We are in the midst of a heat wave here in Utah! 90 degree weather is not unusual here in Utah during the summer, but it IS unusual this early in the summer. I read that our temps hit an all time high beating out the record from 1881. Whoa. That's a long time ago. After not sleeping much at all for the last 3 nights, I finally insisted that we turn on the air conditioner to keep our house temperature at a bearable temperature.
Last weekend for Memorial Day, Dave and I made a trip down to his property in Koosherem, UT. (bet you've never heard of that place! I hadn't before marry him). He hasn't done a lot with it over the years, but it has a modular 3 bed. 2 bath home in good condition and a trailer home that definitely needs some fixing up. I have tried to encourage him to spend some time and money improving it so it could be a nice family retreat property. But since we bought our fix-it up home in Pleasant Grove, he has been so busy on this home, it left little time for Koosherem. It has been hard for me to take off for the weekend when the kids were younger as well, and they weren't much interested in spending time out in the middle of nowhere. But the big major projects are done here and the kids are older, doing their own thing, that I don't feel so bad leaving for a weekend now and again. I'm encouraging Dave to have us go down once a month at least, from now until winter sets in. We can do some property improvements part of the time and play the other part. The property is close to the Piute trail and Monroe Mt. which has some great ATV trails, which Dave loves to do. It is also close to Fish Lake, if you are into fishing and a good home base for trips into Bryce Canyon. There are also some hot springs about an hour away.
On this visit we cleaned up the home so it is in habitable condition for the season. We also pulled sagebrush that had overgrown the grounds. We now at least have a clear path to both entries - front and back. After doing some work, we also played. We took two ATV rides. On our ride up Monroe Mt. we saw an elk, two deer, a badger, a beaver and lots of pretty scenery and we were practically the only ones on the mountain because it was still early in the season and it was a bit chilly at that altitude.
I got Dave to sit down and look over his work calendar and other commitments and we have tentatively determined which weekends we will shoot for to head down to "the farm" as Dave likes to call it. We hope to invite friends and family along as well, but be prepared to put in some work if you come. These are "work vacations", but not ALL work. We do play.
Out of the blue I decided to try to apply for a secretary job with the Alpine School District. It would be a substantial loss of pay, but it would leave me the summers & holidays off, give me a much shorter commute, and I would be back in the Utah Retirement System earning credits towards retirement. Anyway from 3-8 more years would make a significant difference in the amount of retirement credit I would have. Unfortunately, I had to pass a financial test and for some reason, I aced the basic math problems, but the section of the test that required that I balance a bank statement and checkbook, I failed. And I took the test twice! Failing both times. I am baffled because that is what I did as executive director at Altrua and I balance our checking accounts all the time. This was 30% of the test score so it left me with a score in the 60's so I highly doubt I will even be called in for an interview. But I will keep looking and trying.
Dave became a grandfather again this morning for the 6th time with his son, Bryan's family. Another boy. They now have 5 boys and 1 girl in their family. This time they did not find out ahead of time, they wanted to be surprised. They are naming him Rider Adlai Rhoades. Bryan also has been hired to teach science and coach wrestling at Roosevelt junior high in the fall so sometime this summer they will be packing up and moving out to eastern Utah. Bryan is excited. Not so sure about his wife and kids, but the kids are young and will adapt. Moving is never easy and with 6 young kids, could be quite the challenge.
Today is Alyssa & Kelan's 4th wedding anniversary!! Congratulations to them. But Dave & I still beat them out since the end of May we celebrated 5 years since meeting and starting a relationship with each other. We went back to the dance location that started it all. The sad thing was, there were still a lot of the same single people there 5 years later. Both of us are glad to have escaped the single scene although we both feel like we had good experiences being involved in the church single activities and we met a lot of good people.
Spencer took off on his two week road trip last Friday. The first night out an antelope ran onto the road and they hit it totaling the car they were driving. They were almost to Rapid City, SD. All 3 of the boys are younger than 25 so they can't use a rental car. They were driving one of the boy's mother's car. She ended up driving the boy's car (which is older and they weren't sure it could handle this long of a trip) out to them. They are back on their way but they probably lost a day out of their itinerary that they will have to modify.
Jennifer has been hired as an afternoon assistant at a program for troubled teens, called Journey down in Provo. It is just a part-time job but she is liking it a lot.
