Happy Father's Day!

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!!!!

That card was written by my three year-old daughter, Peach Pie.  That girl is so amazing!  She said to me eight or more months ago "Mommy it's time for me to learn my letters."  Okkkaaayyy.  Hmmmm.  Not sure how to teach them to you!  After months and months of her asking I finally thought "Hey, why don't I pray about this?" and found some good answers that have worked great for her.  Including a little dry erase tracing book and she is now a self-taught writer and alphabet pro.  She can recognize all the letters, she knows them capital and lower case, she's got all the sounds down and she is even sounding out words.  I don't need to brag any more---I'll end it here by saying WOW do I have a little smarty on my hands!  She is such a joy!

 

For Father's Day, we went over to my parent's house on Saturday for time honored BBQ style food that was, DELICIOUS.  After dinner, we sat out in the back yard and chit chatted for a few hours and had a great time!  My children were invited to a very fancy Toy Story birthday party earlier in the day where the activities included decorating sheriff hats.  Charity brought hers and when my Dad put it on I just laughed my head off.

It wasn't so much the purple feather or the fuzzy glued on balls or foam flowers.  It was a reminder of William Holden in one of my TOP 5 favorite movies, Stalag 17.  I just hope anyone reading this who hasn't seen that movie will do it---it is fantastic!  It's about American and Brittish POW's in WWII and it is very entertaining and pretty much perfect!  Anyway-in the end, Bill Holden's character is sneaking out of the camp with a hidden soldier the nazi's wanted to put on trial for blowing up a supply train.  When he gets the bag of civilian clothes, he pulls this Swiss looking hat out (that looks like this little brown sheriff hat and even has a feather in near the same spot) puts it on and says "I'll look pretty stupid yodeling my way across the Alps in this!"  When I told my Dad he resembled that scene he laughed a lot too. 

 

Happy Father's Day to all fathers!  Happy Father's Day to mine!  He has been a perfect Dad!

Garden

At my parent's church building, there is a BIG garden lot above the parking lot.  They use it for community outreach and it is really awesome!  This summer my parents have a little spot and every time I see my Dad he wants to go up to see it.  Today my littles and I went over for a visit and I had a great time going up with my Dad to check it out!

 

It is doing really well!  You can see the potatoes growing in front.  They have pumpkins, tomatoes, beans, corn and probably other things I have forgotten!  It is a lot of fun and my Dad loves it! 

Their spot is in the back of the garden so it is fun to make the walk to it and check out what everyone else is doing.  One of their garden neighbors is Grant, and he has been up there for ten years. In the picture below you can see Grant's bamboo shooting up.  That man has got a professional looking garden going on!  They've got some awesome stuff up there!

Boise service

 One of the good things I can think of that has come from all the tragedy of the last month is the people.  The people I've been able to meet and be around have been incredible.  My Uncle Frank died in Phoenix on April 30. On May 6 we all were in Phoenix for his funeral, then my Dad's other brother, Uncle Steve, held a memorial celebration in Boise a few weeks later.  I had the opportunity to take my Dad up and attend that.  It was really lovely.  While up there I got to meet Gary Loveland, a man I've heard a lot about and talked to on the phone but never met.

Dad and Gary Loveland before the service began

It was so good to meet him!  While my Dad was in the hospital almost a year ago, I talked to him on the phone and he told me about coaching my Dad in baseball when he was a youngster.  He told me to this day he still has only seen a few people, Dad included, throw out a runner on second base from the squatting position of pitcher.  He is such a cool guy!  When one of his sons was born, my Dad went for a visit.  Gary said when my Dad showed up he knew what his new son should be named, and he did in fact name the new baby Scott, after my Dad.


I love meeting with these great people who have nice memories to share!  In a very real sense we lost my Dad last year and now you never know if his memories from long ago are really from long ago, or if they are from last night's dream.  Although I will admit through fact checks, he gets things pretty close to right on most of the time.  It was just great to take my Dad to Boise where he was born and raised and meet some of these great people!


Another was Pieper.  Her mother was married to my Dad's uncle, although I am still hazy on whether Pieper was already born when her mother married Uncle Tim or whether Uncle Tim is her father.  (Anyone know?)  My confusion is due to my Dad's explaining her connection for 1-2 hours on the way home, each time he restarted it was a little different.  Notwithstanding, Pieper is a beautiful, wonderful person and lovely to meet.   Pieper was married a little while back and three months after she suffered a massive stroke and also has a TBI.  She talks and acts about like my Dad.  She made that whole trip worth it for my Dad, I think.  (He said after we left my Uncle Steve's house the night before, that that visit was worth the whole trip, and then again after talking to Pieper. I was so glad he had some nice visits!)  I've got to say Pieper made my whole trip worth it too, which was already worth it.  She was such a nice, sweet, lovely person!  One thing I so enjoyed was watching them as they sat and talked to each other.  It was a little bit funny because for my Dad's part, I don't think he was really following anything he or she were saying, but he was so happy!  

One of the hard parts that trip was meeting all these people who my Dad knew in Boise who were absolute jerkstores.  I remember their names and wish I had it in me to rat them out on my blog, but I don't, darn it.  I know he talks slow and is hard to follow and I just wanted to say "you know what? My Dad knows that too! Can't you just humor him for a minute?  Help him feel like the real person he is?  Not make him feel worse than he does?" because he understands still if people are rude to him.  It broke my heart to watch as this guy from his childhood sat and looked through the program (which he helped create) while my Dad was working at reminiscing.  I was also wondering what made the program important enough to look at while I was watching this whole thing happen.  Oh well, I know it is HARD to have the patience to talk to people with brain injuries.  So if you are, have been, plan to, or ever will be someone who takes a minute to talk to my Dad or anyone with a brain injury, I sincerely THANK YOU!  For that act alone, you are a hero to me!

Things that make me happy!

Easter Egg Hunting at Poppy's

My awesome Daddy-o and my incredibly loving husband, Matt

Brother Dan arranging flowers with James (I am on a different computer so I don't have a picture on this one of all my brothers!  Otherwise they'd be up!)

Uncle Steve with Sleeping Beauty

Peach Pie helping with laundry

Charity and her look-alike cousin Brecken

Playtime with Daddy!

My strong, wonderful cousins Kari, Marissa, and Juhani. They are seriously amazing!

Kristin and Jenmy

In short, one of the things that makes me most happy is my AWESOME FAMILY!!!!  I feel so blessed to belong to a family where we love and know each other.  My husband is my best friend ever!  I am thankful to have his support throughout everything.  I have wonderful parents, brothers, and cousins who really are my favorite people.  I thank the Lord for blessing us all to belong to the same family!

Sick and tired of sick and tired!

Wow it's been a long time.  Not for lack or something to write but for lack of opportunity.  May 2011 . . . a MONTH that will live on in infamy! It has been CRAZY!  Truly I hope my grandma Nonie's superstition is correct, because if it is (things come in three's) then we ought to be done!  So here I am with a lot to say, and hopefully I can get it all out.  On top of the events, we've all been sick, some of us sick and pregnant, and it has been that way for over a month!  Craziness, but really I get annoyed with myself listing all the things that are have been hard because I don't like feeling a pessimistic!  And actually, things are hard for everyone.  I am glad if lending a listening ear to the down trodden can help them, but for me, complaining often makes me feel worse.  As Elder Holland said "No misfortune is so bad that whining about it can't make it worse." (From April 2007 General Conference)

I try, sometimes with no success, to follow the advice I sing to my littles "No one likes a frowny face, change it for a smile! Make the world a better place by smiling all the while!"