"a little piece of heaven"

this is the place!

to us it is "a little piece of heaven!"

i helped get the girls down to girls camp. maybe you wonder why i would volunteer to drive a car full of giggly girls to camp? it is because i absolutely love the drive down to fairview? let me just tell you about the peaceful ride it is (even with little girls trying to imagine what kind of fruit they would be if they were a fruit, or what kind of candy they think they remind each other of, or if they were an animal, what would they be? ... get the picture?). okay...just picture this... (well... i will post a few for you to actually see) green farm ground. pastures filled with mares and their colts, cows with their newborn calves, sheep with their lambs. we even had to stop, this time, while the sheep herders were herding their sheep down the road. so many cute little farms, that are sooo inviting. irrigation sprinklers watering fields. wildlife...

(i'll spare you the pictures of the wildlife i saw on this trip down, it was mostly just road kill) but, it's just so peaceful, a slow paced living ! something i dream of ! (maybe someday....) old barns....

then we get up on top of the mountain. need i say more? no phones, very few cars going up and down the road. deer running thru and eating all of the quakies we have planted. last year, one even jumped right over the top of kamryn while she was sitting on the bench down by the swing. freaked her out for a minute, but then she thought that it was cool.


this is a picture (from the road) of our home away from home.

but the best part is that we get to spoil and enjoy the grandkids! siona and kendyl were having a grand ol' time with the spray bottles, trying to spray papa and gramma, then one of them decided to spray the other. and all he!! broke loose. melanie got up and took the spray bottles away from both of them, and this is what we listened to (forever). papa wasn't helping much, but we got a pretty good laugh and so i just had to share it with you.

friday, again!

so this morning, i'm off to one of my favorite places in the whole world! 'skyline mountain' . i'm actually driving the girls in the ward down to camp at "godwin's" cabin for the night. we took our trailer down last weekend (after trek) and got it all set up. so i'll drop the girls off down to godwin's and then have the afternoon to myself. don, chet, tiff, kendyl, ryker, george, mel, and siona will join me tonight. this is the first weekend all summer that we have been able to go down, either because of snow or other commitments. what a way to end the week :).

thankful thursday

i know i'm a day late, but was busy yesterday, so i got up early this morning to post this.

just thought that i'd share kendyl's progress. it's been a little over a week and look how well she is walking. she is still very sore, but very independent and determined! she is sporting the new "purple" swim suit that 'gramma steffie' sent to her (after the breakdown she had when she realized that they had to cut her other one off). sorry, my camera doesn't take that great of videos.

this is our "little miracle" child!

this is kendyl jo. she turned 3 in april.

the story goes like this...
last tuesday night, don and i were getting our act together ~ finally, and were preparing for our ward trek. we were planning on leaving early wednesday morning so we could stop at a few sight seeing places along the way. (okay... so we procrastinate a little. but it was just don and i going and we figured that we could get everything ready in one night ~ NOT!) so... at about 6:00 p.m., my cell phone rings and as i answered it, this is what i heard.:(

chet: mom... kendyl was run over by a truck. the ambulance is here now and they are putting her on a stretcher, but they think they need to call for life flight to take her to primary children's.

me: chet. is she alright? what hapened? what hospital are they going to take her to?

don: (who is standing next to me by now, thinking that it's about his mom) what's going on?!

chet: we don't know anything yet, but i'll call you as so0n as we hear anything. click...

i told don what chet had told me. he grabbed my arm and said "we need to go in and say a prayer, and then we're going out there!"

so that's what we did. it is always a long drive out there, but this time it seemed to take us forever. all sorts of thoughts going thru our minds. we called all of our kids to let them know what had happened. called to have a friend call and put her name on the prayer roll at the temple. all kinds of prayers were being offered, (and, kendyl needed all of them, right now!) by the time we got out to

saratoga springs, life flight had landed in the park by their home.

chet and his bishop had given her a priesthood blessing. kendyl was loaded up and they were ready to take off. there wasn't enough room in the helicopter for anyone to ride up with her (except "baasley", her little lamb that she carries around with her). don and i drove chet and tiff up, the bishop and a friend, jeremy, followed us up with tiff's jeep. in the mean time, jeremy had called his wife, loni, who was in salt lake already and told her what had happened. she headed right over to primary's and met life flight when they got there. kendyl loves loni and was glad to see her. and because it was going to take us a little longer to get there, loni told them at the hospital, that she was tiffany's sister and they let her be with kendyl while they did a ct scan, x-rays and checked her over - loni, thank you sooo much. when we arrived at the hospital, they had kendyl in x-ray. they took us right in, they had just finished up. now the wait..... kendyl was awake and alert the whole time. she had told tiffany earlier, "mama, i'm sorry i got runned over." and she told us "daryl runned over me and pinched me but he didn't squash me all the way." they had given her no pain medication at all.

they came in and told us that there was NO internal damage to any of her organs and the only break that she had was a hairline fracture in her pubic bone. kendyl told me that "the angels lifted up the truck off of me". now... can anyone tell me that there were not angels lifting the weight of that big truck off of this sweet little girl? i think not!

what had happened was the neighbor came out, got in his truck, saw all of the kids standing in the other neighbors yard. he backed his truck out of his driveway and made a Y turn to back in to hook up to his trailer, so he could help move one of the single sisters in the ward. as he was backing up, he happened to look up and he saw the look of terror on all of these little kids faces. the neighbor across the street saw what had happened, came running over and was yelling, but he was in a diesel and didn't hear anything. he stopped the truck, got out, and there was kendyl... smack under the tire. so he had to get back in and pull off of her. she has some pretty snazzy tire tread marks across her butt and some pretty nifty bruises all over her body. they kept her at the hospital overnight for observation, and she was released the following day about 12:30 p.m.

(a picture of her lower back)

(tire tread marks on her leg)

(her ankle, that was also run over)

she is one sore little girl! you can imagine! but with tylenol and tylenol with codeine, the pain is mostly under control. last night, she was even playing (not jumping or bouncing around like usual), but on the trampoline with gramma and papa and all of the other grand kids, while we watched the fireworks out in saratoga springs. she is crawling around and with help, she can walk a little ways. she even pulled herself up to stand all by herself.

we are sooooo very grateful to heavenly father and for priesthood blessings (for a son who is worthy to perform those great blessings and has the faith that heavenly father will answer those prayers), for all of you that have remembered her in your prayers and continue to do so. kendyl we love you! and are so happy that your life was spared! heavenly father must have a great work for you to do!

i have said that "i'd never do it again!"

our ward is going on a family trek... yes! donnie and i are heading off to 'big wonderful wyoming' on wednesday. i do have to confess... we are taking our 5th-wheel trailer. for one small minute (one very small, tiny moment) we thought about tenting it, but after a quick slap in the face, we came back to our senses!

this is a picture of our flag ~ and "if" we make it back ~ i'll post pictures and let the world know ... how it was!

ta! ta! for now.

families are great!

these are two very special people...

let me introduce you to ruth and alan hunter. these are my in-laws. they are getting up there in years, they will both be 85 this summer. together they have raised 6 children. they have 28 grandchildren, 28 great grandchildren and 3 more on the way (that we know of). with all of the spouses, i counted 88 people that they are responsible for. they have always been a great example of what families are suppose to be. today we had a our first (actually i think that this was the second, because a few years back, we all went to the 'castle dale' pagent) 'alva alan and ruth parker hunter' family reunion. we had a really great turn out, and it was fun to get to visit and enjoy each other when we could just sit and relax. grandpa is sporting his tie that kamryn and kendyl made him for fathers day (which happens to be tomorrow). they were so excited to give it to him and he was a good sport and wore it the whole afternoon. grandma wasn't doing too well today and i'm not sure that she really realized that this was her family.

the little ones had fun playing in the water.

some of the boys playing on the scooters and bikes.

hunter, enjoying his icecream cone.

and ryker enjoying his.

and this is our family (minus george, mel, and siona. who are in california at george's mother's funeral) we missed you guys!

haley, hunter, jeff, kamryn (in front) tiffany, chet, kendyl, cheyne, jacki , ryker, and don.

i love being a part of such a special family. thanks mom and dad for showing me what a family can be like. i'll love you always!

what are saturdays for????????

so much for sleepin' in........

saturday morning at 'cabelas' was a free fishing day for the kids. papa don thought that we needed to be up there with them. just look at these sweet faces. how could we miss it? they each got a new 'cabelas' hat. kendyl was reaching for a tan hat and chet said to her "no, kendyl, you want a yellow one". (now...who do you think is going to be wearing that hat the most?). then the fun began. they had fishing poles up there and the workers were baiting the hooks. when siona saw the worm (yuk) she wasn't quite so sure she wanted anything to do with fishing! (so, her mom!) hunter kept realing his line in and kendyl was really into the whole thing. kamryn was okay with it, but it was cold and she was ready to go IN.

ryker (or papa) was having a great time. it was cold, and we didn't stay out long enough for any of them to actually catch a fish, but they had fun. we HAD to go inside (why can't they make grocery stores that enticing to men?). i don't know for sure how long, but it seemed like all day, that we were in the store. have to look at EVERYTHING at least once and some things twice, ya know! papa told the grand kids that he would buy them each whatever they wanted. kamryn found a 'pink' cap gun in a 'pink' holster. kendyl and siona found some pretty spiffy dolls with red hair and camouflage jumpers (camping dolls, is what their moms say). hunter got a pop gun and ryker a camouflage sippy cup. the older kids (mel, chet, tiff, jeff, and haley) thought that if they put all of their kids on the 4-wheelers, maybe papa would think (it' great if he thinks that it's his idea!) he needed to buy one, for all of them to share (this is where a pair of boxing gloves would have to be a fixed item with the wheeler)

kendyl, siona, kamryn, ryker, and hunter sporting the wheelers in front of 'cabelas'

flashback friday

today for my flashback, i thought that i'd tell you a little about my grandma dodge.

grandma dodge was born december 27, 1906 in center creek, utah. (i think they've change the name to wallsburg). her name was martha "ellen" myler. she was raised in myton, utah and was the youngest of her siblings. they all called her "babe". she died may 23, 1992.
she was an awesome grandma! i was lucky, because i was the oldest granddaughter and one of the oldest grandchildren, so i remember her well. this picture is of grandma and grandpa dodge on the front porch of their home. they had the coolest old home in pleasant grove, just up from the p. g. central grade school. along one side of the driveway was a border of lilac bushes. they were fun to hide in and always smelled so good. from her kitchen window, she had a great view of the "G" on the mountain. the water that came out of her kitchen tap was sooo good! we lived in arizona growing up and it didn't matter how long you let the water run, it never got cold, but grandma's water was cold right out of the tap! grandma was always a hard worker. she had 10 children. her oldest little girl, virginia died just before she turned 2. i remember her out in the raspberry patch picking raspberries. she bottled everything she could for her food storage. what i liked most, was her bottled cherries and raspberries. she always made her own bread. i love the smell of burnt toast, because when we would have breakfast at grandma's, she would slice her bread, drop it in the toaster and the crumbs from the bread would be burning in the bottom of the toaster, the toast always was the best! grandma had a big yard that she took care of. on the south west corner of her yard, was a 'big' (maybe it wasn't so big, but it seemed big to me at the time) rock garden. i don't remember all that she grew in it, but i do remember the snapdragons. they always looked so pretty. christmas eve was always the best. we were aloud to open one gift. we would always choose to open the ones from grandma. we knew that it was going to be pajama's, made special for us by grandma. she always used whatever materials she had on hand. most of the time, at least one sleeve or one leg would be different material than the rest and we always loved them!

they had an old chicken coop out back and raised their own chickens to eat. one time when it was time to kill the chickens. my uncles hung the chickens on the fence and cut the heads off (every once in a while, one would fall off the fence and run around with out a head, now, that was a sight i'll never forget!) and then grandma and everyone else there, would pluck them and into the freezer they would go. grandpa and grandma had a little cocker spaniel dog. her name was "jingles". she minded grandma better than any kid. when she died, we lived in arizona and when they called and told us "jingles" was gone, we all cried. she was like part of the family. she use to pull us on the sleigh in the winter, when we lived in utah. there was a great big tree out in front of the chicken coop. we use to climb up the tree, onto the chicken coop, and then jump off the roof. we sat under that tree a lot with all of the family, playing, eating green apples with salt, and having picnics. grandma also had a lot of patience, at least with us grand kids. i never remember her ever getting upset with us for anything. she had the coolest arch that went from her living room into the hall. we would climb the walls of the arch and make totem poles. she had an old claw foot bathtub. it was fun to drain all the water out, soap it down really good and use it for a slide. one time i got stuck between the wall and the tub (butt naked of course). we also bathed in the tubs from her wringer washer, downstairs. we always had water fights, and the outside water tap was right under the bathroom window. many times the person trying to turn on the outside tap was bombed with a bucket full of water from the bathroom window. we played in her living room all the time. she let us make huts, moving her furniture where ever it needed to be and using whatever blankets we could find. we would ride on the pipes downstairs and play hide and seek. she could entertain us for hours, telling us stories about when she was a little girl, living out in myton among the indians. one story she would tell was about hiding under the feather mattress, while the indians came in and went thru the house looking for stuff, and how scared she was. another was about an indian chief who had a little girl grandma use to play with. one day he came to their home and said that he didn't have a little girl "with whatever her name was" anymore. grandma was so sad, but then he told her not to be sad, he still had his little girl, but he had changed her name to "ellen", because he thought grandma was so beautiful.

at grandma's we made and pulled home made taffy. we turned the handle on the old icecream maker out on the back porch until we thought our arms were going to fall off. but oh... the icecream she made was so delicious! we would stand on aunt ellen's, cheryl's and arvilla's knees for hours at a time in the living room. grandma always seemed to be happy to me. at least until after grandpa died. i know she missed him so much. one day i was over in downtown pleasant grove and i saw grandma walking down the sidewalk. i stopped and asked her what she was doing and she said that she was trying to go home, but she couldn't remember how to get there. i took her home and she was so upset with herself. i don't think she ever walked to town after that. she had quite a few mini strokes at the end of her life and it was hard to see her struggle. this last picture is of her just before she passed away. she is buried next to grandpa in the pleasant grove cemetery.

i loved my grandma dodge and have some very great memories of her. thank you grandma for all you were and all you did for us. i hope i can be the kind of grandma that you were and that my granchildren will have as fond of memories of me that i have of you. love you forever!

how do you spell relief?

i spell relief ~

R * E * L * E * A * S * E !

after a little over 3 years of being the bishop of the 'heritage park young single adult ward', don was released on sunday. the 4 years prior to that, he served as a counselor in the 'mt. mahogony young single adult ward'. ~ what a busy little beaver he has been! well... not anymore! we'll see what he gets called to do next..

actually... before anyone else gets to him, i am calling him to 'be of M O R E help around the house! don't get me wrong, he does help out alot, but... i work, too, and i think he could help me more ~ you know those days when you come home from work... hubby is lying on top of the bed (made or not, heaven forbid that HE would make it... "why? we are just going to get back in it tonight!"), eating fruit bars, watching t.v.. and when you walk in the room, you hear the dreaded, "what's for dinner?" question. or if the bed was made left unmade, "did you sleep in this morning?" do these 2 questions make anyone else go into an automatic PMS raging? (whether it's that time or not!?)