My grandma's birthday

Today is my Grandma's birthday. I am glad that she is here and able to celebrate another birthday with us. She has lung cancer and never smoked a day in her life. It is a hard thing to comprehend and even harder to watch her go through. Luckily so far she has been dealing with it very well and not had to many problems. She did the chemo thing and that was not fun but now she just has to use oxygen and pretty much just does her own thing. The worst part is that she is now on Hospice. I know that it doesn't mean she is dying but it also doesn't mean that she is getting better either. She is still able to live alone and does a lot for herself but we all know that it is only a matter of time, we just don't know how much time. I wish her the best and think of her always. We hope and pray that she is here with us to celebrate and holidays that are coming up and be with us during those fun times. I love her so much and she has taught me so much. There really are so many things that I remember from my childhood that she is a part of. I have tried to make it a point to let her know how important she is to me, but I don't think she will ever truely know, I don't think anyone ever really knows how much of an impact they sometimes can make on a person's life.

Far Away Friends

How come all of our close friends live far away? It doesn't quite seem fair to me.

This is Maria who I have known since about 1996 when I started working with her in Downey, CA at my frist job at a doctor's office. We have been through it all together. She has watched me grow up basically and helped me out tons.

This is Lina who is from Sweden and her boyfriend Gary who now live in London, England. She and I met in 1993 when her sister was living with us as a foreign exchange student. We have been best friends ever since. We have only spent one full year together and a couple summers but time and distance doesn't seem to keep us from knowing everything about each other and still loving one another.

These are our friends Josh and Kirsten. We have lived in Las Vegas now for over 5 years. We like it here but have found it hard to really find people that we enjoy hanging out with and that we have things in common with. Then we stumble upon these two crazy kids and only have a chance to hang out with them for a short time before they leave us and move on to Chandler, AZ.

I don't know what it is... Maybe distance really does make the heart grow fonder but we miss everyone so much and wish they were all closer to us. But through it all we love them and are glad they are in our lives and are happy for the times that we are able to spend with them.

Organized...

What do I do with myself when I am bored.... I find something that I can ORGANIZE??


... Like my linen closet which I have done over, and over, and over again. But each time I do it I find tons of towels and sheets that we don't use and don't need. And I just find it soothing to fold the sheets and towels and love to see it nice and neat and put together.

...or my kitchen pantry. This one is really hard to do. I hate finding expired food that we haven't eaten because I am a horrible wife and never cook for my husband so we have food that I buy with good intentions of cooking but never end up doing it. But once again I love the way it looks when everything is all in order and looking fabulous.

I don't have OCD about this or anything but sometimes I just have the urge and need to organize. I wish I could channel the energy into other tasks like cleaning or something like that but that doesn't give me as much satisfaction. But I do love to organize. It really does have to be one of my most favorite things to do. Man that is pathetic really.

Picnic in the RAIN !!

Aranne and Amy trying to stay warm while huddled under the easy up and the back of the truck... What a picnic..!!

For Labor Day weekend Dan's sister Amy and her husband Steve came up from Tuscon to visit us. We decided to go up to Mt. Charleston for a picnic on Sunday after church. It was like 110 in the Valley but on our drive up the mountain we knew it would not be quite as hot when we got to the top. The further up the moutain we drove the more clouds we saw and the more drops of rain began to fall. By the time we were ready for our picnic the rain was falling and the temperatue had dropped to 60 something. WOW what a difference. Good thing I had packed the easy-up for some SHADE!!

We did still have fun though that is for sure. We played 20 questions, ate our lunch and made fun of everyone else who had the same idea as us but didn't bring an easy up. We also sat back and watched the cars go by who pointed at us and thought we were crazy for sitting out in the rain having a picnic, but we are crazy!

Happy Birthday Daddy!!

This weekend we celebrated my dad's 60th birthday. I can't believe he is 60th. Not only does it not seem possible it starts to make me feel old too. He is such a great guy and someone who is always the life of the party and making everyone else feel at home and feel welcomed. We had a party for him and had family and friends mostly from California come and spend the weekend with us enjoying the last days of summer in the pool with us (my dad's favorite thing to do).

I am glad that my dad enjoyed himself and was able to see people he doesn't always see. It is just nice to be with family and hang out. He is wonderful and we look forward to being able to celebrate many, many more birthdays with him.

Well I finally jumped in and decided to start blogging.. I am going to be using it more as a journal than anything else. I am horrible at journal keeping but I am on the computer all day long and this will be the easiest way for me to keep track of what is going on in my life and how things are going... and it will be a way for my family to be updated on things too. Sounds easy enough for me.. Hopefully it will not to be too boring for everyone else though if they do decide to log on and actually take a look at what I have on here. I will try to get into putting pictures on here and all of that fun stuff too.. Wish me luck..