More Texas pictures

Riding the horse at La Hacienda

Looking at.......Jon?

Not the hippo's better side

Friendly parakeets

Our Thanksgiving week in Texas

Sorry about the angle don't know how to straighten it. This is La Hacienda The hippos (In the background!)

Feeding the birds

Friday Nov. 21: We left for the airport in SLC at 3pm and our flight left at 5pm. We were supposed to have only a 1/2 hr to catch our connecting flight in Denver and after running from the beginning of a concourse to the end of it we were informed that our flight had been changed to another gate that we actually had run past! After backtracking we found out that our plane coming from New York had been damaged and we were delayed 3 hrs!! Instead of arriving in Dallas at 10 pm we arrived at 1am.

Sat. Nov. 22: After about 5 hrs sleep Mandy and her 3 kids and I shopped all day for Christmas and birthday gifts while Jon and Garn stained an outdoor wooden playset for the family. Ali napped during this time. That evening Sadie, Haylie Mandy and I went to see High School Musical III at the movie. It was a great production!

Sun. Church and rest

Mon. Mandy, Garn and I shopped at antique stores for an entry way table and vintage clothing stores for some fun finds. Sadie babysat the kids. That night we went to La Hacienda to eat and had a great time!

Tue. Downtown McKinney with old fashioned shoppes. I've really started liking old stores! We got lunch at Sonic (they have the best crushed ice) and ate at Celebration Park which is a huge park in a city nearby. The kids had a great time playing on all the playground apparatus.

Wed. We went to one of only two Treasury Dept. currency making plants. The other one is in Washinton DC. They only make paper money here. After an intensive security check we went on a tour. We saw pallets of $100 bills being stacked and each pallet was worth $64 million! Then on to the Fort Worth Zoo. It's pretty spectacular! They have a bird exhibit with 100's of parakeets and small birds in a huge wire dome that you can wander around in. Just outside the enclosure you can purchase a stick with sticky bird seed attached for $1 and then go back in and hold out the stick and the birds will land on it and feed right off your stick. We looked around for Carden and found him with a man who had given him his stick. We told Carden not to take things from others. The man said it was ok. We checked on the 3 girls since it was so crowded in there and when we turned around that same man was taking Carden out of the enclosure with him. I caught them and told Carden to come back with me but the man insisted that he was just buying more bird seed for him. They were right next to the exit!! I told him no thanks and we watched Carden extra close after that and the man kept watching us so we left. There was a bad feeling about there. The rest of the zoo was uneventful and fun but it sure gave us a scare.

Turkey Day! What a great meal Jon and Mandy fixed! They had a family over that has 2 girls: Cambria 15 yrs and Siri (named for her grmother Iris) 10 yrs, same age as Sadie. We had a great time playing games.

Fri Off to the airport at 12 and flew out at 3; layed over for an hour but stayed on the plane in Phoenix and home at 8pm. Thanks Mike for driving us to and from the airport!

Guess Garn didn't have the sound on!

TEXAS here we come!!

We're down to mere days now and I can't even concentrate on work. Bytheway, Mandy, so many people have told me to say hello to you that I can't remember.....let's see Cherie Woodland, The Clawsons, Sadie's advanced Espanol class (actually the hi is to Sadie), Debbie Hansen, Chuck and Darla, Cherie Hlavaty and others from our ward.
Other news: I've been going to the training room at TOSH (The Overly Sadistic Helpers) to have my shoulder and arm worked on and I feel like a truck ran over me and backed up to see what it hit! I may have overworked it at home doing the assigned exercises and that could be the reason for all the pain. All I did in August to injure it was move my recumbant bike from the back porch to my bedroom and then move my bed to accomodate the bike. I mean, I used to move stuff all the time and nothing tore. Just cuz I'm 60 now, my body is rebelling against these things! My right side is fine, it's just the left that's out of shape. I guess I should be grateful that racquetball has kept my right arm in shape. Anybody have any cheese to go along with my whine?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KAREN

Physical Therapy hurts!

Man, they really work you over! After 11/2 hrs. yesterday he finally let me go. I asked if I could take some Ibuprofen for the pain and inflamation but the therapist said he doesn't believe in NSAIDS or anti-inflamatories. Good thing I don't share his beliefs! I haven't done my home exercises yet today. Instead Garn and I went to see Madagascar II. It was so funny! Best therapy yet. Course it didn't help my arm, but then it didn't hurt it either!!

GREAT NEWS!

Marin's having a baby! It's due May19 three days after JR's b-day.... That would be cool. Also, they're moving into their new home next week and there is a nursery already decorated in a jungle theme. Don't know if they'll keep it or not but at least they have one. We'll be going up around the 17th to welcome the new little one and stay a while. They find out the gender 1/09/09. I'll let you know. Now Marin can quit her job that she doesn't really like anyway and maybe do some temp work until the baby comes. We're sooo excited!! Jeannine, JR's mom and I talked about how great it's going to be.
In other news....Oh, there is no other news to compare. The family is just talking about THIS news. Actually, there is news. We're going to Texas for Thanksgiving to be with Mandy and fam and that is exciting! We miss our kids so much but it's also fun to travel to see them and have them come here for visits. It's so nice to look forward to something, especially with the cold winter coming on....

We're covered in snow!!

And it's still coming down!! I went to the orthopedic dr. today and it looks like I have an impinged rotator cuff in my shoulder and impinged hip on my left side with some bursitis, whatever that means. I'm going to the training room at TOSH next Mon for some physical therapy. Usually I have problems on my right side because of my scoliosis but not my left. We'll see what happens. At least it doesn't affect my racquetball much because I'm right-handed. Dr. Eric Heiden was a speed skater in the olympics at one time. He just finished running the New York City Marathon. On the plus side he said my knee and shoulder joints are in excellent shape and I'm very flexible. At my age I'll take all the good news I can.