Exciting days

This week was such a busy one - most of it was my own fault. I decided to jam pack every single night. On Monday I picked up a friend after work and we had some adventures. A walk outside (Provo bicentennial park), window shopping at our local antique mall, and then dinner at Olive Garden. It was a nice day out and we laughed lots and lots. Here are some of the cutest salt and pepper shakers we saw. My friend collects them, so she had a wonderful time looking at them all. 

Tuesday night I spent an hour or so at the Civic Center. Springville City offers a PAR (Parks and Recreation) Grant to non-profit organizations. The library hinted that they would like board of Friends of the Library to attend. It was interesting, but I don't think I'll be the one writing the grant. 

Wednesday was such a fun night! We had our recap dinner for the fair. All of my best friends where there. It was nice to have lovely chats with everyone, and also delicious food to eat. They had lots of food leftover, so I brought some of it home. My favorite were the butter/salted fancy potatoes. Look at the amazing color!

Thursday was supposed to be my relax night, but Peter's lightsabers arrived this afternoon. So, I dropped everything and I drove the lightsabers up to him. It was so much fun to sit for a little while and watch him assemble them. They are high quality lightsabers, and they are the most expensive purchase Peter has made up to this point in his life. 

Friday was s fun day - I went with the unified sports team to Maple Mountain High School to participate in a soccer tournament. It was such a beautiful day, and it was amazing to see how these special kids worked hard at doing something athletic. I was so glad I was invited/able to go. 

Right before we started loading the bus, I got a phone call from Peter. It's very, very unusual for him to call, so I answered it. He started by saying that I needed to transfer $53.60 from his checking to my savings because he just bought Dad a new crock pot. He went on to explain that he was getting the meat ready to put in the crock pot for dinner and it slipped out of his hands and shattered all over the floor. So, he needed to buy Dad a new one. I was blown away by how responsible and grown up Peter sounded. I told him I would get on that right away and I asked him if he knew how to clean it up. Thankfully, the meat wasn't inside when it slipped, so it was easy just to use a broom. 

I got a message later saying in his flustered state he forgot to change the shipping address and it was coming to me - would I be able to bring it up when it arrived in a few hours? So, I made another trip up to Brandon's to take the crock pot. Bonus of going up was seeing the fully assembled light sabers. Here is the crock pot Peter picked out. It's amazing how expensive these things are. 

Saturday morning I was up bring and early. I had signed up to attend the "Wings and Wheels" event as a volunteer a few weeks ago. It was bitter sweet because this was an event that Larry and I attended together. I wasn't sure how I would feel emotionally, but it actually turned out to be just fine. I wasn't sad at all. I was a ticket scanner for 3.5 hours. It went by so fast! There were thousands and thousands of people in attendance. They expected 20,000 people to attend, but I'm not sure the exact number of people that I helped. I rediscovered something about myself - I really like to be around people. It makes me full of energy and excitement. I need to find a job where I get paid to help lots and lots of people without hoops to jump through. I only saw two people that I knew - weird as I anticipated seeing lots more. 

Yummy snacks that needed a resting spot between handfuls. At one time, I had the code to this gate memorized. The airport had grown significantly since the last time I was there, but parts are still the same. Volunteers could have stayed to walk around, but emotionally I knew that wasn't smart. So I came home and did Saturday chores. 

College days....

 It's been a pretty great week. There were a few fun things that I've done. One of them is finding a few old pictures from when I was in college. We got a request at work to find a picture of us in college so they can show students that going to college is a good thing (I think College week is coming up soon). Anyway, here are some of the fun ones that I found. 

College was a very studious time for me. I made lots of friends, but only because we would study together. I never really kept them after the semester was over. I wish I would have been a little bit more social, but such was not my nature back them. In the picture of Amy/Lisa above I think we were making cookies for the boys we liked in our ward. Lisa was always good at being brave enough to do such things. 

We received out school pictures back this week. My hair looks WAY too high in the front, but I'm ok with that. I'm getting old, and it shows. I've had a life well lived and I am proud of my white hair. I think I look more of a "Davis" than a "Burr". 

Chelsea and I went walking again this week. The trail we found in Spanish Fork is perfect! I am always so thankful that Chelsey is willing to go out with me. We walked the night before Chelsea sent her 2nd daughter on a mission. We talked about so many spiritually things. She encourages me and makes me happy. I am grateful for her! 

I took a trip down to Mt Nebo Middle School this week to visit one of my favorite teachers. I was so close to her last year, but the district decided they needed her in another school and sent her away. It felt so good to go see her. She has challenges at the new school, but she is determined to succeed. Her students are SO lucky to have her. She is crafty, and it was so fun to see the crafts she's already made with her students. 

I cleaned up my garden this week. It was time. The cucumbers did a great job, and I was very pleased with how many I tasty ones I got to eat. I think the trick to not getting any bitter cucumber was planting them later in the season. I planted seeds around July 15th. 

Ran into a traffic jam coming home from Bluffdale this week. It was the worst one that I've run into in a very long time. I was going 5 mph from point of the mountain until 1600 North in Orem. It was annoying. However, it made me SO thankful for higher speed limits. I also feel badly for people involved in the multiple accidents that caused this slow down. I only wish I would have used the bathroom before I left Bluffdale. 

When I was looking at old pictures I stumbled upon this one that cousin Nathan sent to me. I wrote Nathan every week on his mission. They are tender memories for me. He found a pair of rollerblades while he was out there, and decided to take them for a spin. I resent this picture for him and he really enjoyed seeing it. Too bad we are old an unathletic now. Funny enough, I also found a picture of Lisa in roller blades too. 

September bliss

Fall is coming and I can feel it in my bones. I am soooo grateful I live in a place that has three seasons. I put up my fall decorations this week, partly so I knew what decorations I could take to work, and partly because I'm so excited fall is finally here. Here is my shelves at work all decorated with the fall things I didn't need at home. 

Jenny McCulloch, one of our SPED teachers, gifted me the plant in the corner. She said these plants do great in locations that get zero sunlight. So far it's doing amazing. 

My church friend, Glenda, asked for a picture of my boys. Years and years ago she used to be my ministering sister, and she would occasionally see them. Sadly, the kids HATE having their pictures taken so this was the best I could do for Luke. Stay tuned for next weeks' picture of Peter - it's epic. 

The cucumber plants in my garden are finally, FINALLY, giving me what I've wanted. I'm so thrilled. I've harvested around 20 cucumbers thus far. I'm hoping for at least six more before everything freezes in a few weeks. 

I saw a cute/easy craft project on Facebook one night when I was scrolling away. I decided I should try it. So, I went to DI and got the board and puzzle (only cost me $3) and then spray painted it all. Peter and I love this board we use every time we spray paint. It's a fun reminder of all the projects we've done. I think the craft turned out pretty cute - cute enough to enter into 2027 fair? Yes!

I also promised our floriculture teacher that I would bring him back all the vases that he gave me last year with the floral arrangements his students provided to me (because I paid them). These were the only vases he didn't want. My Bishops wife is picking up the hobby of floral arranging, so she was happy to take them. It's fun to be able to give things away to people. 

I went down the Lego aisle at Smith's the other day and noticed these Lego blind bags in tamperproof boxes. I think it's super sad to see that consumers aren't trusted to be honest and even small things have to be locked up to prevent theft. 

The rest of August

The rest of August was very anti-climatic after all the fair excitement, but I did get out and about and do a few things. One afternoon Luke and I went to pick up a few things at Walmart. We discovered these on the shelves. Neither one of us think they are a good idea. 

Another boring afternoon I begged Luke to go on a walk with me. He decided to go on a long one - we were out for an hour and got caught in a rain shower. It was hilarious! We had some pretty great discussions, and I hope he will go on more of these with me. 

One of my desk drawers at work. I bought this shelf liner which I think is pretty adorable. 

I also ended up buying this set for work too. Why buy a small mouse pad, when you have have one that covers most of the desk. I've received a lot of compliments on it. 

The room where I work. It's slowly getting to have more of a personality. This was my first day back at work after three months. 

A teacher at school gave me this book to read/have. I ended up really, really like the book plus the three other books in the series. It's a fantasy book, which is surprising because I don't normally enjoy fantasy. 

My cucumber plants finally decided to give me something yummy to eat. I've harvested 8 cucumbers. I would have enjoyed triple that amount, but I am grateful for what I have. I am especially grateful these aren't bitter. I planted really late - beginning of July - and I'm wondering if that prevented them from getting bitter. Who know, but I want to plants lots more next year. 

The last day of my summer vacation I woke up super early and went walking. I decided to go for a couple of hours. I ended up walking six miles all over Springville. Sadly, I didn't realize we were having a mosquito infestation and got covered in the nasty things. I was pretty miserable for a few days. I had well over 50 bites on my legs/arms. 

Sweet fair pix

We have a team of UVU students that help us with a few things around the fair. One of those things is taking pictures. I recently received all the pictures. I've whittle them down to these favorites. It really was such a great fair.