Feeling Sad Today

I had the most wonderful neighbors, a young couple with two children.  I will have to say they have been the best neighbors I have ever had.

I can still remember when we were moving in to our home and Wendy came over to see if she could help.  She was pregnant at the time and there was no way we were going to let her help.  This is just the kind of neighbor she and her husband were always there to give a helping hand.  When we left for the Summer Wendy watched our home like a hawk and we never worried about our home.

I will never forget when Frank ended up in the hospital and we were told he had a mass in his stomach.(It ended up that he didn't)  Wendy called me on my cell, and when she found out I was by myself, she left her family right in the middle of dinner, and drove 45 miles to be with me.  This is just the kind of person she is, never giving a second thought about helping a person in need.  They were our neighbors for almost eight years and we grew to love them like family. The kids called us Grandma and Grandpa and that thrilled us.  Wendy had us go to grandparents day a couple of times as the other grandparents lived too far away to be there.

When Frank had surgeries, Kyle would watch for us to come home and would be right there to help Frank out of the car and into the house.  I could go on and on about all the things they did for us.

Then the day came when Wendy came to my door in tears telling me that they had lost their home, and they were going to move.  We cried together.  Kyle had lost his job twice, and because of this, they got behind in their house payments and could never get caught up.  Another family caught up in the bad economy.  Wendy told me they were moving just a few minutes away from us and that we would still get to see each other, but I knew it wouldn't be the same as having them next door, and it hasn't been.

Frank went over to their place a few weeks ago to get our flat bed trailer from them, and Wendy broke the news that they were moving again, this time to Arizona. Kyle found a really good job there, and Frank and I agree you have to go where there is work. When Frank came home and told me, once again I felt sad knowing that they would be so far away.  They are moving this weekend.  I took the kids a travel bag of games to play in the car as a farewell gift, and I couldn't believe how much they have grown since they moved from our neighborhood.  As I left the kids gave me a hug and told me Goodbye and a thank you Grandma. Wow! I love being called Grandma.  A tear in my eye started to form, and I quickly said goodbye with a promise from Wendy they would come and see us as they will be coming back the next two weekends. Her brother lives two house away from us.

The house next door sits empty, but every time I look over there I remember the wonderful neighbors that lived there and sometimes I can see the kids playing and hear their laughter.  I sure hope someday soon I will be fortunate enough to have some new friendly neighbors move in, but I know that no one will compare to Wendy and Kyle.

A New Thought From Facebook

The Secret

If you find yourself in a negative situation with someone in your life, take a few minutes each day to feel love within your heart for that person, and then send it out into the Universe. Just doing this one thing helps to remove any resentment, anger, or negativity towards that person.

Remember that feeling resentment, anger, or any negative emotion attracts it back to you. Feeling love attracts love back to you. What you are feeling for another, you are bringing to you. From The Secret Daily Teachings by Rhonda Byrne

I guess I keep picking up on these types of things because I have had a hard time dealing with my estranged family.  The pain in my heart has been a constant part of my life over the past eight years.  I have decided, I have to let it go and I think I will try to do the above and also put it in God's hands.  

FRANK'S WEIGHT LOSS

I am so proud of Frank as he has now lost 60 lbs on his Medifast Diet.  Now he wants to get below the 200 mark and has just ordered his last order of food.  He has modified the diet and it is working for him.  He is really tired of salads, so he has been eating raw broccoli and cauliflower, along with turkey sandwich meat, hot peppers, and dill pickles.  He has been active by doing yard work and other things around the house.  

I keep telling him he looks like the man I married 34 years ago.

VACATION - BROOKSIDE COTTAGE

We are so excited as I was able to tie up a beach house in Lincoln City, OR.  We decided that it would be so much easier than towing our fifth wheel, and having to set it up every time we moved to a new location, plus the cost of fuel, etc.  It would average out to be about the same in cost.  If Frank has to have surgery on his shoulder, it would be hard for him to do all the things you have to do traveling with a fifth wheel.  We will be able to explore more of the Oregon coast that we haven't seen, go explore BC, and visit my sister in Washington.  We will be two blocks from the ocean, and we can walk to the beach and explore it. 

Getting Away With Murder

Sierra with her Theatre teacher Kenna Dalley

I went to the Moapa Valley High School Theatre  play "Getting Away with Murder" last Thrusday.  I like to go on the last day of the play as that is when they give out all the awards, flowers, etc.  I had a wonderful surprise as my granddaughter Sierra won the Directors Choice Award.  Sierra did an outstanding job of playing her character.  She played the part of Nam-Jun Vuong who was a depressed cry baby, is the only way I can describe it.  Sierra had told me a while back that she didn't like her character.  She played someone entirely different than her bubbly personality.

Bret and I both had tears in our eyes.  I think it was being proud of Sierra, and also to know this is her last year of high school.  She graduates in June.  We won't be seeing her in any more of the high school plays.

I have to also mention my other granddaughter Anna, who also received an award for her role with the tech team. The play wouldn't be complete without the tech team.  Anna ran the lighting and did a great job.

Forgiveness

This was posted on Facebook, and I really liked it.  I think it is something we can all use in our lives.  I hold no animosity towards my estranged family, just a lot of hurt, and wishing I could understand it all.  Some of the LDS Conference talks were on this very thing.  I am ready to make peace and let it all go, I want the pain to go away.

Busy, Busy April

This month has been one busy month, first our Anniversary trip to the Palm Springs area, then the fair with my St. George cousins, and a visit from my sister-in-law Artelle. We had Easter Sunday with Renee, Rozlynn, and Sherry.  Add in the doctor appointments that Frank had, one on Thursday and another on Friday the 19th and 20th.

 Renee came Saturday the day before Easter and we colored eggs.  Rozlynn is making crayon designs on the eggs.  She had so much fun, and it was fun watching her.

Renee's sisters Jordan and Alisha helped Rozlynn hunt the eggs.  Once Rozlynn got the hang of it, she ran all over the place finding surprise eggs.

 Before Rozlynn hunted eggs, Renee put her Easter dress on.  She looks like a doll.  She is getting ready for the hunt.

On Wednesday the 11th, my sister in law from the Salt Lake area came our way for a visit. She stopped in St. George to meet our St. George cousins for lunch, so she was able to visit a lot of our family.

It was just a one day visit and we took Artelle to Vegas for dinner and then over to Sherry's condo so she could see Sherry.  Artelle said her tongue was sore from talking so much as we all wanted to hear about her family news.  We had to leave the next morning to head to Mesquite for a doctor's appointment for Frank, and Artelle headed back to Salt Lake.  She followed us to Mesquite and as we got off the freeway exit for Mesquite, Artelle drove by blowing kisses our way.  I sent her some back.  I was a little sad to see her go as we don't get to see each other very often.  I hope we won't go so long in between visits.

Frank has lost over 50 lbs and we couldn't wait to see his cardiologist on the 20th.  When Doctor Savorn saw the blood test results and they were all normal.  He was really excited and was so proud of Frank.  He told us he would be out of business if all of his patients did what he asked them to do, and that is lose weight.

I noticed that the majority of his patients in the waiting room were over weight some more than others.  I should say they were obese.  Dr. Savron took Frank off of one of his heart medications, and said that he would be taken off more if Frank continued to lose weight, and keep it off.  He advised Frank on what to do to keep it off, and he highly recommended building muscles to help with his metabolism.   Dr. Savron told Frank that he had reduced his heart risk significantly.  He smiled through the whole visit.  Now if we could just get his pain under control and Frank could get off from pain meds I know he would feel a whole lot better.

Frank may have to have surgery on his shoulder as he has a bone spur that has caused his shoulder pain.  We will know as soon as he has an MRI.  Frank knows that he will have to have Physical Therapy and is dreading that already. I am hoping if they have to do surgery, they can do it microscoply, which would be a less painful procedure.

Where Does The Time Go

I have been feeling lousy lately and just haven't had the energy to sit and blog. I will be glad when allergy season is over. We have had a busy April so far and it looks like it will continue.  The 4th and 5th of April we were in Palm Springs area staying in a small town called Desert Hot Springs. This trip was to celebrate our 34th wedding anniversary. The whole trip was a wind blown experience, from Logandale and back.  We went to Desert Hot Springs through Barstow California. The trip was going well, until we had to come to a full stop on the freeway.  My first thought was that there had been an accident.  That turned out to be wrong.  Instead there was construction going on at all the bridges, and it caused the traffic to slow down and ended up at a dead stop, like stop and go.  It took us an hour to go 10 miles.  Any way I am going to post some pictures of our trip and make comments.

 This is a picture of our hotel.  It was a really nice.  It had a natural mineral fed spa and swimming pool.  We had full intentions of soaking in the spa.  It was an outdoor spa and pool.  The wind blew so hard and brought in a cold front, so no soaking in the spa.

 This is a distant view of our hotel and as you can see it sits in a desert climate.  It reminded me a lot of our area.

 This is a view of our drive home.  We drove a different route that took us through California, Arizona, to Nevada.  If you look close you can see a small home boarded up.  We saw a lot of these little boarded up abandoned homes.  Kind of made me wonder if it was on an Indian Reservation?  It was desert climate all the way home. Even though, I didn't see any signs saying that we were on a Indian Reservation.

 This should have been our first clue as to how much the wind blows in this area.  These wind generators were running constantly.  There was a huge area of these.

 We drove to Palm Springs and this is what we saw around a lot of the homes.  It was beautiful.  Palm Springs had some real pretty areas.  I still wouldn't go back there, too much like our area and Las Vegas. We should have gone to Salt Lake and stayed in our favorite hotel and visited family and friends.

 This was at a fancy hotel up the road from where we stayed.  We had a fancy dinner on our last night in Desert Hot Springs.  Had to take a picture of these beautiful flowers.  There is a mineral swimming pool in the back ground.  We saw some people coming out of the pool, and they were shaking and shivering from being cold.  That is why we didn't go in our hotel spa.

 We did get to go down to the tourest trap part of Palm Springs and we walked down one side of the street and came back the other side.  Wasn't really impressed, like I said tourest trap.  We wanted to ride the gondola but it was too windy so we didn't even check it out.  We decided we needed more than a two nights stay to explore more and to get to know the area.

Frank sitting on a pretty flower planter on our walk.  We discovered that Palm Springs isn't as windy as there our mountains around that protect it from the wind.  As soon as we headed for our hotel, the wind was blowing like crazy.  I doubt we will ever go to this area again. Too much like where we live and there are plenty of things to do in Vegas.  It was nice to get a way, but I have to admit the traffic on the way spoiled the trip.  It was much better coming home on a two lane highway with a lot less traffic.  It was a pleasant surprise to hit divided highway on the way to Vegas.  It has been a long time since we had been on this road.      

Always Behind

Braxton showing off his new hair cut

 We had another girls day last Monday.  Robyn and Braxton came over from Mesquite, as Robyn brought Sherry some Essential Oils she had ordered.  We met at The Scoop for lunch, Jamie came a little late.  Sherry, Rozlynn, and I got there before the others and we were eating when Robyn and Jamie got there.  There were a lot of people eating at The Scoop that day, and we were lucky to get a table.  We decided to go back to Sherry's place so a we could free up a table for people who were waiting. Jamie got her food to go, and Renee showed up after we got to Sherry's. 

 I had so much fun playing with the little ones.  Braxton had a ton of curls and Robyn told me he was getting his hair cut the next day.  She posted the above picture on facebook right after the hair cut.  I can't believe how much older it makes him look. 

A week ago Friday, Renee had us bring Rozlynn out to Overton to stay with Renee's Dad's family.  It turned out to be a long day as Rozlynn ended up being sick and Renee had to take her to the doctor, and then she came and got me to sit in the car with Rozlynn while she went into Walmart to get a prescription for Roz.  It was a long wait in the car, over an hour.  Frank was sitting at Sherry's condo waiting for us to return so we could go home. He wasn't a happy camper that day.  He hates waiting for people who should have been there earlier.  

Poor Rozlynn, she has allergies, and she ended up with an ear infection.  It's no wonder that Rozlynn has allergies as I have them, my Mom had them, and Renee has them.  Grandma Jeanie, brought Roz over to me Sunday after church, and she was ready for a nap.  Sherry got here just as Roz woke up. I had a fun weekend playing with babies, or should I say toddlers.  This weekend is devoted to watching conference on TV.  

I forgot to post on my 34th anniversary, March 25th.  I can't believe that we have been married that long.  The time has flown by, and it has been a wonderful 34 years with my hubby.  We are planning a trip to Palm Springs to celebrate. Frank is getting closer to his goal weight, and it is going to be hard to stick to his diet on our trip.  It is getting hard to fix food for me and to know he would love to have some.  I have been trying to make stuff that he doesn't really care for, but at this stage of the game, anything looks good to him. I miss going out to eat once in a while.  

We went to Scoop tonight, and I ordered the new shrimp dinner they have, and I was disappointed as they were the real small ones.  Too expensive for what it was.  I have some Jumbo shrimp in my freezer and I will cook them the next time I want shrimp. I know we always eat at The Scoop, but we only have two restaurants, and a McDonalds in our valley.  Not much of a choice, and Mesquite is 45 miles away.