Tired!

I don't know what it is with getting older but it's just so hard to fall asleep. Last night was one of those nights that I didn't get to sleep til 3am. Ouch!! Then woke up at 7:30am. I probably shouldn't be writing a blog in my condition.
I wanted to put up this picture of Maddox feeding me gold fish. He likes to feed people and will be so nice as to take it out of his mouth and put it in yours if he feels you need it. I do love watching him.

Timothy and Kingston in the bathtub

I had to put these picture of Timothy and Kingston on our blog. Kingston reminds me so much of Timothy when he was this age.
Boys will always be boys.....no matter how old they get :)


Thanks for the pics. Jess!!!

Nathan's email

Hey Pops,

Well I hope you had a good birthday, It sounds like you all did a ton of fun stuff, that zipline dealy you did looked really fun!!! So yeah things here are going pretty good, I am getting transferred tomorrow and I'm going up to Pori, which is pretty exciting, Pori has been having a lot of luck lately so it will be cool to get there. Im excited about it. but its pretty weird though they don't normally transfer people on there first transfer cycled. so it was really a surprise.. So other than that things are going pretty well.... on Saturday however, when Elder Bailey and I went to go get on our bike and go do stuff, my Bike was gone :( so pretty much someone stole my bike, which really sucks but there isn't much i can do about it now, soo... i just have to live with it, luckily Pori is a car city so i wont really need a bike as much, but i guess we'll see what happens... welp i do believe that's everything, I love and miss you, Take care!!

Vanhin Peck

Hey mommers

hey so things here are going alright I guess... some crazy stuff has been happening... well First off... I am getting transferred to Pori on Tuesday... so that's interesting... So ill have a 3 hour trip there, cuz i think I'm going to go to Tampere first and then to Pori... but I guess we shall see... And I haven't been able to find a camera yet the only one i found was €180 and it didn't use the same card as my other one.. so that was kinda useless.... so im going to keep looking but... Iguess we we'll see what I can find... So things mission wise here are going pretty good... We have a couple of investigators that could be really good, Its too bad that I got to leave... but oh well... Pori is apparently having some good stuff so that's rather exciting.. So I guess I'll share the bad news now................... <- lots of dots for emphasis so on Saturday when Me and elder Bailey went out side to get on our bikes to leave, My bike was gone.... So pretty much my bike was stolen :( yeah.. it was locked and everything so... I don't know... there's not much I can do now... but luckily Pori has a car, so I wont need a bike as much... but still am bummed about it... oh well... welp that's about everything... oh and the letter from this week will bee later cuz i don't really have time to write this today because of packing and stuff but I'm going to write tomorrow on the train. so yeah... welp I love and miss you take care.

Vanhin Peck

Happy Birthday Steve....For Reals

Today is the day......THE birthday but we kept it low key. Cards, gifts and hanging out. Darrell, Dyann, Christopher, Lesa and Maddox all came over for Steve's birthday dinner....lamb, steak, potatoes and fresh green beans.
Instead of a cake we had fresh strawberry short cake. OMG...it was so good!!! And Steve blew out all 3 of his candles!!
I think Steve had a great birthday. He loved all the cards and notes he received. Til next year..... :)

Day 2 of Steve's b-day

Today we thought it would be "fun" to hike up to Baldy. You know, for Steve's birthday and doing fun stuff together. One thing I did learn is.....I'm a horrible uphill hiker at the age of 48. I didn't complain though. You can ask Steve or any of the kids....not a complaining word out of my mouth. But you can tell by the look on my face how I was feeling.
We hiked 2.5 miles up, up, up!!
We only got to the top of the dry canyon loop and it took us almost 3 hours to get there.
Steve surprised me with a can of diet coke when we got there. A very pleasant surprise and I did share.
As you can tell everyone was pretty wasted except for Jaron. He could have made it up to Baldy easily!!

After enjoying the peace we headed back down. I only slipped and fell twice and it's a good thing I have lots of padding :) We also saw a rattle snake on the way back too. Exhaustion has hit and no one is moving. I know I don't want to hike Baldy for my birthday :)

Day 1 of Steve's birthday

I thought it would be fun for part of Steve's birthday to go to Park City to the Olympic Park to go on the zip lines and the slide. I was kinda nervous cuz I am scared of heights but I have to say that all of us are addicted now to the zip lines!! They were a total blast!!!It's been something I've always wanted to do and Jaron has never been on one either. Only Steve and Emily have. Jaron and I are getting ready to go down the shorter zip line. It looks like we are saying a prayer for our safety :)
And Steve going down!!
Emily and Steve are getting ready to head down. Emily was really nervous and screamed almost the whole way down but she loved it!!

Steve and Emily going down the alpine slide. It was kinda fun but Jaron got stuck behind a very slow person going down.....wasn't too thrilled about the ride. Honestly though....it doesn't even compare to the zip line though.

Jaron and I going down the bigger zip line. So fun!!

Then we went to Cascade Springs....after we went to Subway and had lunch. It's really beautiful there. It's been 24 years since we've been there.



Overall....a very fun and exhausting day. We decided that we are going to go to the Olympic Park at least once a year just to go on the zip line. Happy early birthday Steve!!

Fixing up

First I want to put these two pictures of Maddox up. It was last Sunday after dinner. We were all in the front room talking and didn't hear Maddox. Christopher went to go check on him and this is how he found him......very relaxed in his chair eating chips. Then Steve thought it would be funny to put a (empty) can of Mountain Dew in his hand.
Funny Guy!!

Yesterday Jaron and I tried to fix a broken sprinkler. The pipe had snapped in half so Home Depot showed me what I needed and headed home to do a repair that I thought should take less than a half hour. By the time we got it fixed it was over 2 hours later and covered in water and mud. I can't say that it's perfect but it does what it needs too so I will settle with that.
Then I sealed around the back door/porch since I found out the hard way (ripping up the floor) that the people who installed the doors didn't think it was important. The floor still isn't in.....still waiting for the tiles but I hope soon.

At the end of a very hot, wet and muddy day, Jaron made crunch wraps for us for dinner. OMG.....it sure hit the spot and it was sooooo good!!!

Pictures of Nathan in Turku!!

We just got these pictures today. Yep, Nathan is working in many different ways. These are taken in the city of Turku.




This is his companion, Elder Bailey. I've heard great things about him and I think he is leaving for home this coming transfer.....next week. Enjoy!!!! Cuz I have been :)

Nathan's email

Nathan is doing great. He's getting the language better and better each week.....so that's good!! So here they are.....


Hello Pa!!!

So how are things going back at home? sounds like Fun being able to work from Home... Our apartment building is also kinda getting redone at the moment... well they are finishing it right now... haha... but they put some new windows in... so that's actually quite nice... however the windows are bigger so its harder to cover all the light during night... but oh well... I'm pretty used to it now... so it shouldn't be to bad. oh and don't worry I'm totally Fine from the crazy person... It was just a little weird... but i kinda doubt that it will ever happen again... haha.

Yeah... so the weather is really hot here too its roughly 35 C, and about 95% humidity... So we get nice and sweaty by the end of the day.... But sometimes here is a nice breeze. and that is always amazing... haha... But no we cant smell the ocean :( But there are times when we are walking right buy it and stuff, so that's cool... its really cool though... because when we are at the ocean we are able to see all the islands that are off the coast of Finland... so that's really cool looking...

so we actually go to the Library to email..and its really nice because the library is one of the only buildings with AC... Its awesome!!! And the people here are generally pretty nice... most do speak English... but generally wont speak English to you... which is fine... I wouldn't learn if people just spoke English to me the whole time... welp i think that's it, I love and miss you, Take care.

Vanhin Peck

Hey Mommers!!!
Hey so it sounds like tons of fun stuff it going on back at home!!! And it sounds like Emily had a most grand Birthday... that's good. Things here are going pretty well... I haven't gotten a camera yet, but after this me and my comp are going.... my Comp said that they are about €150 so we shall, see what I can find... I want to hopefully get one just like my other one so that i can use the same memory card and everything... cuz I still have quite a bit of room on the other one... so we shall see I guess. So yeah.. other than that things here are going pretty good... we are going to be teaching a guy, latter tonight, who could be really good, so we shall see how that goes. So the Finnish is still really tough, but i can tell that my I am able to understand more and more. so that's good... Oh and I didn't get your letter last week :( ... so i don't really know what is up with that, so yeah... no pictures or nothing... kinda a bummer... but maybe ill get them soonish... welp I do believe that's all but take care aI love and miss you!!
Vanhin Peck

A successful birthday

Here are some of the birthday pics. Emily REALLY wanted a camera so we got her one. She took over 150 pictures yesterday and still going strong.
She also got her hair cut......4 inches off but not too much that she can still get her hair in a bun for dance. It looks cute and sassy.
Then she went out to lunch with dad and then her favorite dinner. Christopher, Lesa and Maddox came over to celebrate too.

Thanks Lesa for making the cake!




Happy 13th Birthday Emily!!

Happy 13th Birthday Emily and Happy 1st Kingston!!

Can you believe this little girl in this picture is now 13 years old? Yep, a teenager!! It is shocking to me how fast time has gone by but I have enjoyed watching every minute of her growing up. She is remarkable!! We have a full day planned with her and will put more pics up later. But I always want Emily to know how proud I am of her and I love her so, so much!!
Twelve years to the day that Emily was born, my 2nd grandson, Kingston, was born. Kingston has a fun personality and I LOVE (can't express that enough)his smile. He has so many fun facial expressions! It was fun playing with him when we were back there. I miss him so much!! Happy 1st Birthday Kingston and I love you!!

The Floor

I'm writing this for myself......that if I ever decide it would be fun to redo the floor again anywhere in the house I can look back at this and run!!!!!
So far I have ripped out all the linoleum in the kitchen and dining room. Some spots weren't too bad except the places where there was tons of glue. The glue was hit and miss on the floor. Either big blobs or very, very thin amount. I've gotten most of the glue off and I have to say that my arm strength has about doubled since the project started. The people who built this house (no names mentioned...aahh humm...Ivory Homes) really did a poor job in some spots. They also forgot to put any kind of seal between the back porch wall and the inside of the kitchen which leads to really icky wood. So when I get done with the floor I will also be doing some sealing.
Another difficulty was all the mixed information I got and still getting. I've read tons on the Internet, talked to dealers, professionals and family. So much contradicting information. In the end of all the info I've gotten so far......I'm sticky with my brother in law. So as soon as I get this done I will take pics. But don't hold your breath!!!

Nathan's email and pic.

This morning I got this pic. from one of the missionary moms. Nathan is on the far left and his companion, Elder Bailey is next to him. I think he looks great even though he looks like he's barely tolerating getting his picture taken. Here are the emails we got from him today...

Hey Papa

Hey things here are going rather well. Things in Finland are going well, but it is Crazy hot out here, yesterday it was 33 degrees C. at around 6:00ish... and that's about when it was starting to cool down... I wouldn't be surprised if it got to 34 or 35... it was so crazy hot... I was expecting coming to Finland, for it to be cold... haha... but yeah... hopefully soon it will cool down... but from what i here... once it starts to cool down. it gets cold really quick so, I think we'll have like a month of good weather... haha... hopefully..

So yeah... things here are going well... We've got a couple of potential Investigators, so hopefully we will be able to teach some of them.. But we were able to commit one of our investigators to stop smoking. He is supposed to stop today... so hopefully he will and all of that will go well.

So yeah it takes about A week to get Mail out here... I usually get the letters from you on Tuesday. so I should get it tomorrow. So you got an Ipad? when did that happen? Anyway, congratulations on beating the Computer, you sure showed him who was boss. haha...

Welp everything is going good here, the language is still tough but i just keep working at it, and i know that it will come eventually. Welp I love and miss you, take care and keep Dominating at Chess 8D