Goodbye Whiskers!

Last Thursday Tristyn went out to feed the animals and found Whiskers laying there unable to move his hind legs. We couldn't see anything wrong so we took him to the Vet to find out what was wrong. The Vet thought it was a blood clot or perhaps a stroke that had caused it. We left him there for the weekend to see if he would respond to treatment. When it was apparent that nothing was going to change we had to make the decision to put him to sleep. We brought him home last night so the kids could say goodbye one more time then today took him in. Ty told me that he was "going to see Jesus". We'll miss you Whiskers!

This is the sweet letter Tristyn wrote to Whiskers. It reads:

Dear Whiskers,

Thank you for coming into my life. I am so sorry that you had to have a stroke. You must have been so scared and confused. I hope you will have a fun time with your Mom and some of your other brothers and sisters up in heaven. Now you will be able to walk! I wish that you never had a stroke, and that you were still here with me. I want you to know that Po and Freckles will miss you so much. You don't know how excited I am to live with you again. I love you so very very much.

Your owner,

Tristyn

Random picture cleanup

Just looking through my phone I found all these random pictures, some of which I'm not sure why they are even there. So here they are in no particular order:


Just a real cool sunset we saw while at Rodondo beach in California. (I know I'm very sensitive that way).

Just a little tip: Don't leave the spray washer unattended around a 4 year old. Chances are everyone within 30 ft. of that 4 year old will end up soaked, as was the case here.

Tristyn loves taking random photos with my phone whenever she gets ahold of it. I never know what will be on there.

Not sure why this is funny to me but I saw this picture of William Shatner sitting on a horse on the cover of some magazine and it struck me funny for some reason.

Ty loves playing with Mr. potato head and then insists that I take pictures of the creations.

Another random photo that I'm not sure how it got on there. I need to stop leaving my phone unattended by the kids. "Why so serious?"

This was taken in Hawaii when the girls thought it would be funny to dress Ty up in a coconut bra. I'm not catching the humor.

This picture has to do with my obsession with second rate celebrities (i.e. Richard Piatt, Phil Riesen, etc.). I took this at the LAX airport of Kenny Smith (TNT NBA analyst).

Fruits and melons....and a few veggies too.

This last week Randy and I got to go with Associated Foods on a little produce trip to California. We spent a lot of time touring growing areas, and stores, just to get a better idea of what all went in to getting it to the store, as well as getting better educated on the produce. We saw lots of fruits, melons, vegetables, etc. (you hear a lot about California fruits and melons but I do have to say I still prefer Utah home grown) This first picture is the open L.A. market. The growers would line the produce up like this for the buyers to come look at and buy. It was a couple of blocks worth of produce. They said they started everyday at 1 a.m. and would go until about 8:30 or so. It was a good time and gave us a greater appreciation for all the work that goes into making sure we have fresh fruits and veggies year round.


Watching them harvest celery was pretty cool. We even got to wear some cool hairnets. (see the video below)

This was at the mission avocado plant. You just don't realize what all it takes to get the fruit from the farm to the store.

They had machines that would sort the lemons according to size, weight, even color. The technology was really amazing.

This was a huge underground storage facility where they would stage the lemons for sometimes weeks at a time depending on demand. They tagged each container so they could go back and tell you exactly where that lemon was grown, on what date it was harvested, etc.

These were rows of strawberry plants that would go on for acres. We all ate strawberries until we were sick. They build these dirt mounds up and the workers have to bend over and pick them all day. Talk about tough work.

These guys were amazing to watch in action. The faster they went the more they got paid. They got paid by the load so they were all in a hurry to get through it as fast as they could.

It's too late to apologize....or so they say

I recently ran into an old second grade schoolmate by the name of Kyle who I hadn't seen in years. If I remember right Kyle moved either during second grade or shortly thereafter. When I saw Kyle I was suddenly filled with guilt and remorse for my actions those many years ago. During recess one day I found a piece of tar. Well my little mind suddenly had the bright idea to write on the bathroom wall with that tar (I know it's hard to believe when you see that innocent face). So after checking all the stalls and making sure nobody was looking I wrote in big black letters SPENCER + BRANDON (two of my buddies) thinking that would be hillarious. Well the faculty didn't seem to agree with my sense of humor and the investigation commenced. After coming up with no witnesses to the crime, they decided to try another method. They kept our entire class in from recess, turned out the lights, and made us put our heads on our desk. They said it would stay that way until somebody confessed. Obviously they didn't know who they were dealing with so when that didn't work they just put it to a vote. Every student went up to the teacher and guessed who they thought it was. As I approached the teacher I suddenly came up with my name. KYLE, I whispered into the teachers ear. Long story short, Kyle and I were the two with the most votes so we got to spend the rest of the day scrubbing the tar off the bathroom wall. Kyle was so mad. I pretended to be just as idignant at the injustice of it all, while holding back chuckles. I never did get to tell Kyle I was sorry, so when I ran into him I asked if he remembered that. He didn't remember but it gave me the chance to finally say sorry. I guess it's never too late to apologize.

Breakdowns

I was driving with Tristyn the other day and noticed she seemed a little down, so being the sensitive father that I am I asked her what was wrong. She started crying and said "Dad you just don't understand."
"What don't I understand honey?" I responded.
"That's just what girls do, they have emotional breakdowns. I have to deal with school everyday why you get to go have fun at work. You just don't understand."
Now since I'm so compassionate I had to turn and look out my window opposite from her and wipe away a tear. Okay so it was a tear of laughter, but I hid it pretty well. Anyway it opened up a nice conversation and we were both laughing by the end. I love you Tristyn! Your a great daughter who's very special to us (and who likes to take random photos of herself with my phone as you can see here). Just so you know after doing taxes last night I do understand emotional breakdowns, I think I had three of them.

Redneck ingenuity

Sometimes in life when you are at your most difficult moments the only way to get through them is by returning to your roots. After many tears of frustration, countless scoldings, and general banging of my head against the wall I finally decided to return to my roots to solve the Freckles getting out of the fence problem. My redneck roots that is. We spent a day putting cinder blocks around the bottom of the fence. The only thing missing is some duct tape and a few beer cans. Rednecks can solve any problem as the rest of these photos show. Toilet not comfy enough? Just turn it into a recliner. Having a problem with people breaking into your car? Problem solved. Need a good wedding idea? Just ask a redneck. NO problem is too small. Call me for a free quote, or for the do-it-yourselfer, I'd be happy to offer some low-cost consulting.

Nobel peace prize

So I was looking at recent nobel peace prize winners and noticed one that kind of bugged me. In 1997 Al Gore won for his great work at bringing us all to a greater knowledge of global warming. Nice job Al! We're all better off because of your work. I think they should take that away from good ol' Al and give it to whoever came up with DVD players in the car. Talk about peace. As an added bonus they have the cordless headphones so Mom and Dad don't have to listen to the movie they can't see. Now that's true peace! I'd take being in the dark about global warming anyday over not having DVD players in the car....now if we could just figure out a way to fix the "Are we there yet?" question.

St. George

We had a little weekend excursion down to St. George so the ladies could go to a baby shower as well as watch the horse races. I put this picture of Traceys cousins boy in just because it was funny(say no to crack).

Grandpa Rip and Aunt Fawna's horse, trained by Uncle Mark.

Aunt Holly took the kids for a little horse ride.



We had time to do a little fishing. It lasted about five minutes and then throwing rocks sounded a whole lot funner to Ty.

colors

Yo Yo so freckles has been escaping lately through the holes he's been digging. At first we didn't know why, but yesterday I figured it out. After searching the neighborhood far and wide Ty and I finally found him hiding in this guys backyard. Apparently he's joined a gang. I was wondering where he got that blue bandana he had on the other morning. Well when I finally caught him this time he had a new tat on his front leg, not to mention the brand new piercing in his bottom lip. Teenagers, they think they know everything. He won't even answer to Freckles anymore. Apparently his street name is "Rude dog" and that is all he will answer to anymore. I was wondering how my tennis shoes got up on the telephone wire outside the house. Now I know!