6 months later . . .

It's time for another Hansen posting. Before fall semester began (September 09), Mom was doing a fantastic job of keeping our blog postings current. However, times have changed--and for a good cause. Mom has begun school at BYU again, taking prerequisites for the graduate program in psychology. Daily trips to BYU to TA and be in Women's Chorus, as well as the myriad of tasks at home, have caused our blog to fall by the wayside. Unfortuntately, it didn't dawn on me (Maggie) to keep it up myself until today. So here are some highlights of the last six months:

Mom got into Women's Chorus at BYU! She's a second soprano, and she's doing a great job as the secretary over devotionals. She's also in the middle of graduate school interviews, and hopefully we'll have some news about her educational pursuits soon.

Dad is still running in the mornings, despite rumors that a cougar and her cubs live around Wal-Mart. We'll watch out for shreds of Dad's warm-ups around the temple site if he doesn't come home in time for scriptures one day.

Which reminde me . . .
A temple has been announced in Payson, just a few blocks from our home! The site is next door to a ward building in our stake, and we are really looking forward to the changes it will bring. No more arduous treks to the temple in Provo in our car with a heater!

Mike and Vanessa welcomed Ella Noel into their family on October 25. Mom went out to visit the week after. Grandma and Grandpa Tensmeyer were able to be there for the blessing.

BJ has been called to be the elders quorum president in his ward. He is also working and going to school, as well as accruing an impressive collection of upscale band regalia. Amps, guitars--you name it, he's got them by the dozens. Pretty soon he'll have to rent out Ariel's undersea cavern for all of his whos-its and what's-its galore. And don't get me started on his thing-a-mabobs.

Amelie is doing a great job raising her kiddos. She and Cody purchased a '62 Toyota to fix up. It's gold. It has a Christian fish on the bumper. What a nice addition to their family. We went to Amelie's house for Thanksgiving, where there was a lot of food and a lot of target shooting out back.

I'm still in graduate school, working toward becoming a speech pathologist. This severly limits my discretionary time and my preferred topics of conversation. I generally turn any conversation into a lecture on dysarthria or auditory feedback loops with subtle verbal transitions such as "Did you know that . . ." or "Here's something for you. . . " I've been told that my stress level is contagious, so I should keep it to myself. I'll see what I can do about that. I find out about internship placements within the next month.

Melanie is surviving the onslaught of her last full semester at BYU (besides school in the summer time). She got home safely from her summer trip to Europe, spent Christmas in San Diego with her boyfriend Chris Melear, and is now preparing for her Senior recital on April Fool's day. Be sure to mark it on your calendars if you're in the area.

Nels got a letter from the first presidency in the mail last week. It was a mission call (Duh. The first sentence just seemed like a better transition into a paragraph about Nels), and he opened it at our stake center, with Mom, Dad, BJ, Mell, me, Rachel, Maggie Chu, and Meisha present. Mike and Amelie were on speaker phones. He's headed to Mongolia, Ulaanbataar, on March 17th. 6 weeks to prepare to leave the western hemisphere isn't very long. We're all really excited for him.


Rachel started (and is now finishing up) her senior year. She is in Chamber singers and wowing us all on the bassoon, getting ready to compete at the regional level. She also got accepted to Utah State and will be heading there in August. Now, I know she's not 3 anymore, but really, who told her she could grow up so fast? It wasn't me.

I didn't mean for this to end up sounding like a Christmas card catch-up, but that's what it's like. Given my potentially nebulous audience, I'm struggling to decide how much information needs to be put on here. And certainly each of us has had SOMEthing important happen to us in the last year. It needed to be delineated. Hopefully future posts will read better. Cheers!