Lana and Liberty

May 12th 40% of our family got a year older.

Lana got the kayak helmet for mothers day. When you really love your mom you buy her a helmet.

Liberty had a dog party this year. She and her Friends made masks and puppets.

Angiogram went well - BUT

To bring everyone up to date I had a angiogram today and it went very well other than the finding. The Dr. tells me that I have four 75% - 90% blocked arteries so Monday I'm scheduled for a quadruple by-pass. We'll keep you posted. They tell me the convalescent time is 6-8 weeks so I should be in good shape by the Crab Reunion. By the way mom is a great nurse!

Another walk

I went on another “get my strength back” walk.  Today I drove up to the Bountiful Temple grounds and walked slowly and photographed.  I was able to walk for almost an hour!!!! Amazing!

Mother's Day

LaRee, I read this poem a while ago in one of my books and it really made me think of you and everything you have done. It was written by Minnie Price.

To "His" Mother

"Mother-in-law" they say, and yet,
Somehow I simply can't forget
'Twas you who watched his baby ways,
Who taught him his first hymn of praise;
Who smiled on him with living pride
When first he toddled by your side;
And as I think of this today,
Methinks that I'd much rather say
Just "Mother."

"Mother-in-law" but oh, 'twas you
Who taught him to be kind and true;
When he was tired, almost asleep,
'Twas to your arms he used to creep;
And when he bruised his tiny knee,
'Twas you who kissed it tenderly;
When he was sad you cheered him too,
And so I'd rather speak of you
As "Mother."

"Mother-in-law" they say, and yet,
Somehow I never shall forget
How very much I owe to you
Who taught him how to grow,
You trained your son to look above,
You made of him the man I love;
And so I think of that today,
Ah! Then with thankful heart I'll say
"Our Mother."

Thank you both, Doug and LaRee, for being such fine examples and raising your son to be such a wonderful husband and father. We love him a lot!

This boat full of blown glass balls is located at the Desert Batanical Garden which we visited during Grandma's and Charlie's visit. We all loved the tour of the Garden. The glass scultptures are beautiful pieces of art.

Do you think mom and Charlie think they are going to be cut out of the picture?
One of the best things about the Botanical Garden visit was mom's mobility on her little red scotter.

Grandma in her wheelchair and mom in her buggy; it gave her a wonderful ride and other than running me into a cactus one time, she did very well with it. The yellow tower in a background is a "glass" saffon tree.

We all went to the train park in Scottsdale and here is Audry and U. Doug as well as me, mom and A. Kathy.

Three happy mothers with their mother's day flowers.

(L - R) Bryant, Jenny, Grandma, A. Kathy, mom and dad at the Mesa Temple where we did U. Brent's Endowment

More at the temple. I want to tell all of you more about this memorable day when we are together in Maryland.

2009 Crab Reunion ... on-ramp

One of the many activities planned for our the Crab Reunion is a trip to Blackwater National Island Refuge - if you'd like to get to know some of the "residents" of Blackwater you can watch them on this livecam.

http://www.friendsofblackwater.org/camhtm2.html

Happy Mothers Day!

 

Happy Mothers Day to the woman  who makes it look a whole heck of a lot easier (becuase she does it so well) than it actually is.

We love you mom!

Playing Outside

This weekend Clay signed me up for the 5K Tiger Trot. With the "Wall of Fame" as proof positive, I am the family 5K champion, admittedly beating both Joe and Joshua made me somewhat smug. I suspected when Clay invited me to race that my days as family champ were nearing an end. I was right. Clay ran a GREAT race - he's in good shape and trained hard. He came in just over 5 minutes ahead of me with a time of 26:40.  We ran the race with about a dozen guys from the USMC Poolie Program and three of the recruiters. I was the only parent in the running. When it was time for the awards, the Poolies swept the 10 - 19 age bracket taking 1st, 2nd and 3rd. When the awards for 20 -29 were handed out they took one more. We all thought we were done with the oorahs until they read 3rd place for women 40 - 49 and I realized that I had beaten her time, I also beat the 2nd place finisher in that category making me #1 ... and softening the blow of being the 2nd fastest Ward-Anderson.

What I loved best about today was spending time with the soon to grow up Clay .... laughing and talking and singing along to my i-pod (yeah Weezer).

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Last week there was the Muddy Buddy where pal Jason and I biked, ran, conquered obstacles  and then crawled on our bellies through a MUD PIT (totally random fun times!) ... we spent the night  before  camping near Richmond VA with friends of Kristi Stone who manages (and takes exceptional care of) the Baltimore house.  

A walk in the back yard

Thanks to mom’s good care I am finally starting to get better; however I went on a walk in the back yard and that still wears me out!  I took some pictures of the flowers that I have planted.

This is one that the deers snacked on before I put up the deer fence.  I am amazed that it is trying to bloom!

Happy Birthday Emma!

Emma has reached double digits!  She has been so excited and has been counting down the days for a couple of months now.  Emma is our sweet peaceful child.  She brings a calm spirit to our crazy home and is always willing to come along on her dads adventures.  Here is a look back at Emma through the years.  We love you sweetie!

 

Emma got a new digital camera for her birthday.  She has wanted her own camera for about 4 years and she finally got one.  She took about 40 pictures today.   Look for lots of pictures from Emma in the next few weeks.

A day at the zoo

We spent our last free Saturday before soccer starts at the zoo.  It ended up being a nice day and we had fun out there.  The zoo has a show where various small animals from around the world are shown off.  Several parts of the shows have audience participation.  Chas was called up for the Harris Hawk.  The hawks actually stand on top of each other in the wild.  We were so busy laughing at the look on Chas’ head that we didn’t hear the reason why.  By the way there is a dead mouse on top of his costume.  (we looked online and they do it to look for prey as it is hard to find a perch in the desert)

The show also had a rescued eagle who had broken a wing.  We were able to get within a few feet of him (her??).  Absolutely amazing animals.  When you see this picture the term ‘eagle eye’ makes sense.  You feel like they can see everything!

The zoo sits in Pt Defiance Park which is a city park.  There are all sorts of beautiful gardens around the park.  The Flowers are just starting to come out now.  Charlie can probably look at the plants and identify them.  I just take pictures.

 

Not sure what kind of tree this is either but the kids sure had fun in it.  It is some sort of weeping evergreen.  Who knew that was possible??