April 5th Mia and I went to my niece's (the oldest on Lance's side) senior recital at BYU. She graduated in the music program. She's been in several opera's that I've gone to. That has been fun. She's amazing and has worked very hard for that. Her parents were in town from Georgia, so it's always good to see them.
April 6th was the first day of our LDS General Conference. (It's a meeting where generally members of leadership of the church speak. There's six sessions. One for the male members, one for either the women or young women, and four general sessions which are for everyone. Each session is two hours long and it's broadcast on tv as well as the radio here.) I remembered as I was following Lance up to the track with Brady. Lance signed him up for the MiniMX league and that day was the first day of practice. We had to either have a parental release notarized or sign it at the track in front of their personnel. We tried to have it notarized, but the notary wouldn't sign one portion of it because of the wording. So I had to go with Lance out to the track to sign it there. We took two cars out because I didn't want to stay all day with all of the kids. Lance had the kids in the suburban we recently purchased. I had Gabe in the van with me. About 15 minutes into the trip, I had to turn around, because they had forgotten Brady's boots. Anyway, I turned on the radio to listen to conference. I turned it on during Elaine Dalton's talk. She spoke of an experience she had while a member of the International Folk Dancers. They were in Scotland and she was feeling discouraged. She saw a sign outside of the Mission home that said, “What-e’er thou art, act well thy part.” I pretty much started crying. My dad served his mission (A mission is a two year calling to serve and teach about our church. It's preferred that most young men serve one. Women can also choose to go.) in Scotland. While he was on his mission, that sign was saved from a building being torn down. Many years before that time it had been seen by a missionary who eventually went on to become the prophet and president of the church. Some missionaries knew that story and saw the building being torn down. My mom thinks they took up a collection in order to purchase the sign. Anyway, we have a picture of my dad in front of that sign. So that started the waterworks.
On Sunday, April 7th, we got a call from my mom. She'd been out walking with "her" dog, (He started out as my dad's dog. After he died, my mom kindly kept him. She's not an animal lover. Never has been.) when he pretty much laid down and died. She said he made a noise, then he was gone. She didn't want to walk home carrying him. He's a miniature poodle, so she could have, but it would have been quite awkward. I grabbed a box and drove over to meet her. He was definitely gone. Lance dug a grave for him while the kids said goodbye. We went over to a family dinner at Lance's mom's house right after that. We were quite the sight when we got there. Having some family to play with the kids helped them move past their tears. It was pretty emotional for us, except Lance. No tears from him. It was the last connection to my dad, so that was hard for me.
Not only was it hard to say goodbye to Brutus, as well as missing my dad, but it was also the anniversary of our nephew's angel day on April 4th. He was only 7 when he died. It's hard not having him around and wondering what he would be like. My girls are 7 and when I think of how awful it would be to lose one of them, I know I only feel a fraction of the grief his parents feel. The month started off pretty emotional to say the least.
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