It wasn't long after I started going through the pictures that I started to notice some very strong family resemblances that have been passed on through the generations.

Fred definitely looks a lot like Grandpa George Wallace Bruerton. Grandpa Bruerton could fix anything, I think Fred can too.

Jane looks like Margery - in all their pictures they have the same exact smile.

I think there are as many photos of Boyd as there are of great-great-great grandfather Cyril Call - one! If you put a beard on Boyd and a curl in his hair you'd think they were the same person!

Mom has always said Reed looks the most like the Parker side of the family. Great-great grandfather William Cope Parker was from Cheshire, England. The Cheshire Cat disappeared until all that was left was it's grin - perhaps the Cat could lend its grin to William and Reed.

Most people think Great-great-great Grandmother Patty Sessions wasn't much of a looker, but with a little make-up and a smile I think maybe should could have been attractive - maybe.

But then, maybe Denice looks more like Great-great-great-great Grandmother Sally Barber Child. They have a lot in common in these pictures, Denice had just gotten married and Sally had just walked 1300 miles to Utah.


Lisa looks like Mom, who likes like Grandpa Sessions, who looks like his mother, Selena Jane Holt Sessions.

Mom says I look the most like Grandpa Odell Holt Sessions. I think that would be great, everyone I've ever talked to who knew him said he was the most kind person they have ever met. I guess our personalities are alike too! (Hmmm, I guess if I'm being nice I shouldn't be calling my tourists stupid.) And it looks like Aunt Faye was right, Grandpa does have more hair than me :(

Stupid "Tourists"

A group of three people called for a tour to the Great Salt Lake. Our dispatcher gave them directions to the Red Lion Hotel in down town Salt Lake where they would be picked up at 2:00.

About 1:30 the people called the office to say they couldn't find the Red Lion; in fact they couldn't find any hotel. It turns out they made a wrong turn somewhere along the way and ended up in Grantsville! That's over twenty miles the other side of the Great Salt Lake!

The people said they still wanted to do the tour so our dispatcher gave them direction back to the International Center, a hotel center between the Great Salt Lake and the airport. I couldn't believe they still wanted to take the tour even though they had just passed the lake two times! As I drove to pick them up I wondered where such dumb people could be from - I thought most likely they must be from a foreign country and didn't understand English very well.

It turns out they were from WEST VALLEY CITY! That's closer to the lake than either Salt Lake City or Grantsville! Casey - you and the girls need to get out of there! It's not safe to be around those people!

Frontrunner

On Monday, Denice called to say she was bringing Mom to Salt Lake on the Frontrunner. It was so crowded on the train that Mom had to stand from the Roy station to Layton - even with icey glares from Denice no one would give up their seat.

Lance and I met them at the Station then took Trax to Aunt Faye's apartment for dinner with her and Aunt Marilyn.

We didn't want to impose too much on Aunt Faye so we brought a casserole and dessert. She lives right across the street from the Conference Center.

After dinner and visiting, Lance and I took Mom and Denice back to the train station, we got there just as the train was pulling out, so with our big, enourmous, generous hearts (I mean heart, Lance took Trax back to our house) I drove Mom and Denice back to Roy.

When I got back home I found Lance at a neighbors house - when he took Trax home he didn't realize he didn't have a key to the house. Our neighbor, Sophie, took him in and fed him lot of candy and treats.

On Tuesday, Lance and I decided to take the Frontrunner up to Ogden. The scheduled 45 minute ride only took one hour.

We passed by LOTS of very ugly trailer parks, if Eli came back to Utah he would have PLENTY of work fixing them up.

Downtown Ogden wasn't as bad as we remembered it. The Union Station has some great museums. This D&R.G. caboose at the Railroad Museum probably used to pass our house in Roy all the time.

We walked around downtown, ate at a great restaurant and eventually made our way to Farr Icecream. I couldn't believe Lance and I have been together eleven years and this was his first time to Farr's!

The 45 minute trip back to Salt Lake took only 1 hour, 40 minutes. Tomorrow, (Thursday) the Frontrunner will no longer be free so the ride should really take only 45 minutes. Now all the family up in Ogden can easily hop on the the train to Salt Lake, transfer to Trax for the short trip to our house! We'll provide the food! See you soon!