AUGUST UPDATE

What a busy month this has been - maybe that's why it has flown by.  This is my Hansen cousin John Ream who like my father would have been allowed to enter Great Grandfather Smith's huge library because he loves and appreciates good books.  When I took another meal up to him last week he showed me his new huge monitor that allows him to read his Kindle with two pages on the screen.  He was very excited about it.  This has been a very hard month for him as his dear wife, Virginia,  died  end of July from conditions associated with having Alzheimer's for about 20 years.  He's been her sole caregiver in giving over his life to that service.  In that computer room which he has named Ginger's Place he allowed me to view her  in a lovely silver urn along with flowers and other mementos of hers.  It has become a shrine because they spent many of these last years eating, talking, watching TV, reading to her, etc and I'm probably one of the few who have ever been in it.  I know I'm the only cousin who knows Virginia has passed on because he's a very private person and doesn't want a lot of hoop-la made of it.  We've gone way back together, as he helped to tend me when Kate was born, helped refer me to the right people for my job at Thiokol after grad from USU, our love of ancestors, literature, great music, both of us dealing with Alzheimer's care giving, etc and he loves all the goodies I make, bake and deliver to him from spring to winter.

The fellow who was going to put a new roof on house died two weeks ago.  He was such a nice guy so I'll have to find someone else now.  The guys are working on the rain gutters as I type will add two more rain spouts out back.  And yes Justin you and Jesse were correct about the corners needing lots of work.

I finally can see fairly well now, yea!  Best I can hope for with the issues in left eye, but it's sooooo much better than all summer long.  When I picked them up from  office I found out that a high school  friend had finally died of brain tumors after a long three year fight.  I don't take local paper so missed her obit and felt so badly that I'd missed her funeral.  Quite a few of the deco in this house are her works of art.

Two weeks ago dear friends from A. F life drove up to Logan for lunch and four hours of talking as fast as we could to catch up.  I wasn't quite ready to drive to Heber City with old glasses and chest pain so they came up here.  Barbara, who joined our widow's club 5 months ago listened to some of the ways Hi and I dealt with loss of our mates.  Soooo good to see them again.

Then last week with new glasses, I drove to West Jordan to Sally's home and met Barbara there.   I programmed her address into my new car's navigation system and Maggie got me through heavy traffic just great.  These two were my closest friends during our missions together and we also talked as fast as we could for about 3.5 hours.  They're already talking about another get together in October.  We'll see......  We exchange recipes and patterns.

I've been wrapping many wedding gifts this summer for youngsters in the ward, cutting and arranging blocks for next quilts.  Holly got so excited about one of Sunshine's bag material that she asked if I would make her another quilt.  She's purchasing the needed items and will help me tie it when canning season is over.

After I left Sally's I met with Lance and Becky to do a session at the Jordan River temple.  It's been a long time since I've been with them and it was nice.  We ate dinner on their lovely  patio porch and enjoyed the cricket serenade with cute Zac and Leona (just had her 97th birthday.  I slept overnight so avoid heavy traffic back home.  The bed was so soft that I had  the best night's sleep in a long time - my bones loooooooooved it.  Sarah delivered a 5.10 oz baby girl (Indianna) after being on best rest for two weeks.  She came two weeks early and now she and Shad are living with Lance and Becky until Shad heads to Kuwait for a year.  Sarah and babe will stay with grandparents til he returns.

Holly said she texted that I'm up to 88 lbs this a.m.  So I guess eating and drinking  more salt and sugar diet is working.  I'm eating pretty much the things I've done for years, but adding the soy taco mix, and hummus, and ground nuts, bubble less smoothies, flat sugared root beer, Dr. Pepper, and more Ensure and adding powdered milk to anything plausible that I can think of.  I'm eating small peanut butter sandwiches made with dry peanut butter mix with just 4 grams fat is so fun to do again.  And some small bites of homemade candy or chocolates.  The costocronditis if still with me especially when Holly and I are canning.  I try not to overdue, but when I need to rest the pain eventually goes away which it didn't a month ago.  So hopefully I'm healing slowly but surely.  These salsa and marinara sauce recipes Holly and I are making come from our garden and a tomato farm in Mt. Sterling south of Logan.  They are delicious and meet both of our dietary needs (less oil, salt, sugar for her) etc.  She's taken over Dad's job of chopping peppers, onions, garlic, celery so it's nice to have help again.

The pears are falling and I need to do some cin pear jam- am getting low. and the apple are getting ripe.  Cucumbers are overflowing onto the grass and I'm done with dills so we're giving them away.  Have done lots of pickled beets and some for us to cook and eat and also giving many away as out crop was huge.  Our second planting of spinach is looking good and we both love eating a lot of it fresh from garden.  Kale is still there for my salads also.

well I thinks that's enough for today - making too many typos.

BTW - I got an email from Dan Courtney several weeks ago asking if I would be willing to give his accommodations a recommendation on our stay in La Jolla last summer.  I've been giving it some thought and knowing what some of your opinions might be have not responded yet.....