May 28, 2001 Farmington, Utah

HAPPY MEMORIAL WEEKEND TO ALL OF YOU!!! I hope you are all having a long holiday weekend and will have fun and BE SAFE!!! I'm not going to decorate graves as early as I did this year ever again - Margaret called and wanted me to go to Brigham City with her on Thursday morning so we loaded up her car with chrysanthemums and got to the cemetery before noon. The cemetery was beautiful and the flowers were just gorgeous. I need to have the monument company clean my parent's marker because you can hardly read it and I also need to have them put Dee's death date on it. I got a very pretty artificial floral arrangement from Brigham City Floral that fit on top of headstones to take to Papa's grave in Lehi. I went to Lehi after my temple assignment on Saturday and put flowers on Aunt Marvel and Uncle Iras' graves, Grandma & Grandpa Rhodes' graves and also a fresh one on Lynn's. I also put the missionary flag and a U.S. flag on his and it looked SO nice. Our former missionary friend, David Taylor, called me from Connecticut to remind me to put it on his grave - he is such a nice young man. He and his wife and little boys were in Boston and Connecticut to attend Polly's graduation. I was worried about the flowers in Brigham City so I went there after leaving Lehi to water them. It has been SO hot here and they were wilted!!! I wish now that I had waited and taken the flowers to Brigham either today or tomorrow morning. Margaret caught me "off guard" and I didn't even remember that it was Memorial Day - Ha!!! I really think the artificial flowers are prettier and I'm going to go get some when they put them on sale soon and save them for next year. I was SO disappointed when I went to Lehi - they have erected a big "Memorial Wall" to honor all the veterans and I sent them over $100 so they could add Daddy's name and also Uncles Ira and Hugh on it. The have spelled our last name wrong - it is Jesse L. Millor. I am going to take some black tape and try to make an "E" out of the "I" the next time I go. It was done by the Veteran's organization in Lehi and I shouldn't complain because I know how hard a project like that is.

Jean and Rick came over today to visit and bring me some salmon and they told me about Sarah's birthday party on Monday - it was a surprise party. They had the most clever cake I have ever seen - it was a large chocolate sheet cake and it had Sarah's picture on top. They brought me the part with her picture and I have frozen it so I'll show it to you when you come to see me. She is so excited to be able to drive but she has to wait until she takes the written test the end of this week. She started her lifeguard job at Lagoon yesterday and Jeannie said a big swimmer ran into her unintentionally and knocked her over - she is so tiny. She will be GREAT!!! Ricky is going to start working at Meier and Frank tomorrow and he will be doing some inventory and unpacking, etc. He has been working at a temporary job place doing some restoring of old buildings, homes, etc. and he has enjoyed that. Jeannie says that his work is a great motivation to finish college and get a job doing what he REALLY enjoys - when she said that it reminded me of when Roy was doing some "roof installation" in Little Rock when the temperature and humidity were in the 100's and he was determined to get prepared to do something he liked.

Annie - Thank you SO much for sending me the obituary of my friend who was killed last week. I am SO happy and impressed that you remembered she was a friend of mine because I don't remember talking about her that much. I called many of my former Orem neighborhood friends and visited with them about her. They said her daughter, Cinzia Noble, had been in seclusion since the accident so they hadn't seen her. They waited a week to have her funeral and I am thinking they were waiting for her brother to come from Italy. Her husband was injured in the accident and had been hospitalized.

It was fun to visit with Claire for a few minutes this afternoon - thank you for your invitation. I told both Jeannie and Claire that I haven't had enough time to "putter" lately and I know they must think I am crazy but I don't like to be "overprogrammed" - Ha!!! My responsibilities for the pool have been such a pain - I have had a million calls about why it wasn't open this weekend. Our maintenance man who said he could get it "finished" has had one problem after another and I have had to cancel the health department inspection several times. Today when I came home from church there were people swimming in it and there was a sign on the gate "Pool Closed for Repairs" - you would think they couldn't read. The condo President called me and I told him I was just going to close my eyes to their swimming. It is supposed to be inspected on Tuesday morning and hopefully it will be open that afternoon.

Brett - how did you do in your soccer games? Bob called me from where they were playing on Friday evening and he said they were playing a hard team. They have done so well and were in their final competition but I forgot to ask Claire when she called today. Michael - do they celebrate a Memorial Day in Italy? I think it is so interesting to learn the different cultures - do they cremate there like they did in Thailand. Next year we will learn what they do in Madagascar.

Emily - I'm getting SO excited to have you spend time here in Utah with us. I will be on the outlook for things I think you will enjoy doing with me and your cousins. I get VERY envious of some of my friends when their granddaughters come to spend time with them - there are LOTS of interesting and fun things to do here. I want to take you to a candy factory in Alpine (kinda' close to Lehi") that is famous and many schools take excursions there. When we go there we can also go to the "Dinosaur" place at Thanksgiving Point - I haven't been there and I'm not sure you're all that interested in Dinosaurs but from what I hear it is "The Place To Go" in Utah County. Have you been to "Antelope Island" which is close to the Great Salt Lake? We'll plan LOTS of fun things to do. I wish Timothy and Jesse would come too!!!