News of Randy and Me

Randy at Antelope Island

The Great Salt Lake

Me at Antelope Island

We celebrated Valentine's Day by spending a weekend in SLC at Little America. We also took a trip to Antelope Island on the Great Salt Lake. Nothing much to see there except a few buffalo. It smells really bad there. I know they do have great sunsets there but we weren't there at the right time for that. Tina and Kipp took us to brunch and we enjoyed the time we spent with them.

We are tired of winter and can't wait until the weather warms up and we can go camping again. Also, Randy's cat, Blue Boy, is very sick. We don't know how old he is and he may be dying of old age. He has been losing weight and right now he prefers to be alone. We are taking him to the Vet today.

That's about all the news wer have for now. Hope everybody is doing good.

Savannah's Birthday

Can you believe it? Savannah is already 6 years old! We celebrated her birthday with cake and ice cream at my house on Saturday. She is such a cute girl! She enjoyed her presents and also enjoyed miniature golf at Trafalga. MattieJo and Riley, cousin and friend attended as well.

Happy Birthday Savannah. You have such a cute smile.

Girls Night Out

I, with three of my girls, enjoyed a wonderful night out on Friday. Tina and Tammy treated me and Monica to a birthday treat. We ate at Benihana's and on to the Capitol Theater to see CARMEN, (opera.) A wonderful night of catching up, food and music. Thanks to Tina and Tammy for the wonderful gift!

My New Diamond Ring Set

Randy's Gift to Me Christmas 2009

The Holidays with Family

Pugsly, Tammy and Charlie's Pug

Randy with Jaden


Jaden and Kelly

Randy enjoying his crab at Tammy's house

Randy and Me at Ruby River with Tina and Kipp

Kipp and Tina at Ruby River

Me with Marty and Cherise before Christmas at the Pizza Pie Cafe

Before Christmas we visited with Marty and then Tina and Kipp took us to Ruby River. Tina gave me a key chain that I can put digital photos on and she gave Randy a $50 gift card to Chevron. Marty and Cherise gave me a Precious Moments Strawberry Shortcake doll. They know I collect Precious Moment dolls. Tammy gave me and Randy a calendar with family photos on it and that just precious. Matt gave us a Olive Garden gift card. Kathy and John gave us calender. Jennifer and Rob gave us a Felix the Cat clock, shirts, candy and bath stuff. And Randy gave me a new wedding ring set and a mixer.

For New Year's Day, we enjoyed a wonderful meal prepared by Charlie and Tammy. We enjoyed rib eye steaks and crab. Matt and Kelly were there too. So were all the dogs. We had a wonderful time. I got really good news too: Matt and Kelly are expecting a baby boy.

We wish you all a very Happy New Year!

Christmas, Seattle and Family News

The ocean at Ocean Shores from the balcony of the hotel

Our visit with Chris

Our Christmas Eve goodies

The star on the building in downtown Seattle

The caroler's in Downtown Settle Christmas Eve

The hustle and bustle of downtown Seattle on Christmas Eve

The carousel in downtown Seattle on Christmas Eve

On the way to Seattle by the Columbia River (in the distance is MT Hood)

Jennifer's fireplace all lit up on Christmas Eve

Randy with Odin one of Jennifer's foster kitties

We had a wonderful holiday season although an expensive one. We decided to go to Seattle for Christmas and we took the Suburban because it has 4-wheel drive and thought we might need it because of the snow, and we did have snow but not until the way back. That is where our main expense was. The Suburban is a very hungry vehicle and should only be used to take us camping in a not so far away place. But we were glad to have it because it did help with the snow and roads on the way home. But from now on, we will just take our little Elantra and probably won't be able to do Christmas far away from now on. The ride to Seattle was wonderful and clear and we could see MT Hood on the way to Portland.

We did have very good weather on the way there and all the time while we were in Seattle. We enjoyed visiting with Jennifer and Rob and the kids. They were perfect hosts. Jennifer had two foster cats that we really enjoyed. We enjoyed going downtown Seattle for Christmas Eve and people watching. There were many people downtown and there was a Christmas carousel and all kinds of street music and it really put us in the holiday spirit. We also saw Avitar in 3D on Christmas Eve. On Christmas Eve we enjoyed goodies and the Jennifer's traditional Christmas Eve show of A CHRISTMAS STORY. One Christmas day, we enjoyed a pork shoulder that Jennifer made. While visiting, she also made an Irish stew.

Jennifer also took us to a holiday program in Seattle where we got to celebrate the nativity with a Catholic nun and the program was quite fun since the took people from the audience and made them dress in the nativity clothes and play the nativity characters.

Rob and Sid took off for NYC on Christmas night and so the spent the rest of the time with Jennifer and Zoe and also visited my brother Chris in Kent WA. He has lots of stories to tell us because he travels all over the world for his job. Chris and Elaine gave us a gift certificate for honey baked ham.

One the way home, we stayed on the ocean at Ocean Shores in WA at the Shilo Inn. We were very close to the ocean and could see the waves and the sunset. Our suite was wonderful with three TV's and a balcony. However, the bed was very hard.

On the way home, we hit a bad storm coming from Portland Oregon and it was really bad and wad to stop early and the next day the roads were very slick and lots of cars had slid off. We were lucky with the 4-wheel drive. We made it home safely one day later than planned.

We had many more experiences but it would take many pages and time to tell them all. We wish to thank everyone who helped make our season so wonderful and now it's back to the same old thing but we are glad for our home and the blessings we enjoy and look forward to the New Year and to warmer weather for camping.

Wishing You All a Very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Merry Christmas to all my friends and Family

Little Cash


Me and some of Marty's Family
We enjoyed a nice pizza dinner with Marty and his family.

We will soon be on our way to Seattle. Since we won't be here for Christmas, We want to wish all of my family a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Thanksgiving 2009

Randy and His Thanksgiving Feast



Savannah and Grandpa Randy


John and Kathy Enjoying Their Feast

We had a great Thanksgiving. But big feasts do not exactly go with my digestive system. There was so much food and it was all very good. But I could only eat one helping and couldn't even eat any pie afterwards. Charlies makes a good turkey and Tammy makes good stuffing yams. Randy did a lot of the grunt work in the kitchen. He kept everything in order, cleaned up and did most of the dishes. I enjoyed having family over and the great food, but Thanksgiving is kind of wasted on me because I just can't eat all that food!


Tammy's Yams: Yummy

I Am Thankful....

This Thanksgiving, I am very thankful for my health, my security and my family. I have many blessings. I often do not appreciate all that I have. I have a tendency to look at negative other than positive things.

I am thankful that I was raised by loving parents. We didn't have much in the way of material things but we had love and many happy times together. My parents taught me great values and hard work.

I am also thankful for my children. All of them are very successful and responsible people. I could not have asked for better children. I am thankful for my Alex and the hard work and all of the talents he gave us while he was alive. I miss him very much. He was always there for me even though we had our trials. His life was way too short. But he left us with many wonderful memories and things to treasure. He left me with security and I am sorry he had to go through so much only to lose it by an untimely death.

I am thankful for Randy, my husband. He is very special. His life was so much different than mine and I am learning to have understanding of those people who are not just like we are. I am sorry he has so much physical pain to live with every day. He has had pain most of his life. He keeps plugging on and helping me to have a life worth living. I wish I could do more to help him but like it was with my mother, I just can't take all his pain away. Would that I could.

I have a nice warm home, a loving family, food to eat, a nice warm bed, a shower, clothes to wear and fairly good health. There are many in this world who do not enjoy these things. I am truly blessed.

Halloween 2009

We had a great Halloween at Matt's house. He really goes all out. He has fog machines, bubble machines, graveyards, witches, ghouls, bats, you name it. And great Halloween sound effects and music too. He even dressed his dogs up ant took them Trick or Treating! Randy even dyed his hair green for the occassion!!

Zion's Park

The Great White Throne

We enjoyed a week at Zion's National Park. The park is so beautiful. We took a ride on the shuttle and also ate at the restaurant at the Zion Lodge. We saw a 3-D movie and also went to a movie in Hurricane Utah. We also went to a Chinese buffet with Tammy and Charlie who were in St. George to see a production at the Tuachan Theater. The weather was beautiful at first but a cold front came in later in the week and the wind was miserable.

We really enjoyed our trailer and nice and warm furnace we have in it. We had electricity in the park but no water or sewer. We had to fill up with water at the entrance and we ran out because I needed to wash my hair and take a shower. (I don't like to go out with flat hair) So we had to unhook everything and go fill up again. We were right by a water faucet but the park manager would not even let us hook up a hose and fill up even though it would have taken only 10 minutes or less. Because Randy has a lot of arthritis pain, I think we had better find a park in the future with full hookups because of the work he has to go to. In the government parks in Timpanogos we can come home a couple of times a week so that we can shower at home so this is OK when we camp that way. But when we can't come home for a long time, we really need full hookups. I guess we should have gotten a motorhome to make it easier on Randy. But motorhomes are so expensive unless you get a really old one or buy a really small one.

We would like to winter in a warm place but we would have to leave before the snow flies because if we leave later, the weather is too unpredictable and we might get caught in a bad storm and that would not be good with a trailer. Anyway, it is better just camp close by as it is cheaper as the gas mileage is really bad with the Suburban and trailer. The Suburban isn't too bad when not pulling the trailer.

We met some nice folks in Zion. One couple from Canada who were originally from New Zealand. They were very friendly. It seems folks from other countries are much friendlier than our fellow Americans. We did have a good time despite a few setbacks.