This is one of my Dad's favorite photos.
Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
Life Goals
Life Goals
In order of Priority
1.
Live worthily to enter the celestial kingdom and
be with Heavenly Father again
2.
Receive my Endowments
3.
Get married and sealed to a worthy priesthood
holder who will love and support me
5.
Teach my family the gospel
6.
Be sealed to my family
7.
Help bring others to Christ
8.
Get a house of my own
9.
Finish school
10.
Get a job
11.
Read all four books of scripture
12.
Visit my sponsored child in Honduras
Sarah Esther Daily (now Gore)
Sarah Esther Daily was born on the 22 of January 1941 in Los
Angeles, California. She is the youngest child of Howard Eloise Daily and Orva
Lorena Camp. Growing up she had a hard time because she was not treated well by
her mother or sisters. She had to clean the house, at least when she was older,
and was never allowed to play card games, even though her mother and sisters
could. She did not have a horrible childhood however and there are many fond
memories she told me.
When she was young
she loved to play outside and would do so as often as she could. This caused
her to have quite a tan, so much so that people thought she was Mexican. People
would come up to her and start to speak to her in Spanish expecting her to
understand them. She did not like this at all and so she made it a point never
to learn Spanish.
My Grandma Sarah also spent a lot of time with her
grandfather, Bernett Justin Daily. He was her savior and best friend. He would
protect her as much as he could and tell her advice for the future, always
saying, “you will not understand this now, but later you will.” He was correct
about that. A lot of the advice he gave my Grandmother she used later in life.
She was devastated when Bernett died.
When my grandmother was in high school she had to dissect a
frog in one of her classes. On the day of the dissection she fainted in class
and had to be carried to the nurses office by one of the boys in her class. She
was so embarrassed.
When my grandmother was fifteen she got married because she
wanted to get out of the house. Her mother spread the rumor around that she was
only getting married because she was pregnant but that wasn’t true. She didn’t
even know what it was that people did to get them pregnant. She wasn’t pregnant
until several months after her marriage. Her first child was my Aunt Kathie.
My grandmother was married three times throughout her life.
Her first two husbands were not very good people. They would beat her and
insult her. One of these husbands would even bet her when he ran out of money
while he was gambling. For this reason she always had to lock her doors and be
careful. At one point she fled to Oregon to get away from one of her husbands.
Eventually she drove the Yukon Trail through Canada and into Alaska just to say
she did it. She never thought she would stay in Alaska, but she did and she
still lives there now.
Mary Catherine Cunningham (now Lammers)
Mary Catherine Cunningham was born on the eighth of August
1933 in St. Joe, Iowa. She were the fifth child of John Cunningham and Rose
Kramer.
My Grandma Mary grew up on a farm around Livermore and St.
Joe, Iowa. On the farm there was a garden that she would tend with her mother
and siblings. The farm also had some animals so they always had their own milk
and meat. She was never without food. Her mother was a very good cook. She
learned some of her mother’s recipes and still makes some of them today. She
was also never without clothes. They were almost always hand me downs but they
were always there.
When she was growing up on the farm she always had something
to do to entertain herself. She would play games outside with her siblings in
the cow pasture. They would play baseball and use dry cow chips for bases. They
would also play tag and hide and seek. At night she would listen to the radio
with her family.
My Grandma went to a Catholic high school in St. Joe, Iowa
when she was growing up. She would study every night but the next day at school
when the Sister asked her a question she could not remember anything that she
had studied. Sometimes some boys that sat next to her would whisper the answers
to her.
My Grandma Mary and Grandpa met at a dance.
When I was growing up my Grandma Mary babysat my brother and
I until I was about eight or nine years old. She would cook for us and take
care of us. Some of my favorite breakfast dishes she would make were coco
wheats and cinnamon rolls. One day when my grandma was babysitting me I hid
behind the curtains in the living room. My grandma was freaking out because she
couldn’t find me. She ran past where I was hiding a ton of times, calling my
name. I thought it was funny and tried really hard not to laugh but eventually
I laughed and she found me. She was not happy with me but she was glad that I
was found.
My Grandma Mary likes to spend time with her family. We have had
more family dinners at the big house, what we call Grandma Mary’s house, then I
can count. One dinner that I remember is flat pancakes. There would be three or
four people in the kitchen all helping make the meal. Flat pancakes is a recipe
Grandma got from her mother. They are really flat pancakes that are buttered
and filled with syrup and then rolled into a long tube. They are really yummy.
Every Christmas Eve we gather at the big house. Grandma
makes dinner and we all hang out and spend time together. After dinner is eaten
and all of the dishes are done we pass out and open the presents under the
Christmas tree. This is a fond memory of Grandma Mary and everyone else who is
there. This is done every Christmas but is still something to be remembered.
For several years my brother Logan has played Hockey. My
grandma and grandpa love to come and see him play. They don’t come to every
game but they try to go to a few each hockey season. When they can’t come to
his hockey games they always ask about how the game went and about how he did. He
is their only grandson.
A Brief History
Both my brother and I were born prematurely and had to
stay in the neonatal intensive care unit at Alaska Regional Hospital in
Anchorage, Alaska. While we were there we were taken care of by several kind
nurses and doctors. Several years after we were born my Grandma Sarah got a new
next door neighbor. Whenever my Grandma Sarah would see her she would think, “I
know her but I’m not sure where I know her from.” Ginger, the next door
neighbor, would think the exact same thing whenever she saw my Grandma Sarah.
One day Ginger and Grandma Sarah were talking and my Grandma found out that
Ginger worked in the neonatal intensive care unit at Alaska Regional Hospital. My
Grandma Sarah mentioned that she had two grandchildren who had spent some time
there after they were born. Ginger was so excited because she remembered Logan
and I. She wanted to see pictures and hear how we were doing. She wanted to see
us and get to know us. I guess all of the nurses in the neonatal intensive care
unit always wonder how the babies they helped take care of are doing and so
Ginger brought pictures of Logan and I to work. Our pictures were on the board
in the neonatal intensive care unit for quite some time. I remember playing pretend
in Ginger’s yard and being babysat by her daughter. I also remember helping her
in her backyard and spending time with her. A few years ago Ginger got in a car
crash and afterword had a harder time getting around and taking care of her
house both indoors and out. This caused her to move to an apartment where she
doesn’t have to do yard work and if something go’s wrong in her apartment she
doesn’t have to take care of it. After she moved we went to go see the
nutcracker together at the PAC in downtown Anchorage. It was nice to spend time
with her and to see her again. I don’t know how she is doing now but I am sure
she still thinks of me and my family, as we think of her.

The day after I got home from the hospital my
brother was playing on the exact same swing set playground thing with his
friends. He was jumping from the tower, which was connected to a slide, to the
ground. When he jumped he held his arms out and hit his wrist on the slide. He
was crying because it hurt but said he was alright. We didn’t do anything about
it because he said he was fine but whenever he would bump his wrist at all he
would start to cry. This is not like my brother who is tough and hardly ever
shows if he is in pain. So, a week to the day after I broke my wrists, my
mother, grandmother, brother and I found ourselves in the first care waiting
room to have my brother’s wrist X-rayed. I was sitting with my grandma Sarah in
the waiting room when we heard my mother, who was with my brother back in the
exam room, start to cry. My grandma then said, “It’s broken.” My brother had
fractured his wrist. My mother now had two children with broken bones.
Now
to the day I get my wrists put in casts. I do not remember much about them
putting the casts on but I do remember picking the color of the cast and what
it looked like. I chose to have my casts be bright neon pink. They come in a
white plastic package and they are rolled in a ball. The doctor wet the ball
and then put the cast on my arm by unrolling the ball. I had a cast up to my
shoulder on my left arm and up to my elbow on my right. This made writing
difficult because I am left handed and had to write with my right hand. That
was some very sloppy handwriting.
Not long after I got my casts my brother went
to get a cast put on his arm. When he went to get his cast he wanted a color,
I’m not sure if it was green or blue but I do know that it was not pink. The
doctor picked up a package of ready to use cast and my mother said something
along the lines of, “are you sure that cast is (insert color Logan wanted)? My
daughter just got casts and that package looks exactly like the package used
for her casts and she got neon pink.” The doctor assured her it was the proper
color but lone and behold when he opened the package the cast was neon pink. So
my brother and I were not only partners in broken wrists, we had the same color
casts too.
The
fact that both my brother and I had broken wrists was hard on my parents but
especially my mother. I vaguely remember, and have been told about, my mother
taking my brother and I to the store to go grocery shopping like she always
would. This was after both Logan and I had our casts. She got so many
disapproving and questioning and mean looks that she told us we were leaving,
even though Logan and I both noted that we had not finished our shopping yet.
She said that she knew and that we were leaving. When she got home she told my
father that she was never taking my brother and I anywhere in public together
again until after we were out of casts. She never did, or at least not that I
remember.

A few days later I went in for day surgery and
they took the pins out of my arms while I was asleep. I however had another bad
experience in this case as well. When I had broken my wrists they gave me the anesthesia
through an IV so I didn’t really notice it. I thought that would be what they
would do when I went in for day surgery but I was wrong. They had a mask that
they put over my face that pumped the anesthesia into the air so that I would
fall asleep. The mask scared me and I didn’t like the smell so I fought them
putting the mask on my face. They held the mask on my face until I fell asleep.
That was scary and is now another thing I never wish to do again. I will now
request anesthesia through an IV if I ever have to have surgery again so that I
will not have to experience that again.
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