El Tour Weekend

The family was very patient with Grandpa over the last weekend. He has a "Lance Armstrong fantasy" that leads to an annual pilgramage to Tucson the weekend before Thanksgiving. Since Grandpa is going to drag everyone along to help him live out his fantasy, Lisa decided to make the best of it and get in some family time, too.

The adventure started Thursday when we drove to Sierra Vista to stay with Kara and the fam, (with a side trip to pick up Carleigh at EA).

Grandpa got a "Tour de Jadyn"

Friday Grandpa got to spend some special time with Rylee and Jadyn while the girls went to see Taylor Lautner. Excuse me, I guess they went to "New Moon". All us boys heard was how "HOT" he was.

OK. Moving on to Tucson that afternoon, we got to spend the evening at Grandma and Art's place where they had a Lazangna dinner. Yummy! Just what Grandpa needed to fuel up for the big race.

Saturday 3:45AM. Grandpa awakes and heads for the starting line to get a good spot. Ryan is a good sport and goes with him to be support. We met Kevin Kapp and Shawn Snelling downtown. Hurry up and wait was the thing to do for two and a half hours. About a half hour before the race was to start, we heard a "POP" and a collective "Gasp" from the riders. Someone's tire had popped. Kevin came walking over and asked, "Do you have an extra tube?" A trip to the vehicle and some quick repairs and we're ready to go! Finally, 7:00AM arrives and the starting gun goes off and we ride for close to six hours.

The family cheers on Kev and Grandpa at the 75 mile mark.

Colleen, Zach, Ryan, Carleigh and Grandma Keeter. Thanks. It was REALLY APPRECIATED after about 4 hours in the saddle. We needed a boost about then.

THE FINISH!

5:49 A new personal record for both Grandpa and Kevin. Thanks to Kevin Kapp. Our good friend from Utah. Papa could not have ridden to that time with our Kev.

The Chem-Dry Team.

Grandpa, Kevin and Shawn Snelling. Shawn rode a 4:49, which was good for 265 overall out of almost 9000 riders. WOW! That's fast.

We then finished off the day at the Brewers for an early Thanksgiving dinner. If you look close, you'll see Rylee giving "Doggie Kisses" to Kayla. Kayla "LOVED" them of course.

It was great to see the Utah Brewers, the recently to Arizona Windhorsts, Jessica, the Haymores, Grandma and Art Keeter, Bill & Ruth, The Tucson Wallaces, Colleen and Zach, some misc friends and of course, the John & Jan Brewers who hosted 39 people at their house.

Contributing to the Economy

Ryan is a home
owner!


We took a quick trip to Mesa on October 9-11 to help Ryan get moved in. Ryan had been looking forward to this day for several months. His offer was actually accepted in July, but didn't close until early October.


Here's the place.



The Proud "Homeowner" in front of his Castle!















The Living Room, (after cleaning).














Ryan had lots of help.














Ryan's new color in his room.

Everybody loved the Awesome mural on the dinning room wall.














It was a fun, (but too quick), weekend. Grandma Beth and Art came up from Tucson, Kara and the girls came from Sierra Vista, Carleigh, (who really did help alot, I caught her during a break), came from Thatcher and Hannah came with Mom and Dad.

CONGRATULATIONS RYAN on your house!

Walking Wounded & Dog Dancing

First, the update on Lisa.

We had to call in a "SPECIALIST". Dr. Skylar.

"Wow, this is pretty cool"

Uh, Dr. The patient.

Oh Ya, I'll get to her.

"Looks good to me!"

Dr. Skylar gives Lisa the OK to start doing a "little more". Lisa tells the Doc, "I already have been; driving, weeding, watering, cleaning, attending school parent meetings, cooking and shopping."

Doc says, "I guess that qualifies as "A Little More".

Zach + Skateboard =

Skateboards, asphalt and a "Shimmy in the Trucks" don't mix very well.

Zach was moving a little slow Sunday after his mishap.

No, the red on the shirt is NOT blood. It is just a red paint.

Doggie Dancing

Dancing With The Stars? It could happen.

5 Days After

Just an update for those of you following Lisa's progress from her surgery.

She has been:

• Complaining that we don't have a big enough sofa to fit her CPM machine.


• Getting much better with her crutches. (She is only knocking off some of the baseboard corners now)


• Still watering her flowers in the yards, no matter how much pain it causes.


• Removing her bandages against the orders of her Doctor. (Wow, what a surprise!)


• Asking for Dion's almost EVERY DAY. (Another surprise.)


• Getting teased by Carleigh and Hannah for her "clip clop" noise her crutches make going down the hall.

We did go to the Doctor today for her 1st follow up visit.

If this picture isn't enough detail for you, we can send you a copy of the latest DVD out. It is titled, "Lisa's surgery". The Doctor kindly provided us a copy of it. He did say that it was without audio. Lisa said it was because he didn't want anyone to hear him say, "Whoops", during the surgery.

Anyway, let us know if you want a movie for FHE?

Regardless of the teasing she is having to suffer through, she is doing great. Thanks for all the flowers, calls, visits and FB postings.

Knees, drugs and volleyball

I know, you're wondering what these 3 things have in common. Well, Lisa is what they have in common.

Lisa was playing volleyball a few months ago at the Church and went to plant her left foot and felt a tear in her knee. OUCH!

She came home and knew something was wrong. She made an appointment with her Dr. who scheduled an MRI. The MRI confirmed what she really, already knew. ACL tear. Dang it! No more softball this year. She was officially placed on the disabled list as of late June. (Pat had to attend a few games with her after her injury to make sure she didn't sneak out on the field).

Well, all this culminated in an ACL re-construction surgery for the "Star Pitcher" of the Lady Saints.

4:30AM Thursday, Sept 2. - Lisa gets out of bed and starts getting ready for her "Big Day".

5:15Am - Pat struggles out of bed.

6:10AM - We arrive at the surgery clinic, check in and pay the deductable. Please President Obama, make my health care free! On second thought, never mind. We're not on welfare, so we're considered part of the "Wealthy" class of America and would have to pay at least 50% of the cost, plus 25% of the cost of the welfare case that was there also. Dang rich people!

7:00AM - Pre-op for Lisa.

Ain't she beautiful?

8:20AM - Lisa starts getting her anesthesia. Sorry, I can't tell you what she was telling me between the start and when she went into surgery. (Only about 3 minutes), but just let me say she was quite the little chatterbox.

8:26AM - 10:45AM - Lisa surgey, Pat waits, and waits, and waits. Pacing the floor. Concerned for his wife. I was on pins and needles the whole time.

10:46AM - Dr. Mitnik comes out to tell Pat, "everything went great".

11:30AM - Pat gets to go back to the recovery room. Lisa had to stay in recovery until 3:30PM because she kept forgetting to breath. She was still coming out of the anesthesia and every time she would fall asleep, which was about every 30 seconds, she would "forget" to breath and her oxygenation % would go down below 88%. The Doctor said she couldn't go home until she could keep it above 90%. Finally, about 3:00PM we wheeled Lisa out to the curb in a wheelchair.

3:30PM - We arrive home and get Lisa set up on the sofa.

She has to wear a brace whenever she isn't on her CPM.

Hooked up to the Cryogenic Thermalizer Cooler-

Offer The Leg/Knee Machine Thingy.

Every 4 hours. Happy Times. Lisa's drugs.

Day after: She is actually doing great. She is being pretty good and staying off her feet and letting Pat do things for her. We'll see how long that lasts. She had several people send flowers and wish her a speedy recovery. Thanks to everyone. We'll keep you updated via Facebook.

Sweet Digs!

Last weekend, it was load up the truck and take the kid to college time! Yea!

Just kidding. We loved having Carleigh home for the summer. She was employed at Chem-Dry, (and did a GREAT job), attended the University Branch, (which she loved), and was just plain fun to have home, (which we loved). But alas, summer is coming to a close and it was time to get back to Eastern Arizona College for her. Carleigh is sharing a house in Thatcher with 5 other really fun girls and it seems like a great place for her. We thought it would be fun for you to be able to see her new home for the next 9 months.







What every girl wants, it great view from her window.

Carleighs motto has always been "Travel Light". YEAH. WHATEVER!

What house would be complete without an orange velvet chair?

The "RETRO ROOM". One of Carleighs housemates, Julie decorated the den with old albums and covers. It looked really good, except retro means old right? I remember some of those albums. Uh Oh!

Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home.

California Dreamin

Day One - Just outside of Albuquerque, we passed a "Big Rig" hauling a "Little Rig".

I'm glad this guy was making good use of the 8 MPG he was getting driving this truck. Now this is efficiency.

We dropped Hannah off at EFY in Flagstaff about noon and headed for San Diego to meet Garrick, Kara and the girls. SEAWORLD here we come!

Day Two - (Back to day one for a moment. Pat's internal male GPS malfunctioned and we ended up taking the "Scenic Route" through Lake Havuasu City, El Centro & Kingman. 13 hours in the truck Monday! It was worth it though because Rylee and Jadyn were still awake when we got there.)

OK, now on to day two. Quick breakfast at the Comfort Inn breakfast room. We had to fight the youth soccer team for waffles, but we survived. We made the assault on SeaWorld at about 9:30AM.

Jadyn liked "Shamu"

Rylee liked the Seasame Street rides.
We had a great time. We stayed until the place closed at almost 10:00PM that night. The girls did fantastic, (the mid-afternoon naps helped), and everyone enjoyed SeaWorld.

Day Three - A quick trip to show Rylee the San Diego Temple, then we visited Pacific Beach.

GrandPa enjoyed having the beach all to himself.

Well, almost all to himself. After all. This is California.

Day Four - We fight the soccer team for breakfast, check the route this time, and we're off for Phoenix. We met Ryan and his girlfriend Brittani, John and Jan at Cheesecake Factory for an early dinner, then it was off to see the D'Backs play the Rangers at Chase Field.

Brittani, Ryan and GrandPa. Yes that is a Braves jersey courtesy of Ryan on Papa.

He didn't get the nickname, "Pesty Uncle John" for nothing. If you look to the left in the picture, you will see John is pointing his camera at Lisa while she is taking he and Jans picture. That's the "Pesty Uncle John" that we love! The D'Backs lost in 12 innings 9-8. It was a fun game and Ryan and the Brewers were troupers because they all had to get up really early the next morning. Lisa and I slept in. AHHH. Vacations. Ya gotta love them.

Day Five - After a nice Hampton Inn breakfast, we made a quick trip to see the Lowders. We were reminded why we miss them so much, but it was great to see them.

After visiting with Fran, Steve and their kids for a couple hours, (so much for a "quick" visit), we were off for Flagstaff. After about 2 and a half hours, Lisa woke up and said, "We're here already. That was fast." Gramdma doesn't do a lot of driving on the trips.

Day Six - We picked up Hannah at the NAU campus. EFY is such a great, inspired program for the youth. Hannah "LOVED" EFY this year. Quotes from Hannah - "Best counselor ever", "Best group ever", My roommate was SO FUN", "Cute guys".

So let me get this straight Hannah, you really liked EFY?

No, these aren't gang signs Hannah and her counselor Sunshine are flashing. It is "F" for FaceBook. Sunshine inspired Hannah to want to be an EFY counselor in a few years herself. Needless to say we heard EFY stories, adventures and learned what a COW is, until about Winslow when Hannah finally succumed to exhaustion. Needless to say, she had a great time, made some new friends and had a spiritual experience. EFY is about one of the best investments parents can make for their children.

5 hours later, Albuquerque on the horizon.
WHEW! A lot of driving, a lot of going, going, going and seeing a lot of family and friends.

It was GREAT!

A Wheewee!

Caden brought his family over to Grandma & Grandpas house Sunday for a "Stunting" exhibition. Oh, and dinner too.
C'Dawg is following his uncle Zach's example and learning from his father. [Translation - motorcycles are COOL!]
Usually the first thing he has to do is to go into the garage to sit on Zach's bike. Then it is out to the STUNT TRACK (backyard) to ride his bike. However, just riding is not enough. We have to "Wheewee" (wheelie). Fortunately, a camera crew was close when Caden started his show. The pictures below were taken at one of the most THRILLING moments for the crowd that had assembled.

Careful; the following images contain some graphic adventure scenes. Warning; do not eat before viewing! No blood, but really close.

Caden was not injured in the making of this documentary. In fact, after the bike was pulled off of him, we realized he was laughing. What an "Adreneline Junkie".

Caden "Knievel" Edwards.

Laughing in the face of danger. Shaking off injury like a fly. AND, still coming back for more!

That's our C'Dawg!

P. S. - Just to keep you updated on our courtyard family (the Robin fam). Lisa walked out about a week ago and Momma Robin was going CRAZY! She quickly figured out that the babies were learning to fly and had hopped out of the nest.

Here is one of the little tykes staring back at us.

He had basically bailed from the nest and was directly under the tree. "Didn't make it very far with that 1st flight." By that afternoon, all the baby birds were gone. Momma Robin hung around for a day or so, then she was gone. So much for family life.

Good Luck Little Birdies!

Careful!

Them Mormons are out there.

My friend posted this on facebook, so I swiped the picture so I could post it here.
What will they think of next? Being kind to your fellow man, being honest, or maybe, gasp, free agency.

Thoughts on Memorial Day

As we celebrate Memorial Day and honor all those men and women who have defended threats to our American way of life, my thoughts turned to my Dad. He fought in the Korean war. He left college after one semester because he felt he was going to get drafted anyway. He was just a young kid fresh out of High School and a few months later he was in Korea. How about going from a kid with no cares to having to watch out for somebody trying to kill you? Makes you grow up fast!

I'm not sure how the heck they got my Dad to smile like this in a picture. I don't think I have even seen a picture where he was smiling this big except his wedding photo. Did they tell jokes? Did they threaten them? I don't know, but it is a great picture.

I think this is outside the barracks where he went through basic training.

This is Dad next to his "Willys Jeep" on a road near his outfit in Korea. He was stationed in what was called the "Punch Bowl". It was right on the front. From his position, he could see the communist (enemy) territory. He loved driving any kind of vehicle and told me that whenever they asked for volunteers to drive anything he would tell them he knew how to drive it. Then he would figure out how to drive whatever it was "on the fly". He was pretty good at it from his farm upbringing.

Home Sweet Home

How would you like to live in this? If you look closely, you will notice it had about 4' - 5' of sandbags on the roof. The sandbags were in case a mortar shell made a direct hit on their bunker, they would have a better chance of survival.

This is Dad and Pete Bush, his Squad leader at this station. From things he wrote on the back of pictures, I think he thought well of Pete. Dad received the Bronze Star for taking command of his platoon when his commander was killed during an attack. I don't know if Pete was the one killed or not. His station was on a side of a mountain facing a valley and the mountain on the other side was enemy territory. Dad's job was sighting-in the artillery that shot from behind his mountain and over him into enemy territory. The enemy knew what Dad's platoon did and was always sniping at them, firing mortars and generally making life dangerous.

Talk about a "Tough Hombre". Carbine in hand, grenade on the belt.

I know Dad was proud of his service in Korea. He answered the call to serve his country. I would like to think I would do the same if I was needed in the same way, but until it actually happens you really never know how you would react. Dad never said this, but he was a real life hero - taking command of his squad under the conditions he did and serving in a dangerous position on the front lines of the war. Men like my Dad sacrificed so we can enjoy the life we do, in comfort, in safety, with the freedoms we have. I would like to honor our service men and women this Memorial Day and every day that I live in freedom. I am very grateful for all of them, especially Delmer E. Wallace.

Thanks Dad