Not Enough Time and Energy

Have you ever said to yourself "there's just not enough time in the day to get everything done that you want." Well, there's another one that says "I don't have the energy to get done what I used to get done." I feel both of them right now. Working full time and trying to keep a nice house is so hard. And you don't know what it's like until you've actually tried it. I've worked full time for many, many years now. And even though the kids are gone I still find it just as hard to keep it all up. I know I'm older..hahaha..but it seems like I just get all the dusting and bathrooms done and you turn around and see another inch of dust again. I'm like.."didn't I just do that?" I wish I had the money to hire a housekeeper to come in once a week to do those little extra things. Like getting rid of the cobwebs, dusting, vaccuming, baseboards, windows, showers, tubs, cleaning closets, cupboards. It's a never ending job. By the time 2p.m. arrives I need a nap. I just don't have the energy I used to have either. Is it that I'm getting old? Roger said the same thing the other day and I had to remind him that he's now 50. All I want is my house to be presentable. I hope that when people come over they'll look past the dust and feel welcome in our home. It's just a woman thing I guess. Wanting my house to be nice.

Doing something I love to do!!

Today was such an awesome day. I spent it up at the beautiful ski resort of Snowbird. I've been aching to go skinig for so long now and finally got the opportunity. I went with Dr. Melissa Mclane, Laci and FayDawn. I work with Melissa and Laci and FayDawn used to be ER techs several years ago. And of course I'm always the oldest one but pretty much keep up with them. Thank goodness for the gym workouts. I don't think I would be able to if I didn't hit the gym.

We had so much fun. The snow was awesome. We ski'd non stop except for a 45 minute break for lunch. I actually haven't ski'd Snowbird for years and years. Thank goodness FayDawn was with us because she ski's there several times a week so she could show us around. The resort is so huge that we would have been lost without her.

I started skiing when I was in the 4th grade. My parents signed my little sister and I up for ski lessons at Sundance. I also went with my girlfriend Kim Brown. Our parents would take us to Ripples Polar King and that's where the bus would pick us up and take us up for our Saturday lesson and ski day. We did that for years then finally we were old enough to just go on our own. I remember in Jr. High Kim and I went spring skiing. The day was awesome, the sky so blue and we were putting snow on our face to attract the sun. We would sing on the lift so loud "By By Miss American Pie, drove my Chevy to the levy but the levy was dry. "...Well, by the end of the day our faces were so sunburned. And the next day neither one of us could see. We had blisters in our eyes and all over our face. They were even weeping. It was so horrible. I swore I would never allow that to happen again. My mom took me to the doctor and there wasn't anything they could do. So now I lather on the sunscreen and do everything in my power to not get sunburned. Today would have been one of those days if I hadn't doctored up the face.

I have so many fun ski memories growing up. And fun ski memories teaching my kids to ski. I"m so thankful that I'm healthy enough to keep doing it. I hope I can always be that way. My knees are a little sore but other than that I'm not too bad.

What a fun way to spend the day. I love skiing!!!!!!

People Who Judge Others and Two Faced People

There are two things in my life that I really do hate about people and those are "judgemental and two faced people."Who are we to judge others? We've been taught that only our Heavenly Father will be the one who will judge us.
I have been through some experiences in my life where others have judged me. People despise you and look down on you for choices you made that might not have been right ones. We all live and learn. We all make mistakes that we regret. But there are still people who hold those things against you for the rest of your life. There are people who will talk straight to your face and tell you the things you want to hear but then turn around and say something different to someone else. I"m not perfect believe me. And I'm sure I've been guilty of these things myself. But these character faults need to be stopped. People need to mind their own business. We need to forgive. We need to soften our hearts more. I"m tired of being hurt by others and having others hurt the ones that I love just because of two faced and judgemental people. I try not to harbor bad feelings about it but it sure is hard. I hope that we can all remember to remember who we are and to forgive and forget. To remember that we are all human beings. That no one is better than the other. We're all equal in our Heavenly Fathers eyes.

My Bro and his family

It was in February of last year that I found my half brother Jim Osborn. It's been so fun getting to know him and his family. Last night Roger and I drove up to Ogden to his oldest sons wedding reception. It was the first time for us to meet his kids. Jim was so cute. He saw us and he immediatley came out of the line and grabbed me and gave me a big hug. He then went up to his boys with his arm around me and he put our faces right next to each other and asked his boys "do we look alike?" He did the face comparison with about 3 or 4 other people. It was so cute. His boys had heard about me this past year and since they hadn't ever met me they called me the "phantom sister." So now they've met me and it's all real. They are anxious to meet my kids and get to know them. I wish my kids were as anxious as they are. But i'm hoping this summer we can go on a couple of camping trips with them. There names are Dane, Jesse and Sean. Dane is going to medical school, Jesse is in hotel management and Sean is going to the U majoring in engineering. We got to visit with them last night and that was fun. I also got to meet Jims other two half sisters. Ilene and Susan. They were very sweet to us and told us a few stories of when they were growing up and having Jim scare them with the claw stories.

I know my dad would be so happy that we have reunited and are having a relationship now. I just wish we lived closer so that we could get together more often.

Happy Valentines Day

This morning I had three of our four darling grandbabies over and we started another tradition. We decorated our little Valentine cookies. It was funny because it wasn't going to be a start of a new tradition but Brayden saw all my cookie things out last week and he asked what I was going to be doing and so I had to tell him. And of course he wanted to be involved. Well, it turned out to be a lot of fun. I had made all of the sugar cookies yesterday in preparation for the big day. I had Brayden, Dax and Makinley come over and they donned their bibs so they wouldn't get too messy. Gentry will have to come next year when she's a little older.

Before the kids got there though I frosted Troy and Kori's cookies so that they would know that the knife that frosted their cookies didn't have the knife licked..hahaha

As you can see from the pictures the kids had a great time. I think I went through 3 containers of decorations. The cookies had about 1/2" of sprinkles on them. But they turned out so awesome. Each one tried so hard to make their cookies the best.

I love my little Valentines and I love sharing times like this with them. I hope that the times we spend together will always be fun memories for them. I can't wait until next year and Gentry can join us.

Happy Valentines Day!!!!

Happy 87th Birthday to my dad

Feb. 12,1920 Clinton Lincoln Lee was born. Tomorrow my dad would have been 87 years old.
It's so hard for me to imagine what it would be like to have him that age because my dad passed away at the very young age of 56. I was only 16 years old.
Most of my memories of my dad are of when he was ill. He had started smoking at a very young age and his father owned a sand and gravel business that my dad ended up owning so between the cigarettes and dust from the sand his lungs were doomed. He died from emphysema.

I wanted to write about a few of the things that my dad enjoyed. He had a great love for horses. He had a barn in the river bottoms where he had several acres of land. At one time we had 16 horses. He loved to spend time down there and shoot the bull with his friends as they trained the horses on the walker. He loved traveling all over watching the horses race. We would travel to St. George, Idaho, Wyoming and lots of other places. We would watch the cutter races in Heber in the winter time. He made many friends throughout the years as he enjoyed the horse/race scene. One of his good friends was Lyle Davis. He did a lot of the training for dad. I remember mom would get mad at him because he was supposed to be trying to stop smoking and she would go down to the barn and find his cigarettes. I remember spending time down there helping dad clean the stalls. He bought me a new horse for my birthday. I named him Red Feather. I used to spend time down there racing around the barrels he would sit up for us. I used to love hanging onto the walker that you hook the horses up to for exercise. We would go around and around in circles forever.

Dad was so proud of his business up Provo Canyon. It was Lee Sand and Gravel. He had great big dump trucks and I loved riding in them. He used to donate sand and gravel to different projects like the BYU stadium. He built mom and dads beautiful back yard by hand. He hauled in great big huge rocks and did all the beautiful landscape.

I also remember the day that my grandmother died. It was only one of two times that I ever saw my dad break down and cry. He loved his motherinlaw so much.

I remember when my dad finally had to be continually hooked up to an oxygen tank. He would carry his little tank around with him everywhere. He used to go up to the Chalet in Provo Canyon and have breakfast and coffee with his friends. But then it got to the point where he would be out of breath all the time. He was pretty well home bound. My dad had such a dry sense of humor. He was a very smart man with great wisdom. Always had such good advice. But being a teenager I took him for granted. You never expect your parents to die when you are so young. Another special memory of my dad was having him baptized on the day that I was. Larry baptized both of us. That made it a fun day and more memorable for me.

I remember coming home from an Orem High basketball game in Salt Lake. It was March 18, 1976. I was with Roger and when I got home there was a note on the table that mom had written. All it said was "dad is really bad. Please come to the hospital." I hurried down there and dad was in a coma. A couple of his friends had tried to go in and give him a blessing but the doctors ushered them out because he had taken a turn for the worse. It was a long night and each of us took a turn saying our good byes to dad. We wept over his body as it lay there motionless. It's still hard to think of that night to this day and it's been 31 years. I loved my dad very much. He was such a hard worker. He was very stern in his disciplining but we knew it was for the best. I miss him so much and always have wished that he could have seen me graduate from high school, get married, have children, see my grand children. But God had other plans for him.

The picture of him on the sofa is mostly how I remember him. The picture of him in his army outfit is so handsome. And the other picture is of him and his good friend, Jim Diamond. They're with one of his big dump trucks from his business.

Happy Birthday Dad...

The Joys Of Getting Older

Today is Feb. 11, 2007. Fifty years ago today my cute little hubby was born.

He was the 5th child born to Sam and Vivian. And all his older brothers and sisters say he was spoiled rotten growing up as a child.

Well, look at what he got for his 50th birthday. You can tell he is still a spoiled man. He has been asking for a 4 wheeler for several years now. So I finally had to give in. I hope it will keep him quiet for a while now.

The kids and I threw a surprise party for him last night. We had it all planned out. We invited Lola, Ron, Elaine, Morris, Geri, Kayleen, Lora, Rick, Cindy, Steve, Debbie and all of our kids were there. While I took Roger out to dinner to Sizzler the kids were home decorating the house. I"m grateful for their help. Troy had picked up the cake, Shana got the balloons. They had everything set up. Troy had been texting me while we were out to dinner to let me know that everything was set to go. Everyone had arrived. When we walked through the door everyone yelled "Surprise"...He was so excited and unsuspecting. The evening was spent with everyone sharing a memory they had of Roger since they've known him. That was so much fun listening to then and laughing so hard. Shana and I had made a poster with a bunch of different pictures at different ages and we had everyone guess what age Roger was. Jake got the most right out of everyone. He got 6 out of the 13 right. He opened some really fun gifts from everybody. He got a package of depends, old fart cup, a tombstone full of stuff for an old man, nuts, and we gave him a seat with bags for the 4wheeler. We had cake and ice-cream and had fun visiting with everyone.

I can't believe he's the BIG 50!!! He's still a handsome fella and still has a cute butt. (he brags about it all the time). I hope that he can live to enjoy many more happy and healthy years. I know he worries about it but he needs to live each day at a time and enjoy every minute. He is such a great husband and father. He would do anything for our family. He's such a sensitive man and his feelings are right there on the surface when it comes to his kids and grandchildren. I hope that they will appreciate all that he does and cherrish the time they have with him.

These pictures were taken of him at his surprise party and the family one on his birthday today. We love you honey, dad and papa!!! Happy 50th.