Is anyone out there blogging anymore???  I have a feeling you are all on facebook.  I don't even know what that is for sure.  I could probably ramble here for awhile but don't want to if no one is using this method anymore.  So let me know via your comments and then I will post something.  It is almost bedtime and we are in the middle of a big snowstorm.  It has been so beautiful today.  The flakes were huge!!!  We went to Jim's for dinner today.  They have a wonderful family.  The kids are so cute and so well mannered.  That's enough until I know someone is going to read!!

Love you all!!!!!

Well it's about time I guess.  I could say where has the fall gone but I am sick of thinking it much less saying it.  It is amazing though how fast the days, weeks and months fly by.  I always have such an adjustment this time of year with it getting dark so early and the long evenings.  I am hungry for all the fall comfort foods; pumpkin pie, chili, hot bread, hot chocolate, popcorn, cinnamon rolls and the list goes on.  Other than the chili there is not one thing on that list that I really want to eat if I stop and think about it.  Bud and I have really been changing our eating habits over the summer and the results are in.  Substantial weight loss and me off all prescription drugs and him off three more as of last week and an ultra sound on his heart that had his cardiologist thrilled.  I hope I never take good health for granted.  I doubt I will because my body always seems to have something to complain about.  A nasty hiatal hernia dealt me fits for nearly three weeks and now it is better and I have thrown my shoulder out.  I did it trying to pull the covers over my cold behind.  Between Bud and Molly I have to fight for every inch of blanket!!

I ran away to Idaho last week and it was a really good trip.  It has been two years since Kathy and I have done our "Fall Fling"  We didn't do much except go to Driggs to lunch a couple of times and play games at night and of course lots of talking.  She always motivates me to come home and get busy doing the things on my procrastination list and she says I motivate her, so it is good for us to spend some time together.  It was a real experience being in Victor with all of them on election night!!!  A couple of weeks ago we had the fun of having the McLelland kids here while Shawn and Cheryl were Ireland.  We worked them pretty hard in the yard one day (actually Bud worked Brayden two days) and then just enjoyed them the rest of the time.  They are great kids and are so good to each other.  I never heard on cross word from them in the 5 days I was with them.  Thank you kids for a great time.  I am cooking some beets that our neighbors left on the door step and there is beet juice splattered all over my white tile bar.  Now I know why I would NEVER can beets.  They along with some Hubbard Squash are our Sunday night meal!  We had some Chicken Tortilla Soup after church.  It was delicious.  See I told you Aunt Kathy inspired me.  There is always something good cooking at her house.

This is starting to ramble so I will end with a promise to read your blogs more often and do better at keeping mine up  to date.  Don't have yard work as an excuse for a few months!! 

Mama Mia!!!!

I find myself saying that a lot after seeing the movie twice and am going with another friend this week!  I went last week with Andy and we laughed and cried all the way thru it.  For some reason I did neither when I saw it with Bud.  Then we left the theatre and raced to Target in her beautiful little Crossfire Convertible to buy the sound track.  So now here is a picture for you -----after I do my pilates I dance in front of my armoire mirrors to Mama Mia!!  I die laughing at myself.  I should be really healthy due to the exercise, Usana, and now I laugh real hard everyday!!!  They say that can add years to your life.  Wouldn't all of your lives be boring without me in it??  I am so ready for fall and so sick of hot summer and dead heading flowers.  Next year I am going to put plastic ones in my window boxes and anything that has resembled a flower bed will be filled up with bushes!  We are celebrating Bud's big 72 next week at a gorgeous park here in Bountiful and sure wish everyone could be here but I couldn't afford that much chicken so it's just as well.  Course I guess I could cook it myself but then my flowers wouldn't get deadheaded!  We had "my tacos" for an early dinner tonight and now we are headed out to finish the gate on the new fence and then just a couple more projects and we are done and hopefully what we have done this summer will make things easier next.  All you kids are either heading back to school or already there.  Hope it is a wonderful year  for all of you.  I have a favorite country western song that talks about a little girl learning to color and trying to stay in the lines and then it goes on to her growing up and among other things learning to drive and staying in the lines.  Then the message of course is that if we all "STAY IN THE LINES" then our lives will take us to wonderful places instead of dead ends where we have to turn around and start over.

Try to remember that this school year and it will make a difference I know!  I love you beautiful kids so much and your parents so much.  All I need is for all of you to be happy!!!  And just because we have this cyberspace stuff doesn't mean Nana wouldn't love a phone call once in awhile to let me know what is going on in your lives!!!!!

Hugs and Kisses!!

Nana

Summer Sizzle

Well so much for the nice cool spring!  The Summer Sizzle has begun.  It began for me  while in Phoenix and I got a nasty sunburn and a cold sore from @@@@@@@!!  My high blood pressure med. makes me extra sensitive to the sun I just happened to find out by accident.  We have worked so hard this week in spite of the heat putting a beautiful black rod iron fence between us and the Blacks next door.  It looks so pretty and boy what a job.  Linda and I were kept busy just keeping them fed and watered.  They did hire 2 boys from the ward and if they hadn't we would have had two dead husbands.  Bud leaves for Alaska saturday and altho I am sure he will have an awesome time I do worry about him.  I will leave for Amy's 7/2 and be home the 9th.  After that we will be home for the summer and fall.  We are trying to expand our budget to include some help with this yard so we can actually have the energy to enjoy it.  As is now we work so hard that we are out of gas and ready for bed by 8:00pm.  So I ask who are we doing this for!  But it is beautiful and we will figure out something.  I am so grateful for the health we do enjoy.  If getting tired is the worst of our problems then we are truly blessed.  I have been so good at working out at least 4x's a week and am loving the pilates.  I can feel the results whether or not I see them.

I am still considering the no sugar thing with Shawn but haven't committed yet.  The only thing I would really miss is the Pumpkin Pie at TG.  Maybe we could convince him to bend the rules for that day!  I am loving reading all the blogs and I do have pictures but have forgotten how to get them on here so Kristen HELP!!!!  You are all awesome and bring so much joy to my life!!  Thank you!!!!!!!!!

SELF CONTROL WHERE ARE YOU????

I am sitting here reading everyone's blogs and crying my eyes out.  I have sweet music playing on my I pod (I am so proud of myself for finally getting one and figuring out how to work it) and a cold glass of orange juice that I am sipping on trying to make taste like a COKE.  It doesn't work.  I sure hope I can pass this test. There are just certain foods that need COKE!!!  Okay enough of that.  If i can exercise a minimum of 4 times a week since New Years, I can do anything because some days it has nearly killed me.  I am starting to see results and that has become my motivation.  Now Shawn wants me to join the no sugar until New Years club.  No COKE, No SUGAR and now after the results of yesterdays colonoscopy no RASPBERRIES, NO CORN, NO NUTS, NO POPCORN, NOTHING WITH SEEDS!!!!  Then Tara tells me to stay off any carbohydrates that are white.  PASTA, POTATOES,BREAD, PANCAKES,WAFFLES!  You get the picture!!!!  Will Power is not my strong point.  What do I eat and what do I look forward to eating???  Any suggestions will be appreciated.!!!  Change of subject!  Taking Alex and Trent to Rexburg was an awesome experience.  How many Nana's get to do that.  I had to bite my tongue a few times and laughed a lot.  Watching them shop for their kitchens beds and baths was funny but the groceries were the best!!  They are great guys and will have the time of their lives.  Then it was on to Tara's  to stop her tears and just chill.  We do that well when I am there.  Again lots of laughing and some good talks and just feeling overwhelmed with love and gratitude for the children and grandchildren I have been blessed with.  Each one is so unique and special in their own way and so in tune with right and wrong.  I need to sign off now before I start blubbering out of control..  Remember the theme of this blog is SELF CONTROL!!!!!!!!

AFV

I wish someone would have had a video camera in this house today. Bud came home from the dentist looking like a chipmunk with all of his nuts for the winter stored in his cheeks.  He had two teeth pulled.  He was sitting in his recliner with ice bags and a big quilt over him trying to not laugh his guts out (it hurt so bad) while he watched me attempt my first pilates workout .  What a hilarious picture I must have been.  Tara told me about the dvd at WallMart and it is hard but really fun.  I will be one BUFF MAMA  if I stick with it and I intend to!  I spent 5 days with the Clegg clan last week and it really made me appreciate my girls so much.  I went to bed at night so exhausted I hardly had the strength to pull the covers up, but it was fun and they are a family with some really awesome and intense personalities.  I have found myself really missing them today.  I could steal Abby.  She has developed a real love for her Nana too! and that is so fun.  I just wish all of my grandchildren were closer so I could hug, love, tickle, sing songs and have some great discussions with each of them.  I still am struggling to find the motivation to get out in the yard and start making things pretty.  I just keep saying I will wait for the weekend and then every weekend the weather is lousy.   I can't decide if I am just content or just lazy!!!!    Please don't respond to that sentence!  

Weekend Wows!!!!

I made my muscles work when they sure didn't want to.  I listened to Conference yesterday am while I cleaned out my closet and drawers and got all my spring and summer things out of the guest room and the winter things put away.  That was a mistake because then today we headed up to Heber to have dinner between sessions with Jim, Judith and their family.  The meal was delicious and their new summer home is really nice.  We can see the Allred cabin from their family room windows.  It was so cold and still LOTS OF SNOW!!!!  Conference was wonderful and I made it thru without any tears of sadness or fear.  I prayed hard that I would hear things in a way that wouldn't take me to that place!!   I am so grateful to have children that understand Gospel principles and are trying hard to teach my grandchildren to have strong moral compasses.  We will be leaving for St George Wed.(so my summer clothes will work) and be back Sunday.  Then the following Wed. I get to to Nana's "boot camp" to the Clegg house until the following Sunday.  It will be fun to have some one on one time with them and they are always so good for me!  I am sure by the time I finish all of this up it will time to hit the yard and I am still waiting for the desire to him me.  It just looks so overwhelming to me.  I really could be talked into a retirement village if I could wave a magic wand and have the moving and all that that would entail done.  I do worry about Bud and this big yard.  But we love our home and now is not the time to think about major changes.  I love you all and am so proud of you all!!!