Did you know that if you lick the silver wrapping on a piece of Big Red chewing gum and stick it on your forehead, it stings??? Why do it, you ask? Because your friend tells you it's funny, why else?

Our new rose bushes are adjusting to life in the fast lane--the path to the gazebo!! Do we have the cutest boys in our family? Kobe, Kahlil, and Carter--smiling for the cameras.

Like the pictures I've posted, life is a hodge-podge right now. I'm still in recovery mode after my gall bladder surgery but feeling better every day. Our yard is more beautiful than ever, but we're not allowed to do outdoor watering because of a ban on outdoor watering. White Salmon is still struggling with water issues.

Vale waxes and wans between boredom and entertainment. Grandparents aren't very exciting after all. He enjoys the company of the neighbor, but the neighbor can't be here 24/7.

Life in all its complexities is good!! Love, Mom

OF ERKEL, REUNIONS, AND.....

I thought I would write a blog on the eve of my upcoming gall bladder surgery. I always laugh when I think of this "procedure" because many 50's and 60's movies spoofed gall bladder surgery because it was the surgery of the rich and famous. I had two "procedures" done on Monday but couldn't find out anything about the results because the doctor had to rush to an emergency surgery!! I'm ready for tomorrow. Besides having Dad at my side, I have a big, thick book to read and my ever-present sewing bag when Dad has to leave for our class, so I can face anything!!

As you can see by our pictures, we have Vale here for the summer. He's now 5'4." We've been treated to many Steve Erkel impersonations. Dad has spent many hours preparing charts, etc. for the first lesson for our class. It will be on the book of Revelation. I'll join him in the teaching when I'm recovered from my surgery.

We went to a shower for Melanie and her beau, Ryan. Baby is due June 8. The bottles on the table are root beer in case anyone's asking!!

Now, some information on the reunion.

Here's a rough sketch of plans:

Monday: Day getting settled into the lodge. Dad, I, Tom, and Nicole will fix an evening meal of spaghetti and all the trimmings.

Tuesday: We'll all travel to Bremerton for a reunion with Grandma which she's really looking forward to. I haven't made the arrangements yet, but the tentative plan is to find a restaurant that has a private dining area to have lunch together.

Wednesday: The Mark Kennedy family will be in charge of the evening meal. I thought this might be a fun day to gather at the house and do a family project. As you can see, Dad has a big wood pile that could be stacked and there's a weedy area that I really want to become "Aunt Annie's garden."

Thursday: Darla, Susan, and Steve's families will be in charge of dinner. How about a Family Home Evening--casual--talent show, etc.?? for the evening?

Friday: We need to check out of the lodge.

For the dinners, please get a grocery list for your meal to us as soon as possible. We'd like to get as many of the groceries at Costco as possible. It isn't necessary to fix a gourmet meal; we just wanted to have everyone share the cooking chores. You'll be cooking the meals at the lodge in a big commercial kitchen. We'll provide breakfasts and lunches.

I have been purchasing markers, paper, etc. and plan to have a crafts table set up each day. I welcome any and all suggestions!! I don't remember seeing any toys in the lodge, although there may have been. There were lots of movies and two tvs. I looked into renting the White Salmon pool, but they don't rent the pool on weeknights. The Hood River Pool is just too costly. The Hood River County Fair begins on the 23rd.

We're so excited to have all of you here. We've discussed having a formal family picture taken but have decided that it's just too cost prohibitive at this time. So, everyone bring your cameras and let's see what we can do for pictures.

Please, please send any ideas and input.

Love to You All, Mom

37 YEARS BUT WHO'S COUNTING?

Easter Sunday, 1971. Tom had just given me my ring. The roses were given to me by Grandpa and Grandma Kennedy's ever-present neighbor, Mr. Tewsbury, who always seemed to be watering his English roses when anything important was going on at the Kennedys. Later, he provided us with gorgeous roses for our reception.

Early July 1971 in Bremerton. We were married in the Idaho Falls temple. Grandma Whitby made the dress; Aunt Joan donated the veil.

June 2004 at Tobin's wedding reception. Proud grandparents.

I find it so hard sometimes to write about what is most sacred and important in my life, but here goes. 37 years ago Tom and I met through his sister, Betty. It was the proverbial "love at first sight." One date that remains memorable to me is that one evening we sat on the floor in the study of my apartment and shared our favorite scriptures far into the night. Sounds sort of hockey by today's dating standards, but that evening told me the caliber of the man I'd fallen so hard for. I had been warned by well-meaning friends that Tom was "damaged goods"--divorced, father of a child, balding, inactive since he was working three jobs to make ends meet, broke...on and on. If I had had doubts before, they flew out the window on that night. We met in March and were married June 12 in Idaho Falls. As we knelt at the altar, I could hear someone sobbing uncontrollably, tears of joy. I thought it was Joan, but it was my friend, Nancy Smith, who'd been my mentor and supervising teacher who had also married a "damaged goods" guy. We spent our honeymoon, we always joke, looking for the YMCA in Butte, MT and shooing a herd of cattle off the highway. Now, six children, 14 grandchildren, and 2 great-grandchildren later, we are still best friends, lovers, and companions. Our gait is a little slower, our hair grayer, and our waistlines broader, and we've weathered lots of ups and downs in our lives, but that "damaged goods" guy still makes me grit my teeth to stop my heart from fluttering when he gives me a little wave or squeezes my hand during prayer!! How I love him. And all of you. Mom

RHODIES, TRAINS, AND BIRTHDAYS

I keep checking others' blogs, wishing they would upgrade them!! I always think of a notation I read once on an ancestor of Dad's. The writer was listing the children of one of Dad's great-grandfathers, and he noted: "Wesley went west and was never heard from again." I felt so sorry for Wesley's parents and thought how hard life was then when they heard so rarely from family gone away. With blogs, email, phones, etc., we are privy to most of what is going on in our family members' lives in an instant. Thank heavens. When, I looked at my own blog, I realized that I hadn't updated my blog for a long while. So, here goes. Updating a blog is somewhat difficult when your life is really pretty ordinary and routine. We've been moving rooms around and having lots of fun re-decorating and re-organizing them as we go along. By moving them around, I mean that we've moved my sewing room upstairs. Dad felt bad because he feels I look sort of crammed into my new nest, but I love it!! We've created two guest rooms downstairs. One will serve as Dad's study, and we've dubbed it the "Kennedy" room and are filling it with mementos and pictures from the Kennedy side of the family. The other room, my old sewing room, is the Whitby room. We're still making trips at least once a month to see Grandma, and she's still doing well. We're doing lots of speaking at conference, firesides, etc. to drum up students for our class that will start on June 18. I'm feeling much better and am able to do a little more around the house.

We had a wonderful visit with Michelle and Kobe. They were able to come for a few hours, and they brought along Daegon, Kobe's cousin. The boys were really cute; they knew right where the toy box was with its 10,000 Legos. Daegon came upstairs with the St. Bernard, remembering that he played with the dog when he was here before. We had ice cream and cake and presents because Kobe's birthday is June 11. I didn't know Daegon was coming and bought an ice cream cake, and he's allergic to eggs and peanuts. He was a really good sport, and he gobbled down the Jello that I'd fixed. Kobe is a delightful, happy, loving little boy who starts kindergarten in the fall, and we had a wonderful visit with Michelle. She's as beautiful as ever.

Today Joan and Garth were here, and we took the railroad trip on the Hood River Railroad. It was a fun glimpse at the "olden" days of Hood River's history and a fun visit with Joan and Garth.

The yard is beautiful. The constant rain has brought on the rhododondrons and the gladiolias, so the lawn is alive with pinks and purples. Dad is working very hard on the yard, so it will be in pristine shape for the reunion. All is well. We love you all. Update your blogs and keep in touch. Love, Mom

"Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one." - Jane Howard, "Families"

LAUGHTER, LIGHT MOMENTS, AND NUMBER THREE DONE

Life certainly has its twists and turns, slips and slides, and thrilling vistas. These past few weeks have proven this little description to be true. It has been a month to the day that I went into the hospital with all my problems, and I am still recovering. Comparatively speaking, my illnesses aren't seriously life-threatening, but they have stopped me in my tracks. One of my "comforts"??? has been the quilt which I am making for TJ. I've made many quilts, but this one has been challenging, challenging, challenging. I've made every mistake in the book and picked out and put back together every stitch in the quilt, but it has given me hours of busy work when I didn't feel like doing much else. I have about three hours' worth of hand quilting left to do, and I'll be able to send it off to TJ. Yesterday, I had lunch with my dear friend, Kathy, from my working days. She was very concerned about my surgery, when she is dealing, and has been since last summer, with the terminal cancer of her boyfriend, JR, the excessive stress of a special ed job, and the responsibility of being the breadwinner in her family. Kathy has taught me many lessons about dealing with tragedy with grace, and I've never seen it that grace so beautifully manifest as I did yesterday. Kathy and I love to laugh at our troubles as a way to deal with them, so we remembered jokes we've heard about gall bladder surgery and the funny, funny antics of our special ed students years ago.

A week or two ago, we mapped out a careful strategy for re-arranging the house to accommodate Marie's family. We had planned all along to move us upstairs, so that, come winter, we'd be heating only the upstairs, so this was the perfect opportunity to make that move. We'd moved the sewing room/study when we received the news that Marie won't be able to come due to Navy bureaucracy in the form of missing passports!! However, we pressed on, and have the move nearly complete. Now, there will be two guest rooms downstairs. The top picture is of Dad's Father's Day gift--a 42" tv.

The last picture is of our latest adventure. Dad helped Uncle Garth with some roofing. Aunt Joan and I are in the room that would be to Uncle Garth's left, chatting away and solving quilting problems!! Life is fun!!

I promise a blog soon about the reunion!! Love, Mom

MOM-NESS

Happy Mothers' Day to all our family moms. I've had lots of time to reflect upon my role as a mom and to be proud that I am a mom, grandma, and great grandma. I think Motherhood and all its attendant blessings is so sacred a topic that it's quite difficult to write about! I've thought of how each of my six children arrived. Mark flew in on a jet plane from Texas--age 11 or so--in a cowboy suit; Darla sneaked in on a blur of drug-induced labor and nausea; Susan whirled in on a winter storm; Steve sailed in on a beautiful June day with no fuss at all; Marie made her appearance--appropriately--on Labor Day; Tom chose a rainy August day to join the family; and Annie warmed a brisk, cold January day with her arrival. Each of the babies arrived with that special look of: "What happened? A few minutes ago I was in a quiet, dark, warm womb. How'd I get here?" So precious!!! All of you are beautiful, wonderful adults of whom I'm very proud. I love and admire and cherish you all.

Doesn't Grandma look good? She's showing off the "granny" rocker we bought her for her birthday. She turned 93 on the 8th. She's doing well.

The apple tree is extra gorgeous this year! I can't remember it ever being so spectacular. So is that handsome guy under the tree--spectacular that is!!

This is the little gazebo by the driveway. We're gearing up for summer fun by getting the gazebos and yard ready for the reunion.

Flower baskets are my Mothers' Day gift. Dad had to be Mom to these beauties. We bought them on a beautiful, warm day, but by evening the weather had turned, and Mom/Dad had to put them in the shed and coax them into perking up with warm water and sweet words.

The fig tree is also beautiful and there are three more hanging baskets and a wind sock to brighten the front of the house.

The deer are plentiful right now. Dad's resorted to chasing them off because there are so many roaming through the yard.

The Spring is beautiful; I'm on the mend, and life is, as always, wonderful. We hope it's the same for you. Loving being your mom, Love, Mom

SERENDIPITY

An early morning stroll brought some serendipitous moments today. We continue to marvel at our little bird sanctuary and the continuing return on the dollar!! As you look at the first picture, you can count five or six birds in the tree waiting patiently for their turn to devour black sunflower seeds. Feeding time is a regular chorus of chirping and calling to friends.

The lovely tulips were a lovely surprise. I could have sworn that I planted a large number of bulbs the summer before we left for our mission, but I had assumed that my memory was faulty, or none of them had survived. Today, as we were taking our stroll, I spotted these beauties out in the area we're trying to develop as "Aunt Annie's Garden." Not only have they survived but there are three or four clusters throughout Annie's garden. AND a rose bush that looked pretty sickly has blossomed and bloomed and survived!!!

We are doing well. Just before I was released from the hospital, Dad caught a head cold, so we have formed quite a chorus. I feel a little better each day. So does Dad. I have a pre-op meeting with the doctor in Portland on June 10, and we'll go from there. In order to cool down my gall bladder, I'm on a very limited diet. The doctor says, "Every food you love has to go! Mostly it's saturated fats and pop. Food--any kind--at the moment doesn't look all that great anyway. All is well--a little boring, but well. Enjoying Spring in the Gorge. Mom