April 3, 2000 Farmington, Utah

We are going to have the warmest day of the year so far here in Utah today - it will be almost 70 degrees here. It doesn't seem to me that we have even had a Winter but I guess we have!!! I donated two trees to the Condo entry place last week - one was a pine tree that was in the rock garden and it really crowded the magnolia tree and the other was a blue spruce that the tree man told me would grow to 40 feet. The Brownings planted trees every place they could. Now I need to go out and get the weeds out of the rock garden and other places and do some serious yard work - yuck!!! The entry place in the condo area needs many more trees but I have done my part.

We had such a WONDERFUL time yesterday at the Weinerts' home - Jeannie and Rick are SO gracious to have all of us there. It is a rare thing to have so many of our family members together and I DIDN'T GET A PICTURE!!! We missed Roy, Patrice, Emily, Timothy, Jesse, Ricky, and Lee Anna. The young people kinda' "go their own way" and I didn't realize Lee Anna wasn't there until I saw the Woolleys going to their car as we were leaving. Annie said she went to California with her cheerleading group for the weekend. I didn't ever talk to Jimmy but I saw him - Ha!!! Ron and Jimmy went to Jerome to be with Grandpa Russ and Mimi for the weekend and then they stopped at the Weinerts home on their way back. Russ and Mimi are getting along good - I think that is just GREAT!!!

The dinner at the Weinert's home was spectacular!!! I have decided to go back to my old recipes though and admit that I am not smart enough to learn any new way of cooking. The last time my family was at my home I made two soups that I LOVE - cheese and chili!!! WELL - I ended up freezing most of it because it was too fattening. This time I told Jeannie I would bring a soup that had absolutely no calories in it and I have NEVER had such a flop - Ha!!! One would think that I had just "thrown it together" when in fact I made a special trip to the Saigon Market in Clearfield to get the ingredients and besides that I spent a LONG time "shelling" the shrimp and it has to be the nastiest soup I have ever made!!! I admit that it was too spicy hot and I'm sure those of you who ate it are still mad at me - I put too many hot peppers in it!!! I LOVE hot things and I am not very sympathetic with people who don't - I must change my ways!!!

Our church conference was SO good this weekend and it was fun to watch the coverage of it in the new "Conference Center". The light rail system helped with the traffic and from the television reports everything went quite smoothly - I'm sure the leaders involved are happy it is over. I am anxious to visit the new conference center when it is not so crowded. I went to Virginia's condo for lunch last Monday and looked out her windows at the top of the center where they are planting gardens and that is such an unusual sight - when they are finished they will be open to the public for people to visit and enjoy. It was fun to be with my missionary friends and hear reports from Thailand and then Ruth told about her trip to Israel. I felt bad though when I came home because my friend, Somjit, had called from Bangkok and had left a message. I don't have her telephone number but I'm not going to start calling there - I didn't want to give Somjit my number but she kept asking for it so I finally did.

BOB - Thank you SO much for coming over on Saturday night (he came over after the Priesthood broadcast). It is WONDERFUL for you to take the time to come just to visit and I appreciate it SO much!!! I was concerned because I haven't be able to send messages to Roy and Patrice so I asked him to help me with my computer. When we turned it on I noticed that I had a message from Barbara Sondrup - Kevin had passed away that morning. I had a message from her a week ago telling me that they had been able to go to one of their sons' championship hockey games and they had dedicated the game to Kevin so I was surprised that he had died so soon after that. I was happy to have the news in time to call Chris in Little Rock so she could tell our friends when she went to church. Many of them have called me to find out about him. They are having a memorial service for him in Provo on the 11th and I will go to that. It is sad - he was going to the Anderson Cancer clinic in Texas and was doing quite well until a couple weeks ago but pancreatic cancer is difficult to treat I guess.

JOHN - you surely do look good!!! I want to learn more about the triathlon you will be involved in May 20th. It will be held in Nephi and he is training for it now. I don't know anything about triathlons but I am SO happy you are involved in something that is good for you!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH for helping me with my income tax. He needed some more documents to give the accountant and I thought I had found them but when he came yesterday I discovered that I didn't. I have never understood the "income tax thing" - Daddy was always so good to keep records and I was never involved and with the move I didn't do a very good job. I hope Joe can get what he needs - I looked in more boxes last night but I couldn't find anything. John has to wait this long to file my taxes because some of the things I have don't send their information before now.

MICHAEL - You surely do look good too and we're all SO excited about your decision to serve a mission. My neighbor's grandson just received his mission call and he is going to Omaha, Nebraska. I asked Margaret if he were disappointed to not go foreign and she said no, he was thrilled to be going in the states.

ROY AND PATRICE - Bob said I was using the right e-mail addresses for you - why are they coming back? I sent you a message telling you I would be coming to Little Rock for Easter and I hope that is okay. If this letter comes back I will forward it to Emily and hope she shares it with you - I finally forwarded the other message to her address. I will call you soon if I don't hear from you. I hope everything is going good - I LOVED YOUR PHONE MESSAGE ROY!!!

RICKY - I hope you are doing good!!! I was going to send you some "Dinty Moore" box food that you could fix by putting it in boiling water but your Mom kinda' discouraged me. I think it is quite good. Your pictures show that you are healthy and when we were talking to Steve last night - he's Susanna's friend - he told us that he lost 50 pounds while he was on his mission in Brazil. I think you have lost weight but not that much!!!