Our Trip to Anaconda

It was an odd turn of events which made it possible for us to see 5 of our 6 children this week! We have waited . . . and waited for Kaytee and Josh’s home loan to close. Finally she called to report the closing would be scheduled on Valentine's Day so we grabbed our painting supplies in anticipation of a trip to Anaconda to help them settle in and get the interior of the house at 721 Oak Street painted and the wallpaper stripped. On the way, we planned to see Michael, Lilly and Zachary in Provo before traveling onto Ogden for an overnight visit with Kelly and Gary . Then David called to say Jan’L’s grandfather (Clare Reber) had passed away at his home in Santa Clara – so they were coming to “celebrate his life.” After the funeral, David and Jan’L indicated they wanted to stop by Stacy’s to say “hi”  It was such a treat to see all the faces of our children – David, Stacy, Michael, Kelly and Kaytee – one-by-one in a matter of a couple of days.

Kaytee’s house – which is 13 loooooooong hours from St. George - is 3-bedrooms with a full basement, built in 1919. In the tradition of Anaconda it doesn’t have much of a yard – and nearly the entire house is Pepto-Bismol PINK (supposedly made popular in her day by Eleanor Roosevelt who is said to have had the interior of the White House painted in this, her favorite color). Our time in Anaconda was EXTREMELY busy and exhausting as we moved what seemed like hundreds of boxes and lots of furniture, painted the kitchen and the stairwell to the basement (a warm tan with white trim - well, actually a color called Lonesome Dove), demo-ed a couple of cabinets and rode herd on two rambunctious pre-schoolers and a 3-month-old puppy.  

With all our coming and going, here are some of the things which happened during our week on the road:

·         The odometer in Dad’s truck turned over to 100,000 miles in Pocatello!

·         It was freezing cold with lots of snow so I don’t want to hear anyone from Anaconda asking - in June, July and August, “how can you live in St. George?”

·         Kendi got her drivers license.

·         Kelly gave me her “old” iPhone 4 which did not work well because she had spilled something in it, but Dad got me an appointment at the City Creek Apple Store. It took the tech about 30 seconds to “clean out all the gunk”. I got a pretty new cover and am happy to finally have some 21^stcentury technology all my own!!! Thanks, Kelly!

·         We had breakfast with Larry and Karen Harris with whom we served in Guyana and got caught up on all the mission news.

·         “BYU forever” . . . a message I left on Whitney’s University of Utah stuffed bear did NOT make her smile. (NOTE to everyone: Whitney does NOT have a sense-of-humor when it comes to her alma mater).

·         I helped our extreme couponer put away her “stash” – a total of $6000 worth of merchandise for which she paid $500, remarking as we sorted and stacked, “I got so much better at it as I went along!” By my calculations, that still figures out to be 30¢ per item – although Kaytee’s goal is always FREE!!!

·         Dad discovered Clark and Kensington paint – recently named the best paint in America by Consumer Guide – sold at Ace Hardware!

·         Adyn, who says she hates bananas, LOVED Grandma Linda’s banana bread, although her momma didn’t tell her what it was until she had eaten most of a half of a loaf!!! Now she wants her momma to make her some more!

·         Skylar, in her little 2-year-old voice, shouted down into the dark basement of her new house, “Monster, where are you?” It was so cute.

·         Princess, the Postma’s Akita puppy learned to go up and down the steps to the girls’2^nd floor bedroom. It was hilarious to watch as we coaxed her from the bottom to the top and from the top to the bottom, but she finally figured it out.
*          We stopped in Idaho Falls to say “hi” to Grandma and Grandpa Sappington.

·         We stopped at Temple Square looking for Alicia Phagwah who was called from Guyana to serve a mission there.We finally found her in the South Visitors Center.She was so happy to see us.

·         We took Zac shopping for some much needed shoes. We were pleased to find a 2-for-1 sale – and two pairs of shoes he liked and which actually fit!

When it came time for us to say goodbye to our Montana kids, a teary-eyed Adyn begged us not to go. Grandma said, "don't be sad ... we'll come back for your birthday" to which our adorable 4-year-old granddaughter responded, "OK, it's Saturday!"

True Friends

True friends are hard to find, but we found out recently how "true" some of them are!  We went to dinner with Stan and Diane Blackett this week (they are down from Logan to get out of the cold).  In the course of our early dinner, they asked what we were doing for the rest of the evening.  “Stripping wallpaper” was my response, something I consider to be one of the messiest and time consuming jobs in the world!!!  They had just come from CostCo, but noted, “we’ll take our groceries home then come over to help!”  We protested but 45 minutes after we left them in the restaurant parking lot, our doorbell rang.  It was actually a pleasant evening of chit chat and scrapping.  When they left, the bedroom was nearly done!  Thanks to the Blacketts who really understand what friendship means!

Dominos Are Falling!!!

We had our hardwood floors refinished not long after coming home from Guyana . . . and then the dominos began to fall over!!! 

The floors looked so beautiful, we decided to replace our 20-year-old formica kitchen countertops with granite.  As it turns out, we were only happy with high-end and the most expensive granite from Italy.  It was considerably more than we had expected to pay, but it is ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS!!!!  Of course, with new countertops we simply had to have a new refrigerator, stove, microwave and dishwasher. . . and the dominos just kept falling over!  Next we decided we needed a new toaster oven, new faucets and cabinet pulls to match our new appliances. While looking for new carpeting for the entire house and to go with the countertops, Ed found a new easy chair he simply couldn’t live without.  Of course, now we need to replace our bathrooms and laundry room floors, strip the wallpaper in our bedrooms which will then require painting and decorating.  We will also need new bedspreads, towels, a patio, a hot tub . . .

I hope there is a treatment program for this addiction because we can’t seem to stop without some sort of intervention! 

Happy Birthday, Ed

It’s not often I am successful in pulling off a surprise birthday party, but I actually did it for Ed / Dad / Grandpa on New Years Day.  I had sent out a Smilebox invitation (if you haven’t tried Smilebox . . . run, don’t walk to your computer.  It’s such a great little program!!!) to all our friends, neighbors and family members, then needed a diversion to get him out of here on Tuesday morning so I could get ready.  The diversion came in the form of Rilee Welch who has been with Rick and Stacy during the Christmas holidays / school break, but needed to be driven back to Fillmore to meet up with her mother.  “Since Rick has helped us with so many of our little projects around the house, you’d be paying him back by driving Rilee up to Fillmore,” I reasoned with Ed.  He agreed.  He left at 7 a.m. for the 5 hour roundtrip, arriving back home just 5 minutes before the party was supposed to start.  It was a lovely day with visits from lots of friends and family . . . and, best of all, we got rid of most of our holiday goodies (the Must-Goes in our fridge)!  Thanks to Rick and Stacy for playing along and for all who came by to wish the “old man” a happy birthday.

 

Christmas 2012

Christmas 2012 has come . . . and gone!  It was much more commercialized than we remember in the years before we left for Guyana.  Everything, everywhere was about Santa Claus rather than about He whose birth we are supposed to be celebrating! 

Besides shopping, wrapping, mailing and cooking, we enjoyed having Kris here for a short visit in early December and having approximately 70 ward members and neighbors come to see our decorations and partake of our cookies and punch as one of four homes in our annual Christmas Around the Ward!  We put up our village above the stove in the kitchen and spread the Christmas cans around the house.  We also attended our ward Christmas party, a Relief Society Christmas dinner, a fun Rotary Christmas party at the St. George Art Center building . . . and went to lunch or dinner with several friends.

Stacy and her family came from dinner on Christmas Day.  We ate too much and laughed until our sides ached playing “Minute to Win It” – reminiscent of several such YSA activities in Guyana – and Skyped with family members far away!

It was a fun holiday season – our first traditional holiday season in the last three - though we missed having more members of our family here.  Christmas 2012 concluded on Boxing Day (December 26) with cataract surgery – a simple and quick little procedure which is expected to successfully clear up my foggy vision.  Cataracts develop for a number of reasons, but in my case it was as a result of the gas put in my eye to repair the macular hole.  I have had blurry, fuzzy, cloudy eyesight for more than six months and haven’t been able to drive at night because of the glare from oncoming headlights.  I’ve also struggled with a sense of having something in my eye. 

I have hope my sight is now restored.  Skilled surgeons are truly a gift beyond measure!  Merry Christmas.  

Playing by the Numbers

We recently had the opportunity to see our current Fair Issac Corporation score.  The FICO uses mathematical models to determine a lending institution’s credit risk for repayment based on payment history, a consumer’s current level of indebtedness, types of credit used, length of credit history and any new credit. A FICO score above 650 (from a range of 300 to 850) is considered to be a safe risk!

The problem with a FICO score is that it is very sensitive.  Shop for a new car - even if you don't buy one - it goes down!  Miss a payment on something - no matter how insignificant - it goes down!  Have half a dozen credit cards stuck away in a desk drawer - even if you've never even used them - it goes down! 

I always tried to teach my kids – and grandkids – if you have a FICO score of 650 or more and a current temple recommend, you are most certainly on the right track in life!!!

Meeting #11

Kris brought her “lover and best friend” for a first-time visit to St. George this weekend.  Our third daughter came home with tall, handsome Mike Muhlethaler, who is a partner in both a sales/marketing and a mortgage firm in northern California.   The couple traveled to Las Vegas for a Tim McGraw / Faith Hill concert and a quick trip to southern Utah to negotiate the "number of cows" Ed would accept for her hand in marriage.

He and Ed got along famously on the golf course, Kris is happier than we have seen her in a long time . . . and cow negotiations went well!

Together Kris and Mike have just bought a new home in Petaluma, CA (a small town of approximately 15,000 people about a “stone’s throw” from San Francisco). 

While they were here, Stacy, Rick and their family - including Taisley, Kendi and Danielle, Allysa, Josh and Daxton - came for dinner . . . and just as the food was being put on the table, Bruce and Jan Christensen and her daughter Jenny stopped by for "hugs and kisses" with Kris, who they consider their “foster daughter” and “step sister!”  We also celebrated Allysa’s 24^th birthday (December 6) with cake, ice cream and a boisterous rendition of “Happy Birthday” 

We were pleased to see these far-flung members of our family and look forward to an invitation to the wedding some day soon! 

Thanksgiving in Denver

We had a wonderful time on our recent long Thanksgiving weekend in Denver.  In addition to an amazing feast of turkey and stuffing, potatoes and gravy, candied yams, Jan’L’s delicious creamed (Enterprise) corn, and the usual pumpkin and mincemeat pies, we also enjoyed Pictionary, putting together a fun new 750-piece puzzle – since Grandma Linda declared it an old-fashioned, eye-to-eye  “electronics free” day -  and Black Friday shopping. 

Some thoughts on the Sappington boys:  Kyle (age 6) is one of the brightest children I have ever been around.  He has at least a 6^th grade vocabulary and reads at a 3^rd grade level – though he is only in 1^st grade.  This observation really isn’t a case of a prejudiced grandmother . . . this child truly is brilliant.  Kole is a happy, high energy, loving and precocious 11-year-old.  He is a competitive player who “takes no prisoners” in Pictionary and knows his way around his iPad.  In a word or two, Kole is “fun” and adorable!!!  His serious allergies and bothersome eczema haven’t slowed him down socially or in any other way!  Kaler has made huge strides in terms of his autism.  He continues to maintain a near perfect GPA and is a pretty typical 14-year-old (except he is still a little smaller than other boys his same age - but no doubt is going to catch up).  He loves history and is happy to share his knowledge of facts and figures as he plans to travel to Washington DC in the next few months with his classmates.  

The boys cried when it was time for us to head home . . . and Kyle said he was going to hide in my luggage!  We love these boys . . . and their Mom and (especially their) Dad!  They are all so much fun.

MOMMILIES: 1-2-3 for Dental Health

I had an appointment the other day with Allen Hilton - my dentist for more years than I care to remember.  This was my first visit to his office since before we left for our mission at the end of 2010.  Happily, I got a clean bill of dental health.  I have not had a cavity in many years and I have no indication of gum disease!  Yahoo!!!  As my family knows, I am vigilant in taking care of my teeth and told Dr. Hilton in the beginning of our relationship, I want to take these choppers with me into eternity.

My regimen is as simple as 1, 2, and 3!  I floss at least once a day . . . brush at least twice a day and see my dentist 3 times a year (although I may have to cut back to two annual visits since we no longer have dental insurance)!  There are certainly many things which would be worse than having dentures, but having all my teeth pulled ranks right up there on my list of The Top 10 Things I Don’t Want to Experience.

 

Thanks, Allen for your friendship and service in Rotary and for your skill and expertise in the office helping me keep my happy smile!!!

Another Small World Story

The other day, we attended the funeral of Lois Baker, one of our ward members. Lois is the mother of my visiting teacher Jill Jones and a son - Greg Anderson - who lives in Pennsylvania, both who were in attendance at the funeral of their mother along with their spouses. At the viewing, Jill and Royce introduced Ed and Linda Sappington to her brother and his wife.  Greg's wife was obviously startled then responded, "Are you kidding me? My full name is Joyce Sappington Anderson." What followed was a fun exchange of information as we became acquainted with a cousin from another part of the world . . . although this experience shows - once again - that it really is a very small world!!!