Celebrations

Here we are at the beautiful shower for us hosted by our Stake Patriarch in Chatsworth, CA.

And here we are in the Relief Society Room right after we were married by my Bishop.

Where did I get all that hair? It looks so dark too; I never had dark hair. My daughter Nancy and her husband Charles were to give us wedding pictures for our present. Charles owns expensive cameras and was going to really make a lot of pics for us. When he went to develop them, he found they were all ruined. Light somehow got into the camera and none of them were any good. I was absolutely sick because we had wanted to hire a professional photographer, but he talked us into letting him do it. It was a very small wedding, only family and a few good friends. I had to ask those that were there for copies of any snapshots they had taken, and I did receive a few, but none of them were very good, I'm sad to say. No formal shots at all. I cried a few bitter tears over the situation, but have tried to get over it. I wonder if I ever will.

It seems like our weekends are full with interesting events lately. This last weekend was no exception. Last Saturday we celebrated our 40th anniversary by going out to dinner with our long time friends, Dick and Lee Child. Dick Child was our Bishop when Dick finally decided to join our church and the two of them were our close friends even before Dick joined the church. We went to the Red Lobster. Our whole town has been waiting for quite a few weeks for the franchise to come to Palm Desert, and finally it opened a few weeks ago. For a long time there were lines outside waiting to get in. We still had to wait quite a while even now, though we went early. We had a very nice dinner, and it was a four-course meal which included dessert. We all ordered key lime pie, except for Dick C. All he ever wants for dessert is something chocolate, so he ordered a brownie with ice cream. I had baked a cake earlier that day so that we could stop at home and have dessert after dinner. We usually do that when we go out. I love to bake so it usually worked out that way. We did have a whole cake left over, but I had plans for it.

The next day was our anniversary, August 12. Dick did his usual church thing, leaving the house at 8:00 a.m. It was my Sunday to go to R.S. as I like to go at least once a month. I just can't sit through the whole three hours. Dick came home after Sacrament meeting and picked me up for R. S., and after that was over I had an appointment with the Bishop to get my Temple Recommend renewed. After that we came home, cut the cake in half, and took it with us to visit Irene in her assisted living place. Irene Stewart is a lovely woman who played the organ in church for us for many years. She is also one of the people Dick and I visit and home teach each month. She has been quite ill and had to stop living in her home as her daughter, who lived with her, got married and she couldn't live alone. She has had a heck of a time going to the hospital for a couple of lengthy stays and also a couple of rehab places before finally getting released to live in this lovely home with four other ladies and three very lovely caretakers. She really loves it there. It will be her 88th birthday on Thursday, so we took the cake so that everyone there could have it for dinner and an early birthday celebration. We didn't stay too long, but went home to call all of our children and most of our grandchildren to thank them for a wonderful video they had made for us for our anniversary. They all made special videos, some of them sang songs, one wrote us a lovely poem which she recited, and many just expressed their love for us in touching ways. I must admit that I cried through the whole thing, but I did have a couple of laughs too. All in all, it was just a wonderful tribute. They had all sent their videos to our grandson, Jordan, who just graduated this year from NYU and who still lives in New York. He majored in film and I must say, he did a great job putting all the little videos into one large one. What a great time we had watching and listening to that precious video. Even the great grandchildren were a part of it.

Yesterday we went shopping. There were a few things I wanted to get at Walmart and poor Dick had to walk, while I got to ride in one of their electric carts. I felt so sorry for him because we had a heck of a time trying to find practically everything we finally did buy. He never did find the right size battery for our flashlight. It is one of those really big ones, and I thought Walmart had just about anything a person would want. He walked all over that huge store. We were there for two hours and only bought about five things. He was one tired guy, and we still had one stop to make at Costco. I wanted to get a couple of their big Danish pastries. They are almost as good as Dick's, and I love to have a half one for breakfast every day, (one of my bad habits). It seemed so strange to just buy that one thing because practically every time we go shopping there, we come home with a huge cart full of stuff. We are trying not to buy anthing we can't actually eat before we leave. Can you imagine? We are leaving on our six weeks trip in just two weeks from today. We will be leaving early Tuesday morning and I doubt that you will see a post from me that night. I'm sure we will be pretty tired as we are driving straight through to Salt Lake, although we will stop in Saratoga Springs to stay with our 98 year old friend, Connie Server, for a couple of nights. That is just about an hour on this side of Salt Lake, but we have so many friends that live in that area that we want to see. I am going to have to make a list of everyone we want to see in the Salt Lake area or I'm afraid I will forget someone. My memory is getting worse every day, I'm afraid.

It's not quite 9:30 p.m., and I am getting sleepy. I never go to bed before midnight but for some reason I am really tired tonight. I certainly haven't done much today. It was truly a rest day for me but Dick did laundry all morning it seems. I am so fortunate that he does that for me. He has done it for years, even when I was feeling fit as a fiddle!! I can't even remember when he took over that job but all I can say is that I am really grateful as I hate it!

So, I'm off to my chair for a little bit of R&R. Dick is home watching television. How fun for me!

'Til next time.....................love to all.....................