Hiding in Home Depot

Ed and I had fun at Home Depot last night. We were asked to be plants there, while groups of youth from church hunted us down and had their pictures taken with us.

We tried to disguise ourselves with hats, but they were able to ferret us out nonetheless. It was a fun evening, and we were even able to get our 10,000 steps by the end of the day!

Elders Carlson and Shouse

We had the Elders over for dinner tonight. It was fun talking to them, especially since Elder Carlson is from Littleton, Colorado (now Centennial), and we were in the same ward as his family for 10 years. Unfortunately, we had never met him, as he was the baby and born after we moved to Parker! Boy, time has flown!

Blue and Gold Banquet

I went to my first Cub Scout Blue and Gold Banquet last night. I was totally impressed by it. It was almost as fancy as a Relief Society event. The boys seemed to have a good time, too, so it was fun to see it.

There was fun for the entire family, and they even had clever table decorations. It made me wish I had had a cub scout!

Getting Downs

The Downs were in Washington DC this week, so we met them for lunch yesterday at the famous Ben's Chili Bowl. We had never been there, but highly recommend the smoke-house hot dog! We didn't have nearly enough time to catch up on what's happening in Colorado, but it was, as always, entertaining just to spend time with them.

And we found this cute bear to pose with in our pictures!

Cleanin' Day

Ed and I helped clean the DC temple Saturday morning and afterwards stopped for lunch at the newly remodeled Cafe Rio. We had fun visiting with the Johnsons from the Columbia 2nd ward. We were shocked that they had never been to any Cafe Rio before, so we were glad to introduce them to its pleasures.

We spent the afternoon cleaning the garage, and were very proud of ourselves afterwards. We should do that more often. It's now a pleasure coming home and parking the car in such a clean spot!

RV Show

Since we were unsuccessful in finding a new house in Utah, Ed and I went hunting for a new mobile home today. We were thinking we might like to get a tent trailer again, but the RV show only had 2 or 3 of them. So we spent the morning looking at big trailers. This was our favorite. It would be the perfect way for us to see the USA--if we only had a truck to pull it! We came home empty handed!

Herb Garden Terarrium

I didn't have a large enough plastic bag for my herb garden, so I left my basil and cilantro under a big salad bowl while we were out of town for two weeks. We came home and they were perfectly healthy! That was a happy surprise!

The money tree did great, but the jade bonsai finished it's slow descent into oblivion while we were gone. In the back is Amanda's wedding terrarium, which is doing great with no watering in the 8 months I've had it!

Last Day in Provo

We had to get up bright and early today to get in to see the new Provo City Temple.Our time reservations were for 7:30 a.m.! It was worth it, though, as it was so beautiful inside.

After that we spent a couple of hours with Tim, our financial adviser. It is pretty fun to have "people," We're trusting him to steer us into retirement!

We took grandma to see the house we liked in Payson. We were happy to see it really did have a pretty view. Last week the inversion was so bad we couldn't see the mountains.

The current owners have horses, so we felt right at home. (But not tempted to get a horse)

We saw two additional houses. Our favorite was in Draper and had a chicken coop!

It also backed onto a beautiful walking trail. Walking trail or racquetball court, how can one choose between the two of them?

We had a Hawaiian dinner at Big Island Sams. Ed and Brittany had the spam specialty.

We got a bunch more smiles from Mabel today. It's going to be hard to go back to Maryland tomorrow!

Family Home Evening with Grandma

I got home in time to play games with the ladies in mom's Family home Evening Group. It is a great group of ladies, and I enjoy spending time with them. It is amazing that they can fit 10 people around Mom's kitchen table!  We played some guessing games and I didn't remember who slept 20 years in a Washington Irving story.





Rip Van Winkle, in case you also forgot!

Son of Eli

We were invited to lunch at my nephew, Eli's house today. We were pretty excited to see their new addition.

A pizza oven! Made by Eli himself! We were so impressed with his handiwork. It is not quite done, but an impressive project.

I was just kidding.  The real addition is Eli and Lacy's son, Calvin, who was a real sweetie. He is 1 month old and has a full head of hair! (Maybe more than his dad.), Calvin is exactly 5 months younger than Mabel. We hope they can grow up to be friends, as well as second cousins!

Mabel's big day

Mabel had a well baby checkup today and the doctor said it was time to put a little meat on her bones!

So, we were there to watch her try to eat her first solid (or, rather pureed) food-mushed pears. She seemed to like it a lot! Who wouldn't? We all enjoyed watching her, as did the cat. Perhaps Skimmy was hoping for some table scraps!

Valentine's Party at Annette's House

My sister, Annette, hosted Valentine's day dinner at her house tonight. She had a lot of her grandchildren there, including little Cooper, the miracle baby (left) that was only a couple of pounds when he was born. He's now 3 and enjoying very good health!

My niece, Lyndsie and her husband Solomon also brought their girls.

My brother John and sister-in-law Sara came down from Salt Lake City with their family. Tyler, Cooper's dad came alone with the 4 kids to give his wife a Valentines treat--an afternoon without kids!

Mabel's other grandparents, Marti and Ellis, also joined us for dinner. Annette made Enchiladas and Cafe Rio fixin's, which hit the spot!

Our niece, Abby, came down from Salt Lake with Benjamin, who was a great sport about answering all the family questions. We enjoyed getting to know him. He had even served a mission in Baltimore (before our time there). He said he loved Maryland, so we liked him!

More Houses and Baby Tricks

We looked at more houses today, and since. Since we bumped up our price range we had even more fun. This was my favorite of the day.

I have to admit this racquetball court was icing on the cake of an already beautiful house.

We went back to Brittany and John's house where we debated the merits of each house.

We enjoyed seeing more of Mabel's tricks. This was her balancing act. She is a terrific stander, even in the hands of her father. Notice her mother's anxiety ridden face!

House Hunting

We looked at 11 houses today, and found only one that could work for us. We need a place for the grand piano, an organ, pool table, ping pong table and foosball table. Many homes had room for one or two of these items.

We also wanted a nice master suite with a large bathroom. This one had a great walk-through shower with a view of the lake.

This one had a piano bar. A bar literally shaped like a piano!

We enjoyed having Annette and Grandma come along with us, as well as Brittany. Everyone picked up on slightly different items.

We liked this house and spent quite a bit of time thinking how we could adapt it for our furniture. Sadly, we came up empty handed.

John met us in the evening and joined us for pupusas, a Salvadoran treat. They really hit the spot.

Mabel was with us all day, and was good as gold. If she had an opinion, she didn't voice it!

Tomorrow we'll visit a few more homes, as well as talk with a builder. Sadly for us, Utah is in a real building boom, so finding a builder that isn't booked out into next year will be difficult.

Meanwhile, the search continues...

Last Leg

We had breakfast with Crystal at Village Inn this morning before starting out on our last leg of our road trip. We have to get the recipe for their pancakes!

We got to Brittany's house by 5 and were able to enjoy seeing Mabel working out in her jumper. I had fun with her and even got a few steps in!

We brought a bag of red velvet Oreo for them. Mabel was too young to eat one, so we ate hers.

We ended up at Grandma's house where we had a bowl of soup and settled into watching pictures of homes we're going to visit on our home tours tomorrow. We're hoping we fall in love with something!

Day in Denver

We started out our fun day in Denver at Top Golf. It was a driving range that was like a bowling alley. We got scores and took turns whacking golf balls.

They even have heaters, tables and waitresses. But, since it was 65 degrees out we hardly needed the heat!

Ed didn't think he would like it, but since he beat us handily, he loved it!
Crystal loved it, but is frowning about her score!

We had delicious Navajo tacos at Tocabe's for lunch.

We entertained ourselves by looking at model homes in the afternoon. None of them had free cookies, so I was disappointed.

Crystal and Ed loved the games. This shuffle board was fun.

Ping pong was a real challenge for them with this striped table!

While we were out gallivanting, Paul was home working in the kitchen. He had hot, yummy schnitzel waiting for us when we got home.

After dinner Verlene gave us a tour of her art studio. She has been very prolific over the last 5 years. These were some of our favorite pictures of hers. She is hoping to inspire Ed to get back into painting now that he is retired!