Two new family traditions this summer

Now that we know that the Backman scramble will be moved from Saturday, July 5th, I have two ideas I want to propose for everyone who is available and willing to participate. They fit well into my retirement weekend and the lunch for all of you and your teen-age youth on Monday, July 7th at 2:00 at Provo's Brick Oven restaurant. First, on that Saturday, July 5th: You know that I have many family names I have found on Family Search. Deanne, Natalia and Spencer have helped me do many baptisms and my siblings and many of you have helped in doing other temple ordinances. I have many names for sealings and new names for baptisms. Here is the plan: We want to have a temple morning at Opa's and Grammy's Draper temple. At 9:30 a.m., we will gather any of the adults interested in doing sealings. At the same time, the teenagers will take over in watching the children at our home or at the nearby Draper park playground. The sealing session starts at 10:00 and I have reserved a room for us. Then at 11:30, the older children who can help (Natalia, Spencer, Deanne, Michael, Savannah, Emily, Tyson, Dallin and William) will show up at the temple for baptisms for the dead. In the meantime, the mothers will take over taking care of the younger children; hopefully a few of the fathers will help me with the baptisms. So don't forget to bring temple recommends with you if you are travelling to Utah; and be sure the youth have valid limited use recommends. Second, on Sunday, July 6th: Joe and Heather have invited us to their home and yard for our first-ever Family History Gathering event. We will start about 2:30, but you can come when you are available. We will focus this first time on Grandma and Grandpa LeGrand and Edith Backman or on Grandma and Grandpa Gwendolyn and Valden Kimball (Lynn's Mom and Dad). In preparation, please go through your own photo books and find pictures with you together with Grandma and Grandpa Backman (or Grandma and Grandpa Kimball) or photos and stories you have to tell their stories. Our goal is to pick out a range of photos and stories we can upload onto the new Memories section of Family Search/Family Tree attached to their individual profiles. In the future, we can focus on other ancestors, one couple at a time. We can then ask our youth and others who know how to do it to scan the chosen pictures and stories to share and preserve them forever. While we are working on these Memories, the children can be playing in the yard. Then, we will have dinner together sometime after 5:00. In connection with these two new summer traditions to add to the Backman Scramble and to the family triathlon (FAST), I liked these thoughts from the Church General Primary president. She is the wife of my favorite missionary companion, Jack Wixom. Jack and I served together living in the mission home in Munich with President John Fetzer and his family: "We are daughters [and sons] of our Heavenly Father. We are covenant-making women [and men] of all ages walking the path of mortality back to His presence. Keeping covenants protects us, prepares us, and empowers us."

"Temple ordinances lead to the greatest blessings available through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. They are those ordinances necessary for our exaltation in the celestial kingdom. As we strive to keep our covenants, our feelings of inadequacy and imperfection begin to fade, while the ordinances and the covenants of the temple come alive. Everyone is welcome to walk that path to eternal life." —Rosemary M. Wixom, "Keeping Covenants Protects Us, Prepares Us, and Empowers Us" Hopefully, our two new traditions will be meaningful this summer. They fit well with my new blog, Remembering the Covenants of our Mothers and Fathers. Thanks for considering your part on these two days if you are able to join with us.

Mother's Day Points to Ponder

I love these Mother's Day messages (one is a birthday greeting) aimed at the Mothers in our lives. The first one is from Davey Jones to his Mom and his sisters Heather and Brinly. The second one is from Sammy to his Mom for her birthday:

Happy Mothers Day to some of the most amazing mothers I know. I am eternally grateful that I get to be a part of your life. You are kind, brave, inspiring, nurturing, beautiful, patient, loving and many other things. Words cannot really do justice concerning the magnificence that Heavenly Father put into creating you. I hope and pray that you always know who you are and stand in that power of knowing with pride and acceptance and love for your good days and your bad days, for your light side and your dark side. They make up who you are, who you have become and who you will be in the future. You are a daughter of your heavenly mother and are divinely created to inherit her motherly qualities. Never live in regret, for those events are the fabric of who you are and without those experiences your lives would be infinitely different in every way. There is a lesson in all of life's experiences that we can see and learn from and those life lessons are a gift. I stand in awe of you and I have such gratitude and love for you. You play so many important roles in your family's life as well as mine, but the most important is Mom. Whenever you feel like you have made a mistake or like you are failing as a mother, remember that those experiences are just as much for your children to learn from as they are for you and they are perfect experiences to be had for our learning and growth here on earth. Have a wonderful, amazing, grateful and Happy Mothers Day. You deserve every second of it because it should and you should be celebrated every single day of your life. I love you all.

 “Dear mommy, I love you so much. Thank you for being my mom. Thank you for loving me and making me happy. Thank you for being the best mom EVER! Thank you for doing everything that you do for me. Love Sammy.” 

Also check out the job interview for the World's Toughest Job  posted on YouTube for a position entailing: Unlimited hours. 

No breaks. The most important job is also the world's toughest job.: http://www.ask.com/youtube?q=tough+job+interviews+for+Mom&v=HB3xM93rXbY&qsrc=472

An Inspiring story from Jonny's mission involving President Monson

Natalie wrote: I had told my friend Annika this story about a lady in Jonny's mission a few years ago and she wrote wanting to know all the details so I typed the letter for her.  I thought I would pass it on to all of you just in case you are interested

Elder Robert L. Backman

Dear Bob:

I met a nephew of yours while I was in Leipzig last week.  We shared a rather faith-promoting experience, the details of which are outlined in the letter he sent me, a copy of which is attached.

With best regards.

Sincerely your brother,

Thomas S. Monson

.... and here is the letter from Jonny to president Monson........

Leiber President Monson,

I just wanted to write you a short note of gratitude.  Thank you so much for visiting us here in Dreamland.  It was a pleasure being able to hear the love that you have for these wonderful saints.  It was also a great experience for us as missionaries to be able to have our own meeting with you.  I personally wanted to thank you for taking the time to say hi to me from my Uncle Bob, formerly called Robert L. Backman.  It was neat to feel the love you have for him, and the support you have for me as a missionary.

The real reason why I am taking the time to write this is to tell you about a miracle that happened last evening, which testifies that the Lord knows and loves each of us personally.  A newly baptized Sister in Nordhausen, Ophilia Mancheva, has a very strong testimony of a loving father in himmel, but has had some bad experiences with other people in authority, so it is hard for her to trust a person.  Last night at the conference, she had the desire to find out if you truly are an Apostle of the Lord.  As she was on her way to Leipzig, she felt impressed that if you really were an Apostle then she would be able to meet you personally.  Well to hinder that she hid herself downstairs in the baptism room and listened to the conference there.  As it ended she made her way out of the chapel well, lo and behold you cam walking down the hall on your way to chat with the missionaries.  You took the time to shake her hand and to get to know her.  She is that great sister who is originally from Bulgaria.  As this wonderful sister told me this story, she said, wow, my heart is beating fast as I tell you this and that right after you met her, she cried like a baby.  Isn't that a great story?  Like I said at the beginning, it testifies of the love that God has for each one of us personally and like this wonderful sister, it strengthened my testimony that we are led by inspired leaders.

I just wanted to let you know of this small but meaningful miracle.  If you see my Uncle soon, give him a great hug from his favorite little puddy cat here in Germany.  I am truly loving my mission.  Thank you so much for sending President Johnson to this mission, we love him.  And finally, let the prophet know of our love.

Once again, Thank you!

Elder Jonny Backman

BYU Law School Alumni Yearbooks

I was very pleased to discover the following news post on our law school website today: http://www.law2.byu.edu/news2/alumni-yearbooks#sthash.5WyS7ILP.dpuf

Alumni Yearbooks

BYU Law School professor James Backman has worked on a project to serve the alumni community as well as current and future students. He is in the process of compiling a series of yearbooks for each graduating class.

“I’ve wanted to do this for a long time because this is the untold story of the Law School,” Professor Backman said. “It’s a means of proudly displaying the story of BYU Law graduates.”

One of the famous quotes from the foundation era of BYU Law is that the purpose of the Law School will unfold in time. Professor Backman noted this vision was fulfilled to an extent by the original faculty, but that the yearbooks give a glimpse into the impact of BYU Law School beyond its walls. “This gets down to the basic class members,” Professor Backman said. “And—Wow. I just have to say, Wow! It’s full of achievement and life contributors in so many ways.”

The yearbooks help to fulfill the vision of the Law School by highlighting a graduating class with individual pictures, profiles, and infographics displaying trends particular to that class.

“It’s fun to see the graduates' movement geographically, but also the kind of offices they worked in,” he said. “Some graduates started with small firms and went to a big ones. Some started big and established smaller firms, their own firms. Some went from government agencies to private practice. You can’t measure that in trends because there are so many individual stories.

“The yearbooks give a picture of the class that you can’t tell any other way,” Professor Backman stated. “The only way to get a feel for it is to sit down and read.”

Only few physical copies of the yearbooks have been printed and bound. For most, the information is available on the BYU Law alumni website, where access requires a password. The yearbooks will also be posted as PDFs, so information can be added or edited as viewers of the content see fit.

Professor Backman expressed gratitude to Chris Hardy, a current BYU Law student for his help creating the infographics as well as David White for his contributions to the creation of the yearbooks.

Though Professor Backman will leave BYU Law School after summer 2014 to serve a mission in England, he anticipates continuing this work upon his return. “I fully intend to keep it as a hobby, if nothing else,” he said. “I’ve loved it. For me, it’s been just a thrill.”


Posted:  May 1, 2014 - See more at: http://www.law2.byu.edu/news2/alumni-yearbooks#sthash.KVQkwlkw.dpuf

Extended line on our Price family tree

I discovered new information that is exciting news in our William Price family tree. This is my grandfather's line. A lawyer friend I met through the law school is Joe Bentley from Newport Beach. My grandfather's sister married Richard Bentley in the Nauvoo days. Joe is a descendant of that Bentley, so we have a common ancestor in  the father of William Price. William's grandfather was named John Price. Our records continued on in the John Price line but we had never been able to trace his wife's family. We had heard that her name Fanny Constance was an assumed name. It turns out that she was also a Price (Fanny Constance Price) and that her line has been tied to a Price family in a nearby village. One email message I saw indicated that a professional genealogy company had been employed for a high fee and they were able to make the connections. So, each of my children and my siblings should go onto Family Search/Family Tree to see the new names that extend several generations beyond Fanny Constance Price (my grandfather's maternal grandmother). There are three more generations in the family line for her father to the 1670s and two more generations for her mother to the 1680s and 1690s.  There are also new names in my grandfather's paternal Price line going back to a couple of families named Yearsley and to a Daniel Price in the 1650s. You will notice that there are all kinds of Price names in each of these lines which made finding the correct ancestral lines more difficult. You can tell that many of these names are newly identified because their temple ordinance work has been performed in the last couple of years and some of the names have been reserved for temple ordinances but have not yet been completed.

All of this illustrates the value of the new Church family history programs and how helpful the Family Tree software is to each of us when someone tied into these same family lines has pursued professional help and shares the information with the rest of us. We all benefit from the easy way of keeping up with information others have posted. You will also notice that something is wrong in the William Buddings Price line because the Buddings line loops back to a Thomas Buddings born in 1812. This is called a looping problem and needs to be fixed some day.