We first met Brother Sanderson about six years ago, after we bought our first home in Perry, Utah. He lived alone in a condo directly across the street from our house. He was such a friendly and sweet neighbor and the kids would watch him everyday as he made the trek to his mailbox on the corner. Although he was in his 80s, he was young at heart and the kids loved to go visit him and take him pictures and treats. We adopted him as an unofficial grandpa and he in turn treated us as if we were his own grandchildren. When I was serving as the ward choir director in our ward, Brother Sanderson was one of the most faithful members of our choir and it was always so comforting to see him smiling at me encouragingly at every choir practice. When we decided to move away, we were very sad to leave our dear neighbor. During the moving process, he welcomed us into his home on many occasions and gave us a place to be as we were packing and transitioning. The kids and I stayed behind for a couple of months so that I could be in Pirates of Penzance at the Heritage Theatre and Brother Sanderson was one of my biggest fans, coming to see the play two different times. After we were gone, he continued to send cards for every birthday, mother's day and Christmas including dollar bills for all of us as he did for all of his grandchildren. Over the past few years we have been able to go back to Perry and visit and we always enjoyed these visits. The kids especially enjoyed making balloon animals, playing the thimble game and nibbling from Brother Sanderson's "bird feeder". Brother Sanderson was a great example of someone who served faithfully in the church and it was obvious that he had always done so. Even though he had quite a bit of family close by, he always made us feel so special and so loved and treated us as if we were his family. We know that he missed his dear wife, Lois, whom he spoke of frequently and that he is now with her and will soon be busy doing the Lord's work on the other side of the veil. Our lives were blessed by him. We loved him and we will miss him.
I found this picture of Eliza and Brother Sanderson at Eliza's fourth birthday party. Eliza requested that Brother Sanderson come to her birthday party at Grandma and Grandpa Shelton's house and he very sweetly obliged.
This little girl definitely took her time deciding to walk. She is finally converted after many of weeks of scooting on her bottom, crawling and walking while pushing around chairs, laundry baskets, Brigham's big dump truck and anything else with wheels. She was officially 20 months old on Monday making her (by far) the latest of our kids to start walking, but she would not be rushed. She has been such an easy going girl, but just recently has learned the word "mine!" which she uses frequently. Some other words she says lately are "shoes", "baby", "doggy", "ruff, ruff!", "come here" and "go!" (mostly she uses this one when she wants someone to leave her alone). Brigham told me a couple of days ago that Hazel needs to have a birthday soon because she is getting to be such a big girl. I'm afraid he's right--my baby is growing up.
