L is for the . . .

Lovely wife who makes my life a constant bit of heaven. Love ya ;0)

The Phantom

This was from the beginning of the month. Isaac had a lot of fun at this Pack night. He named his boat "The Phantom". Dennis helped with the artwork on the sail. He had a lot of fun racing with the other scouts.

Father's Day

We made a whirl wind trip to Ogden for Fathers Day, up and back. When we left it was pouring rain! I thought for sure that we would be stuck inside all day, but it really turned out to be a beautiful day!! The kids all had a lot of fun playing with the Marker cousins and even some second cousins. We met at Uncle Mel and Aunt Diane's house this year. Great-Grandpa Marker had his 91st birthday on May 22nd and so we celebrated it then as well. Everything was decorated in a contruction type theme. There were trucks and equiptment on the tables with Big Hunks, Sugar Daddy's, and Dad's rootbeer. It was good to visit with everyone. It was a wonderful day together.

Red Barn Days

We started a really fun tradition when we moved here. We have what we call "Red Barn Days". These are days, usually in the summer, when there are absolutely no clouds in the sky. On these rare days, we jump in the van and all head to the Red Barn for an ice cream cone. We have had times when there were 2 or 3 Red Barn Days in a row, but we only go once in a week's time.
We had our first Red Barn Day of the season yesterday. Dennis called me from work to see if I noticed that it was a perfectly clear afternoon. We dropped what we were doing and jumped in the van because we've learned that a perfect day can change quickly sometimes!
Khora usually chooses something pink - big surprise there- and Afton is a fan of the lemon or orange flavors - are they custard??-. This time Isaac chose Rocky Road or "Rocky Mountain" as he called it, and Jacob likes the peanut butter clusters. Dennis tries out different flavors most of the time, but I usually stick with my brownies on the moon. Gotta have my chocolate!!

D-Day Vet

Today for our history lesson we studied about the attack by the allied forces on the beaches of Normandy during WWII. It wasn't until later, when I was looking for this picture, that I noted the irony. June 6, 1944, exactly 67th years ago today, was D-day.

My grandpa Alva E. Sorensen, was only 19 years old when he took part in the largest amphibian attack ever. He ran up the beach with a radio on his back. It was this backpack, I remember him telling us, that saved his life. He was wounded by a piece of metal in his leg. Another soldier came to help him and said "Let's go", but noticed that he couldnt'. He left him to get the medics. Grandpa had to wait 28 hours on the beach without food or water before he was taken to a ship and evacuated to England. By then gangrene had set in which was caused by a piece of cloth that had been impregnated into the wound. The doctors recommended amputation, but Grandpa woudn't sign the nessesary papers so they transfered him to the United States.

At last he was back at the Bushnell General Hospital in Brigham City, Utah, where he fought with his life to save his leg even to the point where he told a Colonel "I won't sign those papers!" which he had been ordered to do.

After six weeks of fighting with an infection he was down 50lbs before they finally changed his medication from penicillin to teramiacine, which seamed to clear things up. On record he had 1156 shots of penicillin, 8 surgeries and spent eleven months at the hospital in bed and then another seven months in therapy at the same hospital.

45 years later, the soldier that had helped him on the beach that day, Donald Blalock from Tennessee, who remembered Alva's name and that he was from Salina, UT tracked grandpa down and called him on the phone. I actually remember when that happened.

I told this story to my children today. They were amazed that he was willing to sacrifice his life like that and of the help of a stranger.

Grandpa always walked with a limp, always cried when he heard the National Anthem and was my greatest example of patriotism. I am so grateful to him and all those who lived and died so selflessly for the cause of freedom.

#1 Kitchen Table and Chairs

My first project of the summer is finally finished. Dennis and I brought in the kitchen table and chairs from their temporary home in the garage last night. I have to admit that I was a little nervous at dinner today. It's hard to actually use it after so much work!
I went with more of an antiqued look and used a matte finish instead of a gloss, so the feel will take a little getting used to, but I'm really please with how it turned out.
Well, on to the next.Well the good news it that now we're planning on new flooring which will really make it stand out so nicely as right now it blends in with the floor, but I think it will look great with a darker tile. Well, on to the next!!

Published

Yesterday I opened my Saturday newsletter from ScrapGirls and saw that they had picked one of my layouts to publish. https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&ik=3fee86a7db&view=lg&msg=1305a282d16f31da Every Saturday the SG Layout team picks a couple Layouts from the members gallery and awards the winners with a gift certificate to their botique as well as publishing the pages in their newsletter. I've been a member of SG since March of 2008. This is only the second time I've had something published. I was so excited!!

They have a lot of challenges and things to help the members find motivation or inspiration on scrapbook pages, so I like to do them quite often. On this layout it was actually a combination of two different challenges they had posted. The first one was a color challenge using the blue, pink and black. The second challenge was to use a photo that was taken with a camera phone. This is the first picture I've been able to get off my phone BTW, for some reason that thing just eludes me most of the time. We were looking at sunglasses at T*arget and Khora had so much fun trying on bracelettes, necklaces, purses, and glasses. I like how she cocks her head when she posses. Cutie!! It can be a lot of fun shopping with my girls, when I don't have a time limit.