First Weekend of November

This past weekend was a good one.  Here are some of the highlights!

We went for our usual walk at the mall Saturday morning before the stores opened.  

Mid-morning, we left to drive to Provo, Utah to go to two open houses.  Josh wanted to go to BYU for a while, so we dropped him off there and went to the open houses. The first house we saw was not great, but the house shown in the picture was small but super nice!  It would make a great second home for us.  We would have one home in Southern Utah and one in Utah County where we would stay when we came up to see our son, daughter and grandchildren. We really like the house and may make an offer if we can just get our condo sold.  

We were back from Provo about 12:30 p.m.. We dropped Josh off at the house, then headed North to meet up with some friends for lunch. We went to this restaurant which is in Layton, Utah, near Ogden.  We really enjoy getting together with this couple who we have been good friends with since the early 1980s.  

The food at the restaurant was excellent.  I had a Philly Cheese Steak sandwich. The fries that came as a side were done just right!  We enjoyed a good meal, a good conversation, and lots of laughter with our friends. 

It was almost 6 p.m. when we got back to our neighborhood after a stop to get gas in the car, wash it, and pick up a few things from the store.  We stopped at the home of some other friends from our church congregation who had made a cheesecake they wanted to share with us.  It was really good, and we enjoyed visiting with them.

 

Sunday morning, I got up about 5:30 a.m.. I meant to sleep in until 6:30 a.m., but with the time change, my brain was awake at 5:30, so I got up.  The first thing I did was read the scriptures.  I am reading Matthew in the New Testament and Samuel I in the Old Testament. 

We had to go over to check and make sure we had the correct keys to get into our little condo because the new refrigerator is hopefully being delivered tomorrow (Monday).   We were up and dressed, so we decided to do that before church.  It was a lovely, sunny, cloudless morning.  

We made sure we had copies of the correct keys, and still made it to church on time for Sunday School.  I found out at church that my friend (that I have been praying would be able to sell her house) got an offer and will be moving to Arizona before the end of the month.  This is truly an answered prayer, but I sure will miss my friend. 

After church, I took a nap, then went for a walk in the neighborhood. 

I love all of the beautiful fall colors in our neighborhood.  It was a beautiful afternoon for a walk - a perfect fall day!

I made Arby's Beef and Cheddar Sliders for dinner.   They were easy and very good.  Here is a link to the recipe.  

We had French fries and green salad with the sliders.  It was a good dinner, and something a little different than I usually fix on Sunday.

 

After cleaning up dinner, Charly and I watched an episode of this show, House of David, on Prime.  It is well done and quite interesting. 

After I finish this post, I plan to do some reading before I go to bed. This week, I have three books going, Every Other Weekend by Zulema Renee Summerfield, Christ Versus Caesar by Connor Boyack, and A Christ-Centered Home by Hannah Stoddard.   I always have several books going at once.  

Weekend Gratitude:

• Enjoying time with friends.
• Traveling safely.
• Getting things on the "to-do" list done.
• Worshipping at church. 
• Having gorgeous fall weather. 
• Making plans for Thanksgiving.
• My friend selling her house.

Coming up this week:

Monday - Refrigerator being delivered to condo (hopefully). 

Friday - New pictures of condo scheduled to be taken. 

Friday - Going out to dinner with my friend who has sold her house and will be moving soon. 

Praying for:

• The specific needs of several family members. 
• Help with selling our little condo. 
• Safety at school. 
• Help with dealing with difficult students.
• Our nation. 

That's all for this weekend.  Have a good week!

Until next time,

😊Deb💖

When you replace

"Why is this happening to me?"

with "What is God Trying to teach me?"

Everything changes. 

~anon.

Last Weekend of April

Thursday and Friday, our warm, spring weather cooled off and we had quite a bit of rain which continued until late on Saturday.  

Thursday, I got a message at school from the daughter of good friends that we have known for many years (almost 50).  The daughter told us that her mother had had a stroke and her parents were on their way to Salt Lake City to get her to the hospital. They live in a small mining town in Wyoming (Green River) so Salt Lake City is the nearest place where there is decent health-care.   We went to the hospital when I got home from school, but the wife was still in the emergency room, so we couldn't see her.  We went back  on Friday afternoon and were able to spend some time with the husband while the wife was having a biopsy.  The wife had not had a stroke, but instead has stage 4 cancer.  It was a total shock to everyone.  We are grateful that we were able to see our friends and express our love for them.  They have now been sent back to Wyoming, basically to wait for the wife to succumb to the cancer.  Apparently there is not much that can be done. It's very sad.  This same family has a 41-year-old son who was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer last year and has been given about two years at most.  This family has been on my mind and in my heart since we got the news.  We are praying for them. 

Since we were at the hospital seeing our friends, Friday afternoon, I decided on a quick and easy dinner of chili-cheese fries with vegetarian chili.  This is one of my favorite "busy night" meals. 

After dinner, we went to Crumbl Cookie to get a box of birthday cookies for our grandson who just turned 13.  

Saturday was another gray and cloudy day.  It rained off and on (mosty on) most of the day. The temperatures were also a lot cooler than they have been. 

Saturday morning, we slept in until about 7 a.m..  After getting dressed and eating breakfast, we went up to the rec center and got our walk finished early in the day. 

Later, we drove to our daughter's home, which is about 40 miles south of where we live.  Our grandson turned 13 on Thursday, so we took his present to him.  He wanted a new soccer ball and that is what he got.  This grandson loves sports of all kinds. 

We took our grandson to lunch for his birthday.  He wanted to go to Popeye's for Chicken sandwiches.  We had a nice lunch together.

After lunch, we went back to our daughter's home and visited with the rest of the family. We always enjoy spending time with them.  

After leaving our daughter's we went to see our oldest grandson at his new place of employment - Home Depot.  He was busily doing his his job so I didn't take a picture, but it is always great to see him, and he was glad we stopped by.  He will be turning 18 and graduating from high school in May.  I have no idea where the years go. 

While we were at Home Depot, I got some flowers for our front yard whiskey barrel potter and also some vegetable seeds for our backyard garden.   I have Monday off as a district no-school day, so I plan to do some serious garden work that day, weather permitting. 

Sunday morning, I got up at 6:30 a.m. and got a stew into the crockpot before leaving for church.

We went to church as usual.  Our congregation had a special conference with some guest speakers and teachers. This is the women's class after our main worship service.  

After church, I did some indexing of marriage and naturalization records at Familysearch.org. I also took a little nap and did some reading. The book I read is Emptying the Nest by Brad E. Sachs, Ph.D.. It is an excellent book about family relationships, communication and self-care as we enter and go through the "empty nest" stage of life.  I be finishing the book either tonight or tomorrow. 

This is the very delicious slow cooker stew we had for Sunday dinner.  We had green salad and Ciabatta Bread to go with it. 

After dinner, I went for a walk around the neighborhood.  After the rains of Thursday, Friday and Saturday, the sun was out and the sky was blue and cloudless. There are lots of trees and flowers out in bloom in my neighborhood.  I thought this tree was pretty.  It is in front of a house just up the street from our home. 

A little further on, I passed this tree - a different kind of tree - but also full of beautiful pink flowers. 

Here is still another tree bursting with pink blossoms.

In my own front yard garden, the pink tulips were all out in bloom.  Apparently pink was the color of the day in our neighborhood. 

After coming back from the walk, Charly and I watched our scripture master class on Youtube.  Later, I plan to do some reading to relax before bed. 

Weekend Gratitude:

• Getting needed rain
• Seeing our grandkids on Saturday
• Having a nice conversation with Josh on Sunday
• Taking a nice walk Sunday evening

Coming up this week:

Monday - District day off for students and teachers

Tuesday - Meeting after school

Thursday - Birthday of our granddaughter Eleanor (who lives in Virginia)

Friday - BYU Women's Conference with my daughter and granddaughter

Saturday - Breakfast with a friend

Saturday - Evening out with Charly

That's all for this final weekend of April. Thanks for stopping by.  Have a good week. 

Until next time,

😊Deb💖

"God wants us to trust Him

and leave the past and future with Him."

~Courtney Joseph Fallick

 

First Week of Summer - Friday Favorites

It's the end of the first week of summer.  As always, there is much to be grateful for, so I am joining, again today with Susanne and friends over at Living to Tell the Story for Friday's Fave Five. 

Rain! - after 31 days of unseasonably hot and dry weather, Thursday was much cooler and we got a good amount of rain. Many have been praying for rain, and this storm, with the cooler temperatures, are truly a blessing.  

Hiking at the Jordan River Trail - I mentioned this in my weekend post, but I have am really enjoying these weekly walk/hikes with Josh.  We plan to keep going on these river hikes as time and weather permit. 

Cleaning up and clearing out - I have been trying to clean and organize around the house.  I reorganized my bookshelves, and cleaned and reorganized some things in the office.  We listed some things on KSL.com, which is like Craigslist - a free listing service sponsored by a local TV station here in Utah.  Last weekend, I posted this old antique chair that a neighbor gave us about a year ago, a small fridge that I used in my classroom in Arizona, and some stackable plastic drawers that Charly had is his classroom in Arizona.  We had sold all three items for our asking prices by the end of the weekend.  

Reading nook - I have been wanting to create a little reading nook in our bedroom, for a while.  Our bedroom is not huge, so I needed to find a small and comfy chair that I could put in a corner next to my nightstand.  I found this nice little chair at a thrift store.  The chair fits me just perfectly, and is so comfortable.   I love my  new little reading nook. 

New cabinet - after we found the new chair for my reading nook, we found this nice little cabinet in another thrift store, and got it for less than $8! It is just perfect for a little extra storage space for office supplies and is now next to Charly's bookshelf in our office.  The cabinet replaced the ugly stackable plastic drawers, that we cleaned out and sold on KSL.com (see above). 

Empty nester dinner - Monday night was our monthly empty nester dinner.  Charly and I really enjoy being part of this group. We are among the younger members of the group, and everyone in the group is so nice and friendly. 

After dinner, the group gathered in the game room at our HOA clubhouse and played Bingo.  It was really fun. 

Yard clean up - we finally got our yard care company over to our rental house to weed and clean-up the yard for the new tenants.  The house and yard look super nice now.  We are hoping that the new tenants keep it that way. 

Lunch with a friend - Thursday I met up with my good friend Sandy and we did a little shopping and had a delicious Mexican lunch. I hadn't seen Sandy for well over a year and this was the first time, since before Covid, that I have dined in a restaurant.   

Thrift store finds - In additions to lunch, Sandy and I went "treasure hunting" in some thrift stores.  At this thrift store,  I found several good things.

My favorite was these brand new, still-in-the-box, boots. I love wearing cute boots in the winter, so I was excited to find these  boots marked way down. 

A clerk at the thrift store told me that the department store Macy's made a donation of merchandise to this thrift store, that helps those who are in addiction recovery programs get back on their feet.  You can see that these brand-new boots originally sold for $99 at Macy's and I got them for $7. I love a good thrift store find. 

Hummingbirds - I have mentioned before how much I love watching the hummingbirds at the feeders in  my backyard.  Usually, there is only one bird at one feeder, but the other night two hummingbirds were eating at the same time, one at each feeder. 

Not a favorite - Monday morning while we were out for our walk, I got a message from one of Charly's cousin, that his Aunt Mary Joyce passed. She was Charly's mother's younger sister. She was 86 and had an aggressive form of cancer that was only discovered in May. Aunt Mary Joyce's funeral will be Friday, and we will be attending.  She was a very nice person and always treated Charly and I very well.   I am sure she is now in heaven having a very happy reunion with her husband who passed about two years ago. 

That's all for now. Thanks for stopping by. 

😊Deb💙

"Let us be grateful to people to make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom."

~Marcel Proust