28 May 2023

Parker, Halie, Sofi and Nate stopped by Sunday morning before leaving town. Parker, Halie, Sarah, Joe and Zina made sure everything was cleaned up and put away Saturday night, both at the reception venue and back at our house, while Brandan and Becky were at the ER with Helen.  Becky left her phone at the reception and wasn't able to communicate for a couple of hours. We are extraordinarily grateful for family who stepped in and managed everything without being asked. Sarah, Joe and Zina came to the hospital to say goodbye on Saturday night since they had an early flight Sunday morning.

 

Sofi and Nate handled a stressful day with grace and gratitude. Helen spent most of Sunday sleeping off the effects of her allergic reaction. Brandan had already left for Sunday morning meetings when we took this photo. Sofi and Nate left on their honeymoon soon after.

The Hansens came ober Sunday night and picked up most of Sofi's belongings to take to Washington.

Sofi and Nate stayed on the Oregon coast for a few nights.

Gibson had his last symphony concert of the season on Sunday afternoon. It was their best concert yet with an impressive selection of music played very well.

Eddy and Jason came to see the performance.

School continues to wind down with end of the year celebrations. Tuesday night was the DECA dinner. Helen was recognized as one of the graduating seniors and outgoing president of DECA.

One last huddle.

Here's a photo of Helen and Gibson with their advisor, Mr. Rogan. Mr. Rogan is retiring this year after 25 years of teaching. He has cancer and he and his wife would like to travel while he is in relatively good health. Their adventures will begin this summer as they volunteer at the World Athletics Championships in Budapest, Hungary

Gibson is taking a design class this term in school. His class partnered with a local company for a design challenge. The company, Anthology Woods, specializes in interior and exterior design using reclaimed woods. For the design challenge, Anthology gave the students some of their scraps to make into a prototypes for a marketable design. Gibson and his partner designed and built this bench/planter combo.

On Saturday, we drove out to Bandon for Memorial Day weekend. Our first planned activity was to play disc golf at a local park. We stopped at the community theater next to the park in Bandon to use the restrooms. We were invited to stay for a community talent show which was about to begin. We were entertained for an hour with singing, dancing, a reading about a dragonfly and a lizard and two stand up comedians. The sincerity and good will of the performers was delightful. We call experiences like this trip serendipity: things you couldn't possibly plan for that make your trip memorable.

After the show, we continued on to the park to play disc golf. We think we last played about 10 years ago on a different vacation. All of the trees on this course made it extra challenging to throw a disc. We all hit a tree more than once. We played in teams and Helen and Gibson won.

After disc golf we headed into Old Town Bandon and the harbor.

There was a community art show set up along the railings on the dock. There was a student category with over a hundred entries and an adult category with over 60. Between the art show and the talent show, we saw a good slice of community involvement in Bandon.

One of the paintings depicted the disc golf course we played at earlier.

We stopped for dinner at a pub called The Broken Anchor. Gibson's burger was so big he had to eat it with a fork and knife, a first for him.

Our hotel is across the street from the beach and we walked over to watch the sunset on Saturday night.

We've been to Bandon a few times and are still discovering new things, like this beautiful stretch of beach we had never been on. We're feeling thankful for our little vacation and looking forward to the rest of the weekend.

Sofi and Nate's Wedding

May 20, 2023 was a beautiful, bright, clear day eclipsed by our radiant bride, Sofi! She and Nate Hansen were sealed in the Medford Oregon temple.

Waiting for Sofi and Nate after the ceremony.

The sun was pretty bright as they exited the temple.

Helen and Zina helped Sofi make her bouquet Friday night.

With Julie, who also shared many of these photos from the temple.

Andrea, Julie and Becky. Our daughters, Johanna, Ireland and Sofi have been close friends since middle school.

Emma and Gibson.

This is Nate's mom, Debbie.

We moved into the shade so no one had to squint into the sun.

From the left are Brandan, Becky, Sofi, Nate, Debbie and Robb.

Sofi and Nate's wedding reception was at the Wildflower Inn, a nearby event space. This is a photo of Halie, Nate and Emma arranging flowers.

Sofi and Nate used a cookbook for their guest registry.

Gib and Ed DJ'd the reception.

Abe got permission from his mission president to call and say hi, a highlight of the evening. Abe is in the top left photo, Tim and Brandan are in the top right and Parker is in the bottom photo.

We had a close call with dessert. Sofi and Nate carefully chose a allergy friendly menu for their reception, probably overemphasizing wheat allergies over nut allergies. Helen ate one of the gluten free tarts and had the worst allergic reaction of her life. The crust contained nuts. Brandan and Becky called 911 dispatch and met the ambulance at our house, where we had an epipen to administer while we waited for the ambulance. In the ambulance, the EMTs gave Helen another dose of epinephrine and started her on oxygen and a nebulizer treatment. When they were confidant she was responding to the epinephrine and not getting worse, they transported her to the hospital. Becky rode in the ambulance and Brandan met them at the hospital. The doctor at the ER gave Helen a steroid to further suppress her immune response. Within a couple of hours, Helen's skin had returned to its normal color and she could breathe without oxygen. Sofi and Nate stopped by after the reception and Helen was able to take and laugh with them. The Hatches stopped by later to say goodbye. It sounds like the reception ended gracefully and the fantastic guests cleaned up the event space in about 10 minutes, much to the delight of the inn's owner. We stayed at the ER about 3 hours before the doctor was confident the danger was passed. 

Brandan and Sofi missed their dance at the reception so they danced in the waiting room of the ER, a very sweet and special end to the evening.

 

21 May 2023

We had a jam packed week, and then a wedding, so we're dividing this week into two posts. First up are all the non-wedding events. Helen finished her English project. Her original idea was to create a book cover for the book, Frankenstein. She decided to turn the paintings in as they were, instead of taking photos of them and submitting her work digitally.

The paintings were inspired by a line from the book, "If I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear."

Monday night was Helen and Gibson's school awards ceremony. Helen received an award for her high GPA. She will graduate 4th in her class. In the photo, Helen is wearing a yellow dress and is standing 4th from the right side.

Gibson made the Principal's List for his GPA. He is standing on the left side of the photo in a dark blue shirt.

Gibson also received a BIS LEADS award. LEADS stands for leadership, enthusiasm, academics, determination and success. He is in the middle of this photo.

Helen received the Global Citizen award presented by her CSB teacher, Mr. Rogan.

Both Helen and Gibson got to go back on stage one more time along with all of the students who had been recognized as students of the month throughout the year. The awards night was fun and we always enjoy seeing the variety of awards and the excellence they represent. We're most proud of Helen and Gibson for their hard work, the risks they have taken trying new things and the consistent high quality of their assignments.

Walking to school and back this week has been especially nice because of the poppies blooming along the road.

Sofi drove out to Oregon on Thursday with friends in two cars. About 100 miles away, on a remote stretch of road with no cell service, a rock got stuck in Sofi's wheel, causing serious damage to the tire and rim. They started to change the tire and realized her spare tire was flat.

Here's a photo of the wheel off the car that shows the damage. After a long wait, two friendly women gave Sofi a ride into a small town about 30 miles away where Sofi could call for help. There was not much help available after 10 pm in Northern California. The tiny town, McCloud, had a service station, but locked up the air compressor hose after hours. Sofi called Brandan and the two women gave her a ride back to her car so she could update her friends.

Soon after Sofi returned, A patrol car stopped by to offer help. The officer drove the group of friends and the spare tire to Mt. Shasta, a bit bigger town that had a working air compressor. Brandan met the group in Mt. Shasta. After talking over options, they decided to get everyone and the car home to Central Point. They drove slowly home because of the spare tire, arriving around 4 am.

Nate flew in Thursday night as well, but he beat Sofi by about 4 hours. The Hatches arrived Friday afternoon. This is a photo from Friday with Zina, Joe, Gibson, Nate and Sofi.

We had attended another awards night on Friday, recognizing the Kiwanis Career and Technical Education winners from 7 local high schools. Helen received the Marketing Award from Crater High School. There must have been some serious miscommunication at her high school. Every other school started with a presentation from the principal, followed by teachers introducing the students who received awards. None of the principals or CTE teachers from Crater attended. The main announcer for the evening asked each Crater student to introduce themselves and the accomplishment they were most proud of. The students did an excellent job, with clear and focused comments, but it was still funny for Helen to attend an awards program and present an award to herself.