PARTY TIME!!!

These are pictures of our retirement party.  We had a good time and I was so proud of my grandchildren.  They behaved very well.  I had several compliments about how well they did and it was a long time.

This is Aunt Jane with Gabby.
Cort acting out.  He was very tired.
My retirement gift was a generous gift card for something of my choice.
Uncle Dallin actually holding Miss Lilly.
My retiring principal and cousin, John Shoell and his lovely wife.
Lori with her little "Twinkle".
Andrew, Sandie, Levi and Miss Lilly
Caeden and Luke entertaining themselves with snake books.
Cort looking at Tarantulas.
Urban bugging Cort.
Bill and Jaque Garber  ( I know I spelled her name wrong.)
Lee and Miss Lilly (She sure gets around)
Sherry C., Cathy N., Lynea H., John and Laura  We are receiving the infamous school bell.
Jamma holding Urban and Miss Lilly

Heather, Kathy C., Lynea H. and Laura
Lovely picture of Cathy and Lynea.
My teammates Stacy and Cathy.  We have been together a lot of years.
Jane and Jill
Dave and Jill, Mary and Joe were also here. I really appreciated my family and friends for their support and love.  Thanks to you all.

What's in a Name?

I took care of Miss Lilly on Saturday.  She is so sweet and mellow, like Jane and Andrew when they were newborns.  I was "contemplating" the names that have been given to family members and thought it would be fun to determine where they came from on the Jones side of the family.

David was probably named after Dad's father who was married to Josephine.  I'm rather grateful that I wasn't next on the list for that one.  Richard, I have no idea where that came from.  Sorry, Richard.  Laurie,me, was named after a close friend of Mom and Dad's from Phoenix.  Mary Lynn was most fortunate.  If she had been a boy she would have been lucky enough to have the name of Melvin.  This has been a family joke for years.  Peggy, aka. Margaret probably came from an ancestor by the name of Margaret Fisher.  Only her husband calls her Margaret, lovingly.  The rest of us call her Peggy.  I'm sure that at some time in some of our lives, like me, have disliked the name that we were blessed with but with age we quite like them.

Many of our children have the middle name of Elaine, but no one has been given Dad's name, Raymond.  I love my Dad very much but his name isn't easy for a child.

My daughter Sandie was named for my dearest friend from college.  We called this friend Mama Sandie to distinguish between the two during those early years.

Jane was a favorite name of mine that I have loved for years.  Janie Hillier was a little girl I tended when I was a teen.

Andrew was an ancestral name that both Lee and I liked.

Dallin was given this name because although it was not used much, it was a strong and a determined name.  Dallin H. Oaks is where we heard the name.

So each of these names was given because of a person we admired and respected but the names that my children chose for their children (except for Lilly) are names that they liked.  There  is nothing wrong with the names that were given.  I just find it interesting as to how we came up with our names.  Certainly a "deep subject" to be discussed. j/k

5 Tag

Sandie tagged me again.  It was a fun one so thought that I would add it to my blog.  I can't tag anyone because my friends and sisters aren't attempting to do this yet.  Jill H.  I think you should get started on one.

5 favorite Snacks

Baskin Robbins ice cream

M & M's

Poppycock

apples

McDonald's hot fudge sundae

5 things on my to do list

computer classes

take new pics of grandkids

walk with Button early each morning

tell Lee I love him every day

get my eyebrows done

5 places I've lived

Phoenix, AZ

South Salt Lake

Holladay

Sugarhouse

Sandy

5 jobs I've had

cleaning for neighborhood ladies

counter waitress at Cottonwood Mall

make drapes for LaBai Drapery

secretary

teacher

5 bad habits

biting my nails

not returning phone calls

not writing to our soldier

not cleaning like I should

giving the look

5 books to read

To Kill a Mockingbird

Narnia series

Book of Mormon by December for Primary

The Infinite Atonement

Jane Eyre--again

Sandie I changed this a little to make it work for me.  Once again, Jill H., I know you can do this.

Real Retirement

This is 30 years of stuff.  Now I need to go through it again to see if I really need to keep any of it.

Everyone asks, "What are you going to do when you retire?"  I came to hate that question!  I would answer, "Oh, I'm going to sew on my new sewing machine or I am going to finish my quilts that I have started, or clean my house, or stockpile books from the library and just saturate myself in reading.

All my life I have had automatic goals.  When I was a child my mother sent me off to school.  When I was a teen I had to finish high school.  When that was done this 18 year old had no choice but to go off to college and even then my only choices at that time were education or nursing.  Nursing didn't work because I didn't have the stamina to understand chemistry.  So with a science minor I headed into the field of education.  I did well at BYU and had a good student teaching experience.  I was a teacher now and ever after.  So with a contract in hand I had to get up every morning and again go back to school.  When I married my goal was to raise a righteous family and when the children were on their way it was back to school for the rest of the 30 years.

What I am trying to say is that there has always been a reason or a goal for me to essentially perform my duties.  I couldn't be a slacker.  But now I have been cut off from all of that and now I am on my own.  It is up to me and the Lord to figure out what I am going to do with my time.  I have to decide how to spend my days.  Its not like I don't want to make these choices its just that in a way they have always been made for me.  And that makes it difficult because I don't want to just read.  I don't watch TV, fortunately.

My goal now is to sit down and decide what it is that I really want to accomplish in my marriage, in my home and for me.  Maybe my list should begin with me.  For the last year I have gone every 3 weeks to have my eyebrows done but I missed my last appointment and now that I don't have a reason to get them done,  I haven't made a new appointment.  This is a silly thing but I can see now that these kinds of things are important and I need to do them for myself.

Today I made time to take a computer class up at Gateway to learn more about my new computer.  There are some good things down the line having to do with family history and I want to be a part of that.

I have sounded off and have made myself feel a little better about moving on.  I'll be OK but I've got to put a lot of thought into this new process.

To Levi, Sandie, and Mary

We just had Button groomed.  He is so cute!  How could anyone not love a pooch like this?

Generosity

Connie came to visit the other day.  She had a retirement gift for me.  Connie is an amazing quilter.  She got into quilting only a few years ago, but her talent knows no bounds.  She produces her quilts as pieces of art.  She has also taught me a lot of what I know.  Besides, she and Mike are great friends.  Connie brought me this beautiful table runner.  I had to take a picture of it to share with everyone.  A gift made by hand is priceless.  It is something that I will always treasure.  Thanks. Connie

Robins and Button

You remember Button.  Button  loves to play with toys.  A little background information.  We have a nest of robins in the tree outside our bedroom window.  The robins have sat on those eggs in the heat, pouring rain and the curiosity of grandchildren.  Yesterday was the first day out of the nest for the babies.  Always a grand accomplishment if  there are no dogs or cats around.

I was reading of course, when I knew that it was to quiet around the house.  I called for Button but he didn't appear.  I went outside and found him playing in the backyard with a toy.  He was having so much fun chasing, pouncing and batting this toy back and forth in his paws.  On closer look I saw that the toy was moving on its own.  It was one of our baby robins.  The parents were flittering back and forth on the fence--very upset.  They couldn't stop this torture of their little one.

I was finally able to get the poor thing away from Butt and put it over the fence in the neighbors yard.  I turned around to find that dog playing with another baby robin and I grabbed that one and put him over the fence.  I didn't find any others.  After a few hours I went to look for them but didn't see them anywhere.  I can only hope that they found safety.  It certainly wasn't in our yard.

Twinkle's BD

This is Twinkle.  Her parent's named her Gabby.  To me she is a bright spot among all her male cousins and brothers.  She is beautiful and at the age of 1 she is walking, getting into and being a major instigator among her siblings.  She definitely has a look of her Aunt Sandie and maybe a bit of her personality.  Here are some more pics of her birthday.

Luke's BD in pictures

This is Cort.  He loves to be just like Luke. This is Luke in the money machine.  He is stuffing the papers in his shirt, front and back.  Pretty clever!

Good times were had by

everyone, even Daddy, Levi.