Friday The Thirteenth

Riverton, Utah              High 80 Low 54

The weather lately has been wonderful. Just right for sleeping and not too hot during the day.

Friday the thirteenth is supposed to be bad luck, but for us it was great! We went to an estate sale put on by a company. The owner has always treated us very well. Today was no exception.

On his listing he said the magic words: fabric and sewing notions. The only problem, which wasn't really a problem, was that the sale started Thursday and I didn't see the ad until Thursday night. We thought that all the fabric would be gone but were we ever wrong.

There was lots of fabric left, most of it name brand good stuff. We didn't see any notions and we kept filling boxes with fabric, which the sales people started helping carry upstairs. we were in a fabulous sewing room in the basement.

Cindy kept asking Patrick (the owner) how much we were into him and all he told her was don't worry. We still aren't sure how he priced the fabric for us, but all I can figure is he was charging us $1.00 per piece. It didn't seem to matter whether it was a fat quarter or or in one case, 5 1/2 yards of nice batick, and some of the pieces were bundles of 12 inch squares. There were several partial bolts of fabric.

There was enough to cover my pool table.

After we filled 8 boxes, we thought we had enough and then Cindy found all the pattern books. She got 8 Missouri Star Quilt Company patterns books and one other book. The car's back seat and trunk were full of fabric.

We are going back tomorrow to see if anything is left and it is 50 per cent off tomorrow.

On other news, Cindy broke a tooth today and we are going to get ready to head to Yuma because neither one of us has dental insurance. We have a good dentist in Algodones that we will go to.

Our grand daughter is going to have her baby cesarean next Tuesday and we will probably leave the following Monday.

Thanks for visiting.

Another Funeral

Riverton, Utah           High 83 Low 62

My first cousin, Grant Warner, died Monday night after a fairly long illness. he was almost 8 months older than I am.

When we were growing up they lived about 3 miles from where we lived and I remember riding my bike to see and play with him a lot. We were so close to the same age that we were good friends.

After we left school, we kind of drifted apart, but we ran into each other once in a while. I remember working on his furnace once. Mostly we saw each other at his parents funerals and then my parents.

I also worked on his daughters furnace one time.

Grant had a large family and a lot of brothers and sister. He was the oldest of 9 children so our parents must have believed in large families. I didn't even know most of my younger cousins.

Grant had a good turn out for his funeral yesterday. There were a lot of family and his friends there.

Again, all of these funerals remind me of how old I'm getting. This makes five family funerals in the last nine months.

Thanks for visiting.

The Simple Pleasures of Life

Riverton, Utah               High 81 Low 61

The temperature is more normal for this time of year, but still a little too warm in Yuma to head that way.

Wednesday we went to see Cindy's daughter and son-in-law, Stephanie and Pat, at their new home near Monticello, Utah (but not too near). They are far enough away from any grocery stores, that it has to be planned ahead of time when to go to the store.

One the way home we stopped at the small town of La Sal, Utah which is truly in the middle of nowhere. I don't know the population, but there is a post office, a small general store, which is owned and ran by a nice older lady, which has one gas pump with your choice of diesel or one grade of gas.

After you get to La Sal, which I reiterate is the middle of nowhere, you then drive another 45 minutes (a lot of it driving 80 MPH) to get to Pat and Stephanie's.

I took the following pictures at the rest stop after Moab, just before we turned off the main highway.

I listened to Mabel, my GPS, and she really got us lost. She had us finally go on a one lane road that was supposed to be our destination, but one side of the road went straight up and the other side straight down with nowhere to turn around. When we got turned around, Cindy was so upset  that she wasn't sure she wanted to ride in the car and was in tears. We finally got back down to the main dirt road, after going through on washed out place that Cindy was sure we would get stuck in, it was 20 miles back to the turn we should have taken. Even then, after I finally got phone service, I had to call Pat to find out how to get there. With no phone service we could have been in trouble. Cindy was afraid we were getting too low on fuel ( we really had plenty).

We finally got to their home about an hour longer than it should have taken.

They have a wonderful log home with views that seem to go on forever.

Pat and Stephanie

Now for the simple things that we enjoy: when we were there, the day was cloudy which meant, no solar power which meant limited electrical power. By morning the batteries didn't have enough power to operate their water pump, so no hot showers in the morning. Their water has to be hauled in and they are limited to 500 gallons per week. When we tried to brush our teeth, the water barley dripped.  No power also meant no TV, so our entertainment for the evening was to watch the humming birds feed at the feeders.

They have limited phone service and no internet. Oh for the simple joys of life. Oh, to be young. I couldn't live like that. Also, about two weeks ago. I had asked Pat about rattle snakes and he told me he hadn't seen any, but about 2 days later he had to kill one. Cindy is very afraid of snakes, so that wouldn't work out for her.

We were going to stay longer, but I had a cousin die on Monday night and wanted to get back to his funeral, so we left Thursday morning the get back to Riverton.

On the way home we stopped at a fruit stand in Green River and bought some different types of melons. The ones we have tried are sure good as was the samples of the other type we haven't tried yet.

Thanks for visiting.

Funeral and Getting Together With My Brothers and Sisters

Riverton, Utah         High 92 Low 64

It warmed up again and is supposed to be even warmer for the next few days.

Because of the funeral today, we decided to put off going to see Pat and Stephanie until next week.

Most of my brothers and sisters were at the funeral today. I don't know why Ralph didn't make it as he lives closer to where the funeral was held than any of us.

Counting myself there were 8 of the remaining family at the funeral. It really wasn't a formal funeral, but more of a gathering of family and friends to celebrate Kathy's life.

There was lots of finger food the whole time we were there.

I got to see my Uncle Gordon again. He seems to have slowed down a lot and told me he hasn't been golfing at all this year. Golf is his passion. He is a little over 9 years older than I am. As I have said before, I was the oldest of 12 children. Kathy make the 3rd sibling that has passed on, with 2 this year. Again it reminds me how old I am getting to be.

Paula is closest with her back to us and in front of her is my uncle Gordon.

We picked up my daughter, Paula, and she was the only one of my kids at the funeral. She is the only one living in Utah, so I guess that's to be expected.

My youngest daughter, Sabrina, did send flowers so she was thinking of her aunt.

This was Sabrina's contribution.

Kathy's husband, Brian, seems to be pretty broken up over loosing Kathy.

Brian is at the far right side  (with the blue checkered shirt). Three of the remaining are Kathy's son's and I think the other 2 are Brian's brothers.

In spite of the reason, it was good to see family that we don't get to see very often.

Paula got the following picture of 2 of my brothers and myself. She thought it was funny that we all had our hands in our pockets.

We are still not sure when we are going to Yuma, but 115 is way too hot for us.

Thanks for visiting.

More News

Riverton, Utah        High 80 Low 53

Yesterday evening we went to a local restaurant for our grandson Skyler's birthday. He turned 14 yesterday. We did get pictures of him opening some presents. He is in his first year of High School.

Yesterday morning I got a message that my sister Kathy, the one with leukemia, was doing worse and would I like to go see her with another of my sisters. We drove to their home and about all she did was lay in bed moaning. I'm not sure she knew we were there. Later she did sit up and drink a little water.

Then last night at about 10:00 my sister called and told me she was a lot worse and was going to her house. Then about 11:30 a text came through saying that Kathy had passed away at about 11:10.

Kathy was 63 years old and the fourth from youngest in my family. She is the third of my siblings to pass away. This makes the fourth family member to pass away in the last nine months. This sure makes me feel old. We are going to have a funeral to go to on Friday.

Today we went to see Linda, partly about our trip next spring, and partly to get a few things from her that she wanted Cindy to have that were their mother's.

Among the things was an old quilt that was hand made from some of the clothes that were their great grandfather, Joseph Moroni Turner. He was born 1881 and died in 1952. Our guess is that the quilt is at least 75 years old and shows some signs of wear. Linda wanted Cindy to repair the missing binding, but after thinking about it and talking it over, they decided not to do anything to the quilt. Some one had already replaced the binding on 2 sides.

We may try to go see Stephanie tomorrow and return home on Thursday, but so far I haven't been able to talk to Stephanie. I guess the phone service isn't very good an hour from the middle of nowhere.

Thanks for visiting.

Very Busy

Riverton, Utah          High 96 Low 66

I heard on the TV last night that Salt Lake temperatures are about 10 degree above normal for this time of year with no relief in sight. In fact the whole of Arizona and New Mexico is above normal for the time of year. Cindy reminded me that last winter Yuma had an unusually cool winter. What's up with this weather?

Since we have been home we have done a lot of pruning on the apricot tree and more is needed but we don't want to stress the tree too much so are going to wait until next year to do much more pruning.

We got all the apricots we wanted and are constantly picking up fallen one the birds and yellow jackets have knocked down.

Today we got some defective windows replaced. After 20 years the seal between the two panes of glass warped badly. Fortunately for us it was only 4 of the smaller picture windows on the south side of our home while the larger ones still look alright.

The tires on our truck were getting pretty worn and I was only going to replace the 4 rear tires but when we checked the depth on the front, they weren't too far behind. I had a 50,000 mile warranty on the tires and since we had only gone 31,000 of  it, Discount tires was able to give me almost $300.00 credit toward new ones and also had a $70.00 rebate if I bought 4 tires. They still cost a lot but we will feel a lot safer when we take the fifth wheel for our next trip.

It seems like I have spent a lot of money on the truck and trailer but it is still less than if we were to buy a new truck.

I have also been busy quilting and Cindy has been making more quilts for me to do. She doesn't seem to want me to run out of things to do.

We still plan on visiting Cindy's daughter Stephanie at her home an hour from the middle of nowhere. They are between Moab and Monticello by the Colorado border.

On a more somber note: my sister that has leukemia is now at home and according to my other sister, she seems to be growing weaker and weaker all the time. Today we got a message that said she is in more pain and is not eating very well.

That's about all the news today.

Thanks for visiting.

We Are Still Here

Riverton, Utah        High 83 Low 67

Today was cooler than it has been. Salt Lake set a new record high for August 2nd.  It was cloudy all day today with rain predicted tomorrow. 

Cindy has been busy freezing apricots and using her new embroidery machine. In the 3 months she has had it, the store we bought it at, told her she had used it as much as a person normally would in a year, so we took it in for it's yearly tune-up yesterday and got it back today. She says she is kind of burned out on embroidering for a while. She wanted to get a lot of her embroidery ready to take to Yuma.

Monday and last night we went to classes on operating the machine and Cindy found out some things she didn't know about the sewing machine. When she went she thought it would be just basics and probably wouldn't find out anything new but, surprise, she found out her machine has lots of toys built in.

I  have been busy quilting and doing various repairs to our home.

I also got the front brakes replace on our truck. The discs weren't worn out but the rotors had heat cracks and the man in Washington thought it would be a good idea to replace them for safety sake.

I feel like I have spent a lot on repairs but at least now the truck and trailer are ready for another trip.We are planning on taking the trailer and truck to Yuma this winter and then leaving for Florida after Yuma. Right now our plans are to be out of Florida by the end of April. We will then head north for a while.

We hope to leave for Yuma about the middle of September.

Thanks for visiting.