the arrival of Liliana Eloise West

Weekend at Preston

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The whole time Samuel, Harrion and Lara would be "Little Moronis" trumpeting their trumpets. Very cute.

This past weekend was spent in the glorious Lancashire countryside.

After an exciting trek across the Peak District, through the awful traffic of Leeds and Manchester, we arrived at the Preston temple Saturday morning.

While Rebecca and David were not able to get in to the temple together, it was great to be able to spend such a lot of focused time at the House of the Lord.

Since it was a national holiday, another benefit of this past weekend was that we had the opportunity, when the temple was closed, to see the sights and attend to some family history.

Since the death of her grandfather, Rebecca has been unable to locate the burial plot. Earlier this month, after some exciting discoveries and some really helpful people at the Preston Cemetery, we were finally able to locate the spot (after deciphering the enigmatic plot map and identifying the numbering format). Rebecca was quite shocked and upset to find that the plot was completely unmarked. Why her parents felt this was appropriate is a bit of a mystery, especially since there were a number of family disputes surrounding the inheritance all going to her mother.

Regardless of the foibles of family politics, we are now in the unexpected process of identifying cemetery monument regulations, deciding what is fitting and (maybe) finding a stone-mason. Quite unforeseen!

The other activities of this past weekend were much less melancholy. We visited the Blackpool Zoo again- it was good but a bit of the novelty has worn off (especially after the wonder of the South Lakes Wildlife Park).

Harrisons dinosaur roar

Lara had her face painted as a butterfuly. This is her elegant butterfly dance

Much more impressive was Blackpool Tower. While the 3D cinema was a little blah (though the kids loved it, and Lara was terrified of the robot dinos), the jungle gym was excellent (but hot, so hot). The circus was especially good-while we were expecting a quick half-hour show, this was a full-blown 2-hour extravaganza with a not-so-dodgy clown, trapeze artists, jugglers, acrobats and fire-hula-hooping Spanish women(!). All very exciting. Lara was mesmerised!

300-odd feet up inn the air there is a pane of glass that you can stand on. Seriously!

Today we ended the weekend with helping with our ward youth temple trip. Seeing the young men and women of the church remind us so much of when we were young and involved in everything. It is amazing to see their love of the gospel and their budding testimonies. They are doing so well in keeping the commandments and overcoming their difficulties. I hope that our kids stay strong in the gospel.

But now it’s time to sleep. We are so tired!

Baby number five... It's a girl!

Well it’s official- baby number five is going to be a girl. Woohoo!

Becky has already been out shopping for pink and has been ordering the fabrics for her blanket. Lots of dresses, frills and cuteness!

Now what shall we call her? We have a few options but would love some suggestions. We want more unusual names but the most important criteria is that it has to be beautiful.

Oh, and there was some not so good news- baby girl has some cysts on her left kidney. Unless these clear up by the next scan (early June) she faces the loss of that kidney. If the cysts spread to the other kidney (rare from what we hear, thankfully) the condition will be “incompatible with life”.

you can see the three cysts here (poor thing) The worst thing is that there is nothing we can do but wait for the next test, and even then there is little that can be done.

And the West family grows by one...

Exciting stuff- baby number five is en route! Having now heard the heart beat and seen the images, there is definitely a baby (one baby) in there. Due date is 29^th/30^th August (ambiguity because this is a leap year and we do not think that the midwife adjusted for this in her calculation).

We are all booked in to Bassetlaw hospital for midwifery care and the birth. This is a great hospital- not too big and so very clean. Even taking into account the recent news article about a set of babies being mixed, we loved this hospital with Micah and so look forward to coming away with some more great birthing memories and (hopefully) the correct child… no Coronation Street story lines for us please!

We are looking for names at the moment- feel free to suggest additions to the shortlist.

Biggest UK Quake in years... hits us!!!

Well last night we had a earthquake measuring 5.4, it was crazy we were woken up just before one in the morning.

The whole house shook, and there was a loud noise... but true to the West nature all the children slept through it!!

Gainsborough (were we live) was the worst hit town with the most damage!!

Our house managed to escape without too much damage however Lara's bedroom and our living room (which had been freshly plastered just 4 years ago) have suffered some significant cracks.

So looks like those finished rooms are going to have to be done all over again!!!

administration in the Kingdom of God a.k.a. the closure of the Retford Branch

Today, during the Worksop branch conference, the Retford branch was formally closed, with west of the Trent becoming part of Worksop branch and everything else becoming part of Lincoln Ward. There were a few last minute expressions of dissatisfaction, but ultimately I think that everyone will get on well in the new units- all the active members have solid testimonies and huge amounts of gospel knowledge. Change is hard. We have only been in the branch for five years but still found it sad to say good bye to the friends that we had there- some of the members have been in the branch for twenty-plus years.

Being part of the eastern Trent-basin, the West family, as well as a further three active families, are now members of the Lincoln Ward, Nottingham Stake.

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Out of the branch, we are probably the least concerned about the change- nearly everyone else has only ever been in small branches and so have quite a bit of fear about what they will find. Being in a small branch means that you will always have a calling and will always be relied upon. It is a scary thing to suddenly be in a larger ward where you can go through long periods without callings and you need to move the comfort zone out to meet new people… That is the scary thing for me… apart from the long periods of time without the calling- that sounds fun!

Although, that said I have yet to serve in the Youth organisation- since leaving Young Men’s myself, I have served in primary, branch presidency, elders quorum, clerk, Sunday school and ward mission… as well as a couple of stake auxiliary presidencies and the usual mission positions. Youth or Primary would be awesome… or I could just be a Home Teacher for ages… while I live in hope, I fear that my Heavenly Father has other plans.

The new Indiana Jones movie is coming...

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Not a great title but exciting stuff for the Indy fan. We are all praying for a movie spectacular rather than a Rambo flop.

Micah is One!

I can hardly believe that Micah has turned one. It seems like only a week ago that Becky was waddling around praying that he would come out. Where does the time go?

Micah is now a cheeky little monkey who loves to wrestle with his dad (more like jump on his head or whack him with the TV remote) or play with his siblings.

While not walking yet, Micah is speedy with his crawling. He has just started to stand unsupported, so we are hopeful that toddling will ensue shortly…

Christmas Day 2007 in Pictures

A happy New Year to you all. With wonder as to what this new year will bring, I have been reminiscing the year gone by. A new child, more kids starting school, church burning down… a lot of crazy events! Here’s to a new year… I wonder what it will bring?

Christmas day was awesome. Too many presents again- less per child but more as a total (Santa keeps forgetting that we are a family of six now so space in our front room is at a premium). Maybe he will remember next year (especially as presents for the older ones become more expensive but less bulky).