Summer Treats

As I was going through my pantry the other day, 

planning meals around needing-to-be-used-food-before-it-expires,

 I ran onto a packet from the famed Serendipity (New York and Las Vegas) 

of ingredients to make their frozen hot chocolate. 

It was hiding and I had forgotten about it.

Score!

Perfect timing on a hot August day!

NAI, the commercial real estate firm that Roger works for, 
has the Best Parties!

We look forward to the Christmas party every year, which is held in a nice restaurant. 

It always has a theme and the Walters come up with great games and prizes.

Past summer parties have been such fun, too. 

It's been a fun day (and night, if you wanted to camp out)

at their ranch near Bryce Canyon, 

and last year, we all stayed over at Ruby's Inn at the entrance to Bryce.

This year, the Walters chartered a huge bus and we enjoyed a day trip to Cedar City.

Mark and Val Walters

Earlier, they purchased an NAI shirt of our choice of style and color for each of us to wear that day.

We enjoyed boxed lunches from Kneader's on the way, 

then we all went to a matinee performance of "Charlie's Aunt" at the Shakespeare Festival.

There was lots of laughter coming from the NAI group!

After it was over, we boarded the bus, drove by the new Cedar City Temple site, 
which had its ground-breaking ceremony the next day.

It will sit on a beautiful location, looking out at the gorgeous surrounding mountains.

Future Cedar City Temple, to be completed in two years

We then drove up the canyon for dinner at Milt's Stage Stop Restaurant.

I love summer treats!

Happy "Connections!"

Missy's Famous!

Roger and I are so excited for our sweet daughter, Missy!

(She is front and center on the above cover of Costco Connection.) 

Over six years ago, she and two friends in her ward in Boise started a blog for women, HowDoesShe.com, 

It shares ideas of "How to" . . . in cooking, raising children, crafting, decorating, fashion, etc. 

It began with each of them contributing $125 of their diaper money 

to set it up and then each of them wrote a post with photos twice a week - 

so in those early days, they had a new post every day, except Sunday. Now the blog has several writers,

and it has grown to a staff of 12 women with writers and contributors from the U.S. and Canada 

and a readership of 2.7 million and 4 million page views monthly. 

Inside the August issue of Costco Connection, which is sent to 8 1/2 million Costco members each month, 

there are HowDoesShe founders and 4 other professional bloggers featured.

We are so proud of her for many reasons other than this nice honor,

but this has been pretty exciting in our family. 

Way to go, Missy!

When our copy came in the mail, we had to take a pic!

Making "Connections" - Happy Dinners With Friends 

All in the same week, we went to dinner with Gordon and Judy Jones (Gordon has been recovering from a kidney transplant and is doing great); 

went to a show and dinner with Jim and Kathy Jensen (Kathy has been recovering from hip surgery and is slowly feeling better); 

and we had a "farewell " dinner with our Aggie group at Taylor's lovely home. 

Bob and Mary Brady are soon to leave for a second LDS mission, this time to the Philippines. 

How we will miss these dear friends!

We enjoyed a hamburger cookout on the 24th of July and we played the dice game, 

and Jay was the repeating champion. 

I guess I'm losing my touch, but I did come in second!

I just threw in these pics of a happy lunch - I guess you could say with my "friend," Roger.

We took a quick day trip to Las Vegas for a one-to-one Mac lesson, then did some shopping 

and had a delicious lunch at Mon Ami Gabi.

Roger had a Croque Madame.

I had a seafood crepe - yum!

We called it an early celebration of Roger's birthday, which is later this month.

They always bring a free chocolate profiterole for celebrations, so we celebrated!

On Saturday, August 1, I got a phone call from a long-time high school friend and fellow quartet member, 

Kay (Katharine Louise) Dunlap Overton.

She had been on a two-week road trip with her brother, Donald, and his wife, Kitty, to various places in Idaho, and they would be passing through St. George on their way to Kay's home in Las Vegas from SLC. 

She wanted to meet somewhere, but I said, "Why don't you come for dinner?"

We got out of church at about the same time that they would be passing through, so they plugged us into their GPS and arrived just as we had a salmon dinner ready.

I was so excited to see her!

We talked non-stop for about 2 1/2 hours, then they were back on the road.

There's just nothing like great old friends!

We've been the visitees more than the visitors for awhile, 

and we have enjoyed every friend and loved one who has "connected" with us!