Biking and Bishoping

This winter has been really mild so I was pleasantly surprised when we got to take our first official family bike ride the last Saturday in February. We drove over to the John Warner Parkway, our old walking route and went on a ride. The walking path is split by one road so we first went towards downtown then crossed back over and went towards Pen Park.  We maybe should have stopped after the first section.  The hills were a little much for Lydia and it was quite warm but she handled it pretty well.  Mark and I have not done a lot of bike riding ourselves and we were working hard on the hills. This paved path is one of the more level spots in town but definitely more on the downtown side.  Either way I am glad we did it and look forward to many more family rides. I also hope to go riding by myself or with friends soon.

 

Things have gone pretty well for Bishop Spencer. People have been kind and helpful. Having a change in a Bishopric has not really ever been a huge deal or change for me but I know it can be for others. We have also not been in the ward that long, 2 years in June so we do not have the same experiences as others with Bishop Papin. It's strange to think that Mark is just the second Bishop of this ward, as the ward is only a little over 5 years old.  Last week Mark went to chat with a couple in the back of the overflow of the chapel after Sacrament meeting.  As he said hello to them a member they were talking to said to Mark, "let me tell you what I told Bishop Papin, we would all be better off if you went back to where you came from. We need some leadership from Virginia." (!!!) For real!  At least he is in good company with our former Bishop.  To counter this members statement, Mark related this story to a member of the Stake Presidency he has gotten to know and he told Mark that he was watching this member as Mark was called and saw him shaking his head so he (the stake presidency member) knew they had picked the right guy.  Mark's first week "presiding" was a little bit off. There was quite a delay with the sacrament bread and one of the speakers assigned was not able to speak because he was dealing with kidney stones.  That Saturday of our bike ride, Mark was trying to find speakers and decide if he should just speak himself.  He felt that he should just speak himself and gave a really (in my opinion) strong, good talk on the temple. It was recently announced that our temple, the Washington DC temple would be closed in March 2018 for 2 years or so.  The closest temple once DC closes is in Raleigh NC, over 3 hours away. It will be a different experience now making it to the temple.  The exciting part is that there will be an open house and rededication of the temple when the updates are completed.  I am so excited we will be able to take Jared and Lydia through this temple that has become a special part of our life and theirs. The Oakland temple will be be closed and rededicated as well. Two temples we have strong ties too. What was really neat during Mark's talk was that when he started speaking the chapel became very still and I felt the spirit come in and sort of settle on Mark.  We mentioned it to the stake presidency member visiting and he said he felt it too, the mantle of the Bishop settling on Mark. It was a powerful experience and an important one for Mark. He can do this!  He will have many hard times but he can do it and Lydia, Jared, and I will support and help him too. It's strange to think how old Jared and Lydia will be 5 years or so from now.  My Sunday School lesson today was on the organization of the church.  Park of the lesson pointed out how 10 years passed between the First Vision and the organization of the church.  A decade. That is a long time.  And Joseph Smith learned and experienced a lot in that time I think Mark will too.  Not on the same level but it will be a growing experience.

Congratulations and I'm sorry.

I heard these two phrases quite a bit on *Sunday.  I heard them because on Sunday Mark was sustained as the Bishop of our ward.

This is our before picture.  

We will see how much Mark ages with this calling. I am not expecting anything like the pictures you see of Presidents when they take office and when they leave but we will for sure take an after one too. 

Back when my Mom was visiting for Lydia's birthday, Mark, who was serving as the Stake Executive Secretary at the time was asked by President Carter to set up an appointment for us to meet with him. Going into the meeting Mark was pretty sure he was going to be extended the call to be Bishop. He had been at the Stake Presidency meetings where they talked not about who to call but about the need to release the current bishop who had passed 5 years in November.  I was trying my best to think of simple stake callings we could be called to do together and keep our other callings.  Not this time.  Having never done this before I was surprised that I needed to have a worthiness interview as well.  I am pretty sure I was there when he was asked to serve as a counselor in Colorado Springs but I was not interviewed myself. We went into the office together and chatted for a few minutes. Then Mark left for my interview and vice versa.  We finished the appointment together with Mark accepting the assignment. This was January 24th.

As my Mom was still here visiting she was the first person we told.  She was more of a congratulations person.  It's kind of a funny thing to say to someone in this situation.  I know people mean, "It's awesome that you are seen as someone who can do this" or "You are a great person and will do a great job." I know it is meant as a compliment, it is just funny and odd to me. I mean you are about to begin a fairly stressful at times, time consuming, probably lose some sleep over venture for the next 5 years or so. It's like, "congratulations your life just got more complicated." That being said, I am grateful for their support and kindness.  Whether they said congratulations or I'm sorry it was well meant in every situation.  There are a lot of strong, helpful wiling people in our ward and I am grateful for them all.  Mark called his Mom that night, she was the first person he told. She immediately made plans to fly out here for that Sunday which was a nice bonus visit for us.  We love it when Sue comes to visit. Mark's niece Hannah in Lynchburg currently came up for the day too. It was nice to have some family here. Mark also talked to his brother Steve shortly after who had some great advice for Mark.  My first thoughts were for Mark himself, he is 35 so fairly young and it's a big responsibility.  And then for Lydia who is quite attached to Mark.  She spends at least half of Sacrament meeting on his lap. It's funny, a day or 2 before Lydia was born Mark was called to the 18th ward bishopric and this calling game a day after her 5th birthday.  Jared will of course miss Mark but I think it will affect Lydia more.  But I know they will both be just fine! We all will be. It's just an adjustment.

The first person I told outside of family was my friend Tara. Since she is no longer here but knows the area and people here it was nice to talk to her about it.  I told her that I was glad that the call came here in Charlottesville a place we love and are happy to commit to for 5 more years. She kindly pointed out that the calling is not only a reflection of Mark's character but mine too, such a great friend. I miss her.  I will be honest, when I am getting a new calling and it is not going to affect lots of people I don't worry too much about telling close friends even in the area/ward. Rebellious I know.  But I felt I did a very good job not giving this away.  Lots of people told us on Sunday that Mark was their guess for who would be called as they all knew Bishop Papin would be released soon.  We really like the Papin's and are glad they can have a bit more time together.  The Sunday before he got sustained we told Jared and Lydia.  We talked about what a Bishop does and asked what they knew about the Bishop and then told them.  We were worried they might say something about their Dad becoming Bishop so felt we better wait to tell them.  It was almost a month between the calling and sustaining.

I think Mark's choice of counselors was possibly more surprising to people.  They are both fairly new to the ward, one lived in Charlottesville but just move into our ward this summer and the other has been here about a year I think.  Funny story: Since Mark was the executive secretary he actually called the men he picked to schedule their appointments with President Carter. He didn't tell them why President Carter wanted to meet with them just set up the appointment.  Even funnier and more interesting was that they accepted the calls to serve as counselors and didn't even ask who the Bishop was going to be!  President Carter said they didn't ask so he didn't tell them!!  I was really surprised when Brother Struble said in his testimony Sunday that "he guessed wrong!" I totally thought he knew but neither he or Brother Kwon asked, they just said yes which is a good demonstration of their faith! Brother Struble figured since Mark had only been the secretary since July he wasn't being switched.  Also funny, Bishop Papin served as the Executive Secretary before he got called as Bishop same as Mark.

Three other funny stories:
Thursday night I was at the church for a RS activity.  As I left I saw Bishop Papin getting into his car.  We happened to be parked by each other so I said to him "How are you feeing about this weekend?" He got a big grin on his face and said "Great!" I bet! He later told Mark that he didn't know who the new Bishop was going to be, no one had told him just asked him about some names in December and Mark was one of them. But after I said that he knew it was Mark. I actually figured he had been told Mark was being called but maybe not?  I wasn't trying to give it away, I think it's something I would have known since Mark was the Secretary, that the change was happening this week but whoops.

When I got to RS a friend who is the Stake RS President stopped to talk to me.  She said that she was in the Staunton Ward for their Ward conference at 9:00 and they released Mark and called one of the current counselors to that calling so she started to get suspicious.

Another counselor in the Stake RS Presidency who I knew in the 1st ward also stopped to chat and she said to me " I love that skirt, keep wearing it as the Bishop's wife." I know this was a compliment but I wasn't sure what she meant by it.  She definitely has a more liberal view of things so I wasn't sure if she liked it because it was a little bold (nothing crazy because I'm not fashionable or crazy) just bright red and not short but not long either.  Or if she meant it was just a classy skirt fitting for a Bishops wife? It's actually my favorite skirt so I will keep wearing it!


We really appreciate all the kind words from friends and ward members and hope this transition goes well. I know Mark will do an excellent job and am ready to support him however I can. I wonder how many blog articles I could find about being the "Bishops wife/family".....




*February 20, 2017

Must haves for our house

When we started looking at houses to buy here our Relator asked Mark and I to both make a list of the top 5 things we had to have in our house and the 5 we could not have in our house.  He also said to add any other things we really wanted.  For me a tire swing was in the the top 10. It was not for Mark but he being the kind and helpful person he is out one up this past weekend. We have had a really mild winter, it has been cold but there have also been quite a few just lovely days and Saturday was one.  One of the teachers Mark works with lives just up the street from us.  He drives past or house each day on our way to work. A little while ago (it was within the month of February) we had a really crazy gusty wind day.  Because of that wind the shingles on our shed had blown off.  This co worker of Mark's noticed the shingles were gone and told Mark he had a package of shingles left over that he would drop off for Mark. He kept forgetting to drop them off so on one really nice Saturday Mark stopped by their house and grabbed them.  He got home and started putting the new shingles on.  He used up that package and then needed some more so when he went to Lowes to get some I asked him to please get a rope for a tire swing. We have been in our house for 19 months and had not put up a tire swing yet!

He came home, did some more shingles and then went to work on setting up the swing.  Now, we live on 2 acres of woods.  We have a lot of trees.  A Lot. But we also live on a slope we have zero truly level ground on our property.  Finding the right tree was a challenge and getting the rope onto the branch was another huge challenge.  This whole process was much more involved than I thought it would be, aren't all ideas? We picked our spot and Mark started throwing the knotted rope up.  (We watched many YouTube videos on the correct knots to use, YouTube is so awesome for things like this.) We attempted a few throws with the hammed tied onto the rope to give it some weight but really didn't feel good about that. After one of the first throws the rope got stuck on a smaller branch on our chosen branch. That was annoying.  Mark worked tirelessly to get it unstuck. A video recommended drilling holes in the tire so when it rains the swing wouldn't get filled with yucky water and that took longer than expected but we persevered and now have a fun, mostly safe tire swing and our shed is protected.  It was a good productive day.

We borrowed this ladder and it was in no way tall enough to reach the branches and since the ground is a slope we couldn't really lean it against anything.  (It did work great to get the last of our Christmas lights down which was the original use for borrowing it) We asked some friends how they did their tire swing and they said "we just stood on a ladder."  Ha!  Easy for them. 

Mark bravely testing to see if it was strong enough. 

Jared and Lydia are excited

and slightly terrified of our swing:

We also had some fun bike riding by ourselves one day and and with friends another on the nice weather days.  Our daffodils are growing really nicely too. I have made 2 trips to Trader Joes in the last 10 days to buy daffodils.  They are so affordable and brighten up our house so much, such a happy flower. I am not in any way ready or looking forward to summer weather but for sure appreciate these nice winer days.  Lydia, Jared and I really wish we would get at least one more good snowstorm this winter.  We have only gotten to go sledding once!

My parents have had some stressful days this past week. California is finally out of the drought again and having an El Nino year so they are getting so much rain! All the lakes that got down to like 15% capacity are full and ready to overflow.  About 35 minutes from them is Lake Oroville which has Oroville Dam.  There was a problem with the spillway and emergency spillway and my parents actually had to evacuate for 2 days.  They went to my brother Derek's house in Sacramento and fortunately the work crews had been able to repair the holes but everyone is still on edge.  The people in Oroville know they live in a river town just like my parents do up the road and are just trying to be prepared.  I don't know how many times I have driven over the dam so it was crazy to see it on the news.  It seems like many things it is just old and needs some updating. I am so glad things are working out but imagine a lot of people are just wondering when will be the next emergency. So glad my parents and everyone there was safe. I remember our Relator commenting that the likelihood of us dealing with a flood on our property was incredibly slim so that is reassuring. It was always kind of there in the background growing up, this threat of a flood in Yuba City.  My grandparents did actually have their house flood back in 1996 or 1997 and it was a horrible experience!

Valentines

Before going to bed Saturday night, I saw a cute Valentines breakfast idea pop up on Facebook. Even though valentines was on Tuesday I decided to do our bigger celebrations on Sunday since we would have all kinds of time as church is not until 1:30.  So at 10:30 at night I got out our pink and red streamers, found some red, white and pink balloons and started decorating. I stayed up much later than I originally planned to that night but I'm okay with that. Jared and Lydia were quite surprised when the walked into the dining room the next day which was great. Holidays are a big deal to me so I know they were expecting something but not streamers and not Sunday morning. Gotta keep them guessing!

 

Breakfast was heart shaped pancakes with sprinkles and whipped cream and heart shaped egg and ham filled crescent rolls. We made pink milk and a enjoyed a lovely leisurely breakfast together. Mark made the crescent rolls which turned out to trickier than I thought they would and he did an excellent job. I love how he helps me with these fun yet unnecessary things.

For FHE that week we made some pretzel, Rolo, and M & M goodies and then took them to a few families.  The idea was to sing "Love One Another" to the families and we did to the first family who kindly sang along with us, but at the other 2 houses we skipped it which was just fine. At the 2nd house we got there just as they were pulling into their driveway, which was lucky but singing in the driveway seemed a little awkward. It was a fun outing. The previous week we made and mailed Valentines. I love sending fun mail to people.  I still remember the old church video that showed the older lady walking to her mailbox and never having any mail and then a little boy and girl (I think) began sending her little notes and she got so excited.  We like to send mail when we can!

Tuesday Mark decided to run over to the grocery store and get Valentines Donuts and chocolate milk for breakfast.  We discovered recently that Harris Teeter has huge, yummy well priced donuts.  They were not donuts from Reading market but still good. I do love donuts!

Jared and Lydia love these little mailboxes and look forward to them each year.  I think it would be fun if I planned to use them a few times in the school year. We heart attacked their doors as per tradition and had our Valentines float with dinner. I forgot to buy the strawberry soda when I did my shopping on Monday and stopped to grab it Tuesday after school on Valentines day. I grabbed the Food Lion brand and it was really gross.  We normally use Strawberry Crush or Fanta or even Cherry 7 UP with vanilla ice cream. Sadly this years float was pretty disappointing.  Luckily St Patricks day is coming up soon and I pretty much can't mess up our Shamrock Float!

I had to work that night and was lucky enough to get visited by my Valentines. A co-worker asked me over the headset what my location was and after I told her Mark, Jared and Lydia showed up.  They brought me a peppermint chocolate chip milkshake which was delicious and a fantastic surprise.  Then when I left work I got to my car and they had heart attacked it for me.  I loved it so much!  I have always liked doing heart attacks and was so happy they did it for me.  Mark said Jared and Lydia loved making the hearts and decorating the car.  They did a great job keeping it secret when I saw them and were so excited to ask me about it the next morning.  It was so sweet.  They are the best.  We disagree and bug each other but we love each other a whole lot!

 

Fun times with Marmee in town

My Mom came into town just before Lydia's birthday. It was great to have her here. Lydia was so happy when she got here.  Since Jared was at school she got a lot of uninterrupted Marmee time.  We took my Mom to check out the newly opened Rotunda at UVA, visited Ash Lawn Highland, James Monroe's "almost home" and made a trip up to the temple and DC.  Mark and I went in to do sealings together which rarely happens and was so nice and Jared and Lydia did a nice job with my Mom in the visitors center. My Mom wanted to visit the Holocaust Museum which I was not very excited about but we did it and she was glad we went there.  There are so many great museums there when I mentioned a few I could see my Mom planning which one we would visit next time she comes out.  She also helped me prepare games and things for Lydia's party and did lots of preschool prep with me.  She is also a great Gospel Doctrine teacher and it was fun to talk about my lesson with her. It was a nice visit with enough fun things happening and enough everyday life things. As we dropped Marmee off at the airport (the second time, her first flight was so late coming from Charlotte that she would not make her connecting flight in Chicago so she got a bonus night here) Lydia said to me, "Now our house isn't fun anymore." Guess I'm not that exciting. It was lovely to have her here.

This museum was hard.  To see pictures of their lives before (like here in this walkway) and then during and after was such a contrast.  It was particularly hard thinking of how people in many countries are having similar experiences, even with all the "never again " speeches and quotes I read.

We did this ice rescue one day in preschool.  Jared, Lydia and I have done it before and it continues to be a favorite around here.  I knew if I did it in preschool I would need to do it for Jared too. 

Before my Mom arrived we went over to UVA for their swimming and diving meet against Virginia Tech, their big rival.  I was actually hoping to see the diving competition but it was held on Friday night so there was just swimming this day. Jared and Lydia really liked seeing the olympic swimmers this past summer.  Jared loved cheering for UVA who did really well. Lydia was not quite as impressed as Jared but still had a nice time. The women's team at UVA is really strong, VT really had very little chance of winning but they worked hard. I can't imagine spending that much time in a swimming pool!