Sunday, June 30, 2013

Of Cows, Cookies, Cake (banners) and Cafe (Rio)

 Yep, another week full of fun and unexpected happening ... first of all there were cows ...

On my way home from walking with LaVern in Genola, I was stopped when a farmer moved his cows from one side of the road to the other ... not something you see everyday, not even in Payson.

Later that day I babysat a sleeping Beckie, so Emily could go and clean a studio apartment that Davin and Bri manage that was coming up for rent ... Emily had taped Coco before Chanel, which I watched and liked a lot. (My kids know me so well!)

 Tuesday morning my visiting teachers came, which is always a great way to start the day.  Then I met my friend Stacy, above, at Dear Lizzie's in Highland for lunch ... always a good time. I am to the right.

When I got home I did a couple of visiting teaching visits, before taking over Grandpa's care and feeding, so that Dad could do his last shift at the temple for a while.  6 weeks to be exact.
 I worked on Wednesday, as usual, and spent some of my time there making this banner for Stacy, she had seen a 'cake' banner at Dear Lizzie, but had choked on the $40 price tag ... (Of course I also got a Pollyanna blog post out of the deal!)  That night I finished reading our ward book club book, so I could pass it along to Emily.

Thursday morning I was off to work again.  This time I spent my spare time there making envelopes out of fancy papers.  It was pretty fun.  When I got home that night Dad had made dinner, bless his heart.  I had book club here that night, which is always fun.
 Friday morning Emily came over to pick up grandpa.  Beckie first grabbed a tomato off the table, I think she thought it was a nectarine, but since I had one of those, I traded her ... she loves them, so cute.
 I met up with my cousin Debbie at her daughter Mellisa's house in Lehi.  They are doing Debbie's youngest daughter's wedding reception next month, and Melissa had posted on face book that she needed some old lace and pearls, both of which I have in spades, so I gathered them all up and headed north.  It was great to get to visit with Debbie for a bit, and also to see Melissa make these cookies that are made from a cake mix with an egg and a square of butter.  So pretty and yummy too!

That night Dad and I met up with the Kews and went to see '42' the movie about the first black baseball player to play in the major league.  We both actually loved it.  Then we headed to Café Rio for dinner.  Always fun to get together with them.

On Saturday Dad took of to run in a 5K with Trevor for one of Trevor's friend's who has cancer.  I went to a few garage sales

.  Then in the afternoon, I put together the items above for a photo shoot for my reclaimologist and other crafty chicks postings.  I have contracted to post once a week, and its nice to have a deadline.

Dad ran to Home Depot to buy some new box fans as it is so hot here, almost a hundred every day all week.

I stopped by my visiting teaching partner, Andrea's house to drop off a TV tray and stand she had wanted, and which I had.  This is her with her new baby, how fun is that?

Then it was off to Emily's house for a minute where Sam showed us the fish he had caught.  He had some fun stories to tell too.

Becca dropped off her babies at Emily, as we were to watch them overnight, while they, Becca and Brady spent the night in Park City to celebrate Becca's last day of work!!  Of course Becca still watches Grandpa one day a week, manages the rental of a condo, and almost has her Real Estate license. I think it was Bri who said, yep, that is how young mother's get to stay home these days.


 It was fun for Dad and me to watch Titan and Beckie playing in the pool. 
 
Then Emily scooped them up and bathed them and got them ready for bed.  Dad and I ran over to Salem for the wedding reception of the daughter of a ward member, before grabbing some take out for Titan and Aunt Cheryl.  I read a couple of Dr. Suess books to Titan, who is great at being read too, and helps me a lot.



 Sunday morning, Dad let me sleep in, then did everything to get the kids ready for church while I got me ready.  He even made the bed while I was in the tub!!  He's my hero!!  Then it was off to church where both kids were great ... I even snuck this picture of Reagan in Grandpa's arms.

Becca and Brady came and got the kids right after our church, and Dad headed off to his second block of meetings for the day
 That evening we all met up at Trevor and Nell's for faux Café Rio ... yummy, Nell made assignments and it always comes together deliciously.  Ben brought along his friend Hanna for us to meet for the first time.  She will be going to California with us in a  couple of weeks so it was nice to meet her.

 Here are more pictures of my kids and grands interacting.  Love this shot of Ben and Reagan.


 Nell was very popular with the two year olds, upsidedowning them.
 And this is a three generation people stack ... not poor grandpa on the bottom, to the far right.
 Eleanor had just been awakened when we got there and was in the funniest mood all night .... actually quite adorable ... at the end when Trevor and Davin were swinging the little kids, she had just seen them throwing dolls to the ceiling in the blanket as they planned something new for the other kids, so she was worried that they would do that to her and kept saying ... "Don't want my turn!"  So cute!
 What a cute family, eh?
and Trevor looking hot in Dad's bow tie with is plaid shirt and Davin's Hatchet Sun Glasses!

Becca gives kisses to those irresistibly chunky cheeks and its time to take grandpa and head home. 

Sunday, June 23, 2013

Our Missionary Week!

On Monday I walked with Emily and the kids along my favorite nature path in Payson.  Beckie was very distracted by the park, and had a hard time when swinging time was over.
 
Dad called about then saying that the place that was to have fixed his car was now saying it was the transmission ... around and around we go.  Emily drove me there to get the car ....
and Beckie was exhausted from her overt sadness about the swinging ending, so she fell right asleep in the car.  While at the car place Emily called Becca thinking we should hook up since we were so far north (Lindon), but Becca was already on her way to meet Ashley at the McD on 8th north.  We headed there and all of us got there within about a two minute span.  Cool, eh.

 Here are some of my pretty girls!! and Titan too.  While there Dad sent me a cryptic text saying his job was changing in big ways.  I had to suffer and wait until he got home, but I will tell you now so you won't have to suffer like I did.  They have added center store supervision for the southern region to his plate, a job that was full time for the guy that had it, this was added to his other two or three responsibilities (formerly done by another two guys) ... Whoa Super Dad!! (He is actually very excited and Emily is a little jealous, she said when she worked at Macey's being the boss of all the Grocery Managers was her dream job!)
 
Then we delivered Dad's car to the transmission place in Provo, again, still.  They had to take it to the dealership for approval, again, (last time the dealership had us get a new catalytic converter) and the new transmission was finally approved, bringing a 6 week long odyssey to an end.
 

 Tuesday morning I walked with Emily again, only this time, she walked to a visiting teaching appointment toward the end of the walk, while I watched Beckie at the park, so Beckie go her fill of the swing and everything else at the park.  Much happier baby girl!

Next I was off to Pleasant Grove to take Eva and Scott on a grandma date.  We went to DI and searched for treasures then went to Macey's and got ice cream cones.  We all had a pretty good time, and I cannot believe that I forgot to take pictures.  What was I thinking?

I got home in time to say hi/bye to Dad as he took off for the temple.  I made dinner for Grandpa and Cheryl before heading out for a visiting teaching appointment myself.
That night I was able to face time with Spencer and Brit, while Dad was doing his session at the temple... he felt awful missing it, so we rescheduled for Thursday.
 
On Wednesday I woke up with a tummy ache, not normal at all for me.  I figured I could tough it out at work, not.  I called someone to come in for me, and was back in bed by 1:30 P.M., I slept on and off all afternoon, then in the evening, when Dad got home from a grocer's convention, we face timed with just Spencer, while Brit was at work. (8:00 P.M. here is 7:00 A.M. there the next day.)
 
Thursday morning I was back to being myself, I was up early and managed to get this old tool box planter painted before going for my walk with Ginny, then filled with plants when I got home.  I have been working very hard trying to find homes for all the double flat deal of flowers I got the previous Saturday.

 Then I was off to work.  I felt so great, and got a lot done in my new booth area I am focusing on.

I got a call from a gal from Payson who wanted to sell me some windows, so I dropped by there on the way home ... she was so interesting.  She is a glass mosaic artist, and is shown above with some of her work.  She is also an amazing gardener and showed me her garden.  When I got home Dad had made spaghetti for us all, such a great Dad! (Brother and son!)
Then after dinner it was off to see Ryan open his mission call!! Hurrah!  He is going to the southern most province in Japan!

 Afterwards we headed over to Maui Chill, which Grandpa loves ... it wasn't exactly torture for me either, and it was fun to see Eric, as it has been at least 10 minutes since we had seen him ... LOL

 

 On Friday I stayed home to fight the fight of the wild rose bush.  I have let it grow for years, but it was really out of control and only blooms for about a week in the spring ... besides it was trying to take over the world.  See it on the right above.  It did not, however, go down without a fight!

I also managed to get the above weather vane ready to sell on the Reclaim-ologist site I belong to.  We are required to list once a week.  I have had this deer for 6 months, and it was time to make it sellable.  The vein did not have an arrow, so I made one out of an old tine ceiling tile, which meant doing some painting to match.
 
That night Dad and I got a movie from Red Box and watched it, while waiting for Spencer and Brit to call again.  We face timed for over an hour.  They had gone to the church early Saturday, as there is WiFi there.  

 On Saturday, I managed to find time, while at work my one Saturday a month, to sew these buttons on these cards I made from a graphic I found on line.  It was a real success for me, as its a project I will do on my Pollyanna blog, and I was NOT doing it at midnight ... something that has been happening too often, just to meet my own self applied deadlines.  I had also hoped to blog about it, having taken my ipad to work, but that didn't happen.  Still I did the blog that night, rather than at midnight on Sunday night.  Good stuff.

Dad worked on the sprinklers mostly, and was there when Emily Wright, a girl in the ward who works at a care facility, came by to shower and shave Grandpa.  Its some money for her, and saves Dad the grief of dealing with it himself.

Then Dad dropped Grandpa off at Emily and Sam's where Sam took this cute picture of Grandpa with Liam.  Then Dad picked me up from work, and we headed to dinner at Café Rio before going to one of his work associates wedding receptions in north Orem.  The man lost his wife to Lou Gehrig's disease about three years ago and just married a gal in his stake whose husband had a heart attack in church last year.

On our way home Sam texted to say we need to come over and see the super moon, the brightest in years.  He has a telescope and it was fun to see the texture of the moon.  He was right, it was super bright!  The we picked up grandpa and headed home.
 
This morning Dad dropped me off at our ward so that I could attend Kevin Stringham's missionary homecoming talk, (He was the only missionary out from our very tiny ward.) and Sunday School, while Dad gave his High Counsel talk to the Spanish Speaking ward, and got Grandpa ready to go to church with us.  Then they picked me up at church and we headed to Salt Lake where ...


Leigh Martinez was having her farewell talk.  She is such a cute girl, and we loved seeing her whole family.  Uncle Clark and Aunt Jo, and all their kids except Brooke, who has moved to Denver, were there.  Jill was there with her baby who was born the day Spencer and Brit got married.  I guess her husband John was called to be bishop three days before she had the baby ... guess the Lord knows how capable she is, and she is almost back to her normal energetic self, despite this sweet surprise of a baby at age 43! The only other family there was two of Bruce's boys, Jon and Matt and their families, but we had fun visiting with them all.



Dad and I and Grandpa then went over to  Kristin's stake center, just behind their house, to watch the missionary meeting that broadcast for High Counsels and Ward Counsels.  We were both pretty touched by it all, the spirit was very strong, I had tears streaming down my face to the point that I was super glad I knew no one there in the meeting ... anonymity definitely has its place!

We stopped on the way home to pick up a car that Davin and Bri are loaning us until Dad's car gets done ... we hope soon.  Everyone has been so great to share!!

So that was our week, full of missionary experiences and family!!  Definitely a good week ... well other than that touch of flu and the attack of the rose!

Sunday, June 16, 2013

Baby Sitting, House Touring and Father's Day Celebrating

 So, while I was walking on Monday morning in Genola with LaVern, we saw these giant weed seed puffs.  Since I had just seen something on Pinterest about burning dandelion fluff and having it burn multi colored, so LaVern pick a bouquet.  When we got back to her house, we went in the garage and closed the door, so we could see if the flames was colored, in the dark.  Then I thought ... here we are like hiding in the garage, light weeds on fire ... so I said, "LaVern, does this mean we are smoking weed?"  See the bad influence Ben is on me? By the way, the big puffs were boring ... guess I will have to wait and try it again with some dandelions.
 
 Becca and Emily met at my house to go couponing, later that morning, and left Beckie and Titan with me, while they went shopping.  I was working like mad on projects for the reclaimologist group I belong to, as we were to have an online sales event that Wednesday.  After the kids were picked up, I had a chance to get some painting done, and was able to style some photos for the sale.

That night Dad brought Trevor and Nell's kids home with him, after work, and we had a fun evening. They were off celebrating their 10th wedding anniversary.

The kids know Grandpa really well, because Nell watches Grandpa two days a week, which I guess means that Grandpa knows them pretty well, though he always calls Scott the cub scout because he often sees him in uniform.

 Here I am playing a game with Eva and Scott.  Eva beat me, but just barely.  Scott was the official banker.
 We got to use our hide-a-bed for only the second time.
 On Tuesday, Dad took grandpa to Becca's, since Trevor and Nell were still away on their get away.  We all walked over to Emily's for play time in the pool and she invited us to ...

 stay for lunch ... the red head is a neighbor girl who saw all the water fun and came over and joined us.

To the right, you can see Eva, with my jewelry fixings as we make a necklace for her mom for her anniversary.  Eva really wanted to make her mom a necklace and chose the components from among my supplies.  She was pretty excited about that.

I also worked on getting sign boards done to make a literary sign post to sell at the reclaimologists event the next day.

Dad brought grandpa home, and I had volunteered to make dinner for a neighbor who just had a baby.  Lots got accomplished before Trevor came and picked up the kids.  We had had a great time.

Dad, of course was off to the temple for the evening.
I finished up the directional sign on Wednesday morning and got my post up just before the event started. The sign sold for $75 within minutes.  I later sold two items out of my group of stuff I had photographed on Monday.  Good sale!  Of course I spent the day at work.  I am still working on changing the one smaller booth into a craft supply sort of place. I have enjoyed doing it so far.
 
That night Dad picked me up from work and we had a quick dinner at Café Rio before heading to the Hale Center theater to see Urine Town, which was fun, energetic and completely inappropriate for our community ... makes me wonder if I like the direction this theater is going. Of course time spent with Heuers and Moes is always good.

 Thursday was another work day for me, but I got someone to come in for the last half of the day so I could take off and go to the old house tour in Provo with Dad. 

This home belongs to one of the men he works at the temple with on Tuesday, who also happened to be in charge of the home tour.  I thought it was amazing.

Of the three homes we saw that night, we knew someone who lived in half of them.  (The other two were customers at the antique store.)

 After the home tour it was off to Maui Chill, Barb and Randy's frozen yogurt shop for Seriously Thursday Night, a program done by KSL radio's Nightside project at local businesses. 

Becca and Brady go to Maui Chill about once a week, so they came to help celebrate, as did Emily and her date.

To the right is Emily, Barb and Dad.
 In this picture of Randy, you can see the Night Side guys set up and broadcasting in the background.
 Robin and Jake came over and joined us for a while .... which made it even more fun, of course.


 
 Please note that Liam and Reagan are holding hands in the picture above, how cute is that?

.... and it was finally Brady that got a cute smile out of Reagan ... look at her cute Shirley Temple dimple on the right hand side. (her left)

I love their yogurt and mix ins and we all had a great time ... but eventually it was time to go home and blog ... which I finished up in time to go to bed at 2:30 A.M. ... yawn!
 I was up early on Friday and off to go junking in Salt Lake with LaVern.  We ran into Tom, Brittany's father-in-law at this estate sale not to far from his home, which turned out to be a good thing, because I bought an enormous cement fountain, which he helped me load into the van!

 Later, while LaVern and I were having lunch at Café Rio, Dad called to say he was having problems with the fuel injectors on his car, and needed me to stop on the way home and pick him up at the repair place in Lindon.  Here LaVern is shown rearranging the loot to make room for another person!!

When we got home, he let me take a nap while he mowed the lawn, how nice is he?

Next it was off to the second evening of home tours in Provo, which we also enjoyed very much. 

That evening we got a Red Box movie.  A young couple in the ward was also getting a movie, and were surprised when we got 'Warm Bodies' a zombie movie we had heard good things about.  In the end, the movie was OK, but it was still a zombie movie, and we were not the target audience.!
On Saturday we ran errands and worked on the yard.  I got a great deal on flowers at Hanson's Green House in Benjamin, which was nice, because I still have a lot of work to do in the garden.
 
We finished up the day with another Red Box movie, Guilt Trip, a movie with Barbara Streisand, which we enjoyed quite a bit more than the zombie movie, as we are its target audience.
 
 

 Here he is shown with half of his children, and nine of his fifteen  grandchildren.  
 
 Sunday was typical with us attending our ward, and then Dad attending his other ward.  I spent the afternoon making a special father's day crown for Dad, which he marginally enjoyed, but was good sport enough to wear.
 
 

Here he is shown with Liam opening his gift from some of the kids, a pair of running pants and shoes.  He also received some running socks and a tie.
 

 Here he is with three of his four youngest grandchildren. 

To the right is a great photo bomb by Adilyn, with the help of her father, the original photo bomber.
 We all had a great evening, and it was fun to be able to eat outside and enjoy the antics of the grands! Happy Father's day to the best dad and grandpa ever!