RETIREMENT/BITTER-SWEET

37 Years

Well, John finally did it! But he is finding that retirement is bitter sweet.....sweet, because he retired, bitter because he accepted a job with a defense contractor. So he is still working 10 hours a day and is only 30 feet away from his old office. For thirty seven years he has worked hard to make our family warm and secure and he continues to do so. He is still a member of the Army National Guard attending weekend drills until this coming August (I am also very proud of him for the sacrifices he has made those many, many, many, many, weekends.)

He is my Hero!

General Tarbet congratulating John for his outstanding service

Major Fitzgerald honoring John with the "Minute Man" trophy

Colonel Norton congratulating John and wishing John good luck in his new job

Family members listening to all the great things that were said about John.
They also presented me with a beautiful bouquet of Flowers. Then we all went to lunch. It was a wonderful retirement program and we were very proud of John.

IT'S TIME FOR CAROLING

HAPPY HOLIDAYS

It's that time of year again. I love singing with this great group of people. They are so talented and we have so much fun at our practices. I really feel privileged to be a part of this group. Tonight is our first performance and I am really excited to get started. We have four concerts, tonight, tomorrow night, Sunday at the tabernacle on temple square and next Thursday we do a benefit for "The Road Home" we collected more than $6,000.00 last year for this charity. I really feel like our music brings out the best spirit of Christmas in so many ways.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!

I am grateful for:

John - Who has worked so hard all his life to make my life and his kids lives comfortable and safe. A man of few words, but his actions speaks volumes for his character. He makes my life complete.

Natalie -A Hard working school teacher who deserves a pat on the back, a talented pianist, wonderful mother and wife. Jay her great husband and great father has more creative ideas and knows how to put them to use than anyone I have ever seen.

Brandt - Man of the hour, landing a 7 million dollar job for his company this last week. A great father, husband and jokester all in one. His wife Soupie literally going to the ends of the earth to deliver Tayler Marie. A wonderful mother of two sweet girls.

Shannon - Ms. community representative, who will make her neighborhood a better place, a fantastic licensor for her company and fun mother to her two boys. Larry her talented husband has such a great imagination and gives his boys lots of opportunities to explore their own imaginations.

Michael - Mr. Police Officer, a man who deals with the "not so pleasant things in life," but still has strong convictions of making the world a better place. A great dad, a loving husband to a wife who keeps him grounded. Nicole the miracle worker on the internet knowing how to find good deals. A wonderful mom and an excited mommy to be with #3.

Grandpa & Grandma Strong - Who keep us young, I want to be that active when I am their age.

My Greatest Blessings Call Me Nana

Carlee, Collin, Dresden, Sydney, Logan, Savannah, Cole and Tayler

I love reading all the friends & family blogs, you are all so awsome!

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving with all the trimmings!

Our Young Women and Young Men went to the taping of the Young Women/Young Men celebration(actually our Young Men didn't make it because they were too late). The audience (us) got to be a part of the broad cast. It was long, but I think it was worth it. We almost didn't make it. The Jazz were playing and there were thousands of YW/YM so the streets were packed with cars. We waited for a red light twice without moving so I made the girls and YM president get out of the car and hike it to the conference center. I was really lucky to get a parking place in a parking lot southwest of the conference center, the guy was just letting everyone in, I think he gave up on who could park in the parking lot. I had a ticket to park three blocks away, but he just let me in anyway. I ran to the conference center. Thank Heavens for texting. I found the girls and made it just in time. I don't think we were taped because we were clear up on the left side of the balcony, but at least we can say we were there. I was so impressed with the enthusiasm of these kids.. They blew me away! I love our new theme for 2009. I am so excited to be with these young women, they are great girls everyone of them! I miss the primary kids, but I am loving these young ladies.

Change Is Good

When we moved into Willow Canyon 1st ward John and I felt right at home. John is in the High Priest Leadership and they put me into Primary as the chorister. My life has been blessed for being a part of those children's lives. I loved every minute of the time I spent preparing and presenting the songs to those children. We have been working so hard on the new songs for the Sacrament Meeting Primary Program and the kids are doing so well. I never in a million years thought that I was not going to be a part of this program.......but, I was wrong, I was called to be in the Young Women's program, can you believe that? I still can't believe what has happened. An Old 60 year Old Grandma. I guess that's where I need to make some changes......I have become a "Rocking Chair Grandma," not to say I don't enjoy rocking my Tayler to sleep, I can't wait for those moments, but I have put myself into the category of Old Folks......shame on me......there is wisdom in Heavenly Fathers plans and I know I will enjoy spending time with our wards young women who by the way can talk very intelligently..........FOR SURE........my kind of language!

I will miss those little darlings, and today just added to it when I heard those sweet primary children singing in General Conference. Some of those songs are the songs the children are learning for the Sacrament meeting program. Oh well life goes on.....It will be nice to sit in sacrament meeting and not worry about the songs. I can just sit back and enjoy their angelic voices, that will be sweet!

CALIFORNIA KIDS

So here are our Cally Kids! Aren't they so cute! I had so much fun with them when I babysat them while their parents went on a great trip. This was Sunday, Aug. 31st. We went to church and had a great time! When Wednesday came around we had Spaghetti Dinner, that's a tradition! Savannah was thrilled to think she got to be a part of the Strong Wed. night fiasco.

I let Savannah and Cole have a picnic up in their play house, I learned quickly that tuna fish is not Savy's favorite sandwich, we changed it quickly to cold cuts.

We spent a few days at the park. It is really nice and the kids had a lot of fun. A really nice lady took this picture, she wanted to know if Nicole needed a Nanny, she thought the kids were really cute. Cole wasn't too happy about being placed in a tree.

But he sure likes the swing.

Our favorite place was the water features at the shopping center. The first time we went I learned quickly who was in charge. Not me! After I realized that wearing water shoes or not really didn't matter, we all had fun! We went there three times during the week.

I think the most fun part of my trip was spending time playing princes board games with Savannah and reading spider man to Cole before bedtime. I miss those moments the most!

Let the Roofing Begin!

While the rest of the world are watching the Olympics, we are having an olympic marathon of our own! With family members running up and down the ladder, crowbars and hammers in hand. The sun beating down and sweat pouring off everyone hoping that the roofing will be done.
These pictures do no justice. The hard work and many hours have been trying for everyone, but the kids came to our rescue, helping us take off two layers of shingles and replace wood as well as put down particle boards, starting over has been overwhelming but everyone pitched in with out complaining. Now we are ready to start shingling. Yeah!

We Love Having Our Family Visit

We are so excited to have a new queen size bed in our guest room. So will all of our visitors! The bed was given to us by Nat and Jay, they bought a new king and they were nice enough to give us their queen. So our little California kids and our St. George, Arizona and Texas families will have a much nicer bed to sleep on. We're still working on the shower, but promise it will be done maybe after we get the roof on. It's been a very busy summer, with working on a shed under the old deck and wanting to build a new deck off the kitchen, but for now we need a new roof. The Deck may have to wait, we'll see.

Another Year Older

August 9th, John celebrated his birthday by going to guard, helping Brandt and Shannon with windows and sprinkling systems and going to bed. But we made up for it on Sunday the 10th. We had dinner and a birthday cake. Happy B Day! We really do appreciate you and love you lots!

"Space Sisters"

So John and I went to Byron Putnams wedding reception, Wednesday night. It was great! We loved visiting with family. Vince, Jean and Gloria came up from St. George for the evening. The funny thing was Jean, Gloria and I were wearing black and white, Jean and I had on black and white polka-dotted skirts and Gloria had on a floral/polka-dotted blouse. Honest, we didn't call each other up and plan it out. Probably no one else even noticed, but I did. Vince calls us the "space sisters." Vince, we may be ditsy but we are well coordinated. I do remember one time when I went to St. George, it was for some church thing on Sunday. Jean and I had on the exact same dress. This was when I was very heavy and I made Jean go change because I didn't want people to notice the fat lady next to the skinny lady in the same dress. Do you remember that Jean?.......Oh wait a minute we need to get Jean blogging.....somebody help her out!

FLOWERS & BUTTERFLIES

When we were up on Ephraim Mountain we saw the glorious spring/summer flowers, they are at the end of their bloom, but still beautiful. I Especially enjoyed watching the butterflies flying all around. They were spectacular! There were three different ones that I could pick out. Only one Monarch out of the hundreds we saw, but there were some others that I thought were just as beautiful. The one I posted was my favorite, but there was another one I liked too, they were little orange ones that were spotted almost like a leopards skin. Anyone know their names and how I can start my own butterfly garden?

ARE YOU JUST "'BEARLY" HOLDING ON'?

It's funny how we begin to appreciate life more as we get older. Johns dad, 81, has been saying good by and patching up old relationships for the last couple of months. It is making the grand kids nervous, John angry, and me melancholy. His health has been borderline lately, but it seems to us that he is literally talking himself into dieing. Mike called him from California the other day and he said that the conversation left him feeling like Grandpa was saying his final goodbyes. We have always loved visiting Ephraim, but the kids are getting as crazy as Grandpa. He is making them feel an urgency to visit. John and I decided to take a little trip down on Friday, without know that Brandt and Soupie were doing the same. Shannon knew we were going down and decided she wanted to pack up the boys and go down after work (Larry has been out of town the last couple of weeks and when he goes, Shannon adventures out with the boys so they can play too...Good for you Shannon!) Natalie and Jay want to go in a couple of weeks, this week they had Grandpa Bob and Grandma Jo in town. We took the ATV's and John took Brandt, Soupie and Carlie up the Canyon to see the tree that Grandpa Bill carved his name into along with the information that he had spotted a bear.......I should say he chased the bear on his ATV until the bear stopped in his tracks and turned around to face him....Grandpa decided to turn around and head out of there. So they got to see the tree, then Shannon came up and the next day we did the same thing over again. It was nice to see Grandpa and Grandma and spend some time.

BEAR LAKE

We had a fun weekend with family members. Most of the kids were at Bear Lake with us, actually Natalie and Jay planned the trip and we all just invited ourselves. Thanks Nat and Jay for letting us crash your party!

Soupie and Tayler at the KOA pool
Carlee and Brandt preparing the camp fire for a hot dog dinner and smores
Sitting around the camp fire roasting marshmallows
Playing at Bear Lake (North Shore)
Jays Dream House (according to Natalie) Brandts "freehand" Sand Castle

RIGHT PLACE - RIGHT TIME

Hi everyone! What a great experience I had today. This morning I went to get my hair done out by Soupie and Brandts, they live by the new Oquirrh Hills Temple that is getting built. when I drove by the temple, they were just hoisting up Angel Moroni onto the steeple. What a thrill! There were a lot of people watching and taking pictures. Channel 2 news was flying around so I tried to take a picture with my cell phone(another hurdle to jump over), I don't know if I got it or not.....anyone know how to find it on my cell? Don't laugh, at least I'm trying to become more savvy.

Hard to teach old dogs new tricks

I'm still learning how this blank, blank, blogging thing works!

I'm a Blogger

Horray! Shannon set my account up for me. More to come......