Celebrating 20 Years of Marriage

Before sharing some about our anniversary, I want to tell you about our Family Home Evening. Noell gave a good lesson on gratitude and Tanner was in charge of the activity. Tanner decided to do something he'd seen in "The Friend" magazine the night before. He had Myranda make a Thanksgiving Tree and each of us made leaves to tape to the tree. On each leaf we were to write something we were grateful for and add another leaf each day. The tree is now full of autum colored leaves and is fun to see. We even taped some of Kaneesha's oragami cranes to the tree.

Tuesday was Noell and my 20th anniversary. It's amazing to think that we have already been married for two decades. We're nearing the point that we've been married longer than we've been single (although that is a few years out for me). 

A few weeks ago, Noell was invited to attend a presentation to get extra credit for one of her classes. She asked me if I'd join her at the presentation (she thought the extra credit could be helpful). The scheduled time was, of course, on our anniversary.

Noell picked me up at work and we enjoyed a police agent from the drug enforcement team speak about drug abuse in Utah County. Noell took a lot of notes and I found it informative. After the meeting, we went to a quiet dinner at the Village Inn Restaurant. 

When we got home, I went to bed early (10:00) and Noell stayed up to do homework. Because our evening was so romantic, Noell pointed out that we would enjoy a nice evening on Friday night. When Friday night came, we watched as much of Kaneesha's soccer game as time would permit (her soccer team was invited to a tournament in Chicago where they won the first game and lost the second). We then rushed to West Jordan to watch Brigadoon at the Hale Center Theater. We stopped at the drive through at Carl's Jr. for a quick hamburger before the show. 

You'd think that the 20 year anniversary should be very well planned and perhaps a very romantic event. Instead, this was similar to a number of our earlier anniversaries. Nevertheless, school, children, work, and a short time together may have made this our most memorable anniversary yet. While it wasn't the evening we'd like to have planned, it was nice to pass a mile marker and realize how much we still love each other.

On Saturday morning we left early to attend the Richard Vernile Goodworth (my paternal grandfather) Reunion. I was in charge of the reunion, but Noell, Mom, Ken, Kathy, and even Myranda all probably did more than I. There was a great representation from the families. It is so fun to be at a reunion where I have the opportunity to visit with so many of my amazing aunts, uncles, and cousins. This time we had two families that havn't been there for years: Suzanne Young Augenbaugh has lived in Hawaii for at least 14 years, and Dawna Larsen Bankus has lived in Virginia since she was married 23 years ago. Since they moved away, neither had attended until yesterday. 

Saturday night Myranda, Tanner, and I watched McKell Wright, Bryan Day, and several other friends perform in the Payson High School's performance of "The Twelve Dancing Princesses." While the performance, scenery, stage, lighting, and sound weren't at the quality of the Hale Center Theater, the students did a great job and I laughed much of the way through the musical comedy. 

Also, last night we learned that Kiah Brown (my friends Bart & Dana Wine Brown's oldest daughter) is among the missionaries who have not been reached since the typhoon in the Philippines. The area president told Bart and Dana that, prior to the typhoon, Kiah was moved to an area of safety and given a 72 hour kit. They had 220 missionaries unaccounted for, and were down to 72 last night. They currently have four motorcycles on their way and a helicopter will be available tomorrow morning. Terrible roads and downed communication systems have made it impossible to receive full reports. They were told that they will have a report tomorrow.