From Julie

Please post for Dean and Lili how I've always loved them. The first time I met Lili was when my brother brought her home to meet the family, I instantly loved how comfortable and special she made me feel. That feeling has never changed and has grown into a deep appreciation and sisterly love. My brother on the other hand has always been my hero and he too has always made sure that I know how well loved I am.

I cherish each conversation that we have. I am the most fortunate sister on the planet to have such an amazing Brother and Sister-in-law. I am in total awe of the wonderful family they have raised and continue to nurture and love each and everyone.

From the Luckiest Sister on the Planet
Julie

From Ethan

Well Dad and Mom, you’ve arrived at a forty year marker of your love. Wow! That is so awesome. I can’t wait until I find the girl that I’m going to spend the next forty years with. I heard it said recently that the sum of a parent’s success, and I would add the success of a marriage, is evidenced in how their children have turned out. No amount of money, wealth, fame or power can account for a failure in the home. I just have to say that even with me in the mix, you two have done exceptionally well.
With the kind of parenting that you displayed we were always able to store away knowledge and develop habits and personalities that we would be able to use wisely in the future. I am so happy to have always had the privilege and blessing of growing up in a home where Christ is at the head with my parents at His side. I am grateful to the two of you for always teaching us just principles and ordinances of the gospel through your examples and one on one teaching. I am grateful to you, Dad, for righteously leading our family in the priesthood for the past forty years and to you, Mom, for righteously leading by teaching us how to follow the direction of the Savior and our earthly father, and how to lead as a companionship. What better lessons could be taught to your children?
I’m grateful for Dad always teaching us to respect our mother, sisters and women in general. I’m grateful to Mom for teaching us how to respect a righteous priesthood holder like Dad. grateful for learning that love notes hidden throughout a house and car can be big part of keeping love in a marriage. I’m grateful to know that it’s okay to let your kids see you kiss and hug your wife before you go to work and throughout the day just because. I'm grateful to have seen that it's okay to have disagreements in a marriage as long as you talk through them and make up. I’m grateful to know that a good way to strengthen a marriage is to pray and read the scriptures as a couple and with your kids. I’m grateful for family home evenings and family scriptures study, but most importantly being able to hear the testimonies of my parents as we studied the gospel together. I’m grateful to have learned how to be a good home teacher from my first companion, Dad. I’m grateful for learning how to not cut corners and to do the job right the first time from both of you guys in scouting, church, work and life. I’m grateful for family camping trips and knowing where I get my wild adventurous side from, what you didn’t think that we knew you would sneak off to go skinny dipping sometimes Dad? I’m grateful for parents who truly established a house of learning through their open mindedness, don’t discount the show of character it was for a white farm boy from Idaho to have an interracial marriage with a cute Latina from Mexico. You taught us to look at the world, not just where we live. When we had questions, you supplied encyclopedias and National Geographics (Yes it took us a while to get internet.) to us. Thank you for showing us how have gratitude for the things we have. Thank you for Hobbits and Elvish songs. Thank you for mended holes in the knees of my jeans all through grade school. Thank you for gardens. Thank you for blessings at the beginning of the school year. Thank you for always being worthy to give blessings when we needed them. Thank you for correcting my grammar. Thank you for making me my favorite food and letting me watch ‘Ferris Beuler’s Day Off’ when I stayed home sick from school. Thank you for waking up early to take me to seminary. Thank you for taking me T.P.-ing to help me fit in with my new friends. Thank you for going to work everyday even when every muscle in your body hurt and still working your hardest so that we could have food to eat and a house to live in. Thank you for always encouraging my talents and helping me to find new ones. Thank you for putting up with my constant talking and extreme opinions. Thank you for shopping from store to store with me for hours to find the jacket I had to have cause all the “cool” kids had one and then doing the same thing all over again to help me find clothes for my mission.Thank you for all the "ear cuts". Thank you for teaching me that family is the most important and how to be a good sibling even when I wasn’t always the best. Thank you for baptizing me. Thank you for being married in the covenant. Thank you for making the sacrifices that you did so that I could grow up where I did with privileges and opportunities that I did. Thank you for homemade bread. Thank you for making popcorn and carob milk to eat while we watch ‘Indiana Jones’ with a generator because the power went out one winter. Thank you for teaching me accountability for my actions. Thank you for making me always share a room with a brother. Thank you for teaching me how to work. Thank you for trips to the beach. Thank you holding me when I scraped my knee and cried. Thank you for explaining the “facts of life” to me, some parents don’t do that. Thank you for tamales and manger pageants at Christmas. Thank you for a wooden rocking horse made by hand. Thank you for family conversations with us all piled on the bed in the “family room”. Thank you for showing me how to love. Thank you for showing me how to forgive. Thank you for showing me how to serve. Thank you for teaching me how to respect sacred things. Thank you for leading me and guiding me and walking beside me. Most of all thank you for loving me.
For these and a myriad of other reasons both personal to me and to all of your other children, you have shown us how to have a successful marriage. Thank you for your example. I hope that I can follow in your footsteps and pray that you have many more great years of marriage for me and my children to learn from and enjoy being a part of. I love you Dad, I love you Mom.

Love,

Ethan

They're AWESOME Grandparents!

Eden and Papa Dean meeting Mikkel at the airport after his mission

Lili Mom with Bria and baby Eden right after her birth


Papa Dean and baby Isaac (July 2000)

Lili Mom and baby Isaiah

Cousins having fun at the family reunion

I want you to know that I thank my Heavenly Father regularly for the great blessing of Kirsten in my life and that she was raised in such a good home with wonderful parents. I am so thankful that our children can also have such wonderful grandparents. I can not express in words how grateful I am to be a part of your family. Your awesome examples, attitudes and resilience have taught and continue to teach me.

Happy Anniversary!!

Love,
Dan

Best Parents

On the subject of raising children and good parenting: I always tell people the same thing. There is no perfect way to raise kids. My parents were pretty close though. All through my childhood I frequently saw mom and dad reading their scriptures, and on their knees in prayer. What better example can a child have? I didn’t always know it, or fully appreciate how well mom and dad took care of us. Now that I am older and know a little more about life, I can see that we had it pretty good.

They made sure that we lived in an area where the church is strong, and the schools are exceptional. We received well balanced nutrition. We often ate things like stir-fry, and fajitas. As a child I didn’t ever appreciate stir-fry. Now that I know some about health and nutrition I eat stir-fry all the time. Still not a favorite, but I know it’s good for me. We always had fresh fruits on the kitchen counter.



A lot of this I took for granted for a long time. It all sounds like little things until you see kids that don’t have quality books in their schools, healthy food to eat, or enough kids their age to make the church programs enjoyable. I’m grateful for all that mom and dad have done to make sure we had the best possible childhoods. Yeah they are pretty much the best

From Sunshine Far Away But Grateful

This is parts of a talk I have given (twice now) about families:

“…I so desperately want my boys to be able to have the kind of parents I have. As I think about what my parents did to ensure that their [family] was strong and unified I realize they did so many things right.

I think the most important thing that any of us can do is to teach and lead by example. I had a boss that used to say I can’t hear what you are saying because your actions are so loud. My parents always had plenty to say but they really, really lead by example. They told us that we should read our scriptures and pray and go to church but they did those things with us. And equally important, we knew that even when we weren’t there they were reading their scriptures and praying and fulfilling their church responsibilities. believed they were slave driving us to do housework and yard work, but we learned how to weed the garden from them, we learned how to clean and organize from them, and we learned that the job isn’t done until all the tools are cleaned and put away.They told us that service is important but then they took us to the church welfare farm to pick corn and grapes at o’dark hundred hours in the morning. My mom fed the missionaries and fixed the holes in their pants. They moved into a different house so that my grandma could live with us for the last year of her life, and ensured that she was as comfortable as she could be. My mom bathed her and fed her, and changed her when she no longer had control over her bladder and bowels. They taught us with words but more importantly they taught us by example.

Another thing my parents did well was to create a safe place where we always knew-no matter what-there were people and an environment that would keep us safe. There were absolutely consequences for wrong choices and bad actions, but I think it was because there was discipline that the environment was possible. My mom was always there, always. And we always knew that our parents loved each other, many times embarrassingly so. Of course now I think it great that they still like to kiss every chance they get. I was told that I was loved every single day. I don’t know if it was a conscious effort on their part but there was no question in my mind that I was very loved. In fact I remember having debates about which kid was loved best. We were all sure it was us because my mom would say things like, “I love you more than any of my other twelve year old girls.”

…Our friends wanted to hang out at our house. I remember being annoyed that my friends wanted to hang with my mom. My parents weren’t just friends with us they were friends with our friends. I was talking to my brother a little while ago and he told me about his friends that came to stay for weeks and months. My parents live in a pretty small house. One time all the bedrooms were so filled up that one of his friends had to sleep under the dining room table. He wanted to be in the safe place my parents had made so badly that he slept under the table for months…

…An invaluable skill my parents instilled in all of their children is a strong work ethic. I believe that one of the reasons my parents made such a strong family is because we worked together…hard and often. I believe that being able to work and not give up is a more valuable skill than being super smart or having a bunch of innate talents. If you know how to work you can learn how to do anything…It is important to know how to work hard because anything worth having has to be worked for…

…I never ever knew how fiercely I would love my children. I want them to be so safe and happy always.”

Now I know how my parents feel about me. Thank you for loving me so much and teaching me the very best you knew how to be a happy, loving, hard working and giving person. I only pray that I will be able to do it for my kids.

Happy, Happy Anniversary-you deserve it! I love you forever

From Patrice

Please let your parents know that I love them and I am so grateful for the example they have been and continue to be to me. What an awesome milestone for them. It is so cute to see them sitting together with your Dad's arm around your mom. We want to be like them when we grow up :)

All our love,

The Frys

Hey Papa Dean and Lili Mom,

We are so happy and proud to be part of your family. Thank you for a gospel heritage and living and working under the covenant. We feel that influence in each and every aspect of our lives as we all grow in our own part of the garden...

A GARDEN'S EXAMPLE

One morning when Dean and Lili were visiting us we awoke to find that Dean had already been up for a few hours digging up our back yard to make a GARDEN!

He mined the rocks and bricks around our house and made a delightful garden enclosure worthy of Better Homes and Gardens.

As we have tended to and harvested the fruits of that charitable act we have been continuously reminded that, while we sleep or are distracted by our daily lives, we have a loving family working behind the scenes and looking out for our needs.

Thanks Lili and Dean for your examples!

Love: Nick

------------------------MORE GARDEN PICS-----------------------

From Gaoa and Bill

This letter is to my very loved sister Lily and "favorite"brother in law Uncle Dean.
Wow!!! Where have all the years gone?....one day I find myself changing my little sister Lily's diapers.... and.. wondering how she could have had such a pointed bald little head... and how can I love her so much, in spite of her funny little head...and what seems like the next day... I find myself congratulating her and her eternal companion on their fortieth year of romance and bliss.

I love you both with all my heart and wish you both, at least another forty times three more. Thank you for all that you have done for my life, the life of my Curtis, Lisa and our Lita.

Hats off to you for sending off 7 (almost 8 ) of your children on a mission...and counting. I have nothing but respect for you two for the wonderful things you brought forth from those 40 years. Oh, yes, we did have a wonderful, extended, honeymoon, with the rest of our family camping, and celebrating some of our kids and family member birthdays, together.

We love you always and forever, Uncle Bill and Aunt "Gaoa"

From Amy

Uncle Dean and Aunt Lili,

Congratulations on your 40th anniversary! Thank you for the wonderful examples you have been over the years and for raising such a beautiful and remarkable family. I am very grateful to be your niece!

All of my love - Amy