Friends...

After sharing a good portion of my weekend with the Relief Society sisters, I was priviledged to spend Monday and Tuesday with dear friends. Fred and Bevy came to see us from Pennsylvania. They arrived a little earlier than I anticipated but it was just great to see them again. We met Fred many years ago when we started riding a Gold Wing. Fred was single at the time. Riding with us were Phyllis and Dave Ayers. We all belonged to Gold Wing Road Riders Association (GWRRA). Fred also belonged to the Maryland Gold Wings. Soon Phyllis and Dave and Claude and I also joined Maryland Gold Wings. This just gave us many more riding opportunities and the chance to make many more friends. As the friendships developed Phyllis and Dave determined that Fred should meet Bevy. Bevy is Dave's cousin. She lived in Virginia. One of the events was dinner at a Chinese restaurant in Germantown, Maryland. Bevy came and met Fred at this event. What can I say...they clicked. Eventually Fred proposed. I had the privilege of playing the piano at their wedding. We spent many years riding together. Our riding styles fit each other. Anyone who rides motorcycles can tell you that is important when you are traveling. Some bikers just fill their gas tank and don't stop until it needs to be refilled. Others like to stop every hour or so for a 'butt break'. It makes riding a lot more fun when you find people that enjoy riding like you do. Fred and Bevy were just perfect riding and touring friends. One ride we took was from a rally and coming back to our homes. Fred picked a road on the map none of us had ever driven. The color of the road on the map indicated it would be a great road and the road 'should have been' good. We were each pulling a trailer behind our bikes. Claude and I had cans of soda pop in our trailer. BIG mistake!! The road started out paved and in good shape, narrow but a good road. Eventually it wasn't paved and it was going through some country we really were praying we wouldn't break down in. After a while it became apparent we should just keep going and not turn back because we were that far into the ride. When we finally came out of this road at an intersection, Claude and Fred pulled their bikes side-by-side at the intersection and we all flipped the covers up on our helmets and had a good laugh at ourselves. Someone made the comment that we could see why people in that particular state married others in their family, they couldn't find their way out!! After finding a better road, we found a pit stop and, it should be noted, realized that some of our cans of soda pop had burst open. Once we were going to a rally in West Virginia. Jake, our son, often came with us. I had to go in my car because I didn't have the vacation time Claude did. He went earlier on the bike with Fred and Bevy. On the way home I had Jake do some of the driving. He was learning and preparing to get his driver's license. He was at that place where you have the learner's so you can practice driving with a licensed driver. This was in the days of the CB's. We had one on the bikes, Fred & Bevy had one on theirs, and we had a portable unit in my car. Jake was driving and he picked up the CB to talk to Claude and Fred and Bevy. He said, "This is Raging Stallion!" We all burst out laughing. Fred called Jake "Raging Stallion" after that. When Claude and I had our 25th anniversary we wanted to do a short cruise to see if we liked that form of travel. We picked a cruise to the Bahamas. Fred and Bevy came along. Let me assure you that you don't take friends on an anniversary cruise unless they are very good friends. We had lots of fun and I have the pictures to prove it. It was great to catch up on our families and how they were doing. It was so good to just have conversation like none of the years had past since we saw each other. I'm grateful for those fun years of biking together, for all the stories and memories, and for being able to visit with Fred and Bevy and renew old friendships.

Retreat!!!

Last Friday & Saturday, October 23 & 24, was our Relief Society Presidency Retreat. This is the 3rd year we have had a Retreat. The 1st was held 4 years ago by the previous stake Relief Society presidency. These are wonderful weekends that take lots of work to prepare and just fill you up spiritually as well as have lots of fun in them. Pat Woods opens her home to us, Ray leaves for the time we are there (bless his heart!) and we have a wonderful time in a home environment. We tried to find camouflage shirts for our presidency to wear. We didn't find those so we decided to each wear a color that would represent out calling in Relief Society. Mine was purple for the presidents, Lisa was blue for the counselors covering Sunday meetings, Laura was green for the counselors covering other Relief Society meetings, and Barbara was pink for the secretaries. Lisa surprised us by giving us all aprons before the sisters got there in the color of our t-shirts. This year our theme was 'Back to Basics' and we focused on the 6 objectives of Relief Society. We sent out invitations with a pink camouflage cover. Then as the sisters enter Pat's home they were each given a dog tag, a power bar (granola bar with a pink camouflage wrapper) and a survival book. The survival book had a pink camouflage cover and contained the cadence, the key survival tips for each member of the presidency, the 6 objectives of Relief Society with room on the page for notes as we covered that objective and the 2 hymns we would sing during the Retreat. The ladies all gathered about 6pm and we started by just mingling together. Then we asked them to all find a seat in Pat's living room and we started off with our Cadence that Lisa (my 1st counselor) wrote. What a sight we must have been as Lisa, Laura, Barbara and myself marched in going "left, left, left, right, left". Then while marching in place we said our cadence. Lisa wrote this cadence. We say 2 complete verses, then I yelled "Sound Off" and Lisa, Laura and Barbara yelled "Build Faith", then I yelled "Sound Off" and Lisa, Laura and Barbara yelled, "With Works". The middle part of the cadence had each of us stepping forward as the next one said our name and something about our role in Relief Society in cadence rhythm. Then we did the Sound Off portion again. We finished with 2 more verses about Relief Society followed by the final Sound Off portion. It brought smiles to the sisters faces and set a great mood for our weekend. I gave a little talk to set the stage about our theme and purpose for the weekend and to explain our goal of covering the 6 objectives to bring us 'Back to the Basics' of Relief Society. We tried to emphasize the importance of foregoing the frivolous for the more important things and making productive use of the valuable time of each Relief Society sister. Then Laura did a wonderful job of giving an object lesson using vegetables to set the stage for our weekend. We followed this by having dinner of vegetable soup and crackers and little peanut butter sandwiches. After dinner our priesthood leaders spoke to us about each sister receiving the blessings of the priesthood. This is the 6th objective. Jaime Kumar is our high councilor and he spoke first. Then Pres. Bob Bylund spoke. He brought his sweet wife, Pam, with him. Pam was a Relief Society president 3 years ago and it was great to have her back with us for a bit. Pat Thompson joined us for the weekend. She shared a brief message about preparedness at home and ideas for your car. Then we took time to cover the changes in the Relief Society program as outlined in Sis. Julie Beck's talk. I covered this portion of the program with the sisters. We gave each sister a copy of Sis. Beck's talk for their notebooks. We also gave each of them the list of points made in Sis. Beck's talk that were printed in the Church News. I made a little booklet of the lds.org website pages under Serving in Relief Society, Sunday Meetings and Other Relief Society Meetings. We passed those among the sisters so they could see the growing number of resources available to them to know how to implement this change in Relief Society. Then Barbara led us in a game of "Who Am I?" She was covering the 2nd objective regarding the divine worth of each sister. Barbara passed out 20 cards with information about a woman in the scriptures or one of the previous General Relief Society Presidents. After someone read the card, we were to guess who the person was. When we got through all 20 women, Barbara played a beautiful song sung by a little child. It was a really touching portion of the evening. It was time for Laura to lead us in a game to emphasize objective #4 regarding strengthening families. Laura had the sisters brainstorm some of the things in today's world that tear down and/or destroy families. Then she brought out slingshots and had sisters shoot little balls at posters that had pictures of these things we named that destroy families. It was great fun, got the sisters moving and thinking. We sang "We Are All Enlisted" for a closing hymn. The evening was not over but it gave an opportunity for our priesthood leaders and those sisters who needed to return to their families an opportunity to leave. The rest of us stayed and made some gift bags with Phyllis Beaman. Bless her sweet heart she has come every year with a scrapping idea we could use to help us with our Relief Society callings. These little bags were great fun to make and decorate. We had a few sisters that did hot wax treatments. We had some time for some sisters to just visit with each other and the stake leaders. We ended our day by playing Left, Right, Center. (I think I might try and find this game for Thanksgiving when the kids are all here.) About 4am we headed to bed. When I curled up in bed I found a plastic skull under my pillow! At first I thought someone had placed a mint under my pillow and I was so thinking how thoughtful that was. Then I realized it was a plastic skull and I got up to question Lisa and Laura. They were placing a thing over the door facing that was full of fun yarn with spiders and things in it. I headed back to bed and when I was adjusting my pillow I found several more skulls in the pillow case. Then Lisa and Laura came in because they had expected screaming or at minimum more reaction than they were getting. I stretched out my foot to sit up and my foot touched something that felt cold and funny. I managed to pull it out to find a big old soft plastic fly!! Ah, but I wasn't through yet. A little further under the covers we managed to find a rat!! We all chuckled at their antics and finally drifted off to sleep about 4:30am. My phone alarm went off at 7am. I dressed and brushed my teeth and then proceeded to be sure all others were waking up. At 7:30am Lisa led us in calisthetics. She was emphasizing the 1st objective about building faith in Jesus Christ. She did a great job of having us do little exercises that represented how be build faith. For example, we did the rocking chair exercise with our scriptures. We would bend over, pick up our scripture, bend our knees while putting our hands and the scriptures in front of us, then stand and hold our scriptures like we were reading them, then bend over and repeat the process. As we continued to do each exercise Lisa would tell us what it represented, share a scripture that supported that concept. It was a great way to wake up and start our day. Our priesthood was back to feed us breakfast at 8:15am. Tom Walker helped Jaime Kumar by fixing us omelettes to order with fresh fruit and muffins and donuts. It was great fun to visit and eat this delicious breakfast together. To continue with our training, I covered objective #3 about exercising charity and nurturing those in need and objective #5 about serving and supporting each sister by focusing on visiting teaching. I used the obstacle courses that are part of basic training. There is a conditioning obstacle course that is run against the clock and everyone must pass. It is down in the trenches and very hard. I compared this to doing the minimum that one has to do to be a visiting teacher. The other obstacle course is the confidence course. It is run at your own pace and has obstacles that vary from easy to very difficult. Some of these obstacles are high in the air. For these you have a safety net. I talked about this type of course being visiting teaching done through love and caring and not as a race to get 1 visit finished by the end of each month. I had some pictures of basic training obstacle courses to show of each of these kinds of courses. Then we separated the sisters by their wards and had each of the wards write a cadence for their ward. After writing their cadence we had every one stand and march in place while we all did the 1st verses of the stake Relief Society cadence, then each ward in turn read their cadence and we ended with all of us reading the end of the stake Relief Society cadence. It was great fun and the sisters wrote really cute and meaningful cadences. Laura Carter then did a bit of training about strengthening presidencies. She sent a survey to the presidencies before Retreat and used the answers from this survery plus the answers we received about presidency meetings taken during ward conferences this year to make a Family Feud type game. It was good to see what answers were given the most. Laura finished by reading some of the answers without sharing names or wards that were very tender. While Laura was doing this activity/object lesson training, we had the sisters make 'Pitter Fudge'. I've shared that in a previous blog. It was a fun activity and was to go in their lunch bags as their dessert. We invited Lyndell Gordon to spend the Retreat with us. Her calling in the stake is as Adoption Specialist working with LDS Family Services. She talked about her experiences at the annual training with LDS Family Services which she and Lisa Adams attended. Then she read to us from the book titled "For the Love of a Child". The two portions she read covered an adoption from the perspective of the birth mother and from the perspective of the adoptive parents. It was so moving we just really wanted to sit quietly for a while. It was all tied into our all being adopted into the fold of Christ and as children of Israel and that adoption is the Lord's way. We concluded our morning with a question and answer session. While this was going on Lisa, Laura and Barbara prepared sack lunches for the sisters to eat at Pat's home or to take with them as they headed back home to their families. This was a wonderful Retreat. We just love to be with these ladies who serve so diligently and well in their wards. It is good to have time to learn, to visit with each other, to share ideas and questions, and to fill our cups a bit so that we can serve faithfully.

Building Memories...

In the whirlwind that is life, it is nice to pause and enjoy some sweet moments. They strengthen you to get through those not so gentle times. Our little Hayden and Bailey really wanted to visit Grampa & Gramma. Andie wanted them to see Mimi and Papa again. Sunday afternoon she loaded up the Marx Mobile and headed to Sadieville. I had a meeting in the afternoon. Claude was there to meet and greet the Mini's. What a treat it is to come home to little ones running to hug and cuddle. There is not a much sweeter feeling than throwing your arms open and having a little child run into them to be scooped up and hugged. As my grandmonsters have each gotten older, I remember doing that with each of them. I even remember how good it felt when my three kids were little and they did that. It is truly one of my favorite feelings.

Hayden brought me a turtle he made at preschool. I love turtles and it is with great pleasure Hayden and I taped this one to the freezer. Bailey quickly found her can of Pringles chips and my reading glasses to wear. That little one loves her chips. We had a fun evening and then got some sleep so that on Monday we could visit the nursing home. Andie really makes sure the kids get lots of use out of those Halloween costumes. She makes sure she is gathering costumes they are going to enjoy wearing. This year Hayden was SURE he was to be a Great White Shark. Andie found a picture on the Internet of a shark costume made by a lady without a store bought pattern. Hayden liked it but there was a good deal of detail missing that needed to be added. Andie took brown paper and cut out a costume shape for the body. Then Hayden picked a picture from his shark book that showed the necessary detail I would need to add. Andie purchased the materials. Then I sewed this adorable shark costume. Please note it has 5 gills on either side, a fin on its back and fins over the arm holes, the tummy is white and the rest is gray. Bailey thought a lot about Bambia (Bambi). Other characters were discussed. Then Michael and Andie found Nemo costume and purchased it for her. Bailey just loves it. It is a perfect costume for Miss Bailey. So my great white shark and clown fish are ready for Halloween. They's already done a round at the Louisville Zoo. While there everyone kept saying a line from a Saturday Night Live skit about the 'land shark'. I must confess, I do not remember that at all but I really didn't watch a lot of Saturday Night Live. Monday at 11:30am we were at the nursing home so all the residents could have fun watching Hayden and Bailey show Mimi their costumes.

Somehow Hayden and I had a little conversation before leaving for the nursing home about Mimi and that she couldn't remember things. I told him she had Alzheimer's and it just takes away her memory so she could remember how to get in and out of cars. That was why we needed to visit her at the nursing home now. He seemed to understand and it was just sweet to watch him explain to Mimi about sharks.Papa joined us and it was great fun. The residents and staff at the nursing home love having kids come. Hayden let me introduce him to the ladies and men's table where he shared some of his shark knowledge with them. Bailey grabbed Papa's finger and had him take her for a peek at the physical therapy room. Afterward, Claude took the kids and Andie and me to Subway for a bite to eat. Then it was time to head back to Sadieville for quiet time. Tuesday would be departure day for the Marx family. But we wanted to have one more outing. Evan's Orchard (they raise all kinds of varieties of apples that you can pick or purchase in their store) has a fall festival each year. They have tons of activities for kids. These can even be enjoyed during the day. So off to Evan's Orchard for a playtime before heading back to LaGrange.Now, located in the center near the back portion of the playground is a 2-story slide. There are actually 2 shorter slide that come off the 1st level. Andie and Bailey grabbed a burlap sack and headed to the top and Hayden and I waited to take a picture. The top left slide is Andie with Bailey on her lap. Then Hayden and I headed up the slide and Andie took a picture. It was great fun. Hayden was addicted. He asked me later how many times we went down the slide. I told him I didn't know but I was sure it was at least 20 times. After a long while of climbing 2 flights of stairs and getting myself settled at the top and my purse beside me then adding Hayden on my lap and bumping down this plastic tubing that the slide is made of, I looked at Hayden and said, "I don't think I'll need to do my treadmill after all this exercise sliding." After several more times down the slide I tried to suggest to Hayden that we might want to try something else. Those intelligent little eyes with that little brain working 90 mph looked at me and in a most sincere manner said, "I don't want you to have to walk your treadmill Ma so we'll go downt he slide some more." There is NO arguing with that logic. In fact, I would have to admit that I laid the groundwork for the reasoning. After many more trips down this slide, Hayden and I once again made it to the 2nd set of stairs going to the top and with the most huge grin he could make and then a hug of my arm and hand he said, "This is the most fun I've had all year!" Well worth the price of admission. One little boy was walking in front of us one time. He was a little round, not fat, just made huggable. His right shoe was untied and the long strings were almost stepped on by several people including himself. As we approached the 2nd flight of stairs I said to him, "You might want to tie that shoe so you don't trip." He just stood there and looked at that shoe. Then he looked up at me again. I said, "Do you know how to tie your shoes?" He shook his head 'no'. I sat down on the steps and had him bring his foot up to my level and I tied that shoe in a double knot. He was one happy little guy. When we got in line at the top he was behind us. He looked up at me again and grinned and said, "What is your name?" I said, "Sandi." Then he thought for a while and said, "How old are you?" I said, "I'm 59 years old." Suddenly him and all his classmates looked at me and went, "Whooaaa!!" I got a huge chuckle out of it. During all this sliding Bailey was keeping Andie quite busy in her own right. She played for the longest time on the tires ehy have buried in the ground part way in a maze type set up. Then, at some point, she noticed a hill right by it. From the top of the slide Hayden and I looked down to find Bailey at the top of this hill and Andie looking up from the bottom. Then Andie got one of the ropes and tried to teach Bailey about using your arms and the rope to pull yourself up the hill and then let yourself down. That Bailey does like to climb up, over and around things. Later that afternoon we turned and saw a kid with one of the kid size tractors tied to one of the ropes at the top of the hill getting ready to try and come down. His mom heard other moms calling him and she rad and got the tractor off the hill and the little boy. We headed to the little patio area to get a hot dog for Hayden & Bailey and take a quick break. There were lots of bees to contend with. They had a display shed between the apple orchard and the playground to see how bees live. I'm sure the bees were coming from there and were to help pollinate the apples. But they are a nuisance when you are eating. The other nuisance was this enormous dog. He was a beautiful dog. Bailey had her hot dog in the bun trying to eat them together. The hot dog fell out of the bun to the ground, the dog grabbed it, Hayden yelled at the dog, Bailey kept on eating the bun like nothing was amiss. Then this nice elderly lady came over and told us what bad dogs these new ones were. It turns out she must be Miss Evans. She offered to get Bailey another hot dog but we declined. She had a little chat with us about the old dog that was originally there and must have passed away not long ago. After eating, Andie took Hayden into the gift shop to check it out. Bailey and I stayed outside so she could finish her chips!! Then we looked at the goats, and the rabbits, and ended up at what is to be the ticket booth for the playground. Miss Bailey pretended to be the ticket lady.

When Andie came out she found that Bailey found the wagons they provide for you to pull while picking apples and choosing pumpkin or flowers. Great fun was had by Hayden pulling Bailey in several of the different wagons. It was delightful watching a little brother and sister playing together.

Andie helped Bailey reciprocate the joy by pulling Hayden in the wagon. Then Andie put both kids in a wagon and pulled them around for a while.

There were also several wood cut-outs you can put your head in to pretend you are apples or other things. One of these was a yellow 'cool bus'. Hayden and Bailey are enjoying the 'Magic School Bus' and they had fun pretending to drive and playing with the bus cut-out.

Andie realized after the wagon pulling that the Rat Race toys were free of all the school field trip kids. She really wanted the kids to try that so we deferred leaving to head to the Rat Race game. Hayden reached it first. He climbed right in. The first couple of times he kept it going with hands and feet. (You can see Andie and Bailey running to get the other wheel in the background.)

But it didn't take but a couple of tries before he figured out how to walk and keep it going. Hayden is in the wheel on the left. Bailey is peeking out of the wheel on the right watching Hayden.

Andie was able to get Bailey to stand in it and walk while Andie pushed the wheel.

Then Hayden pushed Bailey in his wheel for a bit. Then Hayden got in the wheel with Bailey and walked while Bailey tried to sit up as he rolled them along.

We decided to play in the 'Straw Castle' for a bit. The walls are made out of bales of hay, the windows out of the rubber tubing and inside is a maze of bales of hay.

Bailey managed to find a window of tubing with a rope hanging from it. She determined to use her rope climbing skills taught earlier by Andie and worked until she pulled herself up into the window.

To finish off our play at Evan's Orchard we headed back to where the tractors and tricycles are for a quick ride.

Then we finished the play time by sitting in the corn box. That's right. The box is full of these HUGE kernals of yellow corn, not sand, corn. It was great fun for Bailey and Hayden.

It was a fun, exhausting, bruise making, laughing and screaming down the slide, apple donut eating, memory building day. Thanks Andie, Hayden and Bailey for sharing some time with Ma & Pa and bringing so much joy in the process.

Temple Square in Salt Lake City

This site has wonderful 3D pictures of LDS Church sites and places in Utah. Very fun. You just rotate around the picture. Temple Square in Salt Lake City Shared via AddThis

Quiet in the Country???

Normally...our spot in Kentucky is very quiet. This afternoon was NOT. While in my sewing room I heard a siren. I really didn't pay much attention until I heard the second siren. Then my curiosity was piqued.

I went to the window in my sewing room to see what I could see. The sirens sounded like they stopped across the creek from our home. Sure enough there was a fire truck and an emergency SUV parked at the white house across Hwy. 32.

I ran upstairs to tell Claude. His office faces the front of the house so he was hearing the sirens but not what else was happening. We hurried to the back part of the house and watched from our bedroom windows and sometimes on the deck. It was very cold outside today so coming in to warm up was a necessity.

In a short while the other vehicles were joined by a big rescue truck and another fire truck. Then 2 more SUV's. Then the Georgetown ladder truck and a sheriff car. A few more SUV's came. Then another fire truck. At one point we even had the train go by.

Our quiet little spot in Kentucky was not very quiet. We did see smoke coming from both sides of the house at different times. The emergency vehicles stayed for several hours. We didn't hear anything on the news tonight.

Now it is quiet again and the lights are all out at the white house and we are back to life as normal in Sadieville.

Loving Kindness...

It happened one more time... I went to the nursing home to sing with Papa and visit my mom yesterday. She was really chatty when I first got there. I gave her the spearmint candy she likes for a treat. I hugged and kissed her. Then I tore out the picture of a cute baby from the Parent's Magazine Andie gives to me for her to enjoy. Then I took out my crocheting. I got my chair really close to mom and she watched my hands work while she ate her candy. I looked up at her a lot and we said a few things back and forth. Then I asked her if she remembered crocheting. She said, "No." This is quite often her answer for everything. So I never take it as a real answer, just an opportunity to keep her talking for as long as we can. I told her that she taught me, Junie and Neffie how to do this. She continued to watch my hands work. Then she leaned her head over toward mine. She does this a lot now. She will just lean over and I'll lean my head over and we'll rest our heads against each other. I sometimes think I'm in the movie "Rainman" when this happens. We'll just sit there until she is ready to move her head. Mimi finally rolled her head and looked me in the eye. Then we had one of those treasured moments when she said, "I love you". I'm not sure how many of those we have left and each time it happens again I just love it. It made me realize how important that little phrase is in life. I try to say it a lot to my grandmonsters. There are enough people in life that will try and tear our kids down. We need to be their cheerleaders (Alice Hemming used to say that). I'm going to be sure I tell people more often the positive feelings I have for them. There will be enough people willing to correct, shout at, condemn, etc. that, maybe, if I make a concerted effort to send out the positive feelings I have for others more it might make my portion of the world a little more pleasant. There you have it...even an Alzheimer's patient can teach us when we are still and listen.

Ouch!!!

Silly Me... I thought I had most of today to myself. What I forgot was...I told Claude I would go to the City Commission meeting and take minutes today since our City Clerk is in training all week and can't attend. Oops...there goes the morning. After taking the minutes I got a few things done before time to head to Lexington. Claude promised me a meal for helping this morning so we went to Schlotzky's in Lexington. This is a favorite of mine and the restaurant was closed for a time. Joyfully, they have reopened and we ate wonderful sandwiches there. Then it was off to the doctor for Claude. Several weeks ago he was back at the dermatologist to have some places checked. They did scrapings of 2 of them. Then, when the doctor got the results he called to say the one on Claude's face was bad and needed to come out. It was definitely skin cancer. Today was the appointment. It was only a few months ago that I took Papa to the hospital to have surgery to remove skin cancer from his ear. They took a portion of Papa's ear out and the doctor did a great job of stitching it back up so it looks great now. Today Claude came out with an inch long incision just above his mustache. It is covered with a bandage which we are not to remove until tomorrow. He is taking his pain medicine and resting on the sofa. Not a fun thing but the doctor kept saying, "This is going just great!" as he performed the surgery. Claude said they actually cauterize the blood vessels. That means burn them. I said, "Did it smell like burning flesh?" He chuckled and said,"Well, it actually had a familiar odor to it." It smelled like branding cattle when he was younger and Evan and Bonnie were raising beef cattle. So having skin cancer removed brought back lots of cowboy memories for my Kentucky Colonel. My day is really off kilter. It's 9:30pm now and I'm just now getting to my treadmill. But it has been a good day and full of interesting things.

Monday Claude had an afternoon dental cleaning. I rode into Georgetown with him and he dropped me off at the nursing home. I visited with Mimi and Papa while Papa finished feeding Mimi. Then Papa took me to his apartment to practice music for Wednesday's singing at the nursing home. The rest of my day was spent getting things done at home to get back on track after a weekend of play with our family. Tuesday was my day at home to get things done here. These days totally at home don't come often and I cherish that time to do things as they come and try and accomplish as much as I can with my day. I got the wash done and the ironing. Yep, I still iron. I finished Hayden's great white shark costume. Claude and I were going to LaGrange on Wednesday evening so I packed up items to work on while visiting there. It was a good full day and I totally enjoyed all I was able to accomplish. Wednesday morning I attended my Countryside Homemaker's Club. We met at Elaine Rutledge's home. It was a nice meeting, well attended, good little lesson, cute thoughts, and lunch was really great. We always have a lunch. The hostess provides the main course and we all brings sides or desserts to go with it. Elaine made a roast and homemade rolls that were just delicious. They were sooooo light and melt in your mouth good. Then Elaine started some of us on a craft project she makes. I'll not talk about that as it will be a Christmas present for someone in my family. I hurried home from Homemaker's Club and Claude had the car loaded. We headed into Georgetown for his meeting at City Hall. I took lots of reading to get caught up on and sat in the Jeep and read until he finished. Then we walked up the street to Fava's for lunch. They have the best 'frickles' there. They cut a big dill pickle in round slices, batter it in the lightest batter, fry it us and serve it with ranch dressing. Claude and I shared an order and totally enjoyed them. They are a must have when you eat at Fava's. Then Claude left me at the nursing home to sing with Papa and he ran errands. I left Papa with all my Church News and MormonTimes I had finished reading. Mimi was in good spirits and it was a nice visit. Then Claude and I drove to LaGrange. We were on tap to watch the Mini's while Andie went to work at the set up for the big consignment sale they have at St. John's twice each year. If she works the set up, she get to go to the early portion of the sale. Michael was to have had soccer games but there was a lot of rain and they were canceled. We made it to Andie's on time but got concerned about the ability to do that when there was a complete traffic stoppage on I-71 and the Hwy. 393. We were on 393 and I called Andie to tell her we were very close and would get there as quickly as possible. Our traffic moved slowly but we managed to get through and be on time to Andie's. The Mini's were very happy to have Ma & Pa around again. Claude headed to the basement to begin his project. He moved the boxes and toys over to the already painted portion of the basement and got his sweeping done of the floor he wanted to complete this trip. Then he came up and helped me get Bailey to sleep and I took Hayden duty. The Mini's were very cooperative and went down without a bit of trouble. Thursday Andie was to have taken Hayden somewhere and I was going to keep Bailey. The person they were to visit called and was sick with bronchitis so that sent us into plan B. Claude went to the basement and mopped the floors. After they dried he began to do the painting of the floor. Andie and I bundled up the Mini's and headed to Louisville to the Science Center. They have an IMAX movie called Animaloplis. Hayden and Bailey loved the huge screen and enjoyed all the animals and their antics. It was a great IMAX for little ones. My favorite scene was all these red crabs. They are born in the forest and walk across the land to the ocean where they lay their eggs. If you have seen the last Pirates of the Caribbean you might remember the scene where the rocks turn into crabs and then lots and lots of them pull the boat toward the water. There were that many red crabs and more. The people in the village they walk through just take it all in stride. The kids on the playground at school lay down in the path of all the crabs and let them walk over them. It was amazing. After the Science Center we stopped a Subway and took Grampa a HUGE sandwich to build his strength after all his hard work. He used an oil based paint this time and the fumes were stronger than the Latex he used last time. We opened windows and turned on ceiling fans to help clear the air and keep it circulating. Andie headed out early to get in line with the others that had helped set up for the sale. She had a list of items she saw while setting up that she was interested in seeing if she could locate. Hayden and Bailey and I played hide-'n-seek. This is great sport with a 2 year old and a 4 year old. Hayden understands it all now but Bailey, not so much. Hayden would hide his eyes and count. I would run to find a place to hide. Once I hid under the dining room table. Bailey ran after me and crawled under with me. Now, when I count and then do the seek part, I pretend to look in all these places and talk about them as I'm looking making sure I note that Hayden is not in that place. Hayden has started to do that with me when he looks for me. Hayden is in the living (toy) room looking behind the chalkboard. He's saying, "Ma is not in there." I hear Bailey beside me giggling. I tried to motion to be quieter but she hears Hayden say, "May is not in here." Then Bailey says, "Here we are!" It is just a hoot. We had a fun evening and then trundled the Mini's off to bed. Claude and Michael watched some TV while I finished with the kids upstairs. Andie returned home with Dairy Queen for all of us. We ate ice cream and looked at all the fun things she had purchased. Friday morning Claude put a 2nd coat of paint on the floor, painted the support poles, and then finished painting the tops of the stairs. While he was painting Hayden and I watched a couple of Magic School Bus shows. He tried watching them with my reading glasses. My he looked intellectual in them. After Claude cleaned up we took Andie, Hayden & Bailey to Arby's for lunch. Then we parted ways.

Claude stopped at Walmart on the way home so I could pick up a few supplies I needed for making my Christmas gift. Then we were definitely on the way home. Today was the last day of Sadieville Clean-up Week. Claude and Cindy (city clerk) came up with a grant to help fund this project. The scout troop at Church was asked if they wanted to do the pick-up of trash on the streets of Sadieville to raise money for the scout troop. So this morning at 8am Claude and I were over at the Depot (City Hall) to get the scouts going on their trash pick-up detail. Bluegrass Pride donated plastic gloves and garbage bags. Someone, it may have been Bluegrass Pride, donated orange vests for the workers. The boys and leaders got their gear and their maps of Sadieville and set out on their cleaning details. Claude has been needing to get pictures taken of the sidewalks and streets of Sadieville and the repair work they need. He wants to draft a plan to attack the repair of the streets and sidewalks and then work that plan by finding grant money where available to get the work done. One of the beginning steps is to take pictures. So while the scouts did their pickup. Claude drove the streets and I walked a lot of them taking pictures of sidewalks and streets showing the work that needs to be done. As much work as there is to do to fix up our little town, I still find little picture moments that bring joy and peace to my heart. Along Highway 32 which runs through Sadieville there are a lot of rock walls. Some are really in need of repair. Kentucky has lots and lots of these beautiful rock walls. A lot of the early settlers here were from Ireland and the land looks a lot like were they came from. They used their rock wall building skills they used in Ireland and took all the lovely limestone we have 6 inches below the surface to build rock walls for their fences. These are all protected historic features of the state now. Today I took pictures of one portion of rock wall with all these little red flowers one it. I don't know if you can tell they are tiny little red flowers. Very pretty little things they were.

A little further down there was a section of a rock wall covered in honeysuckle. It is amazing to me and a real sign of this summer's oddness in temperature that these honeysuckles are blooming in October!! I remember when we were riding the Goldwing that honeysuckle blooming time was one of my favorites. You would be riding along and suddenly there was the fragrance that was totally pleasing to my sniffer. It was the scent of honeysuckles in bloom. Then I would think back to my childhood when we lived on Herndon in Shreveport, Louisiana. We had a hedge that went from the sidewalk in front of the down all the way to the garage at the back of our home. In the front part of this hedge the honeysuckle had taken residence. They would bloom and fill the yard with the sweet scent. As kids we would take a blossom, pop the base open and suck out the nectar. Very sweet and tasty. For a while Avon carried a creme sachet fragrance that was Honeysuckle. I remember that being a favorite of mine when we lived in Denver and our neighbor across the street, Dorothy Charles, was my Avon lady. So I delighted today in finding honeysuckle in bloom on a rock wall.

Then a little further down Highway 32 is the Mt. Pleasant Baptist Church. In front of it on the sidewalk was an old wooden bench. I just looked at it and thought it was a neat picture. There is no bus service in Sadieville, no taxis. I wonder who put this bench there and how long it has been there. It just made me realize that life can have a slower pace to it. I liked the thought of a couple of neighbors sitting there catching up on the news in Sadieville.

After we took our pictures we met all the scouts back at the Depot (City Hall). They gathered around the rain garden made by the old scouts a few weeks earlier for a picture. This rain garden in a great way of saving the soil and cleaning the water before it hits the streams. The plants in it are native to Kentucky and will flourish in all kinds of Kentuckey weather. It'll be fun to see how much they grow next year. Eventually they will fill in this little rain garden and bloom throughout the summer.

When all the trash was picked up we invited the scouts over for hot chocolate and whatever snack foods we could round up for them. They are good kids and it was great fun having them in our home for a bit.

The remainder of my day was spent getting the pictures of sidewalks and streets and things off my camera and in their proper files on the computer. Now I'll go make a CD of them for Claude and get things ready for Church tomorrow. It was a good day!

Happy Birthday to BlamPa...

What would you want to do for your 60th birthday? This is the question I posed to my hubby. His response...I just want to spend time with my family. Now that is a request I can run with. I called the Holiday Inn Express in Chelsea, Michigan, booked 3 rooms (one of which was the Kid's Suite), and notified all family members it was time to celebrate the aging process. Last Thursday Claude and I left our home around 3pm to be sure we made it to Buffalo Trace Distillery before the gift shop closed. This is our favorite place to buy Dr. McGillicuddy's root beer. We made it in time, purchased 2 six packs of root beer and 6 votive candles that are bourbon scented for our 2 Michigan kids. Then we were on the road to LaGrange We spent the night at the Marx home, allowing Andie and Michael a bit of time in the evening for a bit of a date. This made it easy for us to get up Friday morning for the drive to Chelsea in the Marx mobile with Andie, Hayden and Bailey.

We made it fine on the drive. The mini's were just great. We did our drive with only 2 stops. One for lunch at McDonald's and one a Cabelos.

Cabelo's is a great place for a rest stop. Its big and open with a floor to 3 story ceiling size mountain covered with stuffed wildlife. They even have a stream stocked with fish the kids can feed. Hayden and Bailey loved the furniture section with the stuffed moose, deer and bear they could sit on.

We made it to the hotel, checked into the 3 rooms, then donned our bathing suits for a quick dip in the pool till everyone else arrived. Hayden and Bailey loved the pool. Andie helped Bailey float and play and I had Hayden duty. They had so much fun floating and splashing from one end to the other. The ladder was great fun to climb in and out of the pool. Soon the rest of the family arrived and Nissa's kids quickly got into their suits and joined us. Claude took the swimming time to head to the grocery store for water, milk, chips, soda, paper products and other things we needed for the weekend. Then he stopped by Kentucky Fried Chicken for buckets of chicken to fill everyone's tummies for dinner. After a little swim and when Claude got back to the hotel, we all headed upstairs for dinner.

The Kid's Suite has a section that is called Fort Chelsea. It has bunk beds and a TV with a PlayStation. The kids loved climbing onto the top bunk. They watched a movie, played with cars and trains Andie brought, and just had fun being together again. Saturday we had breakfast at the hotels buffet. Jake baked the birthday cake and brought it over with white icing. The kids decorated it with decorations Andie donated to the cause. This was an amazing sugar on top of sugar edible concoction.

Andie brought body crayons and Aubrey had fun coloring herself.

At 11am we hurried out to a tour of the Chelsea Teddy Bear Factory. This was a really fun activity. A bit of history...about 3 years ago we took Katelyn, Paul and Aubrey to the factory at it's old location in the Clock Tower. While there each kid picked out a Teddy Bear. Katelyn, Paul and Aubrey felt that Hayden needed to have a stuffed toy as well even though he couldn't be there. They carefully picked out a cow they were sure he would love. Hayden loved the cow and it became one of his 'loveys'. He eventually named it Sally. Andie's concern that he might hurl on it or it might be misplaced led to the purchase of a 2nd Sally to be held in reserve and used when the original was being washed & dried or was temporarily misplaced. This was a great idea and has served her and Hayden well over the years. When Bailey was due to be born, Claude and I determined that she needed a lovey as well. While visiting Jake in Chelsea, we dropped by the Teddy Bear Factory at it's new location and found a monkey made just like Hayden's cow. We purchased it and it became Bailey's favorite lovey. This necessitated a purchase of a second monkey to act just as Hayden's 2nd Sally had. Bailey eventually named her monkey Wah-Wah. You have seen him in many of the pictures with Bailey. That is the background history you need. As you enter the factory there is a huge stuffed teddy bear right there. We quickly gathered the kids around for a photo op. You have Aubrey holding Hayden, Kately holding Bailey and Paul. The tour started. The Mini's lasted about as many minutes as their age. Then they were off to explore the store while the tour guide continued to share her knowledge.

While Hayden and Bailey were roaming they came to the racks of stuffed animals in the back of the gift shop. On these racks were a shelf full of Sally's (cows) and shelf full of Wah-Wah's (monkeys). The excitement from Hayden and Bailey was extremely audible. It was a pure delight to watch and hear them as they found so many of their favorite lovey's. We were able to explain to Hayden that this was where Sally was born. He was just very happy to know this fact. As the tour moved into the actual factory where they make the bears, Hayden continued to look up at the tour guide and say, "Excuse me." She finally looked at him and let him explain that he had a Sally and Bailey had a Wah-Wah and they were both born here. It was extremely cute and we all got a kick out of his persistence in being sure she understood it.

Again, Grampa let each grandmonster pick out a new stuffed animal. Bailey picked out a duck which when she got home she told Michael was named Quack-Quack. Hayden picked out another cow and determined Sally would name it when he got home. However, somehow we started calling it Sally II all the rest of the weekend. Nissa even got a bear for Todd and then biker leathers to dress it in. Nissa has always been our teddy bear loving child and she was in pure heaven at the factory. On the way home we picked up tacos from Taco Bell for lunch. Bailey took a nap. Hayden and I had quiet time in our room by watching Lady & the Tramp while curled up in our bed. The Thompson kids headed to the pool for some real splashing fun. In the afternoon we pulled out games and just had some family fun. Andie brought a coin construction game. Claude supplied the coins, Andie the pieces to connect them, and Jacob and Katelyn sat down to create the space shuttle.

I brought a Twister game which Katelyn, Paul, and Aubrey played. They included Hayden and then Hayden played a game with Aunt Nissa.

We had play time in the bath tub with new washcloths. They were in the shape of dinosaur eggs and some had planets on them. We played with puzzles, Legos, Toss the Potato, Nissa and Katelyn made a tied quilt out of fleece and we visited.

We had a little pool time and then came upstairs for pizza, lots and lots of pizza. Then we had birthday cake and Claude opened his presents.

After a final round in the pool, we finally called it a day and got some much needed rest. Sunday morning we all met for breakfast at the buffet. Then it was time to pack up everything and load the cars. A kind stranger agreed to take our picture in front of the hotel. It is at the beginning of the blog entry. This was a splendid way to spend a milestone birthday. Grampa was very happy being with his family and watching his grandmonsters enjoy each other. It was a delight to visit with each other.