The Best of 2019 and My Word for 2020

I was gone from blogland for a good part of 2019, but I am so happy to be back now.  This post will be a recap of the best parts of 2019 for me and my family, and it will also be my Catching Up - Part II post.  If you missed the posts explaining why I was absent from this space for ten months of this year, click here.  If you missed my Catching Up - Part I post, click here.

Ok, let's get started on the Jones Family best of 2019!

• Moving

We moved to our townhouse in February, 2019.

It is proven to be an excellent decision.  We really like it here in our new neighborhood.

• 40th Anniversary

Charly and I celebrated our 40th Anniversary in June of 2019.  Even with the ups and downs of marriage, I am proud and grateful to have been Charly's wife for over 40 years!    I sure do love him - he is a great blessing in my life.

• Hiking with my family

We enjoyed hiking in the mountains nearby this year.  Here are some of my favorite hikes:

Donut Falls - beautiful hike about 30 minutes from our home.  It is a popular hike around here, but it was a new one for Josh and I.

Mueller Park Trail - a good trail above Bountiful  I remember hiking here as a child.

Ensign Peak -  with its pioneer history and beautiful views of the Salt Lake Valley.

Holbrook Canyon Trail  - also above Bountiful, near the Bountiful Temple and a beautiful new hiking spot for Josh and I.

• Sacramento

We went to Sacramento in June. We had a great time.

The highlight, of course was seeing and spending time with our oldest son, Alex and his wife, Jess.  I enjoyed being with those two.  We love Alex and Jess and are very proud of both of them.

• Southern Utah and Colorado

At the end of July, when Josh was between semesters at school, we had a family vacation to Southern Utah and Colorado. We stayed in Moab and went to Arches National Park - one of my favorite National Parks. 

We stayed in Moab and went to Arches National Park - one of my favorite National Parks. 

In Colorado, we stayed in one of our family favorite places - Pagosa Springs.

We enjoyed going to the Pagosa Hot Springs...

...and of course, doing some hiking.  It was a good family getaway.

• Performances

Charly and I have always enjoyed plays, but went only rarely when the kids were little, but we decided that at this season in our life we have the time and means to go to a few more permanances, so we started doing more of that this past year.

We even bought season tickets to the opera.  

We also gone to the Hale CentreTheatre for performances of The Addams Family...

Dicken's classic, A Christmas Carol, and the fun and fanciful Seussical.  We have really enjoyed these date nights out at the theater.  

• Volunteering

Charly and I have also enjoyed volunteering at St. Vincent De Paul this past year. 

Helping others and giving back is always a positive thing, resulting in positive feelings.  I am grateful for these opportunities to serve. 

I am also a volunteer indexer for Familysearch.org and do data input of microfilmed historical records, such as birth certificates, marriage certificates, military records, land records, immigration and slavery records.  I look at images of the actual records, some going clear back to the 1600s, and do my best to interpret and type in the relevant information so that all the historic information is preserved digitally and can be accessed by those who want to know more about their ancestors and family history.  I enjoy indexing and have been doing it for years.  This year, I indexed over 500 historic records - mostly WWI draft cards.  As a history buff, I feel that preserving historic information about individuals and families is extremely important so I am glad to be able to serve as an indexer. 

• Temple Time

I love going to the temple and this past year, I was able to go 14 times in 2019.  That is down quite a bit from what I have done in years past, but I am still grateful for all the time I can spend there.  Being in the  temple brings me peace.

For Latter-day Saints, temple worship is special and in addition to our regular Sunday services.  I am grateful to have several temples not too far from our home.  I hope to be able to attend the temple even more in the coming year. 

• New Job

After two years of teaching junior high with some amazing women like the two pictured with me here, I applied for and got a position teaching English at a high school which is only about ten minutes from our home. 

Since I taught high school for 16 years in Arizona, I am super excited and grateful to be back working with students who are little older and more mature (at least some of them) than the junior high students. 

I began my 18th year of teaching in a new classroom at a new school and so far,  I like it (most days) and am grateful for this new challenge.  

My new job, which is teaching English and AVID.  AVID stands for Advancement Via Individual Determination.  The entire purpose of the program and the classes I teach is to prepare students for success in college.  I love teaching these classes.  My new school sent me to an AVID conference in San Diego last summer to prepare.  It was a fun trip where I learned a lot, spent some time in a beautiful city, and got to know my new colleagues.

• Moving Forward

Josh has been making great strides moving forward in life.  He has attended two semesters of college at LDS Business College, where he is working on his Associate' Degree.  He really likes this college, and it is working well for him.

Josh also has a job he likes at Sherwin Williams. He started there in June and worked at one of their retail stores for several months, but he is now in their warehouse, where he works as many hours as possible while attending school. 

Overall,  even with ups and downs and challenges, 2019 has been a good year, and I have much to be grateful for.  

My word for 2020:

I chose the word Intentional as my word for this year.  I want to be intentional - meaning that I want act consciously and with thought in all things I do and say.   I do not want to react, but to intentionally choose peace, love and positivity.

That then is my recap of 2019 and my word for 2020.  I know the next year will have, as all years do, ups and downs and challenges, but I also hope to be able to intentionally seek the good and love my life.

Have an amazing 2020!

A little catching up - Part 1

First of all, I want to thank you, my blogging buddies, for all the kind and supportive comments on my last post.  Your empathetic and understanding words mean the world to me.

Next, as I am back in blog land, I want to catch  up this little blog and all my blogging friends. I went through all of the pictures I took during this past year, to find those that would represent the very best and most positive things that took place.  I like to make this space a small running record of my life which periodically, I like to have made into book form, so here are a few moments from the past ten months:

We moved into our new townhouse last February.  As soon as we closed on the purchase in December of 2018, we started remodeling and renovating. This has continued in one way or another throughout this past year.  In June, we completely redid the main bathroom on the main floor.  We had contractors take it all the way down to the studs...

...then put it back together, completely new. We are so pleased with the way this turned out.  I love the wood-look tile around the bathtub. That was Charly's choice. There is stone tile on the floor.  We hope to have the same contractor back to re-do another of our bathrooms next summer.  

We replaced several of the windows in our home, including the slider that goes out to back patio.  

We are also pleased with how it turned out.  We plan to replace more of the 

old windows in the future.

We attended our grandson Clay's baptism.  We always love being with our grandchildren.  They are growing up so fast! (This is actually the only time I have seen our daughter Tiffany and her children all year so far, even though they only live about 40 miles away.  This is not our choice and we miss them terribly).  

We took a road trip to California to see our oldest son and his wife.

Our son lives in Sacramento and it was fun to explore that area. 

We found some fun used book stores in Sacramento.

Of course, the best part was seeing our son Alex and his wife, Jess.

It was a nice trip.

We saw a lot of interesting things.

It was also a great way to celebrate our 40th wedding anniversary.  

We have done quite a bit of hiking this year, and it has been fun to discover some cool places to hike in the nearby mountains.  This is a hike I did with Josh last summer to a place called Donut Falls. 

I really enjoy hiking in the mountains. 

This is a trail we hiked in the mountains just above the town where I lived during some of my elementary and high school years.

I am glad Josh enjoys hiking with me.  He is more of a hiker than his dad...

...but sometimes we can get Charly to come with us as well. 

Ensign Peak is one of our favorite places.  

It is a fairly short hike to the top of a small mountain that has great views 

of the entire Salt Lake Valley.

There are just so many great places to hike around here.

Last July, when Josh was between semesters in college, we took a family trip to Southern Utah and Colorado. We stopped  in Moab and went to Arches National Park

We love the beautiful National Parks we have here in Utah.

Arches is one of our favorites.

After Moab, it was on to Pagosa Springs, Colorado, 

where we stayed in our Wyndham Time-Share condo...

 ...and enjoyed a relaxing week this quaint little town high in the Rockies.  We soaked in the Pagosa Hot Springs  (pictured above).  Josh and I went white water rafting (but I didn't bring my phone with me in the raft) - so no pictures of that.  

 We also went (you guessed it) hiking along the Continental Divide trail...

...and some other beautiful places that have become favorites through the years. 

One place we had not been before, was Chimney Rock National Monument.  There are beautiful views at the top of Chimney Rock Mountain, and the Native American ruins are super interesting.  It was a very nice trip. 

I'll share a little more about our family's 2019 next time.  Until then, have a great week!