It's nice to be back on the Family Blog...

Hi All,

We hope that you and your sweet families are each doing wonderfully well.  We are happy & just came back from our dinner celebration.  Can't believe it has been 2 yrs. already.  We are in the throws of deciding just which things we want to get done & which things we are going to put on hold until after our Service Mission here in San Diego at the Mission Home.  It will be for 1 year with the option to extend if our health is such that we can.  Mine primarily is in question, yet we feel it is a blessing & privilege to be asked to serve.  As it stands now, there is paper work to fill out & other things that are necessarily required by Salt Lake.  We are looking at an Aug. 1st starting time but are grateful that it will be here in San Diego - no worries about the house; Drs. appt., etc., close by & in an area that we know. It just makes for a Mission that we know the Lord wanted for us.  We'll know more down the line.  In any event, it also means that there won't be any problems seeing you all during the Reunion.  It should be a great time & I'm hoping everyone can attend.  We really need to do this every couple of years as kids grow so fast & many things happen to us in our lives.  I am so truly grateful to each of you for going ahead & getting the ball rolling.

I had a great time visiting with Cheryl, John & Chris in Utah if only for just 4 1/2 days.  Between the two of us, Cheryl & I, we managed to spread the wealth to every store we shopped in!  John's work, Famous Dave's BBQ Restaurant, is very big, very busy & serves scrumptious food.  It is like a rustic cabin with memorabilia & a hunter's trophy case all done in good taste.  I'd say it deserves a visit for lunch or dinner anytime.  Cheryl showed me a place where the family often goes that is a Mandarin Buffet that served killer food including Mongolian Beef BBQ like we used to get at Shanghai.  It was great & also deserves a return visit.  The whole area is sure growing & the people at Cheryl's work seemed to think a lot of her.  It was so much bigger than I had envisioned.  No wonder they are a multi-million $ Co.  On Monday morning, I had a chance to do a session at the St. George Temple & that was very nice.  There must - seriously - have been at least 100 people in my session, or maybe more.  My trip down to Las Vegas afterwards, was uneventful but finding the return place for the car was a nightmare.  I drove around before I got the tank filled & then made it straight to the return center (by then I knew where it was via previously passed signs, etc. & decided to return it at least 1 hr. early & get on over to the airport & situated for the flight - that took off over 2 hours late!!  See - that will teach me to be extra early - it doesn't pay - in fact Dollar Rent a car charged me for 4 extra hours that I thought was already paid in the contract per the agreed upon hours!  Sie le vie.  I just won't use them again, that's all. Anyway, with a delayed flight, as I said, the people in the area became buddies & in fact, a gal I met on the  plane was telling me she'd like to get some history on her family from Ireland when they changed their name, etc., & let's just say that I hooked her up with the right web sight, told her where the family history center is at the Mission Valley Bldg. on the east end & promised to send her some papers to help her in filling out her family genealogy more easily than just listing them.  I have some family group sheets & pedigree charts with just some basic info that doesn't have the church info on them.

It was good to get home safely & now that I've written a 10 pg ltr/blog, I will say Good Night to each of you.  It was good to have Garry meet me at the airport & half carry my luggage & me to the car!!  I'm glad he missed me, too!

We look forward to continually hearing from you & seeing all those wonderful pictures of each one of you.  We'll have to get busy & try to do that, too.  Hugs & kisses to all from us both!

Mom & Garry