Dangerfields visit

This will be a short post. I'm counting on my daughter, Susan, to make the complete report. She took lots of pictures while she was here.
We were very pleasantly surprised when Sue told us they would be coming up to see us this week!
If I have the time line correct; on Monday morning (Memorial day) Sue and Ben decided to travel from their home in the Phoenix area to Utah. They called us on the phone to see if they could come. It's not hard to guess what we said to that! So, they were on the road by that afternoon. That's what I call spontaneous! So fun.
They stayed in Vegas over night and got to our house on Tuesday evening.
Wednesday we must have stayed mainly here at the house (It's all a busy, happy blur).
Thursday we all visited Sues grandma and grandpa (my mom and dad).
Friday we took the kids to a splash park and Thanksgiving point gardens.
Saturday Sues husband, dad and brother went golfing. Sue, the kids, Susans little sister and mom went to a Pixar movie called 'Up'. It was about an old gent who ties balloons to his house and floats away on an adventure.
Susans brother lives in Provo, but he came up several times to see her and to play scrabble and other games with us.

Mom and Dad with their great grandchildren:



Emma watching two squirrels in gr. grandpas tree:



Being a grandma is neat. I just love these little people.

Rhubarb Pie

Today is Memorial day. So far, Joe has worked on the front yard by putting in a dirt barrier around the flower bed. After our big project of ripping out bushes there was nothing to keep the dirt from just washing away. He also added fresh topsoil to the depleted ground.
I made a Rhubarb pie. Dad let me pick some rhubarb from his garden. I put the extra in the freezer, so I can make another one.
I made the crust from scratch and it seems to be pretty flaky. Hooray for success!


While the pie was cooling, Joe and I played a game of Scrabble. We're possibly going to Thanksgiving point to walk and buy flower bulbs.
Thanks for sharing your rhubarb dad!

Memorial Weekend

Hello to my family and friends. Monday is Memorial day, but dad was wise and decided to visit cemeteries today instead and beat the traffic. It was a good plan because there was plenty of traffic anyway, and lots of people with the same idea. There were already lots of pretty flowers and decorations on graves.
I was really happy to get to go along on this venture with my parents. My husband came along too.
I took a small notepad and pen and tried my best to learn more about some of my relatives. I also needed to be reminded as to where some of the people are located.
Most of the pictures that I took will stay on file for my own use. I'll just show a few that may be familiar to some of you.

We started in the Salt Lake City cemetery, as it's very close to mom and dads home. The very first site that we went to was my younger sister; Laurie. We lost her last summer. It's very strange to comprehend.
I have to mention that Dads car trunk was filled with flowers for several graves. He also brought stakes and string to tie up the flower pots. This way they wouldn't fall over.

We also swept and decorated his step-moms grave in Salt Lake. Dad's mom, Beth, passed away when he was 12 (She's in Logan). Later grandpa Smith married Lela, who happens to be Beths sister.
Grandmas plot has 5 pots of flowers on it now; very pretty. I didn't take a picture of her stone though.

Next we drove to Farmington. If cemeteries can be loveable, this one is it. It's small and homey. It's also filled with relatives.
Here we tended to my Great Grandma Robinson; Beth and Lelas mother. Then we went to an older section and took care of people that lived in the 1800's. I'm glad they wrote journals, because I have a good sense of who they were, and I really wish that I could meet them and talk to them.

Here's one that I really like:



This is my other favorite person; Ezra T. Clark. His first wife was Mary S. Clark. We come through her.

These were awesome pioneer people. Their lives were hard, but they were history makers.
Like I said, I'm keeping this post simple. I'm leaving out several grave sites and there are really good stories about the people.

When we finished in Farmington, we drove up to Logan. It's really pretty up there.


I think this first picture is of Grandpa Smiths parents. I didn't write this one in my notepad, so I could possibly have it wrong.
We filled a bucket with water to wash off the stones. Birds must like to hang out on them. Then we swept them off really good. Dad carefully tied up flower pots, everywhere we went. They brought about 15 pots.


Here's my nice mom:


I like this picture the best, because it's just me and my dad. We're standing behind Grandpa Calvin Smiths spot, after we cleaned it up.
I really liked my grandpa Smith. He passed away when I was about 14, but I remember him perfectly. He was very good to us.
We were raised in California, but many summers we came up to Utah to visit grandparents. When we stayed at his house he sometimes walked with my sisters and me down to the local ice cream store and bought us cones. He also kept gum in his pocket for us. When we were really little he would sit in a big chair and let us put curlers in his hair. He was pretty neat.

Before leaving the Logan area, dad took us to the college for some Aggie Ice cream. This ice cream thing is a really good tradition!!
By now the day was getting long and we stopped at Maddox restaurant for the best late lunch ever!! It helped that we were all starving by now.
I had Salmon, mashed potatoes, veggies, rolls, and Shrimp cocktail. It had jumbo shrimp. It's my new favorite menu item.



I thought for sure mom and dad were ready to get rid of us by now, but instead they had us go in their pretty backyard. I picked some of dads rhubarb so I can make a pie on Monday. They're also going to have lots of apples this fall. Yum.
I don't want this to be the longest post in the world, so I'll end here.
Have a nice memorial weekend and don't forget about your loved ones.

Yard Work 2009

Each year we try to tackle one big yard project. Our bulk cleanup date is this Monday. That seemed to get us moving on the yard today.
I'm rather proud of myself for working for 7 hours in the front yard. Joe helped me for at least 3 hours and spent the rest of the time helping clean up our local cemetery. That was a church sponsored project. To be fair, he's out getting supplies to work on our sprinklers so he's not done yet.
Can you believe the size of this pile out on our curb? This includes several difficult stumps with deep and thick roots. I'm not as weak as I look, because I removed at least half of them myself!
These used to be big (ugly) rectangle bushes, tams and Ivy. I've decided that I dislike Ivy. It sprawls everywhere and that stuff doesn't look very good (at least not in MY yard).

We now have a clean slate to work with. I wish I was a talented landscaper, because I can't afford to hire one. I'm going to think this one out as best as I can. I'm not going to just throw things in there.
At any rate, it looks a lot better than it did. That's saying something when dirt looks better than the plants.
I'm open to suggestions and opinions.



As long as I'm talking about the yard; here's an update on my garden boxes. Almost everything I planted is growing. We seem to have lost a row to the unexpected frost, even though I covered the boxes for a few days. Otherwise, it's all flourishing.


Yes, those tall things are onions.


Happy gardening people. Summer finally made it to Utah!

Aarons Birthday

Our son, Aaron, will be 24 years old tomorrow (Sunday, May 10). This evening his dad, younger sister and Mom drove to dear old Provo. We first went into his apartment to give him a few little gifts. In a little while his friend, Malay, arrived.
We all went to the Brick Oven Pizza place that's very close to campus. We ordered a couple of Medium pizza's and root beers. Actually, I had an apple beer.
We enjoyed a good long visit. At the end of dinner, the employees brought him a special birthday treat and sang a Happy Birthday song while we clapped along.
Finally we took him and his cute friend back to his student apartment and we returned home.

We get to see Aaron again tomorrow afternoon. He'll come up for a mothers day dinner that his sister is cooking and we'll also have his birthday cake and the rest of his gifts.



Aaron and his date:




Aarons birthday treat. We all had a taste:




This is kind of random. It's just a school themed display in the restaurant. Enlarge the picture to see all of the stuff in the glass case:




Last but not least; here are the two oldies. We actually had our first date here, nearly 28 years ago. It's shocking that we've been together that long.



Today has been a good day. I spent about 4 hours at my parents house this afternoon. I haven't gotten up there in a long time and I wasn't about to let mothers day get away from me.
I love being in their backyard. They get lots of beautiful wild birds landing on their bird feeder and their apple trees are full of blossoms. Best of all it was just great to see my folks.