You Know You Need Psychological Help When . . .

Today we went to see a movie, Toy Story 3. It was awesome!! Before the main show began there was a little clip about "Night" and "Day". Night and Day were kind of like people and without telling about the whole thing or giving the end away let's just say that they had their problems with each other. Sometimes they didn't like each other but there was one part in the clip where they smiled and hugged each other. There was a little girl in front of us who at that very time, cried out, "Look, they're happy now!!" Kids really tell it like it is. Let me digress into this for a moment: My brother and his wife have their home on the market right now. They have a darling little boy, East. The other day they had some people who came for a showing on the house. East followed them around and watched them. When they opened the door to the furnace room he put his head inside the door and looked around. Then he said, "No mouse." They walked around the rest of the house and when they looked inside the cellar he looked around the corner to see and said, "No mice." Needless to say, East isn't invited to any more home showings! Lucky Grandma and Pop pop! This is a picture of Mr. Cute:

Isn't he a cutie?! Anyway back to the reason for my involuntary plea for mental help. There is a scene where Andy and his mom hug before leaving for college and I just start bawling!! I'm trying reeeaaally hard to not make any sound but it's bad. I just thought, "Geez, it's a cartoon, for heaven's sake get a grip!!" Lucky for me I was sitting between Gary and Leslie and they were kind enough to not comment unkindly about my little lapse in emotion. Thanks, guys! : D

I Don't Get It . . . Where Does the Time Go?!

When I was a kid it seemed like the days went on forever! Especially in High School - sometimes I thought the day would never end! Older - I mean more mature - people told me that the older you got the faster time went. I never believed them. I thought that I had updated my blog not too long ago. But I found out that my cute niece, Kailee, was looking at the blog last night and was horrified to see that she had missed Alex's birthday on Friday. She told her mom, Toni, that they'd missed his birthday and Toni said, "Uh, uh". So Kailee called and asked Alex if his birthday was last Friday. He told her no and she was confused. She went back to my blog to look at the birthday post and realized that it was back in April!

Hahaha, sorry Kailee! I'll try to keep up a little better : D

INTERESTED IN PUFFINS?

Almost every day we have something hilarious happen at school. The other day, I was walking down the Kindergarten/3rd Grade hallway when "something" caught my eye. The 3rd graders had teamed up with each other and each team did a report/poster of a bird or an animal. The posters were put up on the big bulletin board outside their classroom. They were all pretty good, but the poster about puffins (especially THIS part) made me laugh!!!!

The headline of the poster was: "INTERESTED IN PUFFINS?"

My Baby isn't a Baby Anymore

Alex turned 17 on Friday. It seems like the time sure flew by since he was born. He is like the perfect child. He's not grouchy very often, he usually helps me when I ask, he takes the garbage out to the road (sometimes without even being asked!), and he's always pleasant to be with.

He's pretty funny too! Not to mention cute, kind, nice, and still hugs me : ) Anyway, Happy Birthday, Buddy!! (He didn't want a party or a big deal made of his birthday so I'll just post it on my blog, hahaha).

Lance and his Comps!

In some ways Lance hasn't changed a bit!! hahaha

I miss him!!!!!!

Mouse? Snake? Oh No!! It's . . .

We were sitting in the restaurant at Little America eating the most delicious breakfast, when Les got the most horrified look on her face! We all turned to see . . .


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Yup! The Easter Bunny, hahaha. Les hates people in costumes to get by her. They totally freak her out!

Help!! I've Been Hatnapped!!!

Andy left his hat at work one night. When he went back to get it, it was gone. Then on his facebook one night he found out that his hat had been hatnapped! The hatnapper would post pictures of “Hat” and make comments like:
“Hi my name is Hat, I'm Andy's hat. I am being held captive by 3 very strong men. The leader is Dreadnok Ripper, 2nd mate is Tom, and the 3rd is CrazyEyes McNewmann. My whereabouts are unknown.”

No ransom was asked for. The only thing Andy could do is post a comment:

I will find you, and when I do, I am going to kill whoever hatnapped you!!! I'm so sorry for leaving you at work. It won't happen again, I promise. Just come home...Please

Andy and his hat have since been reunited! Yay!!!!

Happy Birthday, Ernie!!

I can't believee that you are already 12 years old!  On one hand it seems like yesterday when you came to live with us as a baby.  On the other hand, it seems like you've been into mischief FOREVER!! hahaha  Anyway, I hope you enjoyed your birthday cake and ice cream.  It sure seemed like you did, and it was nice that Ajax could come to your party!  : D

Words To Live By ~

My New Job

With the economy the way that it is, we are having a hard time making it. But thanks to a local business I now have a second job to help with buying bread, milk and such. The picture below is of me in my new
uniform.

JUST KIDDING!!!  hahaha!  Lance wrote home to ask if we would send him an external hard drive to save his pictures on.  Gary wrote back and asked him if it was a necessity and said he didn't know if we could swing it because we just got through sending Alex to a lacrosse tournament in Las Vegas.  So I decided that it would be funny if I played a joke on him and sent him this email:

"Dad forwarded me his letter that he wrote to you. Don't worry about the cost of the hard drive. I just found out that the tax place that's over by Chili's has an opening from 4:30 to 7:30 everyday. I would be the Statue of Liberty holding up their sign."  Then I wrote some other stuff and ended with this: "I'm just kidding about getting a new job at the tax place. I just thought that you would think that was funny thinking of me dressed like that. hahaha."

Then he sent me this email:

"Good Night!   haha I thought for a second, "GEEZ, my mom is going to be the Statue of Liberty - dancing! hahaha  Thank goodness that's a lie.  Kids aren't nice to them, flipping her off and saying bad things to them.  I wouldn't know from first hand experience or anything that's just what I've been told....:)"

Ya, I'm glad it was a lie too!!  : D

Transferred!!

Lance is being transferred to St. Lucia!  He will be in Vieux Fort which is on the southern tip of the island.  He's been in Guyana for almost a year now and is so excited to be moving (not mention having an American companion again).  It looks like a beautiful place to be!!!

St Lucia lies at latitude 13 54’ north of the Equator and 60 50’ west. One of the Windward Islands, it is located in the middle of the Eastern Caribbean chain of islands and is approximately 21 miles south of Martinique and 90 miles northwest of Barbados. Castries (population 50,000) is the island’s capital and is

situated North-west of the island.

The island is 238 sq. miles, 27 miles long, 14 miles wide with a combination of high mountains, forests, low lying lands and beaches. A central mountain range runs the length of the island, with peaks ranging between 1000 and 3145 feet. Forests dominate the mountains, while jasmine, scarlet chenille and wild orchids provide splashes of color to the lush green slopes. The two towering volcanic cones on the southwest coast, Gros Piton (797m) and Petit Piton (750m) are one of the Caribbean’s most famous landmarks. The volcanic origin of the island provides visitors with an opportunity to visit a “drive-in volcano” and take a dip in the reputedly therapeutic Sulphur springs.

The climate on island is tropical with temperatures ranging from 70 – 90 Fahrenheit. The rainy season is from June to November and the drier period between December and May. Average rainfall is between 160-360cm depending on altitude.

Our Gifts For 2009

Simple and easy was the name of the game this year : )

Some Of My Favorite Christmas Moments. . .

I Did, I Did, I Got What I Wanted!!

The only thing I wanted this year was to have all of my family together and to talk to Lance.  The first part absolutely came true but it seemed as if the second part of my wish was not to be.  I was so sad! 

My kids always tease me that whenever I am upset, I clean.  Well, Christmas night I started scrubbing the walls after trying for so long to get a hold of Lance with no success.  They finally convinced me to sit down and play some games and we had such a fun time. 

We played Uno Attack and laughed our heads off.  After that we played Taboo.  We played that for a long time with the teams being Gary, Andy and me; and Scott, Leslie and Alex.  Then we started playing as one big team with only one person giving clues and everyone else guessing.  When it was Gary's turn we were amazed at how good he was with clues because we guessed them everytime!!  After a while he started laughing and we found out that every single clue he used was a "Taboo" word, hahaha.  He's hilarious!!  After that we straightened the house and I started getting food ready for our traditional Day After Christmas Brunch.  Then we went to bed - it was VERY late. 

At 6:30 the next morning our phone rang and it was Lance.  He told us to call him back which we tried to do, again unsuccessfully.  He ended up going to the Hymas's (the Senior Couple in his area) and called us from their phone.  We got to talk to him for 2 1/2 hours!  It was soooooooooo great to hear his voice.  He sounded very, very happy.  He did tell me a couple for stories that I will relate later, having to do with bats, anacondas and wild monkeys. . .

(Sorry, I just can't bring myself to post a picture of a bat and Les would have a fit about the anaconda, maybe later?)

I Didn't Get What I Wanted . . .

I've been looking forward to today for for the past 6 months.  In fact, the whole family has.  Today at 5:00 pm we were going to call Lance in Guyana!  We had everything set up right down to how we were going to record the conversation so we could listen to it later.  We had gone over to my mom and dad's for dinner and left about 4:40 so we could be ready for "The Phone Call".  We dialed once, we dialed twice, we dialed three times.  Nothing but a busy signal!  We called the international operator and he told us to just keep trying.  After about 30 minutes Lance calls us and tells us to call him back.  We try again - nothing.  He calls back and we tell him that our call won't go through.  He said that he would try to get permission to call us tomorrow.  We'll see how that works out.

Other than that our day was great!  It was all pretty laid back this year but all of the kids were here except Lance and he was in our hearts : ).  Everyone had a great day and I have to say that I have certainly been blessed in my life.  I'm so thankful for such a wonderful family!!  And at least our house doesn't look like this, hahaha  : D

Merry Christmas!

Image by Greg Olsen

Happy 50th Anniversary, Mom and Dad!

We've been celebrating our parents' 50th Wedding Anniversary for the past week and it's been wonderful!  The family all went to Maddox last Saturday for a big dinner.  It was a very scary drive through the canyon with all of the snow but well worth it.  We all had a great time!

Then today we all went to see The Bar J Wranglers.  It was awesome!  I love the way that they sing and they are hilarious!! 

We have such a great family with the BEST parents in the world!!!!  Thanks for everything, Mom and Dad.  WE LOVE YOU!!!!!!

Our Company Party

Once again our company party was a blast!  We had it at Hamilton's Steak and Seafood Restaurant and had the best table in the house, right in front of the big fireplace!  Christmas trees flanked the fireplace and everything looked beautiful.

My food was amazing!  I had a green salad, roasted mashed sweet potatoes, asparagus, roasted vegetables and chicken cordon bleu.  For dessert I had crème brulee - YUM!  We ate and laughed and had a great time.  We always have a good time together, you'd think we were related we get along so well, hahaha.  Then it came time for the awards - What a SURPRISE!!!  It was truly a night to remember!

Our Family's Own Celebrity

Andy works in Salt Lake at an upscale restaurant called The New Yorker.  The following article appeared in the Salt Lake Examiner newspaper.  Andy is such a hard worker and everyone likes him.  He's easy to talk to, understanding and kind.  I'm so proud of him!!!  I did have to laugh about what he had to "endure" though, hahaha!

The New Yorker’s $14 prix-fixe lunch in SLC

Salt Lake City Lunch Examiner Heather King

The New Yorker is certainly one of the finest restaurants in Salt Lake City. Designed in 1940’s New York era décor with dark woods, fine linens and a stained-glass ceiling, The New Yorker is a wonderful place to take visitors or become a frequent local diner for lunch or dinner.

Located in the historic 1906 New York Hotel, The New Yorker offers a fantastic two course prix-fixe lunch for just $14 in addition to a wide selection of specials, salads, sandwiches and other entrees.

Included on the prix-fixe menu is a chopped salad with roasted chicken breast, a New York steak sandwich with shoestring potatoes which comes highly recommended, chicken breast marsala or a filet of Atlantic salmon (excellently prepared to the perfect point of juiciness while flaking apart just right) with sour cream whipped potatoes. Each of these entrees comes with the choice of soup (Gastronomy’s wonderful clam chowder or, on this day, cream of mushroom) or Caesar or mixed green salad or a dessert of Tahitian vanilla crème brûleé or vanilla Haagen Dazs with fresh berries. It’s a great deal for some delicious food (see slideshow for tempting photos!).

As a side note, this most recent visit to The New Yorker involved a group of 10 business women gathering for a baby shower. We were seated in one of the beautiful private dining rooms and given excellent service by our server, Andy. In addition to needing separate checks and accommodating special orders, Andy was also subjected to some very graphic conversations about pregnancy, surgeries and gynocologists. Besides an occasional lifted eyebrow or jaw drop, he was an excellent sport and met our every whim with a smile. I’m happy to say that most of my visits to The New Yorker have been with large parties and they are one of the most accommodating restaurants for this. Thank you!