Wander With Wayne

This Christmas was so very different than we’ve ever had. On Monday night, Tanner gave a great Christmas lesson for family home evening. We watched the new nativity video that the Church produced and discussed the events surrounding the birth of Christ. On Christmas Eve, we tried to keep some of our family traditions alive. With Kaneesha, Riley, and Brooks at their home, and Myranda in Slovakia, it left Noell, Tanner, and I with the infant twins and Dad and Mom. It was all nice and good, but didn’t have the same sparkle that exists with more of the family there. Tate and Dawson are a lot of work, so on Christmas Day we didn’t even begin to open presents until after 9 am (and it may have been closer to 10). Tanner had cooked a great breakfast and we enjoyed it, then we opened presents. That didn’t take long, as there were no gifts for the twins and few for the rest of us. Excitement picked up Christmas afternoon as Kaneesha and Riley arrived with Brooks. It was fun to see Brooks’...

This year has been very busy for our family (written Spring 2017). Tanner has been working hard to keep good grades. He also began playing tennis. Myranda has been keeping good grades while playing soccer and serving on the Hope Squad. Noell is in her final semester to complete her Bachelor's degree and has been student teaching. I've been rolling out changes from LDS Employment Services to LDS Self-Reliance Services. The change moves me from managing an employment center with hours from 8-5 to working with stake leaders with work most Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Sunday nights. It's been a challenge to arrange when I'll work and when I'll have time for my family, my church callings, and personal time. It's been a difficult change, but I've loved the way this work is blessing individuals. Because of how busy things have been, we've not made plans for spring break. About 10 days ago we felt like we might go to Zion Canyon and hike Angel's...

Letter to Myranda: This weekend we went to watch Kaneesha in her stake Christmas music devotional. She sang in the choir and played a beautiful rendition of Carol of the Bells, with six hands (played by Kaneesha and two others). I’ll try to include an audio recording of her piano trio (she plays the highest part). While I loved Kaneesha’s piano performance, I can honestly say that I wasn’t very attentive to the other performances. I spent the entire time entertaining Brooks. He’d had enough church for the day and wanted to do other things. We spent most of the time in the hall walking, babbling, and playing at the drinking fountain. On Saturday night, Kaneesha, Riley, Brooks, Tanner, Noell, and I went to Temple Square to see the Christmas lights. With changes planned for the temple next year, we felt that the Christmas lights might be different next year and that it would be great for us to see them one last time before the changes. As always, we enjoyed the beautiful lights ...

Recently, I had a BYU student reach out to me to serve as a mentor for him. He served his mission in Poland about a year and a half ago and wants to work for the church in self-reliance. As that is my job, he thought I might give him some great advice. Actually, I believe I received better advice from him then I gave him. Here’s what I learned from him: During his mission in Poland, he helped set up and run self-reliance groups. He said they were very beneficial in bringing people into the church. After I shared some things about self-reliance, I asked him more about his experience as a missionary in Poland. Poland is next to Slovakia, and because Myranda will be serving there, I thought I might get some ideas of what he found beneficial as a missionary. He stated that Elder Neil Anderson spoke to his mission while he was there and encouraged the missionaries to focus on the younger generation. He said some tools that they accessed to bring people in for gospel discussions were: se...

This week we enjoyed Thanksgiving. It was so nice to be with family again. Before family arrived, I had an impression that I should spend some time whittling. Part of my time on Thanksgiving day I whittled a little Santa. I spent time eating, visiting, and whittling. This time, I didn’t visit as much with the family as I typically do. Most of the visiting I did was with the children who were drawn to my whittling... it was actually very fun. After Thanksgiving, Ken came to visit. He spent Thanksgiving with his wife, children, and grandchildren, then felt he should come spend some time with Mom and Dad. He and I stayed up visiting until it was after 3 AM. I really enjoyed the time talking with him. One of the things we discussed was finances. One of our old neighbors, and a friend of the family, David Cottrell has been a financial planner for decades. He is known for being very good. WARNING: THIS IS A BORING PARAGRAPH!!! YOU'RE WELCOME TO SKIP IT: David has helped Dad, Mom, Ke...

Sarah & Nathan Riding Sarah Lyle Riding This weekend was Sarah Lyle’s wedding. She married Shaelynn McCoy’s brother, Nathan Riding, from the Payson South Stake. It was so fun to be a part of the wedding reception. To see them, and their excitement for their future. It was also great to see so many friends and neighbors that we lived with for years. While living in Idaho is great, it's difficult to leave the friends we lived near and the home we lived in for 12 years. Savanna, Tate & Dawson again Savannah Lyle with Tate & Dawson Years ago, Darren Hardy told about a time that he wrote each day, for a year, the many things he was grateful for regarding his wife. I liked that idea, so I began a gratitude journal for Noell. I decided to fill up an entire journal with feelings of gratitude toward Noell. Writing a gratitude journal for a spouse may not be something that will be beneficial to others, but it was a good experience for me. At first, I highlig...

Thinking of Myranda in the Missionary Training Center this week, memories from decades ago entered my mind. These memories were of some experiences that I had in Brazil as a missionary. Throughout my life, I’d heard of missionaries preaching the gospel. I’d heard story after story of how their words changed a person’s life. In my mind, that was what we were called to do. After being in the mission for a while, the Church began to encourage missionaries to do service. They suggested we find people who needed service and just help them. They also suggested that we could do service for community organizations. It was new and they were encouraging us to do service by districts or zones. My memories contain only a few times we completed service projects. Some of them were: painting a home, helping to build a home, helping dig a well (using a shovel), helping build a wall, weeding a garden/yard, etc. (I have photos of when we did some service on my mission. I wish I could find my photo a...

In the last letter Myranda wrote to me, she asked  about a quote regarding baptizing congregations. About 3 years ago, my great friend and co-worker Larry Stevenson retired. Years earlier, Larry’s son Eric, and I met when he was attending BYU-Idaho and was looking for employment. I was working at the Idaho Falls Church employment center. I assisted him in his employment search. He is a very talented artist, as was his grandfather.  At Larry’s retirement party, Eric and I visited. We’ve visited numerous times over the years and like his father, Eric is a man who expands my vision. As we talked, he mentioned that he was currently serving as a stake mission leader. He then told me that he believes that there will again be times when individuals will flock to the Church for baptism, similar to when missionaries first went to England.  His thought struck me—first as odd. Although, within a moment, I felt he was right. I still feel a warm feeling that groups will soon ...

When moving to Idaho, we planned to build a new home in a gorgeous location just below Pebble Creek ski area. We decided to temporarily live in my parent's home during construction. We had been there three weeks when I felt a very strong impression that we were to stay with my parents for an undetermined amount of time (my father has dementia). This hadn’t been our plan and I didn’t know how to break the news to Noell. The pressure kept building throughout that week until we were finally able to go out for our date night. As the night progressed, I kept struggling with how to tell her. Noell then said something that pulled me out of my stupor—she stated, “Honey, I keep feeling like we’re not to live in Inkom. We’re to stay with your parents for an undetermined time.” The decision was settled for both of us. A few months later, I began to feel promptings that I needed to do something with the cash we had from the sale of our Payson, Utah home. The parable of the talents kept co...

Sometime after graduating from college, we had a home built. When we went into debt, to purchase the home, I was talking to an accountant friend of mine. The accountant excitedly exclaimed, “You’re a homeowner!” I felt we didn’t own the home, we only owned the debt. This accountant was a professor at a business college and had taught for decades. She emphasized that I was a homeowner. Throughout our married lives, we have gone into debt for three different homes that we’ve lived in. I was never able to pay off any of them before we moved from them. Even with my college professor’s comment, I still feel that I have never owned a home. Perhaps this is because we’ve always had a mortgage on the homes. I learned later in life, that the word mortgage actually means “death grip.” I have always felt this death grip around my neck.  As we’re currently living in Mom & Dad’s home and don’t have a mortgage payment where we’re living, I’ve felt a series of promptings that we shoul...

This week, Tate and Dawson have had goopy eyes and congested noses. I’ve learned to clear the goopy eyes with a clean, warm, wet washcloth. After holding it on the eye for a few seconds, the group softens and, I wipe it clean. The nose congestion has been a completely new experience. Kaneesha showed us a powerful nose sucking tool that helps clear the congestion. While it helped, it only got a little that was close to the surface. I believe she also suggested a saline nose rinse. Wow, if you haven’t experienced that, you may choose to YouTube videos of “saline nose rinse,” truly enlightening!  Here’s a snapshot from one of the videos. It is truly amazingly disgusting and amazingly incredible and amazingly helpful. Tate had the worst congestion of the two. After the saline rinse, he slept good. This morning, when I left, he was breathing better than Dawson.