The Lord Made The Bees and The Bees Made the Honey

Well The lord made the bees and the bees made the honey. So Deena and I have been bee keepers this year, and our hive has really been thriving! usually in your first year you wont be able to keep any honey because the bees will need it all for the winter. however ours have been doing really good and collected enough. so this quart jar you see in the pictures is from that one tray in the background. we have maybe 4 more trays we can  use. we are pretty excited! it is really good! i am not sure why but most of you werent aware that we were keeping bees. but this is my announcement and result. next year we should be getting buckets...literally buckets of honey! there is more to bee keeping than i originally thought, yet they are the easiest animals we have for sure! and I didnt get one bee sting! neither did Deena.

Ok, all our hardwork just got harder....I am sure there is a grammatical error there somewhere.....anyways our goats (all there of them ) have given birth... And believe me there is a reason goat babies are called kids!! They are soo flippin cute... We have 4 boys and 4 girls, we would have had 5 boys but one didn't make it.... Enjoy the pictures

She's number 1

So, Sammy has been playing softball this year. She has Become pretty good, and really enjoys it.. ( she invites everybody, and I mean even random strangers to come to her games) first game of the season, she struck out ecg time at bat. She would hang her headand walk back to the dugout. I felt bad, next game grandpa and grandma were there and she hit a home run! Everybody was telling her to stop on the bases, but she just kept running, and they couldn't catch her...only home run in the entire league all year. I started working with her on her batting. The next game she hit every time up! Her coach said to me that she has something you can't teach, I said what is that, he said she swings the bat fast and hard. She does, another parent told me she swings like she is angry, she does. I think she only struck out once in the next 15 or so at bats, she hits the ball very hard. She has been playing 3rd base, because she can throw so hard. Its been a lot of fun to go to her games. So at the end of the season they had a little single elimination playoff to determine a champion. Sammy team was dead last in the standings, Sammy hit most of her balls all the way to the grass, and in 9 year old girls softball, that is a mile, she was crushing them! They won that game and moved on. They won the next game and moved to the championship game and they won that! The games in a row! Sammy hit everytime up and they were crushed out of the infield.  Her teamwon the championship! They didn't give Ann award for this but all the parents thought she was the most valuable player! Its been great for her confidence.

Monument

I have been meaning to do this for a while. At my grandpa Warners funeral celebration of life, one of his friends told a story about him involving the indians. Now anytime there is a story involving my relatives with native americans, i am very interested. We have stories in my family involving my great grandpa Callister, and his uncles Jody Lyman, and DeAlton Lyman. Here is what i remember from the story of my grandpa Warner. as a young boy the indians would sometimes come to Richfield (for reasons unknown until my research) and the chief of the group was named Chief Crockett. these youngsters were interested in the indians when they came to town and would go and get a look at them. as i remember they had to cross a canal or something to get to where the indians would stay or meet. my Grandpa (described by his friend as a stocky well built boy) would not risk crossing the canal and would stand there watching. his friend (who would cross the canal) would speak with the indians sometimes and Chief Crockett asked him about my grandpa who never came over but just stood there looking on. He said Chief Crockett called my grandpa "Monument". this implies to me that cheif crockett had seen this occurance on more than one occasion to warrant the moniker. it is a pretty neat story, and my research made it a little more interesting as well. I wrote chief Crocketts name down after hearing that story because both mom and I were interested in chronicling this story. I tried so many ways to look up chief crockett. there is a list of chiefs for recognized native american groups kept by the US Government. but i could not find any info on a Chief Crockett at about the time when my grandpa would have been a young boy. ( i didnt even know what group of native americans were in the area). i kicked around for a while and found a list of indian groups from utah. In the Richfield area the indians were the Piutes. that made sense, also i found out that there is a Piute band recognized in the US government called the Koosharem Piute band. this band was recognized ever since the first chief known for the group....Chief Kanosh! so i looked up a pedigree chart for chief Kanosh and he had a grandson who became chief named ....Crockett...chief Crockett is literally Crockett Kanosh. in his childhood he probably would have known a Pres. Callister .... another piece of history i found was that in 1922 the Koosharem Piute band moved their official headquarters to ... Richfield Utah! so it makes sense that they would be in Richfield so often! then in my search i actually found a picture of Chief Kanosh the man who named my grandpa "Monument"`

Hannah got a boo boo

Ok, so Hannah can be really cute, bless her for having that quality because other times you just want to push her off of chair or something. That is what bfs (best friend sister) Abby decided to do when she had enough of Hannah for the morning.....the result was she broke her hand. we didn't know until the next day when it was swollen pretty bad and she was just miserable. so she will be in this cast for the next 4 weeks!

Hannah is ONE !

Alright it has been a looooong time since i have done anything with my blog. i would like to think it has something to do with the 'time' of life i am in right now. We don't take pictures (we can never find the camera), i cant sit and write anything (little girls constantly tugging at me and screaming, and needing fathering), there never seems to be any 'free' time, and when there is, i want to read my book! i am beginning to understand why there are soo many baby pictures and just pictures in general of me, and a relatively few in comparison of Deborah. we have oodles of pictures of Caleb, and Hannah is severely lacking. We know this, and yet it doesn't change for the above reasons. she does cute things all the time and we say "sheesh we really should get this on film or video" it doesnt happen. i need Becky at my house for a couple of years to capture these moments for us and write cute things about them. (i think she is the best writer i have ever read.....and i read lots!) soo, where am i going with all this? Hannah, just turned one! i actually have a couple of pictures of the event, and need to share with everyone just what a fun girl she is turning out to be. the first few months...alright until just recently, she wouldn't cuddle...always squirmy and not content.. she screamed ( more like a screech at just the decibel that makes my fatherly impulse to hold her turn to the 'i should probably just end this now and worry about consequences later' mode). she was a constant and by that i mean CONSTANT spitter-uper. now however she is a little more cuddly, doesn't screech as much and aside from the 6 poopies every day is generally quite fun and cute! i think that since she has been walking the last 2 months she has exercises a lot of her 'energy' out. Of course as i am writing this she is screaming bloody murder in the bath tub with Abby.....but things are great, we love her!! happy birthday -H

Jacob 32

So Jacob Lathel Callister has achieved another notch on his belt. another completion in his yearbook of life. Quite a man now, had the privilege of doing the Hole in The Rock with him this year and Andrew and Caleb sure enjoyed his presence...(they still talk about his inspiring and statuesque entry in to Lake Powell at the bottom of the trail. ) you will have to ask him about that.....it is fun to see the father he is becoming and is, cute kids and i am sure a handful, but he has or will learn patience, and be an even better man for it. kids certainly have a way of trying what little patience you have, and as your patience increases, so do their abilities to test it!! i hope that your birthday was and is everything it deserves to be and know that a little family in Kaysville is thinking of you and wishing uncle Jacob the best! P.S.. Caleb and Andrew really want to play spin the bottle again and have some good ideas of things to do if it lands on you!

Dan "The Man"

So i am really getting old, when i think about my youngest brother hitting the ripe ol age of 28! freak!! i remember turning 28, um wow. He is one of the coolest people i know, and one of my very best friends! not many people out there would understand the coolness of Clutch, or be willing to belt out Mississippi Queen whilst crossing the Mississippi river. not many people would be willing to sleep in the truck on the bench seats rather than spend money for a hotel. not many people would make up sweet trivia games to help us get through the great plains states and actually enjoy it, and not many people would spend 90% of their time in Minnesota on the toilet. this is what my brother Dan is and does! he is the coolest guy, he will never short change you, will always give you his best, i have literally seen streams of sweat running off of his nose, and he still keeps going. happy birthday to the original employee of Great Basin Asphalt, king of the squeegie! love ya man

our new 'kids' Mandy and Mindy....and Lola

Here is Mandy an Overhasli Kid Goat

Isnt she Cute!

This is Mindy, a Nigerian Dwarf Kid Goat

she is really small and jumps alot!

Mandy
This is Lola, she is our milking goat right now.
she is 2 years old, and just had 3 kids, she is a little
loud calling for her kids, which are nowhere around. we hope
that in a few days she calms down. (and yes i have milked her already)
i haven drinken the milk but will,





Yes we are crazy and don't know fully what we are doing, but Deena
feels pressed to become as self sufficient as we can become, and
this his part of the 'mother plan' ....pun intended.
i will have to post some video later, as they are just incredibly cute
and climb up anything!

Hannah

all right Becky, hopefully this will get you off my back for a little while.....:-]

the end of an era.

Now this may seem like a strange post, but for 'most' of my life, this team has been an important part of my life, not 'thee' most important thing, but they definitely were a 'bell weather' for josh most of the time. i was up when they were winning big, and down when the lost (which wasn't very often) i will forever remember the 'finals' years and will never forget the awful refereeing and will never 'like' michael jordan. i can certainly admit that he was amazing, but i cant get over the image of him smoking a cigar celebrating the second championship over the jazz in the Delta Center. the main reason i am even going here is because the one constant from the time i was 12 is Jerry Sloan. i Love that guy! tough as nails, but humble, always took the blame and never took the credit for all the success of the Utah Jazz. He retired after being the coach for 23years! longer than any professional coach in any sport. so just to acknowledge my respect for him and my love for what he demanded from his teams...tell me if you can, wether you can remember any off court incidents or embarrassing situations to the team while he was at the head....it happens all over the NBA and not with the Jazz! i wish him the best and am excited for the future of the team. i think the future is bright and it is mainly due to this great coach!

happy birthday Rachel!

Well, as hard as it is to believe, we have another Callister sibling in their 30's. Happy birthday Rach! 3o is the new 20, so there really isn't too much to be worried about Rachel. you are awesome! we have perhaps more of your art in our house than any other and we love it! I dont know if you think so, but to everybody else you exude confidence, and that is an attractive quality and one that serves you well. we wish you didn't live so far away so we could all celebrate together, but i have come to realize that until Stephen takes Deb somewhere exotic to live, it is going to just be her and i here with the parents in Utah. kind of sad really, but we love hearing about things that are happening in Lubbuck so keep us informed and love your 30's. i am half way through now?! scary!

stripey socks

this is all three of my girls in their new stripey socks that Deena has fallen in love with. she says it makes her just soo happy when she sees her girls in them. i am not sure i understand the infatuation but....my little girls are cute in them!

what do these great men have in common?

Charlie Daniels
Musician Extraordinaire

ZZ Top -
nuff said

Brigham Young
2nd President of the Church
colonizer of the west.

Platte D Lyman
Great Great Uncle, 1st Counsiler San Juan Mission
Leader of Hole in Rock Expedition
Thomas Callister
Great Great Grandpa
Stake Pres Filmore 20 years

Ulysses S Grant.
Winning General of Civil War
President of United States

And finally, Joshua Von Callister

yes the beard truly makes the man...

busy saturday

Saturday was a big day for our family. Samantha was giddy because she was finally going to be baptized and she loves when the attention is on her! also since everyone who had the ability to be there for the baptism was going to be there, we decided to have Hannah's baby blessing at the same time. so congratulate Sammy (who was generous to share her special day with her little sister) on being a new member of the church, and getting the holy ghost, and Hannah, for being mostly content through her blessing. those in both circles were, Grandpa Von, Great Grandpa Guenter, Uncle Stephen Skokos, Great Grandpa Verl, Bishop Dunford, Uncle Rick, Cousin Stephen, myself.

Little Hannah (the life so far)

Not much to say, it has been a short life so far, so we will just let the pictures do the talking

A Slamdunk of a time

Sammy is now officially 8 years old! a little crazy to think that i have had this energetic and bouncy girl that everybody in the Neighborhood 'knows' for her daring bike and scooter skills and not being afraid of anything, for eight whole years now!

She started off her birthday by opening a present she had for a couple of days from her uncle Dan and Aunt Angie. She loves her 'skull, cross bones, and guitar pajamas! (so does her dad!)

then her dad took her to lunch mono y mono. we went to Pepperbellies here in Kaysville, because she loves their burrittos. we had fun with the appetizer chips and salsa and they had some fire sause that we each dared each other to try, and we went through quite a bit of root beer to put it out!
Then her, Deena, and Andrew went to chucky Cheeses to play the games with all the free tokens we had from a year ago or so.
then everybody came over and we had a birthday party at the house. it was a good time and everybody got a chance to dance with sammy, and do leg wrestling, and have cake and ice cream. thanks for coming everybody! obviously our cameras time and date thingy is way off, it really is Oct 23, 2010 :-)