Jan 2012

May 2008

May 2008 the crew cab was still at Omars place, the camper was off so we could access the fuel tanks, still had the chrome 8 spoke wheels and all the body panels matched.

January 2012, the beast runs and drives, it is at my house now the camper is back on (temporarlily) and the doors have been changed and upgraded to power windows and door locks. Wheels have been upgraded as well to 2008 GMC 17 inch wheels.

Original Blue

New Gold/Brown

The interior was removed and updated to 1989 Suburban front seats and the original rear seat was recovered by Pillow Talk Designs, (Rachael's Business) the headliner was also redone by Ginger, Paul and me, and new carpet to complete the inside. The gas tank in the picture is now under the truck where it is supposed to be, the original one was rusted out.

The original dash and steering wheel.

New wheel and the brown dash.

Some how I just cant get used to having the old skinny steering wheel, I had one like this in my 75 truck and really liked it, so I had to have one in here. While changing the seats, carpets, doors and headliner, we figured why not do it all and rip out the dash as well. So for a while it was completely gutted on the inside, I did wonder what the heck was I thinking?! Finally I did get the inside back together, about July 2011. it is starting to come together.

This is where the rear seat is supposed to be.

Putting on the brackets for the rear seat.

The rear seat in and the trim on for the capret.

After driving my 2 seat sport truck, it now has a back seat, and looks pretty dang good. The original seat material is no longer available and Rachael did a great job matching what was in there.
who wants to be the first to sit in here?

For those of you who have not been to the house.

This is Ducky. 

 She mostly lives in Paul and Ben's room.

Her favorite hobby is guarding any door that might open to the outside world.

She only wants to drink running water.

She has her own private fountain

and has many servants who will willingly turn on a faucet for her.

Her favorite climbing post is Ginger's jeans when she is doing dishes.

She is frightened of the water that falls from the sky.

She sharpens her claws on all the boys and Julia.
She loves to sneak up on Buddy and jump on him or around him saying here I am, play with me.
He ignors her, mostly.

She doesn't listen to instructions as well as the fish or the dog.

Lately her favorite tree house is the Christmas tree.

NASCAR racing



I received a birthday present for the Rusty Wallace Race Experience, it was scheduled for the Saturday after Thanksgiving, so early Sat. morning Ben, Julia, Ginger and I headed out to Phoenix International Raceway  (PIR) in Avondale. John Thaxton met us out there, there were already cars on the track, 2 were ride along cars, and had some extra horsepower and 8 others for the drives to use.

Suited up and ready to go, now I just have to wait my turn to crawl into the car. You don't get your choice of cars, they are already set up for different size people, makes it easier for the crews to get you into them. With the luck of the draw i ended up with #8 Budweiser car, (not a huge Earnhardt fan) but what the heck I am not buying it.

The crew is checking out John, at least so he thinks, they are seeing who to take the mount got the Go Pro camera to. Thanks so much Seth from Dragonfire Racing for letting me borrow it.

With the track only being a mile in length, it was pretty quick to get around it, Julia was taking lap times and my quickest was 36.19 seconds, average speed of 99.5 mph. Passing was allowed, but the spotter would get the slow car to move over so you could go by, they do their best to keep you safe and the cars in one piece.

Was it fun? Oh yeah, it was. Would I like to do it again? Most definitely

Halloween

Dressing up for Halloween.  Friday's pack meeting had a contest for the leaders.  We had a construction worker, ceiling fan, aircraft carrier and Mr. Conductor.  Needless to say Mr Conductor walked away with the two movie tickets.  With his "All aboard", train tickets and hole punch he was a big hit with the children.

Julia's school party was Thursday and she went as a jelly fish complete with blue ocean.

Everyone had a good time.Thursday was Julia's school party, Friday was the ward chili cook off and trunk or treat, and then finally Monday, candy at the door.  We might have had 20 trick or treaters.  

Happy Halloween from the dunes

Saturday Ginger and I went to the dunes with Dusty and Rachael and Shawn. We met up with several from our ward friends, Weinzerl, Mclaws, Geiger, Jones. Unloaded the bikes and dune buggy and took off for a ride. We usually will end up at Oldsmobile hill and watch the people racing up and down and race a few times as well. the Tri-Z was running exceptionally well this weekend ( probably about ready to break) and me and Rachael raced a few times, it was a draw she won some and I won some.

this is the view form the top of Olds hill looking down at some of the spectators and racers.

this is part of the group that we went for a afternoon ride through the dunes and then out to the bowls to ride around in, our group stops at the sand rail.

Just a little dirty from a days riding, but still smiling through it.

This is one really fast jeep, he would wait for the rails to go past then he would launch and catch them before the end.

Heads?

Well it is just Julia in the first bedroom. It's hard to believe at one time there were 5 girls in that 10x11 room.

Friday I asked her to start sorting out the other girls things. Then I started on the closet. Way up top ( I had to use a ladder), were two of Cristal's beauty school heads. I called her and asked if I could donated them. She said sure. So off to the living room where I threw them on the huge pile of Halloween costumes I was donating.

Well time came to take Ben to school so he met Kathy at her car and traded Andy K to my car but before we could drive off, we could hear the dog going crazy in the house. We could hear him clear out at the street. Ben went in and discovered he had found the heads. We just left him to work off some of his energy and drove to school Twenty minutes later I returned with Andy K. Buddy was still barking, and the look on Andy K's face was priceless. It was that "what the heck?" look. She knew something just wasn't right.

Now the heads are in a bag and will be on their way to DI tomorrow. I'm sure Andy K and Buddy are relieved. me, I'm just glad to see empty shelves. We all know that won't last long.

Julia's Chior Concert

Interesting facial expression.

We looked for fabric without a sheen to it. I'll have to try again.

I hate sewing on polyester.

There was standing room only in the audience to invites were limited.

Sorry. It was much improved over the last performance.

Maybe there is hope for the new choir director.

It's hard to measure up to Mrs. Campbell.

Julia is the shiny one in the front.

Emilee's Day

Early morning Cristal is Getting Emilee ready.

Saturday Sept 17th 2011, Alarm clocks go off around 4:00 a.m. and the house starts waking up, Ginger makes a run to Walmart, before the people of walmart get there, to get a few things that are needed. Cristal and Emilee get started with hair and makeup, there is an appointment to meet Celeste at the Temple for pre wedding pictures at 7 a.m.

Emilee looking beautiful





We were a few minutes late to the temple for pictures. Celeste was waiting for us so we got started, while Celeste was taking her pictures I was taking some also, Emilee was looking exceptionally beautiful this morning, and the light was just right.

Celeste, Ginger, Emilee, and Shaine.

We had an extra piece of white fabric to put down on the grass to keep her dress clean and dry, this is the dress she is getting married in after all. I think that Celeste took several hundred pictures. Ginger almost lost her shoes in the grass, it was pretty wet in a few spots.

Emilee

Where is that boy?

Shaine

Oh there he is! Just hanging out a little ways down the sidewalk trying to look cool and calm.

Emilee and Shaine

This was out opportunity to get their picture coming down the steps of the temple, without a crowd around, there were 8 couples getting married on this day.

Julia, Cristal, Dawn, Kathy, and Rachael

Emilee's colors were black and teal all of the sisters had the same shirts. Cristal and a couple of the sisters made the bouquets.

Wow I do have pretty daughters!

Cristal and Me

I know that it is Emilee's day, but Cristal came down from Provo to help out and visit,

and I am her favorite!

Happy 33rd Anniversary

Somehow we have a tradition that Ginger and I get out of town, stay someplace nice and go for a hike somewhere cool. This year was no different. Wednesday night we drove to Strawberry and stayed in Omar's cabin, (thanks for the use of the cabin Omar!!!)  Thursday morning we did a little maintenance for him and found his water leak, visited with the neighbors, who were watching us and making sure we weren't up to no good. Ted gave us a couple of his recommendations for places to eat breakfast, so we went to the Nifty 50's diner in Pine had a great breakfast and then headed down the road to Fossil Springs

Some of the rapids and pools along the way.

We made the 6 mile drive down into the canyon, with the Bonneville, I would recommend a truck though, and arrived at the parking lot and started the hike into the Waterfall trail, it is about 1.5 miles or so to the falls and well worth the hike, you pass by some smaller falls and swimming holes and are tempted to stop thinking that you are there, but keep going.





 The Falls, and the deep swimming hole.

If you swim across the pool to the other side and make your way behind the falls and get up in between them it is amazing how much water is coming down on you.

Ginger in the middle of the falls.

The view from behind the falls looking down stream.

It was a perfect day, slight overcast with the sun coming out every now and then, the water was a little chilly but not to bad. Near the end of the day the clouds were starting to gather and you could hear the thunder off in the distance rumbling in the canyon.

We returned to the cabin cleaned up and shut the cabin down and started the journey home. after we gassed up in Payson we wanted someplace to eat, so we got on the smart phone and found a Mexican restaurant right across the street, La Sierra!  It was very tasty and the staff was very friendly, definitely will go there again.

You're a redneck when.....

your late 1880's bath tub is being suported by a floor jack?

Saturday, I was washing my hair when the tub fell out from under me.

Thank goodness it hasn't been resurfaced or I would have fallen.

Over time the screws securing the feet to the tub had worked loose.

First there was the crash

and then scream of being surprised that something I thought was stationary had moved.

Michael came down the hall to check that I was alright.

I was and surpringly so was the tile that the tub fell on.

It did bend the pipe to the shower head a little.

We've made a trip to Lowes for new screws but have yet to have the time to install them.

Everyone is sharing the middle shower this morning.

We are blessed to have two.

Thank you, thank you.