A March Medley

I've gotta begin this March post with the Softball Roger Bobblehead our son, Ryan, created. Roger plays slow-pitch a couple of times a week with local teams and loves it, though he fell on his shoulder a few weeks ago and has had physical therapy and has been nursing it since. Despite the sore shoulder, he continues to keep moving, as usual - softball, pickle ball, golf and running.

The day before the Mountain West Basketball Tournament every year, held in Las Vegas, Roger gets invited to an Aggie golf tournament sponsored by USU in St. George. This year, they golfed at The Ledges. Fellow Friends and Aggies, Loran Van Noy, and Steve Whitmer, got to make up their foursome with Roger and the Alumni Relations director, Sian Smith.

Our Aggie basketball team was top-seeded and won the Mountain West Tournament and came out on top of the Mountain West Conference in regular season play, insuring a berth in the NCAA March Madness! This pic was taken by grandson, Sam, at the floor celebration after the game.

We were so excited this year for the March Madness. BYU had a great team, too, with A J Dybontsa, and they got a 6th seed in the tournament, though they lost in the first round to the Texas Longhorns, who went on to win two more rounds. Our Aggies were seeded 9th, which was a disappointment - my gosh, what do they have to do to get a good seed??? Their win-loss record was 29-7 and they won the Mountain West tournament at the end of the season.

Anyway, in the NCAA Tournament, they won the first round, beating 8th-seeded Villanova, 86-76, and then had to play #1-seeded Arizona in the 2nd round. They lost, but played them a lot better than most of the teams later in the tournament.

As you have probably surmised, I LOVE March Madness, though it is changing and will continue to change with the portal and who has the most money to buy players. Sure hope Cinderella teams aren't a thing of the past! We have a bracket contest with our kids and spouses every year, and I led until the final. Roger picked Michigan and won! Our boys, especially, really get into it and know lots more than we do about the teams, so this was a fun victory! Who says Grandma and Grandpa can't keep up!

We lost 3 wonderful people within a week in our ward - Lorin Nielsen, Connie Richter and Chuck Dubois. 

Roger served as Lorin's 1st counselor a little while after we moved to St. George. What a knowledgable, talented man he was and he and his wonderful wife, Kathy, are dear friends!

Darling Connie was Carl Richter's sweet wife. Everyone loved Connie! Carl golfs in a foursome with Roger every Monday morning and is a very dear friend.

Chuck was our bishop's brother. He and his wife, Elsa, live in our ward. He has taught Gospel Doctrine and his wife is a little dynamo!

We were tickled when our grandson, Ben, texted to ask if he and his sister, Becca, could come stay a couple of nights on the weekend on March 20 and 21st. They had fun hiking with their cousin, Ellie, who goes to college here and she knew a good hike to take them on. I fixed a chicken enchilada dinner and they were starving! We loved watching how these cute cousins interacted and it was so fun to step into their college world for a few hours! We adore these great grandkids, noticing how they're maturing each time we see them and we appreciate how they'e such good kids, pursuing good and great things.

Alas, another March funeral! Roger's cousin, Annette, unexpectedly passed away with complications of shingles, of all things! She was a very upbeat, lovable, charitable gal, doing so much good for others. She and her husband served two missions for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and they headed up a project of sending life-saving equipment for newborns to Mexico, among many other charitable acts. Her husband, Shaun, called Roger to pass on the news of her illness, then of her death to family members. We drove from St. George to Sandy for her beautiful funeral and Roger was able to catch up with all of his Stratford cousins who were there. 

After we drove to the grave site at the SLC Cemetery, instead of driving all of the way back south to Sandy in traffic for the luncheon at the church, we met back up with Roger's sister, Susie and Chyrrl and 3 other cousins from up north, Dolly, Cindy and Butch, at Little America Cafe, a long-time favorite in SLC. We all lingered a while, laughing, reminiscing and catching up - the best part of funerals!

We forgot to get pics this time, but we had such fun at our monthly Game Night. The best game was, we all wrote down our most embarrassing moment, and other topical personal stories, then 3 of us told the story of 1 of the 3 to convince all the others it was our story, and then they voted on which one of us was telling the truth. We heard lots of funny stories! So fun!

I made a crunchy veggie dip, enough to feed an army! I sent some home with friends and to other friends the next day!

Finally, we celebrated Palm Sunday with a 1-hour Sacrament meeting at church and our usual Easter meal when we returned home - lamb chops and mint jelly a week early! General Conference will fall on Easter Sunday next week. This year I have especially thought about the "awesome arithmetic of the Atonement," as Elder Neil Maxwell calls it, and the incomprehensible sacrifice God and Jesus Christ made for me so my spirit will live on after mortal death. Our Come Follow Me group has had wonderful discussions about our Savior and my love grows deeper every year for Him!

We often enjoy relaxed Sunday dinner in our chairs!

Both sobering and gloriously happy things have come to us this March. We are grateful for it all.

 

Fabulous February!

I look forward to February every year, no matter how dreary the weather and the doldrums of winter turn out to be, because it's my birthday month, and, with Valentine's Day, it's the month of love! As it turns out this year, I'm not sure St. George has even had winter! We had one day hit 71 degrees in January and a day or two hit 79 degrees in February.

USU invites us to an annual music workshop held in St. George, which includes a dinner and performances by instrumentalists and choirs from USU. Dane Graham, whom I've mentioned before, invites Roger and I go to lunch or dinner with him the night before. This year, I came down with something the day he came, but Roger met him for dinner at the Rib and Chop House and had a nice visit with him. 

A delightful surprise happened the first part of February - I received an invitation to a Valentine Party from an old Ogden friend who has a second home in St. George, Joan Petty. Through our mutual friend, Connie Minnoch, who also lived in Ogden (her husband was our Stake President there) and now lives in Sunbrook, Joan found out I live here now and invited me. She has this party every year. Some of her Ogden friends come and stay with her and help her put it together and she invites old and new friends from St. George. She goes all out - Valentine motif at street signs, up her walk, on the garage, on her porch and everywhere in her home! She decorates us as we arrive - necklaces, bracelets, even sparkly beauty marks! Lovely quiches, salads, trifles, cookies, and other goodies cover her counter tops and tables are set up for eating, then playing fun games. It was a delightful afternoon for me because I talked to so many whom I had some connection with - either from Ogden, or college days or distant relatives or St. George. I think the older we get, the more we appreciate happy surprises!

They remembered to take the pic below when more than half of the guests had already left. We were even sent out the door with swag bags!

We used to always celebrate my birthday by going to Vegas for a couple of days, but this year, I thought sticking around home sounded better (surely I'm not getting old!), so we had a delicious dinner at a new restaurant, the Cosmopolitan, with an old, known chef in the area, Chef Imi. We went a couple of days before my Valentine birthday to beat the crowds.

On my birthday, Roger took me to lunch at Painted Pony and I had my favorite, fresh Ahi tuna salad.

I was thrilled with the beautiful bright orange roses Roger greeted me with that morning!

Loved ones made me feel so loved on my birthday!

My birthday was Saturday. Sunday, after we attended church, had our Sunday salmon dinner, listened to the weekly Tabernacle choir program, we were watching a podcast for Come Follow Me. We heard the doorbell ring, and . . .

I truly could not have been more surprised! Roger had no clue, either, about these two daughters, Stacy (lives in Gilbert, Az.) and Missy (lives in Boise, Ida.), and Missy's two daughters, Claire, and Ellie (who goes to UTU in St. George), coming to surprise me for my birthday and to attend the St. George Home Show the next day. Best surprise ever!

On Tuesday, before everyone left for home (except Ellie, who went back to her apartment), the girls took us to lunch for sushi at Sakura.

A robot delivered a birthday dessert to me, sang Happy Birthday and I blew out the candles.

I am so lucky to have these beautiful, wonderful girls in my life!

More cards and gifts came, so we had to take some more pics.

Roger took this one morning after we had a frosting of snow come on the distant mountains.

Our talented granddaughter, Addie, who lives in Alpine, Utah, invited us to come up north and see her in this production, so, on Wednesday, February 25, we drove to Mindy and Jeff's.

As you can see, it states the performances go from February 20-28, with no mention that there will not be a Wednesday night performance. Addie got her theater make-up on early that evening, costumes in hand, had her mom drop her off at the school to only find out that there was no show that night. We were waiting at Mindy's house when they both came back, so apologetic, and Addie, crushed.

We drove home, after the whole family took us to dinner at a great Japanese restaurant, Himachi. We received this text the next day.

Mindy Lind:

Thank you again for coming yesterday… I still can’t believe you came all that way and then there wasn’t even a play🤦‍♀️. Thank you for being so gracious about it! I hope the drive home wasn’t too awful. It was so wonderful to see you and get to have dinner with you and all the kids. About 15 minutes after we got home Fiona came up to me and said, “I really miss grandma and grandpa.” I love you so much!

I answered her, saying:

It's so weird how sometimes things work out even better than the original plan, even though things go wrong. We loved having so much time to be with all of the kids and you, to talk and share and laugh and eat together! Probably much more time than we would have had, especially with Addie. We talked about how each of your kids is so special, so talented, so smart, so wonderful. We could feel their genuine love for us and we feel it so strongly for them! We're very lucky parents and grandparents to have each of you to love! It  was so worth the drive to be with you all! And thank you for a fun and delicious dinner!

Mindy sent pics of Addie in some of her scenes - she played three different characters.

This production is being said to be one of Lone Peak High School's finest! I love this cute pic of their family (Fiona had somewhere else she had to be that night).

One of our favorite friends, Nancy, asked us, "Are you guys gamers?" We laughed and answered, "Sure!" though we never were into games much as we were raising our kids. Now, they're fun, though I feel that I'm never quite quick enough - most games require quickness. I've told my kids that I want on my tombstone - "She was slow, but she was good!"

So, we have been invited to be in a little Gamer Group to meet once a month.

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IT'S TIME FOR FUN AND GAMES 😆🤣😂

WHEN: Friday, February 27

WHERE: VanNoy's Home

TIME: 6:00 pm

BRING: Your favorite hors d'oeuvre to share!

Roger set the iPhone on the timer and placed it on a far-away shelf for these pics, not great, but they remind us of a very fun evening!

Here are some quick pics. This is grandson, Max Young, ready for a school cowboy-themed dance. He's now 6' 4''!

And here are some updates of new great-grandkids. This is Anna and Jack's, Charlotte, meeting her cousin, Peter and Izzy's, Theo!

Here is little William, Josh and Jaylen's third child, getting hugs from his big bro, Caleb!

It's so nice to be able to label a whole month fabulous! As we continue to get older and so many sad and hard things are happening in our personal world and in the world all around us, we appreciate the happy, fabulous times!