Demise of the Wedding dress... Birth of the blessing outfits

Today I finally found someone to turn my wedding dress into blessing outfits! And to make it even better the woman who is doing it is someone I really love and respect from my childhood.  Pauline Colton is a really good friend of my family's from our Berkeley days.  She has a daughter named Leslie who my mom always jokes is named after me.  Not only am I super excited that my dress is finally in the process of becoming baby clothes, I am so excited that it is someone I love and trust doing it! So for your visual enjoyment, here is a picture of my dress and the pattern from the blessing outfits (yes I am doing both a boy and a girl outfit... just get it over with all at once).  Enjoy!

Hives, 'gas leaks', and raspberries

It has been a rather eventful week! On Friday night I was up with a rumbustious child in my belly and reading Anna Karenina when I started to notice my eyes were itching. As a long term allergy sufferer (sage brush is my kryptonite) I figured that I was having a reaction of some kind and didn't think to much about it, I mean I was already on Claretin what more what I suppose to do. We Saturday morning my eyes were swollen, puffy, and red. Again I figured 'oh well, put some eye drops in and double up the Claretin, it will be alright" By Saturday night the upper half of my face was covered in hives and my eyes were even more swollen. Sunday morning my entire face was covered and my eyes were swollen almost shut. Thanks to benadrill my eyes opened before David got home but I'm still trying to get ride of all the hives, all that is left are a few on my forehead and a little red around my eyes. We really don't know what happened, whether I ate something or there was just something really nasty in the air this weekend but I really did not approve. I mean hives are bad enough but did they really have to go for my face? Seriously? Its really unkind to do that to a person... especially a pregnant person, LEAVE THE FACE ALONE GOSH DANG IT! Luckily I have an incredibly sweet husband who kept telling my that I looked beautiful and never complained that I was in a drug induced sleep for most of the weekend. He even would wet my wash cloth and remind me not to scratch. I am so lucky to have him!

Last night we did have a bit of an adventure. I was awakened at 1am (you may notice a theme in my life) by a certain someone kicking my full bladder. By the time I got myself out of bed (not an easy thing these days) and went to the bathroom I was very awake and feeling the urge to clean something. For those who don't live in Wymount I should preface this story by saying that as much as I am grateful for a place to live and for almost everything about our apartment (I really do love it) the stove is a really scary out of date piece of crap. If you don't believe me go look at one sometime. Anyway, as I was scrubbing the stove and counter-tops all the sudden the stove started making the clicking noise it makes when its lighting. All the nobs were turned off and I couldn't figure out what was wrong. What scared me even more was that I thought I smelled gas. I woke up David and he also smelled gas so I called the midnight maintenance guy. He didn't answer (apparently due to all the rain 20-30 apt in Wyview had flooded that night) so my call got sent to the BYU Police. They told us to get out of the apt and they sent over a police officer and got a hold of the maintenance man. Luckily we weren't having a gas leak (the gas I smelled was probably from when I was turning the nobs trying to figure out what was wrong) and the maintenance man was able to fix our stove pretty quick (turns out the pilot on one of the ranges was frizzing). I am still really grateful that I was awake and caught it because it could have started a fire or triggered a gas leak. David was again such a trooper. He never complained about being woken up (even though he misses enough sleep for work as it is) and even stayed up to wait for the maintenance guy when he didn't have to. I really am a lucky girl, not all men are as amazing as my husband is!

This week we also made a fun discovery. During the daily Daddy and D.J. talks we discovered a game. David has not been able to feel a distinct kick yet but he can see/feel my belly shift slightly as the baby moves from one side to the other. Well during one of these 'belly talks' David decided to blow a raspberry on my belly right where D.J. was hanging out. That little baby moved to the other side of my body so fast I'm pretty sure my intestines spun. Well David and I got such a kick out of it that it has now become a game. David blows raspberries where D.J. is hanging out and we both laugh as my belly shifts in the opposite direction. Its so much fun! I still can't wait for the day when David can really feel D.J. kick, hopefully soon:)

Well that's all for us over and out!

Daddy and Son: already buds (Mom may be feeling a little left out)

So little D.J. is a super active little man. He kicks and squirms and rams his body into places that, gosh dang it, he really isn't welcome (namely my spine and pelvic bones). I know its not physically possible but I'm pretty sure he has figured out a way to wrap his little hands around my spine and swing from it, like it his own jungle gym. And no matter how much I may beg, plead, growl, or even prod he does not move (or let go) of mom. He seems to have very little interest in what I'm doing, unless of course I'm laying down to go to bed, which seems to be some sort of clue for him to throw a dance party with my bladder. But, the little squirt is already enamored of his Daddy! Whenever David leans down and talks to 'the belly' D.J. moves as far forward as possible, almost like he's trying to get as close to the voice as he can, and kicks out as if trying to say 'look daddy I'm here! see what I can do!" David hasn't been able to feel it yet but the daily talks to the belly are becoming a ritual that is super cute. It makes me super happy that David is so excited and that D.J. is so interested (to say the least) in daddy. I have no doubt in my mind that David is gonna be a great daddy, it will be fun to tell D.J. when he older that he and his dad have been friends since the womb. But I'll admit, it makes me sniffle a little bit that baby doesn't listen to me like that:( Its probably that I talk so much that the poor kid is just excited when I am quiet for more than 5 min at a time. Oh well, I'm sure little man will love me... at least I hope... I am his mom after all right? The important thing is that the two men in my life are already getting along really well! Yeah! David is so excited, and just as enthralled with the baby as D.J. is of him. I can't wait to watch these two over the coming years! I have a feeling its going to be a hoot!

Over and Out!

My talk on Indexing... minus the on the stand add-ins

Indexing Talk
July 11, 2011
Good morning brothers and sisters, my name is Leslie Pelon and I am an Indexing addict. Before I get into that however I’ll give the customary introduction of my family.
David and I have been married for a little over a year now and we are expecting a baby boy around Thanksgiving. I graduated in History and have been substitute teaching, while David is finishing up his degree getting ready for pharmacy school. Quick story of how we met, David and I were both working custodial for BYU and we met when I sprayed him with water. A few weeks later I invited him to my birthday party. He asked me out three days later and the rest is history. Seven months later we were married in the Oakland, CA temple.
Now as I said earlier I am an indexing addict. The bishopric has asked me to speak about that to you today.
I’d like to begin by telling all of you how (and why) I got into indexing. Right after we got married David and I were called as the family history consultants in our ward. When we were given the calling our bishopric told us we had two jobs; to help ward members get family names to the temple through the family history class and to get the ward indexing. I was incredibly intimidated by the assignment. I had never logged onto the family search website before and had no idea what to do with that. But even more embarrassing, I had no idea what indexing was. When we walked out of the meeting I still had no idea, so like a good college student I went and did some research.
I learned that indexing is the process of getting documents like census records, draft cards, and birth certificates entered into a searchable database. So that instead of having to go through an entire city’s census records to find a family member people will be able do a word search of a database and be lead straight to the correct documents. “Since 1894, when the Genealogical Society of Utah was established, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has gathered genealogical records to help members research their own family history. The Granite Mountain Records Vault in the mountainside above Salt Lake City now contains nearly two and a half million microfilms from 110 countries and principalities. Very little of the information contained in these films is available online. Family Search indexing creates indexes to this information and makes it available to everyone on the Internet.” (Ensign August 2007).
My first thoughts were, okay that’s cool, (as someone who was currently spending hours pouring over census records from 1870 I could appreciate what the indexing project was trying to accomplish). But I also felt that I should probably spend my time getting my own family in order, making sure all the work was done as far back as I could go. “I mean as a history major I should have the skills and training to find things my Great-Aunt Becky couldn’t, right?”
Well I got on family search and boy was I wrong. I should preface this story by saying that my family is the exception to the rule, even for someone who is descended from pioneer stock on both sides of the family. If you have not been on family search, or not really looked through it, because you assume that the work has already been done I can almost guarantee that you are wrong, most of us have work and people waiting for us to get up and find them. I, at least on my side of the family, am not so lucky. I found out later that a very wealthy aunt on my mom’s side had hired the genealogy done and completed all the work back to Charlemagne. And on my father’s, well turns out Aunt Becky was a professional genealogist. To my great disappointment no matter how hard I looked the only names I could find that were marked and needing work, were doubles (people entered into the system more than once). In order to do any more of the work I would have to travel to France or England and start crawling around really old graveyards and digging through old church records. As newly married students David and I just didn’t have the money for that.
I was incredibly disappointed! Here I was, the new family history consultant and a history major, and I lacked the resources to do the temple work for my kindred dead. What was I going to be able to teach? How was I going to motivate the ward if I myself wasn’t doing anything? It was then I remembered the second part of my calling. “To get the ward indexing.” So I hopped on and created an account. Two hours later I had completed 6 batches and had to pull myself away to go make dinner. I couldn’t believe how addicting and enjoyable it was. I thought it would be horrible, I mean I was already spending hours looking at census records for my history capstone paper, there was no way that looking at more should have been at all enjoyable. But it was. I was like eating potatoes chips, you can’t stop at one.
Indexing became, and remains, my personal therapy. When school work, family drama, or other issues became too much to handle I would log on and do several batches. And for a while that was all it was, a mind numbing way of distancing myself from problems without feeling like I was completely wasting my time. Then the Lord sent me the New York census from 1920.
Many of you probably don’t know that my husband is the desendent of east European Jews. In fact when you watch the movie Fiddler on the Roof you are watching the story of my husband’s family. So perhaps you will understand why, when I started indexing the NYC census from 1920, and did three pages of Rosenberg, Moskovitz, and Rosenthal’s I started to cry. Though none of the names I indexed that day were my husband’s direct ancestor’s I still believe that someone out there was doing the other pages that had their names, and that someday when those records are made more available we will be able to find and do that work. That was the moment I realized how beyond cool this project was. This is a key part of our modern day mission to help find and redeem, not only our own, but others kindred dead. I firmly believe, and pray that, the day will come when the records from all the churches in Europe, the temples in
Asia, and the Mosques in the Middle East will be available to be indexed so that we can each find those kindred dead who we’re are unable to find now. It is that faith that helps keep me excited about the work. Even though I may never actually do the batch of names that hold the names of my family members, I am doing the names of someone else’s family.
I truly believe that being assigned those pages was not an accident, but Heavenly Father teaching me something important. These pages are not just names from years past; they hold the stories, and the futures of people and families. Every name indexed is another piece in someone’s family puzzle, another clue to where they come from. It reminds me of an Ancestry.com commercial where an African American man talks about looking through is family tree. He found a census and other records showing that his great-grandfather had been born a slave but died a business man. Without indexing, and other projects like it, discoveries like that would be much more difficult to make and families would miss out on the beautiful things that can occur when they are joined together across generations of time.
There is so much work to be done, brothers and sisters. I would like for a moment to speak to those we are blessed to know another language. The church is working on getting indexing set up for many languages but currently there are seven; English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Russian. Looking out into this congregation I see several brothers and sisters that I know speak and read these languges, and there are probably more that I do not know about. There is a need for your skills. There are not enough people indexing who speak these languages to keep up with the demand. I can think of few better uses for your talent than to use it helping the members who speak these languages find their loved ones so they can do the work. The more records we can get completed the more other countries will be will to let us index their records and the more people we will be able to find.
I know I have been slamming all of you with a lot of ‘do indexing’ and that many of you may not be sure how to fit one more thing into your day. Trust me I understand. We are told to work, go to school, take care of our children, keep the house clean, read our scriptures every day, pray several times a day, get to the temple once a month, and write in a journal, trying to fit indexing into all that can seem a daunting task. So here are some ideas:
1) Just do 5-10 min a day. The indexing program is perfectly set up for this. Once you have downloaded a batch you have at least a week to finish it. You can close and reopen it without losing work. Since the average batch should only take 30 min you can still get a batch done a week in the time it takes you to check your facebook and read a blog post.
2) Do smaller batches. Not all the projects and batches are 50 names. Many, like drafts and birth records, are fewer and have less data to extract. This means they take less time and you still are contributing to the effort.
3) Return batches with crazy handwriting. You can return a batch for other people to do and that is more than okay. If you look over the batch and realize that the person who wrote it must have been trying to write with the wrong hand in the middle of an earthquake send it back and let other people deal with it. You will find indexing much more enjoyable if you aren’t spending 20 min trying to figure out if line one is Sara or Kara.
4) Take the time to realize who these people were and what their lives may have been like. The Oklahoma census from 1930 is much more interesting when you remember that many of these people were on the verge of losing their farms to a massive dust storm and that countless of them would end up moving across the country looking work in places like California and Oregon. As you take the time to remember or learn about what these people’s lives may have entailed you will feel a deeper kinship and a desire to help get them closer to the temple.
The family history work is no longer in the hands of the old men and women in family history centers around the world. We are the children of the digital age, and the work is coming to us. We need to do our part to make the work of finding family members easier. I hope that my children never have to be held back from doing genealogy because they can’t afford to travel the world, and if we do all we can it will become possible for our children or grandchildren to simply go online and look through the documents of a tiny little French church and find family names that perhaps would have been hidden forever.

IT'S A BOY!!!!

Dear world we are pleased to announce we are having a boy! Our ultrasound turned out well with nothing appearing out of place! Nothing where it should not be and everything where it should be. Little DJ (David Jeffrey) was a bit of a pill and refused to pose pretty for the pictures, in fact the ultrasound tech said that in twenty years he had never had a baby who was less cooperative. But we got definite proof that we are having a boy! Here is the closest we came to a whole baby profile picture! (Not going to lie I think he has an adorable bottom! hehe)