Sentimental Value

My mother didn't have a lot of expensive jewelry. I remember she had several sets of earrings, matching necklaces and pins - mostly costume jewelry. Whenever she got dressed up in her "Sunday Best", she always wore some of her jewelry. As a girl, I would go to her small, cloth lined jewelry box and look at her collection. Everything was very fancy to a young girl. There was one piece that I never saw her wear. It was a ring with a stone missing in the setting. The loose stone sat in the jewelry box along with the ring. I never asked her why she didn't get it fixed so she could wear the ring.

When she passed away 24 years ago, that was the one piece of jewelry I took for myself with the idea that I'd get the ring fixed and wear it. The ring sat in my jewelry box for almost 13 years before I took it to get it repaired. By then, I had lost the loose stone and had to replace it. I've worn the ring almost daily ever since.

Until just recently, I didn't think that the ring had much sentiment to any of my brothers and sisters. But after sending my younger brother a picture of our newborn granddaughter, he remarked that he got more sentimental seeing Mom's ring in my hand than looking at the picture of my granddaughter. I learned from him that he saw Mom wear the ring later in her life. She must have put in on often enough for him to recognize it 24 years later. His reaction has given me reason to pause and reflect a little on my mother and "the ring".

My mother had a comfortable life. But I know that there were some things that she would have liked to have done - one of them was traveling. This may be shocking to some, but one of the reasons why she didn't travel was my Dad. He couldn't understand the interest or be bothered with it. My mom was nine years younger than my Dad. She said to me, more than once, that she would probably out live him. She looked forward to being able to travel with her sisters to some of the places she had only heard about. When she became ill with cancer and knew that she would not survive my Dad, she was a little angry knowing those travels wouldn't happen.

So what's the sentimental value in all this? I look at the ring I wear on my right hand a little differently. My mom wasn't able to travel, but her ring has been pretty well traveled in the last several years - many places in the United States, as well as Paris, London, Scotland, and Denmark. Now when I head out on another travel adventure, I will be taking a little of my mother with me in the form of a special ring. It makes me a little sentimental.

Newest Grandchild

Sienna
August 25, 2007
6 lbs 4 oz - 18"

On August 25 at about 5:30 pm, we got a phone call from our pregnant daughter-in-law. "I'm in the hospital. They just checked me in." About 1/2 hour later, our son calls. "Wife is in the hospital." We said, "We know, she called us." Son says - "What, she called you before she called me??" He was at work when his wife drove herself to the hospital! She didn't want to bother her husband because they had had several false alarms. He made it in time for the delivery of our newest granddaughter. Big sister and brother are excited to have a little sister.

They're No Fools

I got some mail from the Drivers License Division a couple of days ago. My license expires on my birthday in a few months and because I've been without any moving traffic violations in the last five years, I could renew by mail. Yippee! No going to the DMV and waiting in line. No taking an eye test. But it got better, I could actually renew online! Yea! No stamps or trip to the mailbox. I quickly got online and filed my renewal form. But my joy was short lived. There was another notice at the bottom of the form: "If you will be 65 when your new license expires, you will need to apply in person and take an eye exam." Yep, that means me. I can't believe that would possibly mean me. For years, I've been fooling a lot of people about how old I really am. But I guess you just can't fool the DMV!

Weeds Be Conquered!

Yesterday, I spent 3 hours weeding the top portion of our steep back hillside. Even though, I spent hours this spring planting ground cover, perennials, more shrubbery and trees (actually, professionals and Patrick planted the trees and shrubbery), the infamous wild grass and morning glory still took over the hillside. You really couldn't tell what was growing up there. Six black garbages later, the place looks a lot better.

However, my body is paying today for the physical labor. Aside from the usual aches and pains, I also sat down hard on a small rock and bruised my tail bone! Ouch! I didn't know the rock was right under my butt when I sat down on the hill. I should probably just let the weeds totally claim the hillside as theirs. They've been trying ever since we moved in here. But I won't be conquered by the obnoxious little weeds. Even though it seemed that no one in my family noticed my hard work, or the six garbage bags sitting on the patio waiting for someone to haul them around front to the garbage cans; I have some satisfaction of a job well done. Hopefully next year, the perennials and shrubs will grow up and show the little old weeds who is in charge.

Rooster asked for more pictures of our July trip...

The Prince of Wales Hotel in Waterton Ntl Park, Alberta, Canada is in a stunning setting. It was too early to stop for the day when we went through, so we didn't stay. Maybe next time.

Motorcycle Grandpa loved the fresh crab cocktails at this fish market in Westport, Oregon.
A local eatery across the street billed itself as the "Home of famous Cranberry Oyster Ice Cream". Now there's a combination for you. Westport was also where we met a very friendly woman who offered to have us stay at her place for the night. I still have her name and phone number if anyone is in the Westport area and needs a place to stay.

There was no rain in the Hoh Rainforest, Olympic Ntl Park WA...
But we did have record breaking heat!

East side of Flathead Lake, MT.
It was on this road that a cooler full of beer fell off the back of a moving truck that was right in front of us. Beer cans were exploding all over the road!
It was amazing that we were able to dodge the mess.

I promise no more pictures. It was a great trip.

July 2007 Trip - Canadian Rockies/Pacific Northwest

The ride through the elevation changes, twisties and straightaways of the Canadian Rockies to Vancouver, BC. was exhilarating! I took this picture from the back of the bike going 65 mph.

Lake Louise, Alberta, Canada was another amazing place. The Canadian Rockies came right down to the lake shore.

If you'd rather "leave the driving to somebody else", these red vintage buses make the trip to Logan Summit, Glacier Ntl Park on a regular basis. It was in this parking lot that we dropped the bike while dismounting. Like Motorcycle Grandpa always says, regardless of what really caused it, it was my fault.

We drove the Highway to the Sun, Glacier Ntl Park, last summer. But on the motorcycle it was spectacular...completely surrounded by the environment.


On the road to Kalispell MT, A very large bird smacked right into the lower windshield, leaving a pretty good splat mark. We're lucky it didn't run right into Motorcycle Grandpa's helmut. That would have caused some problems.

There are so many pictures from this trip. I could post a huge blog full of them. But you'll have to wait for the Shutterfly book of this trip to be put together to see the most of them.

Motorcycles and Me

About a year ago while I was on a trip to Europe, my husband bought a BMW touring motorcycle. He logged hundreds of miles while I was gone. Since then, we've ridden together over 7000 miles Last fall, we did a gypsy trip (no specific itinerary) that took us from SLC to Santa Fe, New Mexico and back. We logged almost 3000 miles! It was an amazing trip over roads that we had been on by car many times. On a motorcycle, it was like a whole new world.

In June 2007, Motorcycle Grandpa decided he wanted an motorcycle upgrade. I was happy with the one we had. But after borrowing a friend's 2006 model of the one we had, there was no turning back. He came across a great deal on the 2007 demo at the local dealership. We were ready to ride for our next big trip.

July 2007, we took a trip north from SLC through Glacier Ntl Park, Banff, Alberta, Canada, the southern Canadian Rockies, west to Vancouver BC and then south down the Washington and Oregon coasts. Most of it was country that we had never seen before. We never knew what to expect around the next bend, uphill the next hill or in the next town. We planned our trip from day to day and always managed find a good place to stay each night. By the time we pulled into the driveway at home two weeks later, we had logged 3380 miles. I also put in my longest day on the bike during the trip - 550 miles.

Pictures of July trip to follow in a later post.

This is my life....

Some of you have brought to my attention that the purpose of having a blog is to post something other than lists. Since I started this blog over 10 days ago, my life has been something a little different than planned. I think another list is in order to kind of justify why there hasn't been any post since Aug 5.

1. Oldest daughter came home from OB appointment and told me that she was suppose to "lie low" for the duration of her pregnancy - about five weeks left. So, my grandma duties have increased helping to take care of a 2 year old, etc.

2. Youngest daughter was in the hospital for various reasons over the course of 6 days. One was for a planned procedure that was very difficult for her (see her Blog for details). The 2nd stay was a result of an ER visit.

3. Second son's wife had her tonsils out and they needed help from me with their 15 month old for a morning - which just happened to be the same day that daughter #2 had a radiology test done.

4. Youngest son had a doctor' appointment and will be having minor surgery this week.

It's been kind of crazy. I've also realized if I was 15 to 20 years younger, I would have handled all this without too much problem or the exhaustion that came from days taking care of grandkids, family members, cooking, cleaning and all that stuff. I know why you have kids while you are young!

If any one of the above listed events had not have happened practically on top of each other, I may have posted to the blog. But just about every time I sat down to post something new, my brain was mush and I'm pretty sure that what ever I wrote would have been pretty much incoherent ramblings.

4 Reals

I've been lurking around everyone's blog for awhile. Now I'm jumping in and trying to get up to speed on this blogging stuff.

Here's my 4 REAL

4 Jobs:
1. Hotel desk clerk
2.Receptionist
3. Condo/hotel manager
4. Secretary

4 Movies I could watch over and over
1. Pretty Woman
2. American President
3. Gone with the Wind
4. Mmm...can't think another one

4 Places I've Lived
1. Arlington, Virginia
2. Orem, Utah
3. Park City, Utah
4. Salt Lake City

4 TV Show I Watch
(when I can get my hands on the remote for longer that 5 minutes)
1. HDTV House Hunters
2. HDTV Design to Sell
3. Dancing with the Stars
4.Survivor

4 Places I've Been on Vacation
1. Paris, France
2. London, England
3. Lake Powell
4. Cannon Beach, Oregon

4 Favorite Restaurants
1. Anyplace with a great filet mignon and baked potato
2.Loco Lizard
3.Faustinas
4. Pagoda

4 Websites visit daily
1. msn.com
2. Gamehouse (I'm a jigsaw puzzle junkie)
3. SLCity.com
4. KSL.com

4 Places I'd rather be
1. Paris, France
2. On the beach - Cannon Beach, OR specifically
3. Lake Powell
4. Motorcycle touring