March Visit

On March 18, 2010, Sue's dad flew to Phoenix and spent a couple of days at her house. On Saturday, March 20, he helped her drive to Utah, along with her three children. She visited with us in Utah for a week.

This morning, Saturday,March 27, she left for her return trip to Arizona. Her sister, Sarah, went along to help with the kids in the car. She will stay in her sisters home for a couple of days, then return home on March 31 by airplane.

It's always quite a feat to get Sue and our grandkids here safely, but it's worth it. Her husband is usually working long hours at the hospital these days as a resident doctor.

Here are a few random pics of their visit.

Aunt Sarah with Emma and Becca. This is at Tracy Aviary in Liberty Park.

Pelicans:

Coloring pictures in the Tracy Aviary building:

Feeding ducks at Liberty Park:

Playing at Granite View Park on a windy morning:

Jacob will turn one on Monday, March 29. Just so that we could be a part of this milestone we tried to do a little party last night. We gave him a little clothing for a present. His mommy made him a cupcake and lit a candle for him. He made a huge mess of his frosted cupcake. He needed a bath afterwards.

I would describe this party as very brief and very messy.

I'm sure that Sue's blog will be more complete. She took pictures of their visit to the Dinosaur museum and other things.

Sarah is 21

Friday, February 12 was Sarahs official birthday. She turned 21. That was a work day so we postponed her little party until tonight (Saturday).
This morning we did some girl shopping. I love birthdays just because it's a rare time to loosen the purse strings and have a bit of fun.
I think these are the things she got; pajamas, long sleeve black shirt, necklace, earrings, lotion, an I.K.E.A gift card, money from grandparents and a really interesting houseplant from her brother.
She asked for a big chocolate cake from Costco. We'll never eat it all fast enough, so most of it will go in the freezer. We've done this before and that cake lasted about 4 months.
I only had 19 candles, so Sarahs brother used 5 candles and lit them to represent binary numbers. Don't ask me to explain that, ask the college student.





Believe me it's not easy to get a cooperative picture of this girl. She's so self conscious.



Getting set to blow out her binary lit candles (whatever)


Happy Birthday Sarah. You are a neat girl.

Symphony night

Last night (Friday) Joe and I rode Trax (light rail) up to Salt Lake to attend the Symphony. Mom and Dad gave us their tickets since mom is still in a cast.
We got up there an hour early and used the time to browse in the Church History museum which is a short walk from where Trax let us off.





The Symphony played some lively music, including some Glen Miller and others. After intermission a group called 'Big Bad Voodoo Daddy' carried the rest of the program. The Symphony continued as background support.

Here is the program:
Hungarian Dance no. 5 in G Minor
Sabre Dance from Gayane
Dance of the Comedians from The Bartered Bride
On the Beautiful blue Danube Waltz
Big Band Sounds

Intermission

Come on with the "Come On"
Calloway Boogie
Hey Now, Hey Now
Mr. Pinstripe Suit
Minnie The Moocher
You & Me & The Bottle Make Three
The Jumpin' Jive
The Reefer Man
The Old Man Of The Mountain
Jumpin' Jack
'I Wanna Be Like You' from the Jungle Book
Go Daddy- O

So that was our Friday night and now it's back to a regular old day. At least the sun is shining.

Solitude

Today Joe and I went up to the Solitude Nordic Center. We bought a couple of very inexpensive trail passes.
Then we began our little snow shoe journey down to the Solitude Village, just 2 1/2 miles down the canyon.



First we went around the frozen Silver Lake. This is the dock we fished from this summer.
The cross country skiers have a groomed trail that is right on the frozen lake. They can go around in circles forever or eventually follow the trail off into the woods.
The various trails are well groomed and marked with color coded plastic that they tie on the trees.


By just going up the canyon we are out of the smoggy inversions that hover over the valley from January through February. We even saw some sunshine up there.

I heard someone say once that there's no bad weather, just bad clothing. We both stayed comfortable, although I like Joes idea of putting 'toe warmers' in my shoes. Thats the only part that got a bit cold.


I thought I did pretty well, considering I went out there with a touch of the flu or something else like that. I usually don't let little things like that stop me.

Here's a picture of Joes back.

A shuttle drove us back up the canyon to the Nordic Center where we were parked. We had almost two hours to use up until the shuttle came, so we went off on some side trail to play some more. There were a couple of signs saying to watch out for the Moose in the area.
All in all we were outside playing for about 5 hours.

Honour Society

Aaron was inducted into the Golden Key International Honour Society this evening. We were in the Wilkinson Center Ballroom on B.Y.U. campus. I should mention that he's a computer science major in his Senior year.

I took this first picture before the room really filled up.




My hard working boy:



Aaron and his dad:




Aaron and his mom:




For refreshments, before and after the meeting, we could have punch, fruit, cheese cubes, ham cubes, crackers and some other good things. They also had chocolate fountains!




Out in the hallway, on the way out:





The keynote speaker was Dr.Brad Wilcox, Professor of Teacher Education





I got to bring his certificate home:




We're proud of you Aaron. You've worked hard. This is truly a stellar achievement.

Snow shoeing

Today Joe went with the kids to hunt down a new car for Aaron. Before Christmas my boy was in a collision that totaled his vehicle. Fortunately he wasn't injured and he received a good amount of insurance money.
While they were doing that I grabbed some personal time. I've been anxious to try out my new snow shoes.
It was fairly easy walking and I dressed in layers which kept me very warm. In fact at times I was too warm. I also carried a backpack with a 'survival kit', water, phone and snacks.

Here are some pictures from my walk:
























I was out in the woods for about 2 hours. I loved it. It was very relaxing, I got some exercise, and I was surprisingly very comfortable. I saw several other snowshoeing folks out there.
It was so weird; I was just 5-10 minutes from the end of my walk when here comes my husband on his snowshoes! Man, that was bizarre. He knew where I was and had my daughter drive him up and leave him off.
I had him take a picture of me and drive home.






Here's a little video:





Since I got home I can't find one of my gloves. I hate it when that happens.

Snow shoes for Christmas!!

This is just a quick post to show my most favorite Christmas gift ever!!! I think that I'll remember this year, which is really something considering the economy these days.
Can you believe this old grandma person is playing on her new snow shoes!
I got such a kick out of this and I really had a blast walking around in the back yard on these things. It was seriously fun. I can't wait to get up into the mountains and trek among the snowy pines.
My husband is also getting a pair so he can come play in the mountains with me. The added bonus is the workout we can get. It's a struggle to control the weight during winter and I'd love to get back into shape.






See, I'm smiling!!








My two grown kids got a few nice things to, but who cares about them? Just kidding!