I'm glad I'm Not a Pioneer

Today was a good day, a crazy day, a tiring day, but a good day.

Today my niece Lucy was baptized.

Today my nephew Shawn had his 2nd birthday party.

We left our house at 8:30 this morning to drive to Brigham City for the baptism and enjoyed visiting with family afterwards while having refreshments.  The kids loved seeing my parents, my brother Jacob and his wife Carolyn, their Turley cousins, their Matthews cousins, and their Pachev cousins.

The fun was supposed to continue at the birthday party in Layton.  Right after we got there my sister Sarah Pachev called my cell phone and told me their car had broken down 6 miles out of Brighan city.  They have 10 people in their family, so my BIL Dave and my husband took our large cars and drove to the rescue.  An hour and a half later, they returned.

My Dad took my BIL Sasha Pachev and his daughter Jenny to the TRAX station for the long trip down to Orem, including a 4 mile run to his house, where he picked up his OTHER 15 passenger van to come and get his family.  I know, how many people own two 15 passenger vans and also ARE NOT polygamists?

We divided the rest of the family up between 3 cars.  Luckily, our boys had not come with us due to being at Trek and Scout camp, so we had room in our car. There was just enough room to fit all of the people and all of the swimming bags, church clothes, shoes, coolers, towels, etc..

My car added 2 kids, lots of stuff, and my mom's wheelchair. My parents took 4 children. My brother took two people and my mom's bags. The Turley's took Jacob's cooler. It was like car tetris! Everyone met at my house and untangled their belongings from each other's cars.  My sister and her kids came inside and we settled into making some dinner as quickly as possible since it was already 6:45 p.m.

I cooked some noodles, chopped some cucumbers and pulled out the arugula. Sarah washed the strawberries and washed a ton of dirty dishes for me too.  Dinner was yummy and we finally finished eating and cleaning up around 8 P.M.  Things MIGHT have been a little delayed by a chain reaction of children that accidentally knocked a can of spaghetti sauce on the floor.  It MIGHT have splattered.  Emmeline will tell you that "splatter" means "all over the place".  And, well, yes, it did go all over.  So, now a few things are cleaner than they were, including the floor, the door, the fridge, and Julia and Clara.

So, it was a favor, but not a huge deal to drive all the way back to pick up stranded family, shuffle stuff and people in cars, and cook dinner for another family.  That's was family does for each other.

But, it's made me think a little bit about the early pioneers ( probably since my oldest child just returned from a handcart trek) and how, when they heard that the handcart companies were stranded and starving, the Saints immediately set to work putting together a rescue effort.  It was a Sunday, in the middle of church.  The meeting ended and the work began . There were lives to save.

I'm glad I'm not a pioneer.  But, I'm also glad for their great example and for the things we learn at church that help us, in our modern callings to help our friends and family, to drop everything and go to the rescue. Nothing is more important than family.

The day was busy. It was crazy.  It was messy.  Things didn't go exactly as planned. It may have been somewhat stressful for a few people. But, it was also a chance to serve and bond.



In closing, I'd like to share what I shared from facebook the other day. It was written by a friend of a friend.

On particularly rough days when i'm sure I can't possibly endure, I like to remind myself that my track record for getting through bad days so far is 100%, and that's pretty good'. -James Bramble


Everyone survived. Enough said.