BIRTHDAYS AND PATIOS

Sunday, July 13, 2008 I showed up at Corey and Stacey’s around 9:30 yesterday morning to help him with their back yard. They have approximately a 16X26 foot area; just enough for a patio. We did some digging down and leveling so we could lay pavers. Then we went to Lowe’s and bought nine sixteen inch pavers and some pea gravel as well as a few smaller pavers and some weed barrier cloth to get started. I took over my leftover 2X4s, my miter saw a rake, a mallet and a few other odds and ends. We got far enough along to lay the nine pavers. They look nice. Corey figured out a nice plan as to how to lay them. By five or so in the afternoon we were beat but had accomplished a lot though mostly preliminary. Today Wayne and Ginnie, Stacey’s parents went over and helped. They made several trips to Lowe’s, and in total laid an additional nineteen pavers if I remember correctly. Now, it is really looking nice. We are approaching the halfway mark in pavers and much of the initial prep work is done for the rest. Looking nice guys. Last night we had a second birthday party for Jayden at our house. Diane, Austin and Molly were there. We ate hotdogs and hamburgers then went to the pool and swam. After going back to our place we ate cake. Among other things, Jayden got a tool kit. I knew he was into such things. It was rather all inclusive. As of this evening he was still pounding nails and drilling holes. Bailey is jealous and keeps getting mad when he doesn’t hand over the tool he is using right now! His birthday was Thursday the tenth. He had a party at their place for Stacey’s side of the family. They then came to our place to use the pool.

POOR SIERRA

Friday, July 11, 2008 This evening Sierra came up to me and said, “Grandpa, I have a dilemma. I’m going to Paris tomorrow for five days and I only have two pair of pants, one long black pair and a pair of jeans.” Of course she has a wardrobe here and another at her mother’s. Later I asked if she wanted to go to Wal-Mart but she had gotten hold of her dad, Chris and he said they would get something in the morning before their flight. Their plane leaves at 10:00 with a layover in Houston. I should have such a problem. Just kidding. Sierra is barely fourteen and she has been to Paris how many times plus other exotic places in the world. Oh well. Maybe she’ll bring me back a T-shirt that reads, “My son and granddaughter went to Paris and all I got was this stupid T-shirt!”

Beautiful Sierra

Yesterday Judy and I were commenting on how beautiful our fourteen year-old granddaughter Sierra has become. She is also most expert at applying makeup and doing her hair etc. I said something to her about how I could see boys fighting over her and she said, “Oh they did that in the sixth grade. One of them got suspended (from school).” Oh boy!

Shopping with Alexa

Sunday, July 06, 2008 We were in Phoenix Thursday, Friday and Saturday. After seeing WALL-E at the theater, we went to the Disney Store nearby; seemingly for hours. While we were in the Disney Store our granddaughter Alexa grabbed two outfits off a rack, holding them by the hangers she stuck one and then the other out towards me and asked, “This one or this one Grandpa?” Gee, I wonder where she learned that line. She’s only two years old.

A day at Cub Scout Camp

Yesterday Corey took Jayden to Cub Scout day camp up Springville Canyon with Jayden’s new friend Artemis. Artemis’ dad drove. Jayden came home with a big grin on his face and enough dirt on his face to match. He couldn’t stop talking about the fun he had. He got nine beads, one for boat racing, one for tying knots, one for another kind of boat race, one for picking up two piles of trash ten pieces each, one for learning about Marco Polo; he chronicled the spice route to China, one for bow and arrow and one for B.B. gun shooting, one for “art scratching”, (rubbing). Actually for one of the boat racings he got a camouflage wrist band. His cub leader gave him an extra bead just because. His dad bought him a pocket knife that has a blade, a fingernail file, tooth pick and tweezers. “Then we went to prayer and that is all that really happened.” He looked so cute in his blue shirt and shorts with beads and badges etc.

Longings

I have been rereading Hugh Nibley’s The Ancient State. In the second section Tenting, Toll and Taxing it brings me some sense of satisfaction in my perpetual feelings…knowing it is human nature i.e. All my life I have had the sense that, no matter where I am or what I am doing, I should be somewhere else and doing something else. For example when I am at home doing one thing I have a very strong urging to get out and go somewhere else and do something different yet when I get to the place I have decided to go to, to appease that urge I get another strong urge go somewhere else, and not necessarily somewhere specific. It seems that this yearning in me is stronger now that I am older though perhaps I don’t remember just how pulling that yearning was in the past, do to the fact that the “hear and now” is overshadowing the past. I am reminded by Nibley that we are strangers here and have an innate longing for a long lost home. Long drives, especially in the mountains to a degree bring an easy to my suffering but only to a degree!

"I went pee pee on the potty - EEEEE

Three or four times in the last couple of days, our two-year-old granddaughter Alexa called from Queen Creek, Arizona; with the assistance of her mother,Niki,and announced with a loud happy voice, “I went pee-pee in the potty” and jabbered on about other stuff, some unintelligible. She has to tell me and “Grandma.” After telling me, she yells out a loud “EEEEE” or however you spell a loud funny yell. She expects me to “EEEEE” back to her. She laughs when I do. It is something I taught her on one of my trips to Arizona to visit them.