7/28 Peruvian Independence Day

Dear family and friends,

HAPPY PERUVIAN INDEPENDENCE DAY!!!!!!! Annnnnnnnnnnnnnndddddddddd, Happy birthday to my wonderful Father! I hope he's having lots of fun in Peru, and partying like it's hot, oh, and like it's 1961. What a wonderful year, haha.

In celebration, Sarah and I had devoted this whole month to cooking Authentic Peruvian Cuisine (because, Sarah is that Great), and as you will remember, it has been a great month of food. Because Peruvian Food is the best. We have made Papa a la Huancaina, Tallarin Saltado, Aguadito, Estofado, and we invited our Branch President's family to eat one of Peru's signature dishes: Lomo Saltado. We had invited a whole lot more people, but it was still a super awesome night. But that's not all, Sarah also made a Peruvian purple corn drink called Chicha Morada, and a signature Peruvian dessert, Mazza Morada. All super authentic. We have one or two more dishes we want to try for the month, Causa Rellena and a type of fried chicken with a green rice and chicken that has a tint of green, mostly from Cilantro.

Having the President's family over was super fun. It was President Castaneda and his wife, Miriam, and their two kids, Loy and Eddie. We played three games that I remembered that I had learned either from my dad or in Peru. One is a hand game called Pingparagayo???? that we always had fun playing as kids with our dad whenever he was willing. Another I learned which has the name of Wingardium Leviosa and the other was Zorrillo (Skunk), both of which were card games. Super fun night. I also told stories of having gone to Peru, and of course wore my Peruvian jersey throughout the course of the meal. Sarah was super good at explaining the meal's secrets. There were a lot of things that I found out that I actually need to learn about Peru, even more than I know. Stuff like the significance of the colors on the flag or the items in the Seal of Peru. It's never too late to learn more about one's heritage, nor help educate people about the diversity and the beauties of the world we live in.

It was so nice to have been invited by Aunt Ann to a dinner with the Williams family and Susan and Dana, who were actually visiting on their way to the funeral of Uncle Lloyd. Aunt Ann also had the opportunity to hitch a ride with them. It was a really fun time to catch up with family. We all sat around the table of a less than busy IHOP. We tried two other places to no avail, having been Friday and everywhere else was super busy. Breakfast for dinner and great company was great. Can't wait to have another Arizona gathering. We heard that Peter, Ann's friend, may be a likely candidate in hosting it next (as we were the last to do so a couple months ago). It was good to hear from Gracie, who had just returned from Provo EFY, and who is going to be starting the big ole' High School in two-ish weeks. We also got to hear about Dana and Susan's kids as well. It seems like things are doing so good for them.

Otherwise, just a week of work and fun with Sarah as we navigate life together on this windy road we call life.

I could write more, but time permitting, I hope this suffices. I did write a whopping letter last time.

Welcome to all those who have been added to the email list. I hope you are all doing good.

Love,

John Gonzales

7/24, 7/21, 7/14 The Trefflich Family Reunion

Dear Family and Friends,

0I'm thinking about "enduring to the end" again. What does that actually mean?

After working very hard, enduring the three/four days of continuous work that both Sarah and I had, we got to our second goal for the summer! The thing we've been saving for and working for. We made it to see and be with OUR family, the Trefflich/Lagunas/Martin/Gonzales side. In fact, when we had heard a couple months ago that Sarah's brother, Enoch, was going to be deployed this week, and Sarah asked me if we wanted to go and support the beautiful baptism of his and Sonia's daughter, Melany, I of course said yes, that we would do our best to get up here to support. I even referred to the adage that I hear all the time in one of my favorite TV shows, THE MIDDLE, "We do for family!"

This weekend has been so fun! We decided to leave on Thursday afternoon, after Sarah had finished working. I spent all of that morning, doing all of our Vacation packing. I ended the packing by using the Rotisserie Chicken that we had bought for some soup we were going to make this week but never got to do because of the business, and made some Rotisserie chicken sandwiches, which Sarah was very happy with at the end of her shift. We got on the road after watching some funny Polos that I received from Danielle Trefflich.

The ride was good. I drove first, and Sarah drove the rest of the way. Sarah and I spent a good portion of the trip on the California side talking about Moses, specifically because Stephen in our Come, Follow Me book, was discussing his life and said some things about his age that I didn't know was recording in the scriptures, such that he was 40 when he left Egypt, and 80 after the burning bush. We then decided to read Exodus for more clarification. We stopped at the story of when Moses was almost killed because he almost didn't circumcise his child.

We spent the night at the Garcia home in Fontana. Vicky received us happily, even though it was like 9:30pm at night. She gave us some half-slices of toast with cream cheese and cranberry jam that they had personally made. Then she gave us some of Isaac's birthday cheesecake from Claim Jumper. All the while, we discussed stories about Mount Everest, stuff I had never heard before because I have never read about the crazy mountain. But it seems cool. The air mattress did the job for the night.

We had arranged with Helen that we would go pick up Arno on our way to meet up with her in Santa Clarita. However, what we didn't know is that in the first 3 miles on the Interstate 10 the freeway was closed to one lane, probably because of an accident that was almost all the way done when we passed in the one lane. Anyways, it put us off a couple of hours.

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Finding time to write about the Family Reunion during the family reunion has not been that easy.

First of all, it was really awesome!

We went up to Marysville and spent time with a good majority of the family in two different "cabins." Namely, the Lincoln House (which, ironically, wasn't a cabin) and the Brownsville House (which was a nice, actually brown, cabin). We drove up there first and had a good dinner. It was in the middle of the woods, so we spent time hiking around, which was actually not too easy because there were a lot of weeds with thorns and stickers. The cabin was really, really nice, with the exception of the railing to the upstairs rooms. They were super loose and potentially could have caused a fall...but fortunately, no one fell, haha (at least not that I heard about). The Brownsville House fit Richard's Family, The Martins, Athena and her two kids, and some of Enoch's in-laws (I think), oh, and Possibly Arnie???. Yeah, that's how big it was. Sarah and I stayed at the Lincoln House, appropriately named because it was in the little town of Lincoln. This house was very, very nice. It was us, Arno, and Lisa and her family. We were given the Master Bedroom, which was very nice of them. Unfortunately, Lisa's family couldn't join us on the first day's festivities because Adina had last-minute homework due and for some reason, wasn't getting the WiFi password to the Lincoln Home's internet.

But the big thing happened the next day. Melany was baptized confirmed by her father, Enoch. The meeting and ordinance were spectacular. Many people came. Helen played the piano, Lorenzo Trefflich, Richard's son, gave the baptism talk and Diana Treffich, his wife, was asked to give the talk on the Holy Ghost. Sarah was asked to lead the music. Jon Martin and I were asked to be the witnesses (she had to be dunked twice because her left arm didn't fully get immersed) and the rest of the brothers and Arno, Enoch's Father, participated in the confirmation.

Afterwards we took pictures in front of the building, after eating a hearty pinwheel sandwich and chips and some nicely decorated cookies. The pictures were interupted at times by baloons that said stuff like "I'm 8," kept on blowing into the pictures. It was a tiny bit windy, and hot (nobody really wanted to be outside). The kids that saw the baloons were asking their parents for them, namely Noah and Briana, and unfortunately they flew away right after we put them in the car.

Earlier that morning, Sarah, Julius Lagunas, Helen and I went to the Museum of the Forgotten Warrior. It is a museum that has a collection of items from all the wars that the United States has fought in (I think). It is kinda like a Mom-and-Pop museum located in the middle of rural Marysville. The things that are in there are actually truly amazing, ranging from helmets, to uniforms, to actual helicopters and jeeps, all from different war areas. We got to know the owner, and she is a recent Widow of a man that collected this stuff and he had a dream to make it into such a museum. It's actually quite a remarkable story.

The evening festivities were quaint. We all gathered around a cake that Sonia had made, or maybe a friend of Sonia's, and sang a hearty Happy Birthday to her. We included Richard, who's birthday was the week before, and Adina, who's birthday is this week. We ate really, really good Carne Asada, cocinado por la mama de Sonia. I was asked to stuff the pinatas, and later we let the kids at them. I was also asked to be the pointman in finding a place to put the pinata, but I told them I didn't know too much about that. I played card games with William, Ricardo, Lorenzo, and others that joined here and there. We played Exploding Kittens. Fun game.

The next day was are departure. We decided to go to church with Enoch's family. On the way we had to pick up Helen, who was staying at the Beale Air Force Base Home of Enoch throughout her time there. We listened to some stirring talks and got to watch Melany get welcomed into the church. It was hard saying goodbye to them, knowing that this would be the last time we see Enoch, and perhaps, the rest of the family. Sarah and I walked to the girl's primary class, right before we left and gave Melany and Maya a big hug.

The trip back to SoCal was without events. And we made it easily to our cars. Then we took Arno home. And proceeded to the first of our 5-night hotel stay, as gifted to us from a good friend of Sarah's, Cindy Johnson. Sarah had given Cindy a call a couple of weeks prior to the reunion, seeing if she had room for us to stay at her house. She said no, but that her son is a manager of one of the Marriott's, and with that, is able to get discounts to hotels. We didn't know if we could pay for a Marriott, even after the discount, but Cindy, out of the kindness of her heart, offered to cover the costs. We dumb-foundedly agreed, grateful to her for her kindness and generosity.

The first night was a stay at a Residence Hotel, which not surprisingly, is more of a little apartment (or residence) than a normal hotel room. It was nice to be with Sarah there, and we discussed the next day's events that night and early into the morning, eating from the only hotel during this stay that had a contintental breakfast.

We decided to go to Hollywood, specifically to see the Stars on Hollywood Blvd, see the Mann's Chinese Theater, which is actually PLC theather now, and to go to Ripley's Beleive it or Not. Sarah also wanted me to be introduced to a restaurant not too far away called Canter's, a family owned Jewish restaurant. And we decided that our mode of transportation would be the bus and the metrolink/subway. I was uber excited to be in the Metrolink again. It reminded me of my childhood. All of the places we went to that day were amazing, and it was a nice day to ourselves, outside of the family Reunion.

Our next three night hotel stays were at the Westin Hotel, right next to the LAX airport. We even got there on the day that my brother and Mom returned from Peru, but missed out on seeing them then, or giving them a ride. During the stay we watched a movie called Awakenings, with Robin Williams and Robert De Niro, watched the three Seinfeld episodes about when Kramer goes to Los Angeles, and we swam in the pool.

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The following two days were at two different settings in Los Angeles: the first in El Segundo Park, and the next at White Point Park, on the coast. It was pretty cool to see many members of the family there, including Arno, Helen, Arnie and Dila and kids, Danny and Carol, Athena and kids, Christina and Jon and kids, Lisa and Adina and Julius, and us. It was quite fun to play around at the park on the first day. There was a big kids and little kids park, and so of course we played at both. Danny and Carol brought their dog Foxy/Roxy??? She was a hoot to play with. Laura, Julia and I played tossing a water bottle like an egg toss, as well as saying the alphabet backwards, and other little fun games. I then went with Laura and Adina to play a modified version of table tennis, where you got like a million points if you hit it from one table to another, or a quadrillion points if you get it over the overhanging polls, and googleplex points if you get it out of the fenced-in sections. Yeah, so there was no rhyme or reason to the madness, but it was quite fun. So fun, that later, at the end of the lunch, Briana, Fiona, and Noah wanted to play. We played an extremely modified version for the two little ones, haha. But they had fun. All the while, Sarah and Athena were at it in an all-out duel, at least until Mia started fussing in my arms in the shade. Earlier, in between the two, I got to play Arnie. Oh, it was fun. I think he thought I would be easy…but he didn’t know how competitive I could get. The first game was terrible for him. The second he did much better. But overall, I came out the winner.

It was nice to talk to him after the game, though. I talked with him about his service in the military, and about Enoch’s deployment. It was a really interesting conversation. I have never had any real desire to serve in the military, and have even been afraid of conscription in the future, but seeing Sarah’s brothers, many of whom have served or are serving; it is truly an inspirational thing. Especially since they have families that they leave, and kids. Man, I sure do appreciate the things they do for our country and for our freedoms.

The Beach was super nice. BTW, lunch all three days was great and filling and it was super cool that we came together for it. Julia taught me how to ride a ‘hoverboard.’ And I really held my own, I think. Sarah also told me that she rode it, but I missed seeing the glory. The thing that is most fun about hoverboards for me is the turning around. Julia, however, is the all-out pro. However, an unlikely candidate emerged from us, Julius Lagunas was riding the hoverboard, and it was a glorious sight. I honestly couldn’t believe it. He was cruising around. It was also surprisingly hot in the little cove next to the cliffs that we were eating.

After the party at White Point, Sarah and I did a drive along the coast. It was pretty great. We passed by the Trump estates and golf course, and then we dropped by to see Cindy Johnson. It was a super good time spent with her, bouncing off ideas with her about our future.

The night before, Sarah and I went to go see the movie Spider-man: Far From Home. It was definitely a great Spider-man movie. If anyone has seen it, I am free to talk. But I will give no spoilers here. It was nice to go watch it with Sarah. We used the AMC gift card my parents gave me for my birthday, so we only had to pay 99 cents. Worth it.

The last day of the family reunion was pretty cool. However, being the last day, it was also the day we were most pooped. But we were able to drive to Athena’s house in Oceanside??? or for sure, the San Diego area. Their house is super nice. They have only lived there since January or February, but it was super cool to get a tour and just talk sitting on her couches. I introduced a game that I had done my research about (namely through POLOing Sis. Knudsen for ideas). The game involves sitting in a circle with one empty chair, switching names at the start, and having to sit down in order of age being mixed up, and not knowing who’s names is who’s. It sounds confusing but was actually pretty fun. Then we watched the Diversity Day episode of The Office, since Ashish had made it home, with noticeable Lol’ing from Arno and Helen…then we watched a SNL skit that they had just put out about Japan’s The Office, and a little bit of Black Jeopardy. To keep the kids occupied before that, I used my camera to tape Briana, Fiona, and Noah. It was great fun to watch them make up stories about ‘having a birthday party and eating a cake like cookie monster’ or ‘going shopping and eating the cake they bought at the end like cookie monster.’ Then I introduced one of my favorites, The Paper Bag Game, which involves putting a paper bag on the floor and, while standing, no hands and not letting your knees touch the ground, bending over and using your mouth, picking it up and ripping off the a piece of the bag until there is practically no bag left and you are bending to pick something off the ground which is Practically the ground! Not very easy for adults. I played that with the three kids. I intentionally lost by toppling over three times. Noah got third place because he picked up the bag with using his hands and knees, and Briana got second and Fiona got first place.

We followed Christina home that night, just to make sure she made it. She had been feeling very tired from the organization of the Whole family reunion. We made it home, picked up our Hotel key, and had a good night. The next day, Sarah had arranged that we go to her friend’s house in Canyon Lake named _________. We swam for about an hour and just talked about many things, and then left. We then drove to my home in Fontana and had lunch at Viva Villa with Sarah, my mom, and my Brother. It was good to eat with them and just talk for a little while. Then we made our way back to Arizona without any hitches. Well, just one. Our home was a pure mess! Mainly because I wrecked it packing for the trip.

Sarah and I both worked on Saturday, the maximum amount of hours. And got ready for Sunday.

Sarah got called as the Relief Society President of our Guerrero Park Branch! So crazy, and yet so awesome. She chose her two counselors: her good friend, Elizabeth Santos, and another good member of the branch, Paulina Giron. They did the sustaining in our first hour meeting, which was our Fifth Sunday meeting, and was resustained in Branch Conference in the next Sacrament hour. She was set apart by the President, and I stood in the circle. It was truly awe inspiring to see her with those women talkingabout different ideas they have. I'm really excited for her.

I did not have work on Monday, so I spent the whole time Sarah was at work, getting our house clean. It was laborious, but I had different YouTube videos on, and I talked to Briana on the phone. I worked super hard, and now our house is clean.

Sarah had to look for her Social Security card yesterday, and combed through the whole house looking for it. She put everything back later, with the reward of finding it, (or at least I found it later). I also helped Sarah fill out an application for new work. However, shes probably not going to continue with it.

Sorry to all who have been awaiting this letter. It is not easy writing about a family reunion while it is happening. And we had a really nice long family council on Sunday, when I normally write my letters.

I'm grateful to all of you who do read, and if you know of anybody else on the list that might like the letter, go ahead and message me.

Love you all,

John Gonzales

7/7 Sickness Laden Week with some Working and Stranger Things

Dear family and friends,

It's been quite the week. Since last week, this would be our week to kinda kick back and relax (whilst going to work) since next week we are going to Sarah's family reunion. However, we both got sick this week, starting with me on which day? The Fourth of July! Well, I was actually sick on the third. I didn't really think anything of it, until I came home after taking Sarah to work and I was just feeling hot and cold and really weak and dizzy. The funny thing is is that we had signed up for the elders and sisters to come over for dinner, and since Sarah was working, I was going to host them. I had decided to make them breakfast for dinner: eggs, hash browns, sausage patties, and pancakes. I didn't have to work all day on Wednesday, because this week has been a weird scheduled week. Well, Sarah had the idea to have them come over and have them cook most of the dinner. That wasn't the only thing that needed to be done, as we had a pile of dishes to get washed too. I asked the Elders to give me a blessing after the dinner, but they came over a half an hour early to help me with those tasks. I started feeling better when they came over. But after the fact, I was depleted of energy. Anyways, we started with washing the dishes that mattered. We cleaned the yellow potatoes, which I later found out were bought for another use, and went at it. However, I messed up with the hash browns, and the turned out super nasty. I felt bad for Sister Rusk, who's task it was to make them, but she was redeemed with the pancakes she made, all the while filming for her own personal vlog. The dinner was nice, and we barely had time to eat it when they had to go...it literally took until 7 minutes before they had to go, when the dinner was finally ready and everything was clean. And even after all of that, we still had to clean THOSE dishes.

Wednesday night I was tossing and turning from bedtime til about 3AM. I got up thinking that the whole night was done, and when I saw that it was only 3, I was super taken aback. Sarah got up and talked to me, telling me things to feel better emotionally, physically and spiritually. It must have worked, because I slept til about 6 or 7am. Well, somehow we were blessed to both get the fourth off, so, Sarah stayed with me and pretty much nursed me back to health. She had arranged to get two new bar chairs, and a really nice rug from our Good Neighbor Jackie France, and while they brought them, they talked about a lot of things.

I opted to stay home from work that Friday, but by midday, I was feeling up to cleaning the home. Well, I spent about 2-3 hours cleaning the dishes, vacuuming, and picking up after ourselves. While doing the dishes, I  was watching the history of different Songs on the TV while Spotify played them, as put on by a program called Genius. I spent a good portion of the day chatting with my sister, Briana, through the cell phone app called Marco Polo. It was actually quite nice, as Sarah was away working hard for us.

Sarah and I spent ALL day of the Fourth in the home, except, Sarah did leave to get me things to take care of myself. We watched 5 of the 8 episodes of the newly released season of Stranger Things. We finished the eighth episode last night, actually, to tears (at least by my part). I really, really enjoyed the season. It is an amazing series. The stories are so great. And it is great how it all comes together.

The cool thing is that the whole day that I got sick, is the day that we meal planned to cook a Peruvian soup called Aguadito. And boy, let me tell you, Sarah is Peruvian. Haha, it's true. Sarah is practically any race she wants to be with her cooking. We have dedicated this month to cooking signature Peruvian dishes, since July is also Peruvian Independence Day (28 de julio), and Sarah is taking all the recipes and handling them like a Pro. The Aguadito tasted Authentic. And the cool thing is that we had put it down for Thursday, and that was the day that I got sick. It was well planned. We aren't cooking Peruvian Dishes every day, but we spread them out so each week we cook about two, all culminating with a Party that we're planning on having on Peruvian Independence day at the end of this month. We have invited the President of our branch, and our friends the Santos, and we're planning on having Lomo Saltado, with some Peruvian dessert, called Maza Morra, unless Sarah decides to make it sometime before. We went to the Ranch Market this Monday, and we found Purple Corn, the ingredient that Chicha and Maza Morra is made out of. We also got ourselves some Aji Amarillo (yellow pepper paste), which is a signature spice/paste that they use in a majority of the most beloved of Peruvian culture.

She began the week by making Tallarin Saltado, which is one of my favorite dishes. It is basically a spaghetti type of meal with a particular sauce and pieces of meat. I have never known anyone else to make it except for a particular Peruvian Restaurant called Luchos in California. But somehow, Sarah was able to replicate it to perfection. It calls for something that I have never even heard of called Oyster Sauce. Anyways, Sarah is great! She also did a great job making another Peruvian dish called Papas a la Huancaina, even without some of the needed ingredients.

Well, like I said at the beginning of the letter, Sarah also got sick this week, probably from me. Saturday and a lot of today for her has been sick. She went home early from church, and I've been doing my best to nurse her back to health.

Lastly, we were able to go to the temple this week together to do Sealings. It was a very nice experience. We went during the day, which was actually the day I came home sick. But it was nice to be in the Lord's house. Sarah also got to go to the temple to do Endowments with the branch on Saturday morning. Silly thing, that was the day she got sick. There is probably no connection there, haha :P

Hope you all had a great week and until next week. It will find us in LA after going to central Cali to witness the baptism of Melanie Trefflich, Enoch and Sonia's daughter, and niece to Sarah and me.

Love you all,

John

7/1 Disneyland and Half Anniversary

Dear family,

We were able to go to Disneyland together as a family. I have some favorite moments. They had just opened the Star Wars land to the public. I couldn't believe how awesome it looked. The Millennium Falcon never looked so good. In fact, we got to literally ride in the vessel and do a smuggler's run. Each person had an assigned part to play and what was cool is that there were six roles, and we had six people to play the parts. There were two pilots, two shooters, and two engineers. The first two roles made sense, but I'm  not exactly sure what the engineers did the whole duration of the ride. Sarah and I got to be pilots. I think we got the large of the stick with that deal. I controlled whether or not we go left or right and Sarah controlled going up or down. Now I think I know why Han Solo needed a copilot in Chewbacca.

After the ride, Briana and Sarah went really quickly back to attend to Cohen, who must have been having a rough go, So my wife, Jacob, Tony, and I explored the place for a few minutes. Jacob really wanted to get a picture with some Storm Troopers, who we saw walking into the Star Wars land, so we looked around for them again. We found them as we were walking out of the park. They were hard to catch, though. They were definitely playing the part. As they passed us by, they stopped a man that had bought a Light Saber souvenir (probably at a gift shop) and said that he mush have had a special license to carry one. I thought we wouldn't be able to stop them from going off, but Sarah dashed after them and told them that we were friends to the empire. That stopped them in their tracks. For about a few seconds. Enough time for me to take a selfie. Sarah was the hero of that venture.

We went on Thunder Mountain Railroad twice as the line was very small. It was one right after the other. What was funny, is right when we got in the car to go, Sarah had noticed that the previous people in our cart had left their waterbottles and sunglasses. We had also noticed who was in our cart before us. Well, Sarah noticed that they were walking and looking for their stuff as they were leaving and right when our cart started moving and were going down the way at the beginning of the ride, we were probably going about 20 mph-ish, Sarah grabbed the sunglasses and tossed them as the cart was starting to speed up, while calling out to those women. Somehow miraculously, she got them to them. The ride was super fun.

I also enjoyed one-on-one time I spent with my little nephew, Cohen, and my mom. The rest of my family wanted to go on Indiana Jones Adv ride, which is now, one of my least favorite rides at Disneyland. Briana actually knew about a cool little cove for babies that they have had since Disneyland opened. It's a quaint little place, really old fashioned. I helped Mom change Cohen right when we got there, and believe me, it is a lot easier to do so when the person you are changing doesn't weigh a ton. It was great to be with Cohen. He was taking several steps, crawling around like mad man, wanting to see the places where other moms were nursing. I had to stop him. We also played around with plastic cups and water. And I also played around with him with Sarah's keys. He really liked going after them, kinda like a little cat chases a laser point. It was kinda sad when his actual parents returned after the ride. I'll have to spend more time with him in the future.

We had the chance to go on ALL the mountains, since it was Tony's first time. I loved it and it was glorious. I also enjoyed getting a corn dog with Sarah. What was cool is Briana and Tony also shared a corn dog; which, is honestly different than if we had been with our parents in our family before Both Briana and I had families.

It was so nice spending time with the whole family at Disneyland. I also enjoyed spending it with my wife. Sarah and I decided to go to the park about 2 hours before my family got there. We decided to do the things we love and even some things new. The first thing we did was get the MaxPass for our favorite ride, Space Mountain. We took pictures in front of the big Mickey Mouse that is composed of flowers that is in front of the park. We also took pictures in front of the Sleeping Beauty Castle. We decided together that while we wait for the Pass to take in effect for Space Mountain, we would go to the Fantasy Land rides, which is a place we usually skip when we go there. Our first ride of choosing was the PETER PAN ride, which is normally the most sought out ride in Fantasy Land, and for good reason. It is really a magical ride, probably my favorite in Fantasy Land. In case you have never gone on it, you are literally in the ship they sail/fly on to Neverland, and you are flying, FLYING. But the most amazing thing is that you see England from up above, like a bird's eye view, seeing Big Ben, etc. And then you see Neverland as portrayed in the Disney movie of Peter Pan.

We then had a few minutes to spare before our ride, so we went on Snow White, which is a ride Sarah has never been on. However, Sarah has never seen the movie, and the ride is not something to cry home about, even for someone who has never seen the movie. I am planning on showing Sarah that classic movie soon, though. Space Mountain was sooooo fun. I had to psyche Sarah up for the ride, because she was getting pretty nervous, but I think Nervousness is another thing that Heavenly Father gives us so that when the thing we do that we're nervous about, will make it all the better. It was so fun.

Cohen liked Haunted Mansion, but really didn't like Pirates. We enjoyed going on It's a Small World. Something that was really Magical...well, I've been to Disneyland with an Aunt (Lucy) who has never been before, and I got to see her eyes light up when she met Minnie Mouse for the first time. Well, when we were in Toon Town, we took a few minutes to go to Mickey Mouse's house. The sign outside said 10ish minutes to meet him. Well, it took at least 20 and so we were getting irritable in line a bit. Well, we walk in when we were on deck, and Cohen sees Mickey. His reaction was priceless. I think Briana said that it was the only time he had smiled during a ride/event at Disney. It was soooooooooooooo cute. Mickey even wiggled his nose, which was really unexpected! And, Cohen even grabbed at the nose, which was the cutest thing ever, and Briana's reaction to his reaction was one of joyful glee and happiness. Really great memory.

Splash Mountain was pretty memorable for me, as I sat behind Sarah and Jacob and Tony. Well, since we were a full party, they decided to add one more to our group that wasn't in our party, a girl named Angelica. I got to know this girl as the ride was going on. She was nervous as she's only gotten to go on Splash Mountain the time she had come to Disneyland before. She was from Las Vegas and she had just graduated from High School, and while the ride was going on, I was psyching her for the drops, while giving her life advice. Honestly, we would probs make great friends. Well, on Splash Mountain, right before the big drop, on the way up, I thought, well I should take my hat off, and then I thought, I should take the picture of myself holding up the BYU hat and me pointing to it. Well, in the picture, I am holding up the BYU hat, but not quite pointing to it, I didn't time it right....aw man. Opportunity wasted, but good story.

Disneyland was good. Really Good.

We offered to go get the In-n-out afterwards. It was definitely much needed.

Another nice moment of the weekend that I don't think I wrote in my last letter, is we organized ourselves to talk about the Week's "Come, Follow Me" reading and lesson. I really enjoyed hearing from my family about their take on the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. I also loved hearing my two siblings, Sarah and Jacob, playing their favorite Ukulele songs. It was really serene and peaceful. Sarah even felt how nice it was.

Sarah and I had our Year and a Half married Anniversary yesterday. It was nice to be with her, and talk about the day we got married. We went to our nearest park (actually called Guerrero Park), and we lay in the grass, with Sarah's head on my stomach and look up into the night sky talking about such things. It was really neat to look up into the stars and it was reminiscent of the time that we went to the Phoenix Art Museum and stood in a completely dark room surrounded my mirrors and we felt like we were in complete nothingness and yet so empowered as well. We decided to visit the investigator family, la familia Robledo, just to see how they were doing, as they didn't make it to church, and we had heard that their teenage daughter had been sick. It was a super good visit and the dad just joked around a lot with me and Sarah. They are such a nice family. Their little daughter Jani (pronounced Ha-ney) was so cute. They gave us pistachios to eat and she was just grabbing at them. I showed her a picture of Cohen, and she just smiled. She is a two year old little girl. Sweetest little thing. She even started following us as we were leaving. Ari, the teenage daughter, was actually doing okay, but didn't really participate.

I  was asked to teach the Fifth Sunday lesson this week, for the Branch Presidency. It is my first lesson since moving here to Arizona. The Elders Quorum President did ask me to teach at the beginning of our residency here. Well, I was battling throughout this week as to how and what I should talk about, but mostly because I was assigned to teach it with the newly called Branch Clerk, Alex Juarez. We did our best to get together throughout the week, but each time it fell through. Finally, I told Sarah my frustrations, and she told me that I should prepare a lesson as if I was going to be the only one teaching it. Well, her advice served me well, in that I prepared a lesson that I was happy with, and morning of, Alex asked me if I could teach it, and he'd get next lesson. If Sarah hadn't been so understanding, I don't know if that would've gone over well with me, but I was prepared, and I had no hard feelings toward the Brother.

And boy, my lesson went really well. So well. I was teaching, in a language other than my own, and I was connecting with the members of the class. Even the sister missionaries told me afterward they started recording it without my knowledge. What helped even more is that before the hour, I went to find my wife, who was in the Mother's Room, and I asked her if we could say a prayer together. And that calmed my nerves. And I had also miraculously found a picture of the story that I was going to talk about in the library. My lesson topic was how to incorporate Gospel learning in the Home so that our children will want to learn for themselves. I used my recent Come, Follow Me reading to talk about this topic. I used the story of Thomas, the apostle. We, as parents, are the 10 that have seen Christ and know he has been resurrected and have gotten our own testimonies of Christ, and our children are like Thomas, they won't believe until they get their own witness. And I delved into how we can allow the Holy Ghost and our works to help our children receive their own witness. It was a good lesson.

Other than that, it's been a good week. A lot of working. A lot. We have needed to spend the rest of last week catching up after our nice vacation. But it was good.

Anyways, there is always more, but I have to get to work for today.

Last thing, though! Sarah and I spent a good portion of our morning today doing our Meal Planning. And we decided that this month, since it is the Independence Day of Peru on the 28th of July, we will be focusing on cooking Peruvian dishes the whole month of July, at least 2 a week, culminating with a celebration on the 28th in honor of that Holiday. Also, Dad's birthday is the 27th.

Happy Independence Day to you!

Love,

John