Fun two weeks

We have had a great two weeks. I went with Steve to Florida to work. He worked and I relaxed. I do have to laugh that they call it the sunshine state, because it's mostly cloudy when I visit. I didn't mind the clouds because it was so hot. The hotel had a pool and I was the only one that layed out during the day. So it was very relaxing. I don't think I could handle more then a week of doing nothing. On Friday we loaded up and headed to Georgia. Heather and Kevin live about 6 hours away from where Steve works. We were a little early so we just walked in to surprise them. Braelyn shouted out our names and came and gave us a big hug. Berkley just looked at us and then came and sat on my lap. It felt so good to have my arms around them again. I couldn't show up emty handed and heeded Heather when she said they didn't need anymore clothes or toys, so I bought them each an umbrella and Braelyn some cute boots to play in the rain.

The girls love being outside so we spent most of our time out there. Luckily it had cooled down a bit from our trip in August and I could handle being out there.

I saw this cute haunted house kit at Macy's. You make the form with chocolate rice krispies. I can handle that. Then we let Braelyn decorate it however she wanted. Heather helped do Berkley's.
We were able to attend church with them. Luckily they only live 10 minutes from the building. Their ward has been very friendly and welcoming to them. It was fun to meet some of them. They had one new member that after church has a bag of candy that he hands out to all the kids. They have nick named him the candy man.

One of my Grandpa's cousins live in their ward and it was his 91st birthday so we were invited over for cake and ice-cream. Afterwards we visited with him. It was amazing the things he could recall and the stories he told of my dad and grandpa. It just goes to show what a small world this is. I tried to make every minute count and here is a picture of me and Braelyn dressing up to go to dinner at the queen's house. The weekend went to fast and we had to leave that night to make it to the cruise the next day.
Our first stop on the cruise was Key West. It was bigger then I thought and the houses were so cool. I would have loved to walk through them. We just walked around the town taking in the sites.
We went to a musuem and learned alot about the history of Key West. At one time they had more millionaires then anywhere in the United States. It was a fun town to visit but I don't think I would want to live there.
The second day we were in Cozumel. At the last minute we booked a snorkeling trip. We meet alot of nice people of the trip, but once you scuba dive, snorkeling is a bit boring. That night was formal night. We got our own table facing the ocean and had a nice dinner. I do love being able to try new food. We usually try two appetizers. The deserts were a bit disappointing. I guess that is good since then we only ordered one.

Here was the exciting part of the cruise. We were still at dock in Cozumel and were planning on taking off in an hour. A storm rolled in, just as the Carnival cruise ship took off. We were on the top deck and felt a big rock of the ship. We thought it was from the waves of the Carnival cruise ship taking off. We were talking to some friends we had made on the snorkeling trip when over the speaker we heard "Echo, Echo all crew members to deck four". Then we knew something was up and ran across the deck and this is what we saw. Carnival had crashed into us. Everyone from our boat ran up to the top and all of Carnival's people were on their side. Luckily no serious damage and they were able to get pushed off us and on their way. We did have alot of fun harrasing the Carnival cruisers.
We were grateful in Belize that they just anchor and we didn't have to be close to Carnival. In Belize we took the cave river run. It was fun and we got to see alot of Belize while driving to it. We bought a cheap water camera so I have to wait to get the pictures developed and then I will post them. The last day was a day at sea and the weather was perfect. Not a cloud in sight. They were running a spa special so I talked Steve into doing it. My girl was wonderful and I felt so relaxed after it. Steve didn't have the same luck. We spent the day outside soaking up the sun and of course eating. It was fun to be with Steve and I'm lucky I have someone in my life that I enjoy spending time with.

I did it!

When we built the cabin our dream was to have a stone fireplace run through the middle of the cabin to the top. We even had the floor of the basement reinforced so we could do it. We had someone give us the bid and when we were told it would be $25,000.00 to do it we realized that our pocket book would not allow that dream. So we thought that it would look nice to rock the outside of the basement. We had just become empty nesters so when Steve went to Florida I decided that I would rather be alone out at the cabin then here in Cedar Hills and that I would put up the rocks. Steve did help me get the first couple of rows in and we gathered enough rocks we thought to finish it. So the next week I drove out and started working some more on it. Since they are real rocks I had to be picky about where they would go because they had to rest on the rock below it. So I would pick up a rock and walk it all the way around seeing if it would fit anywhere. Most of the time it would not and I would start again with another rock. After doing a couple of rows I would have to let them set and really dry. It was fun at the first but towards the end I was tired of it.

Luckily my mom came over one day to help. I was almost out of rocks so she helped me gather some more of them and then spent about 5 hours scrubbing the grout off the rocks I had already put up. I'm so grateful for her help. This weekend I finished the last couple of rows and started to grout between them. Of course we had not bought enough mortar and had to do a quick trip to Park City on Friday night to get some more. Saturday Steve was able to help me finish grouting between them.
It was so much work and I hope my back recovers from it, but it looks great. I can't believe I did it. And the grand total was around $80.00. Not too bad.

Labor Day

You will never guess it but we went up to the cabin for the Labor Day weekend. We had our good friends Larry and Talitha Hudgins come up.

My brother Ken got the ditch cleared out so Steve opened it up to let the water come down and the plan was that it would water the meadow outside the cabin. Apparently it wasn't sloped the way we had hoped and we got a big pond in our front yard.

So thanks to our great neighbor Tom who lets us borrow his equipment Steve started working to get the water flowing better. We decided there are two spots at the ranch that isn't rocky. Ken found the first one when he sunk the cat and Steve found the second one and almost sunk the back hoe. Luckily we had family there and after throwing in all of Jodi and Mike's firewood they had just chopped and half our wood pile they were able to get the back hoe out. This picture was taken when they were almost out. I didn't

want to remember how it looked before.
That night we decided to take a midnight run over the loop. It took awhile for the moon to come over the mountains but when it did it was beautiful.
Steve and Taylor were on the four-wheeler and led out. Taylor and Larry had spotlights, but all we saw was one deer and a bunch of mice.
It gets a little spooky driving it at night, but Steve said nothing would have attacked us because me and Talitha were talking so loud. He said he could hear everything we said. We had alot of great food and good conversations. The only thing missing was the rest of my family.

My beautiful granddaughters

It has been almost two weeks since they moved to Georgia. After having them live with us for a year it was really hard to see them go so far away. But I'm excited for them to have this experience and to be their own little family.

The weekend before they left was cold, Taylor called after his shift and said the storm has moved over Deer Creek and the water is flat and their are no boats on it.

We hurried and jumped in the truck and headed to the lake.

The temperature was only 68 degrees but I got some good water to ski on so it was worth the trip.
It's been so hot this summer that the girls didn't use the playhouse much. So we went in one evening and they had so much fun playing with the dishes. Braelyn was the cook and came up with some fun dinner combinations.

Braelyn would ask every day if we could go to the park. I really hate the heat and would try to distract her to do something else. So the last week they were here we headed out first thing in the morning. Braelyn is old enough to do things but you have to follow Berkley around to keep her safe.
I can't wait until the end of September when I get to see them again.

Road trip to Georgia

Much to our dismay we loaded up the moving truck last Monday and Tuesday afternoon me and Steve took off to Georgia. This is how big we were. We pulled up by an eighteen wheeler and we were about 2 feet shorter. Being this big made the trip very interesting. Also when you are towing a vehicle you can't back up, so we had to be very careful about the exits we took and where we gased up and where we stayed the night.

In a car the trip is supposed to take 31 hours. In a moving truck the trip took 40 hours. I have never enjoyed road trips and was not excited about this one, but me and Steve had a great time.
I thought it was a beautiful drive once we left Wyoming. Missouri really surprised me at how green it was. In my mind I had always pictured it dry and ugly. Maybe because of the way they treated the early mormons. We loved seeing all the cool old barns and I would love to go back and photograph them.

We thought this sign was pretty funny. At times we felt like we were nowhere.
We would get up and leave the motel by six and drive until 9:oo. Luckily for us their are alot of rest stops along the way. We could only ride for about 2 hours and then we had to stretch our legs.
I got a GPS for christmas and this tool will save or marriage and allow us to go on road trips. We hit St. Louis and I was driving. Because of road construction they had a detour through the city. We were going all over and would have been completely lost without the GPS. It was scary for me to drive and at one time I had to get across three lanes of traffic in about 20 seconds. Not easy in a car, but in the truck it was scary. Luckily I did and we made it through.

I can't wait to drive it again, although this time in a car. Georgia is really pretty and the people we meet were so nice and friendly. I guess it's that southern hospitality coming out. Kevin found a nice little three-bedroom home to rent in a quiet neighborhood. It's a college town and they have the busiest wal-mart in Georgia. I will be grateful for our quiet wal-mart in Cedar Hills. The ward is so nice and alot of people dropped over on Saturday with food and to welcome them into the ward. We meet one of their cute neighbors on a walk and she had the best accent. I love the way they talk. I wish Heather and Kevin the best and I think they will really love the time they spend in Georgia. That is if they get used to the humidity.

Taylor's party

We had talked of Taylor inviting some friends up to the cabin all summer, so we finally found a date that worked with us. They loaded up in a van and came out Friday afternoon. They were only in the cabin for a few minutes when they decided to hike the mountain. I was outside shucking corn so I watched them and it only took them a few minutes to hike up and around the cliff. Wouldn't it be great to be young and have energy again.

Zach brought out some guns and Taylor had his so they went shooting. Some of the girls had never shot a gun before. I think Shea was the only girl that enjoyed it.

They all graduated this year so I decided to see how smart the kids from Lone Peak are and had them play this is a fork, this is a spoon game. Didn't seem to smart to me.

The weather forcast for this weekend was not good. A high of 71 on the wasatch front. The weather out in the basin is always different, but since we were going boating I was worried. We woke up to a brisk 50 degrees, but it was sunny.
By the time we got to Starvation I think it was in the 70's. They started the day cliff jumping. The water was warm but when you climbed back out the air was chilly.

A couple of the kids had never jumped off a cliff. Once they climbed on the boat, they all commented that it wasn't a very high cliff. But at least they were safe.

Derrick had to be last. We got a few hours of good water and sunshine and then the winds started so we ended the party early. They were a great good of kids and very easy to be around. What impressed me was the girls all had modest swimsuits on and no drama. Taylor said that's why their his friends.

Moon Reunion

I'm sure this will come as a big surprise but we went up to the cabin again this weekend. Heather and the girls were able to come with us. On Friday morning Braelyn looked out the window and said there's deer. We looked out and saw the cows and told her they were cows. She said there were deer and we looked up on the hill and saw about 7 deer coming out of the trees and running up the mountain. They were also there on Saturday morning. They must sleep in the trees. One mother had little twins running behind her. It's amazing how fast they can travel. I wish I had that ability.

Both Braelyn and Berkley love to go for four-wheeler rides so we loaded up the ranger and went on the loop. After you get to the top there is this old corral. I think it is beautiful and wish I could go back in the past and see it in use. Steve would have loved to live back then and spend the summer up in the mountains. When my Grandmother first got married she lived in a tent up in the mountains, while Grandpa herded sheep.

Saturday was the reunion at the ranch. Wade and Karen's kids are some of my favorite cousins and I love visiting with them and catching up on their lives. Karen had planned games to play that afternoon but we were all content to visit and the kids were having a ball running around and playing in the ditch and on the four-wheeler.
Braelyn was so happy when Kilee came. They have turned into best friends and they spent the day playing.
Here is Berkley with my nieces daughter Kali. I wanted to show Berkley's big brown eyes and Kali's big blue eyes, but my camera isn't that good. It was a great weekend and I'm lucky to be part of such a wonderful family.