Our Loss - Heaven's Gain

It was a sad day on May 21st when we received the phone call that Glenn's dad had passed away - very much a shock as he was in good health.

Although our hearts were heavy, it did help to know that dad hadn't suffered at all - he wasn't feeling well and just sat down in a chair and died - and that was a comfort knowing he didn't feel a thing!

Dad had lived 87 years so had lived a full life - he was a TRUE American and proudly flew his flag on his huge flagpole in the front yard! He had served in the military as a Ranger and loved telling stories about his times during the war! He also received the Bronze Star Medal and the Purple Heart during his tour of duty!

More than anything, Dad loved his family and spent a lot of time around their old kitchen table, just talking to his 7 children, 34 grandchildren, 54 great grandchildren and 2 great-great grandchildren - he'll be missed by all of us!

We'll miss you Dad!! And we know that after spending some time visiting daughter Punk up in heaven, that you'll be off to build that log cabin home in Montana that you always dreamed about!

Celebration Day!!

Between Mother's Day, Glenn's birthday on the 22nd and Kylan's birthday on the 25th, it's ONE BUSY MONTH!! SO we try to pick a weekend somewhere in the middle of those dates to all get together!!

Last weekend was our celebration day (yes, I'm behind on my blogs!!) and Saturday was a busy day!! Glenn and I stayed at Jaime and Brad's this time but didn't get to Denver till late Friday night.

Glenn and I got up early, headed to Caribou Coffee to get our drinks (and one for Jessi and Gary) and then headed to Jessi's place - we even got to see Laura, Jessi's bridesmaid from her wedding!! After Laura headed to her seminar, we all climbed into 2 vehicles and went garage saleing! Their subdivision was having their annual garage sales along with a neighboring community so we had LOTS of stops to make!!

Glenn made a haul this time - I'm not sure of everything he bought but the BEST bargain was 2 fabric covered chairs for his office - a bargain at $5.00 each!! I ended up buying about 8 books and a toy for Aleah!

Running late, Jessi, Glenn and I headed over to Jaime's where Jill and her 2 kids had arrived a little bit earlier. Glenn babysat Kylan and Aleah while the rest of us "girls" plus Parker went to brunch for Mother's Day - we had a great meal at La Peep!!

Jaime ran Rayna to a birthday party while the rest of us went to Jessi's new office to see it decorated and to have adjustments!! Nap time for the kiddos was next while Glenn and I ran to Verizon to see about getting him a new cell phone - he opted to just get a new battery for his old phone - and a new case for it - which he has now discovered was a waste of money because he can't HEAR his cell phone ring when it's in the case!!!

Here's a cute pic of Papa with his 2 little girls and their dolls!!

Next on the list was gift opening!! Glenn got a couple of great games that we'll definitely enjoy when we camp and a cute pancake bottle where he can make names and whatever else each child decides they want!!

For Kylan, we bought the cutest little grill that even lights up red when you turn it on! It came with all the accessories too so the boys had fun playing with it!!

After a great meal of tacos (compliments of Jaime), we had birthday cake - one for each birthday!! Glenn's favorite cake is German chocolate with the coconut pecan frosting which nobody else likes - and Jaime was kind enough (or should I say MORE than willing enough) to send the cake home with Glenn so he could share it with his employees!!

Kylan's favorite cake is yellow with chocolate frosting and that's just what he got!! He's such a little ham in front of the camera!!

WHEW - by this time we were all pretty tired from the days' activities!! But took some time to play with little Parker who is now smiling up a storm and giggling - it's SO cute!!

Jill and her kids headed back to Ft. Collins - Jessi and her kids headed home to spend time with Laura - and Jaime, Rayna and I headed to Kohl's!!! Of course I was actually LOOKING for some new clothes and that's the time when you can NEVER find anything!! But I managed to get a cute pair of shoes for the summer so I was excited about that - also a couple of Easter decorations that were on the clearance rack for 90% off!!

What a fun Saturday with the kids and grandkids!!

Munchkin Market

It was time again for the Munchkin Market - held every May and October with usually lots of infant and kids toys and clothes!! The place is always packed and sometimes even hard to get around in with all the tables and rooms set up with items!! I always take my big orange bag to put things in and I was sure glad I had it this year!!

Did I make a haul again??? Absolutely!! Take a look............

That's a pile of clothes on the right side, a cute pull toy for Parker, a My Little Pony kit, 4 hardback books, a baggie full of dinosaurs and one full of snakes, a bicycle with training wheels (not pictured!) and a tub full of Pet Shop things!

The deal of the day was a plastic tote just full of Pet Shop supplies - everything you see below to the left of the blue plastic pet shop was in this tub - not only a carrying case and a lit-up stage but 23 baggies full of pet shop accessories!! And the price - $10.00!!

The total I paid for everything was $50.87 - now you just can't find bargains like this every day!!

Lost!

Last Wednesday night the choir girls took dinner over to Clara's house - she'd had knee surgery the week before and we had a great time eating and catching up!

Now Clara only lives about 4 miles from my house - that is if you take the back roads - which happens to be a multitude of turns!! The last time I went over there, I printed out the directions and then wrote them backwards for when I went home!

But since I was going to her house from work, of course I had to take a little different route to get there! Fast forward to 8:00 - time to leave and it's still a little bit light out which is great because I can still read my directions!!

I headed out of the driveway and turned right (as per the directions) and the next turn said to turn left - I just KNEW that was wrong so I took a right - WRONG!!!! As soon as I went over a couple of hills and of course turned the way I thought I should, I knew I was going the wrong way. So I tried to backtrack and find Clara's place again - no luck - there was not only a Manchester Dr but a Manchester Ct. and a Manchester St. and by this time, I was hopelessly LOST!!!

Of course I have no sense of direction anyway so I just kept driving - I came out on a blacktopped road so figured it would eventually take me SOMEWHERE!!! After driving and driving, I still had no idea what road I was on so thought I better call Glenn - so I grabbed the cell phone and then a panic attack - I could not for the life of me remember our home phone!! And no, it's not programmed into my cell phone (you can bet it is now!!).

But as I drove a little further, I came to a T and sure enough there was a sign to the Florissant Fossil Beds - I then knew where I was at!! My 5 minute trip home turned into a 1/2 hour trip home - not fun - just plain scary when you're lost!!

Not Again?????

It happened ONCE again - hackers got into my email account!!

Believe it or not we actually had cell phone service where we were camping (out in the middle of nowhere if you recall!) Jill called to tell me that 2 strange emails came from my account - the email about being overseas and getting mugged and needing money............. So I had her get into my account and immediately change my password so no more emails COULD go out!!

When I got back home, I checked my emails and didn't think much about it till Monday morning when I went to work - I have about 10 daily emails that come through during the week and not a ONE of them were there - grrrrrrr!!! So thought I better email Robby so he could check that out for me - and that's when I discovered all of my contact email addresses were gone - the hacker had deleted every single one of them!!

I called Robby and left him a message - and later that afternoon he did retrieve my lost emails and got the account back to normal! But of course he was unable to find my contact list - gone forever in cyberland!!

Luckily, I had not deleted sent mail for a long time and was able to find most of the email addresses and type them back into my contact list - a long procedure!!

Robby also told me that I needed a very strong password so this wouldn't happen again - one with characters in it - and that's exactly what I did!! My password should now be extremely secure - even if it does take me longer to type in each time!!

Thanks AGAIN Robby for your help - and I'm crossing my fingers that this is the LAST time this will EVER happen!!

Mothers Day 2011

Ah, nothing like a good night's sleep when you're camping!! I couldn't believe it when Glenn came back to the camper at 8:00 and I was still sound asleep!!

After breakfast, he fished a little more and then we packed up and headed to the GREAT SAND DUNES!!! Now you all must know that the Sand Dunes have been on my bucket list since not long after we moved to Colorado - 22 years ago!! Why we have never went is beyond me but what a great Mother's Day gift!!!

We explored the Visitor's Center first and it was neat to see how these sand dunes were formed and all the info about them! They're actually the tallest ones in the United States!!

Because there was NO cloud cover that day - just bright sunshine - it was difficult taking pictures because the sand all looked the same color - which it is of course, but the clouds would have helped with some shading issues!!

We walked out a ways on the dunes but opted not to climb them because the wind was so bad - it was swirling around our legs and I can't imagine how bad it would have been higher up!

The backdrop for the dunes are the San Juan Mountains and the Sangre de Cristo Mountains and because of recent snows, they were gorgeous!!

Wouldn't the grand kids have fun in this HUGE sandbox???

Usually in the spring, there is water running on this flat part, coming down from the mountains. But it either hasn't started flowing down yet OR it was extremely dry over in this area!

We had a picnic over in the picnic area before we headed out - and yes, it was a long drive home! The truck had been driven in one huge circle in 2 days time - but it was a great start to our camping season and we're already planning the next trip!!

The First Camping Trip of the Season!

Although we slept in a little bit, we were on the road by 8:00 - Glenn had decided we were going to stop in Co. Springs and eat at Sheldon's Luncheonette for breakfast. Ok, I think I HAD been there before but it wouldn't have been my first choice - probably not my second or third either......... But breakfast was OK and they had those little jelly packets that work SO NICE in the camper instead of bringing a jar of jelly so I conveniently packed a few in my purse for future use!

The diner reminded me of something out of the 50's or 60's - that was the type of place it was!! And at that point, Glenn and I reminisced about the time we stopped at a "diner" with Jessi - we were either going to visit Jill in Durango OR a camping trip - and Jessi could not BELIEVE the diner - it was something out of the 60's that had NEVER been updated and she got such a kick out of it - I do remember the food was good and there was LOTS of it!!

After breakfast we headed to La Veta where the new house was and he did templates for the granite while I walked around admiring the new home! And then it was off to Sanchez Reservoir so Glenn could fish - it's a lake kind of out in the middle of nowhere but he enjoys fishing there for walleye! I prefer to be in the mountains of course but was willing to sacrifice so Glenn could enjoy the lake!!

First we had to stop in the town of Ft. Garland as Glenn wanted some beer and some worms - and I needed marshmallows!! The first stop was at the liquor store which claimed to be a convenience store so I thought all 3 items could be bought there but all he came out with was a 6 pack of beer. Next stop, the Food Mart which is the local grocery store - they were SUPPOSED to have worms here but all he came out with was a package of marshmallows (and darn it, they didn't have the brand I wanted either!!). So our third and final stop was at the Commissary where he ended up getting the worms and also some small items to work on the plumbing in the camper!! By this time, I'm famished so I crawled in the back and made us some sandwiches to eat while we drove to the reservoir!

We set up camp and realized later that afternoon that we were the only ones camping there - that's always kind of nice!! Glenn left to fish and I grabbed a book and headed out to read - except the wind was SO bad, it was miserable so I ended up just reading in the camper.

I sure didn't pack properly though - guess I was still on "mountain" weather where it's still 15 degrees in the morning and maybe up to 50 during the day! It was pretty warm out but all I had were jeans or sweats to wear.........

I didn't totally spend all of my time sitting in a chair reading a book - I actually walked over to where Glenn was fishing to snap this photo!!

We had some great grilled brats for dinner and a nice campfire to sit by - and then Glenn headed to bed while I read! The camper worked out great - the way the dining area is set up makes it much easier to relax and read!! I was a little leery when I headed up to sleep, knowing that I usually have my panic attack when I turn out the light if the moon isn't very bright (I have a solar light but forgot to charge it up!). But I had no problem falling asleep NOR staying asleep - in fact, I slept for 10 hours - absolutely UNHEARD of for me!!

To be continued.............

Why TRIAL Runs Are Necessary..........

It's Friday evening - hooray - the work week is over - and it's time to take our first camping trip of the season in our new/used camper!!

Glenn has to do templates for an upcoming granite job way down around LaVeta which is south - where it's much warmer than here in the mountains! So I 've cleaned the camper - packed it up and now it's ready for Glenn to load it on the back of the truck and fill it with water!

It loaded easily - always a plus! I went on into the house to make some pizza for dinner and Glenn came in a little while later with the news - water problems! Seems like we forgot to blow out the water lines last fall when we picked up the camper - darn..............

The damage wasn't bad - 2 broken pipes that we knew of and 2 flooded cupboards - luckily one was below the kitchen sink where I had a dishpan that seemed to catch most of it - and the other one was under the bathroom sink where of course I had most of the towels and linens! An easy enough clean-up!

Now the decision on what to do - if we took the camper, we wouldn't have any water so the decision was mine! Of course I chose to STILL go camping - since we always grill for dinner anyway, the dishes are minimum and the breakfast dishes could just be brought back to the house for washing!! I just packed another jug of water and we were good!

I KNEW there was a reason for doing a short camping trip prior to our 3 or 4 night upcoming Memorial Day camping trip! And this time it sure paid off! Put some new water lines on the list!

And we're off!