From Emmeline to Emma

I know, I know two old women. Am I crazy? Well, I think that I am beginning to recover from five plus years of writing a thesis.

Not actually writing a thesis, but I'm beginning to recover from five plus years of feeling guilty and then working and then feeling gulity, and well, you've got the picture. In the meantime I married, had two pregancies and children and moved a couple of states away.

Now I'm reasearching another story. That of Emma Smith. I named my daughter Goldie Emma after her. She was the wife of the first President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. She was about a year and half older than her husband and very well educated for her day and time. Her husband on the other hand, was not.

Anyway, I hope to create a fifteen minute story in the next couple of months. I have a possible performance set for November 8th. I've been wanting to devour the book that I've been reading about Emma. I read the first chapter and dutifully took notes. Then its been hard because I can open to any page and fine out amazing things about this woman. I just want to skip around.

But I'm going to discipline myself and over the next few months I can report my progress on this interesting new character I've developed an interest in.

Butterflies

What would life be like without buterflies? I once read a series of Dragon books that talked about a new world where dragons existed, but most of the animals and insects from our world did not. I often wondered if there were butterflies in that world. What a sad life to live for many, many years and not ever see or know the beauty of one of these winged creatures.

I love to watch dragonflies and butterflies on the breezes, soaring, falling, diving and then catching themselves to find another current. They are amazing creatures.

We took pictures for no reason at all

Goldie asked me to get the camera and shoot pictures of her an her brother.
We were going to make the bed, but we got sidetracked.
Goldie took this picture of me.
But I think this one was my favorite.

Long overdue and much anticipated...its Amanda's Show

Amanda lived with us for almost the entire time we lived in Jonesborough. She finished up her degree at the same time I did.
This is a few pictures of her art show that she produced back in April.
We are so proud of Amanda that she finished her bachelor's degree.
She is the first person in family to do so.
We love you Amanda Jo!

California here we come!

In August we went to the family reunion in California. This is the day we left. We took Grandma Allen with us to the annual storytime bash at the library.
In California at the beach they buried three cousins.
Grandma took Josiah for walks.
Cousins played....
...and sunned themselves.

We had a really good time. Goldie and I wish we could stay there. We want to come play again.

Hangin' with the family in July

This month we caught some really good Josiah shots. So this is a lot of him. This first one was from when we went for a picnic supper at one of our local state parks.
He loves horses and had to ride this one at his cousin Jen's house on Pine Creek.
The two kids were eagerly awaiting breakfast after camping out by the river at Mike's sister Alice's home.
We went into the river after lunch. Alice to this picture of all of us.
I took this picture one day after Josiah finished up lunch. It's a wonder any of it ended up on the inside of him. But he thought he'd done a swell job.

For Harold

Mike thought Harold would like these pictures because they are items we won from the Richardson Family Reunion.
We always win the contests for having the youngest children. We are going to have to recruit some other parents with little kids to this reunion.
I hope you like the bear apron...
...and the baseball cap/overall outfit.
Here is one final picture of the reunion held in Harold's garage.

(More to come soon from the Michael Richardsons' family life....I promise)