Chasing rainbows....

...finding sunsets. I did find a couple of rainbows too and they were beautiful but the lens never does them justice but it was fun trying.

The sunsets were spectacular Sunday as well....as the sky was ablaze after a little bit of a sprinkling. I do" like to look for rainbows whenever there is rain and ponder on the beauty of an earth made clean again..."

I do so enjoy the colors of the Dixie sky..... I posted a few more on my picture blog as well. Nothing more beautiful than nature's artwork.

The older I get...

...the more pictures I take. I know, I should have said something like "the wiser I get"...or "the more I know"...but this I do know, I don't want to miss a thing but I have to because I've moved and I'm not here or in Bountiful or in Henderson to enjoy every little thing my grand kids do but thank goodness for blogs, Skype, Facetime, texting, e-mails and heaven forbid, THE TELEPHONE....nobody calls to talk any more but at least we can stay in touch. Well, I've been here (actually, I have two homes now so I'll call it "home", here in color country)....and I've tried to take in as much as I can with the family which has included some pretty fun stuff. For as long as I can remember, we've been going up to "The Pools of Living Youth"....named, I think by Uncle Gawain but actually, I think it's called the "White Sands"......

Here we are with the Wells Clan...and on one of our "off track" activities with the kids. It's just a fun place to go and hike and play in the "white sand"......so, with a little free time last Monday, we took whatever kids wanted to go and headed up to play, just like old times. The pools were frozen, of course but the sand was still white and soft and cool and the kids had a great time.

It's been lots of fun enjoying the sunshine with the kids......

It's been fun to introduce Seth and Jack to Geocaching. I had them for the afternoon on Saturday while the rest of the family went to a soccer tournament in Vegas and we had three finds....Laynee and Drewby joined in the next day....but not quite as successful, fun, nonetheless.

While we are all down here enjoying the sun, Traci has been a trooper to "enjoy" the snow. This is her house and I think the snow plow just piles all the left-over snow in front because she knows her boys will do something with it like make snow caves and awesome sledding hills. 

Scotty loves it, Jake hates it and Max and Harry just stay inside and warm. It's really been a cold one the last couple of weeks.

I was supposed to go up and "enjoy" the snow for a couple of days with Traci but my Aunt Melba died last week-end and I stayed to attend her funeral and see some cousins that I haven't seen in many, many years.

We spent a lot of time with these cousins when we were kids and would go visit them in Cedar. They moved from here with my grandpa when he bought Sullivan's Cafe. Bill (upper left), Bob (upper right with blue coat) and Linda (bottom left with me). She and I were privileged to go with Grandpa to the horse races in Prescott, Arizona when we were just little girls. Good memories......This is my dad's family......

My Uncle Wes (back right) is the only one living....Back row, left to right....Dee, Dad, Wes...Bottom left to right, Glenna, Grandma, Grandpa and Melba...(their daughter, Twila, died in a childhood accident. I think she was the oldest).  It has been a week full of family. Lauri and her family joined me last week-end and we had a little photo shoot with the girls....Lucy and Molly were most cooperative.

It's nice to get in on some of the kids sports events. Drew's soccer was Friday night in Vegas and Seth's basketball game on Saturday....McKay has some gymnastic meets but they've been out of town.

 Love it when I can see my kiddies in action. I got to see George perform his Deacon duties on Sunday.....so heartwarming to this grandma. Laynee, Drew and George are all accompanists now in their various groups. So well pleased with all of these little ones and the things they are accomplishing. They all have such busy lives but I've loved being here for a few days. Now back to my other home....that will be good too. Just gotta come and check in once in a while.

It's been a pretty cool day....

...literally, as we ventured up to Cool, California.....where we saw a Cool Lutheran Church and bought a Cool sweatshirt.....

Randy took me to a cool little secluded property where he had previously painted for some people. They have a little (?) retreat tucked up into a wooded area overlooking some rushing water.....they have built bridges and walkways everywhere...it really would be a cool place to spend a summer day. I'm sure we'll go back...

Then we ventured up to Empire Mine State Historical Park. In 1850, prospectors found gold-bearing quartz here and started to mine....we snapped a few pics of the mining graveyard and other interesting things on the property.....

Bottom left looked more like a torture machine than a rock press.....

We took the guided tour and were able to step back in time as we toured one of the mansions of the owners of long ago. So much history and so very cool.....it really has been a cool day on so many levels. One more little "cool" tidbit of information though......

If the antlers don't fit in the place you want to put it, just drill a hole in the wall. (left antler in the upper right of the picture). I thought it was pretty cool.

All I ever wanted...

...is happy children and my children can attest to that. Whenever they ask me what I want for a gift my reply is "happy children" and I mean it. I have a quote on my calendar at home that says..."a mom is only as happy as her saddest child"....and I choose to believe that my children are happy and doing happy things with their lives. I got a chance to Facetime with Traci yesterday and it was fun to see, even though there's a gazillion inches of snow in Bountiful, she's happy and enjoying life with her boys and they all should be especially happy today celebrating Russ' birthday.

Happy Birthday, Russ and thanks for contributing to my daughter's happiness. Eat some cake!!!!
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Speaking of celebrating, Randy and I don't have to look too far to find something to celebrate and I'm not sure what it was yesterday but it felt like a celebration. When he gets off work early, he likes to go out exploring so off we went....riding the light rail (Trax) to downtown Sacramento and not to sound snobby or anything, the crowd was a bit questionable but we made it fine and enjoyed a little window shopping, a great dinner at "Ten22"...shot a few pics then headed back.

A little walk down by the waterfront and trying on hats at a cowboy store....good times. Hope y'all find something to celebrate today.

Been to the movies lately?

I've probably seen more movies in the last 8 months than I have throughout my whole life but I've come to really enjoy most of them. One that has become my favorite is "Lincoln"....I had just read "Killing Lincoln" by Bill O'Reilly and really liked it and learned a lot but I absolutely loved this movie. This is what JoEllen wrote on a recent e-mail to the family:

"We just saw Lincoln, Kyle for the 2nd time. I thought it was a fantastic movie, I hope it wins every award it has been nominated for..
Daniel Day Lewis as Lincoln reminded me so much of Scott that I cried through most of it. I just wanted to share these emotions, these memories that have been stirred up in me about what a great man he is. He was deliberate in his words and his actions. He saw the big picture, he had a great eternal perspective. He was jovial and fun loving in a quiet way, not wanting to draw attention to himself. You could see his love and respect for you, or for whomever he was with, through his eyes. He loved to spend time with his kids, and they were his priority. (the harsh relationship with his eldest wasn't true to Scott though).
He was such a great man, and I know I didn't know him for long, not nearly long enough, but I miss him and this movie helped me remember all the greatness that he had in him.
If you haven't seen it yet, you should."

I appreciated that insight and hadn't thought of it but when I was watching the movie, I remembered that Daniel Day Lewis was one of Scott's favorite actors and he actually won the Golden Globe for his performance in this movie. Then, I got to thinking about how much Scott enjoyed his movies in his years of recovering; sometimes he would watch the same movie two or three times in just a matter of a few days. I did a post a few years back that I would like to refer to so click HERE if your are interested in remembering what my children thought were his favorite movies.
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And now, are you all enjoying Downton Abbey? We are, for sure. Not sure why this has caught on but when I was watching an interview with the characters by Katie Curic the other day, one of the actresses said very eloquently that it is just a show about people trying to be good (except Thomas).....but I think we enjoy seeing how another class of people live and I have to say, I enjoy thinking about the history of it and as absurd as it seems to us, it was real....the people seem real to me and I enjoy the writing, the acting, the "soap opera like" story lines, which we all really have a bit of in our lives don't we? Don't really know why, but so enjoying it and I figure they are opening enough story lines to last forever....so "Go Downton".....we're in it for the long haul. Reminds me a bit when the world got hooked on "Dallas".....
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P.S. Not normally my kind of movie but I liked "Jack Reacher"......I'm just sayin'.....

As if....

....exercise and a beautiful day wasn't enough to get us out on our bikes, we've discovered geocaching...about 12 years late. It started around 2000....but there are still treasures out there to be found.

I heard about it a long time ago...thought it sounded weird then Karen and Len have fun doing it and I was wanting to get out with them but Randy and I stumbled on a cache last summer and since then I've been interested so we've been looking into it. I downloaded an app on my phone and today on our bike ride, we tried it out. We found 3 caches....the object is to take something, leave something and then log on to show that you were there. It's pretty exciting....the "find" is reward enough but we had a bag of little goodies to leave a little in each one.  One of the finds was just a little encouragement.....

....the note in the upper left hand side says "..work on improving your exercise routine"....and that's exactly what we are doing, geocaching. It's been a fun day out on the trails.

I can't believe it.....

...my daffodils are sprouting and it's the first week in January......

...and Spencer is turning another year older....where does time go.....and speaking of unbelievable, he ran a marathon (no offense, Spence but I think you were surprised too). Looking forward to many more proud moments. Happy Birthday tomorrow.....eat some cake (and lemon meringue pie). Have a good one. I'll be thinking of life 37 years ago. It was a good day when you came into this world.

Oh, and now that Christmas is over we are all enjoying the wonderful presents we got....I am for sure. My new Canon is tons of fun.....took this picture on the bike trail yesterday and I know I'm gonna be taking a lot more so......

..I created a new blog just for my pictures. memybikeandmycamera.blogspot.com in case you might be interested. It'll be pretty random.

We're back...

....in Folsom and it's been a blast. Thinking back over the past two weeks, we've been saturated with family and we have loved it. First off though, I was on the road yesterday but my thoughts were with Mandy.....

It was her birthday. For those of you out there in blog land that don't know, Mandy ran a marathon...then had a defibrillator (sp?) put in to keep her heart beating if it decides to stop. We are just glad to have her here as the "heart" of her home and hope she keeps running for lots of years. Speaking of running, Randy and I did a lot of running (actually driving) between our mom's houses but I'm thinking it's one of the things I've enjoyed the most this holiday season is helping my mom and visiting Josephine.....they are both 85 and keep as busy as they can in their aged bodies.....

My mom works at the temple answering phones once a week, still loves making food and taking it to her neighbors and loves visits from her family (I think, at least she makes us feel like she does) and still makes a cake every week for my kids and their kids and anyone else that drops in. She writes birthday cards and letters to hundreds of people a year and loves to hold and watch her great grandchildren whenever she can.

Randy's mom, Josephine loves working on her stitchery and takes walks around her neighborhood every day. This is a piece I bought for her....it's turned into a major project but it is so beautiful and it amazes me that she can stick with it....but she works so fast and loves to finish projects. These two amazing women are an inspiration to me....they thrive on their "routine" and are happy even with their aches and pains. They are an example of "enduring". We were able to take them out to eat a couple of times and we are blessed to have them both in our lives and to learn from them. I have enjoyed my family as well as Randy's as we've had a little time with both through these past two weeks.....

We've had a lot of good times together. Section 105...the Wells families congregate here every Dixie basketball game. Glad I got to enjoy one with them before we left. We got to stop off in Henderson and see Lauri and James....and BTW....check out Lauri's cooking blog. She's at it again. Click HERE for some really good stuff. Happy New Year one and all. May 2013 be the best ever....try to get to Disneyland at least once, more if possible.

My dad woulda been proud....

...as Spencer won the First Annual Polar Bear Plunge last night at Mason's (and I think Spencer wore his swim suit)....in very cold water, I wanna say about 40 degrees.

...and speaking of my dad, it's his birthday today. He would have been 85 and I sure do miss him, and other than the suits looking a bit similar, I think there's a striking resemblance here. Blogger's giving me fits today so I'm going to post this while I can and add more later. I want to say more about my dad.....

He was a good man....wonderful husband, awesome father, amazing grandpa to my kids....he made us laugh and he always smiled. He loved life and loved to play with us. He really would have loved all the crazy things we do these days. We loved our snow trips, jaunts to the farm and his daily visits as he went to or came from working on the farm. I'm so glad my kids have good memories of this good man.....and it's always fun to celebrate on this New Year's Day and remember him......and speaking of celebrations, we had one last night......

....a little ping pong, some good food and the "plunge".....Have a Happy New Year and smile today as you think of my dad.