Happy Birthday Week

Hi Elder Penrod,

Happy Birthday!! Woot woot!!

How is your week so far? Have you done anything interesting and new? How is the ward?

I hope you are doing well. It has been another whirlwind of a week for us. I feel like they fly by so quickly, sometimes.

The week was a typical week. I ended up going into the office more than I usually do this last week. We had Elder Stevenson, Bishop Causse, and Sis Tracy Browning visiting the employees for a broadcast from the Tabernacle. That was pretty cool. They talked about how our job is not a calling, but it is more than just a career with the church as we are still representatives of Christ's church even though it is our professional career and we are focused on helping others to further their own careers as well. They have a new Communications Guidebook that we use to help guide us with making decisions in our day to day work and leadership roles. They talked about how we should view each other and those we work with outside of the church as Children of God. It was a good address. I really liked what Sis. Tracy Browning said in the event. She said that when she is conducting an interview for the positions she has open, she prays for the interviewees that they will be able to convey the skills that they have and communicate with her why they would be a good fit. I found that interesting as a lot of times when we are putting together interviews, we look to make them complicated and not really think of the individuals who are applying but the skills we are seeking. We try to come up with tricky questions and tough leadership dilemmas. Instead, she sees them as Sons and Daughters of God. She wants to see them all shine and do their best.

Curtis had only one dual last week and that was a dual with Weber High. It was Senior night and apparently that is a big deal and you are supposed to get there at the start when they announce all the seniors (we had no idea and we showed up late...) We missed the presentation of the seniors and his match age. Not a good parenting moment for me, but I will hopefully have leared my lesson and next year know that Senior night is VERY important.

Beth and Cameron are up to their same fun selves. Cameron has been going over to Riley Jones' house to hang out with him along with a lot of the other teachers. Riley had his dog pass away and so he invited them all over for funeral services which ended up being more of a Minecraft marathon, haha. I think it is fun though that they support him like that. I don't know if you know, but Riley has autism and it has been quite the adjustment for him to go to junior high. have actually been in the room and watched kids make fun of his quirkiness because they don't understand him. But I am glad the teacher's quorum and hopefully the deacons are looking for ways to make Riley feel like he belongs.

Beth has been drawing up a storm and has been creating some really fun clay pieces with Elise to go with the different holidays/seasons. She made a cute pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving and is working on a wizard snake circling a box, a tiny baby snowman, a bear with a hot cocoa, and a whale.

Dad is coming up with creative ideas for the addition. His ideas include a concrete floor coating for the basement (since we always seem to be getting water, this would make cleaning up really easy), a bed that raises and lowers in the master bedroom, to make more room for walking around and he says it would be really cool, haha, and lastly an unfinished concrete wall as a focal point in the downstairs (similar to what Bill Gates had in his house). He is slowly getting things going on the exterior to get the siding up but it is slow, as the weather always seems to be bad over the weekend and with

Curtis tournaments, haha

I hope you are doing well.

I love you tons bud, so excited to hear from you again.

Love,

Mom