NEW CARS!!!

You wouldn't think the damage on our Camry would have cost about $7,000 to repair. According to the insurance, that was more than the value of the car so they wouldn't fix it and paid us what they thought the value was (not what we thought it should be). We knew we wanted another Camry so went shopping. Nobody sells used camrys that 10 years old. We couldn't even find a 2008 used car for sale. We did find a few 2007's and ended up with this black one. I wanted leather seats (which it doesn't have) but it does have a moon roof.


After finally getting insurance money for the Jeep, we bought a Pontiac Grand Prix from Becky and Aaron. They were given it by Jonathan when he received a car from his mom. Becky and Aaron ended up with more cars than drivers and were looking to sell. We had more drivers than cars (only the gas hog Suburban) so we bought it.

Now we will see how long it will be before someone decides to total one of these cars! I think we have had our fair share of car totals. We've had the Ford Taurus (that was a blessing), our Toyota Corolla, the Mitsubishi Galant, the Jeep and our camry. Not all were our fault however. Several were other bad drivers on the road.

We are not meant to have cars

We have the worst luck with cars. Everytime we put an expensive repair into a car it gets crashed. While dad and Nancy were in Arizona, Laura ran a stop sign and crashed the Jeep that she and Lindsey drive. Of course the repairs are a lot more than the value of the Jeep so it is totalled. We are waiting for the insurance money buy them another beater car. Thanks to Teri who went to rescue Laura that night.

Saturday, while Nancy was innocently driving to take the dogs to the groomers, a car pulled out of a side street and side swiped her. It knocked her into oncoming traffic so she swerved back to her lane, crossed two lanes of traffic, jumped a curb and landed in someones front yard. Nobody was hurt (including the two white puffs of fur that Nancy saw flying in the car) but the camry was towed away - hopefully it will be fixable. We just spent over $500 fixing brakes. However, the curb jumping did damage to the tires and rims.

That left the suburban as the only available car which it decided to die later in the day. Thanks

to Teri who picked up Dad to go rescue Laura and Lindsey who were in the Burb when it died. Thanks to Erin who was going camping over the weekend and loaned us her car. Although the check engine light is on in the Burb we really think it ran out of gas because adding a gallon made it start again. We just have the fuel pump replaced (another $700 repair) and we don't think the guage was put on correctly because it didn't show empty.

We will pick up a rental on Tuesday and drop the Burb off at the dealership to see why the check enginge light is on and hopefully find replacement cars in the near future. Wish us luck in the future - we really seem to need it!!

Texas

Michelle, Calvin, Brig & Dad

Mom with gun and hit pop cans Dad and Brig on an old tractor

Adam trying to shoot himself in the head

Dad showing off his shot up pop cans.

Dad about being hit in the head with a propeller at the airbase

Calvin - isn't he cute!

A day after we returned from Arizona, dad and I jumped a plane to Abilene, Texas to visit Adam, Michelle, Brig and Calvin. We had a great time hanging out, watching the Olympics, touring the airbase and shooting guns. Calvin was a lot of fun to hold and play with. He smiles everytime you look at him. Brig was fun to watch play "tackle football" with his dad. They have sure brainwashed him to like BYU. Adam took us to a shooting range. Dad and Adam spent some time working on their upstairs room. They would have got more done if they didn't keep putting nails in electrical lines and shutting off power.

We are now back to work and I've started school again. Laura and Lindsey started their Senior year and are very busy.

We love all our kids and really miss those that aren't close by.

Arizona

Dad and I drove to Kingmen, Arizona with Galima, Max and Sophie and spent a couple days with them. Aaron arranged to be working in Phoenix so he wouldn't have to be with us. JK. We really had a great time with Galima and kids. It was great spending time one on one with the kids. Here are some pictures of our time there. Galima was great in letting us have her bed after her being gone for 3 weeks.

Trip to Seattle

Mom and dad at the beach in Seattle



Laura and Lindsey zonked out in car.

Laura and Lindsey being bored in car

Laura and Lindsey at beach

Laura and Lindsey still bored in car

In July, Dad and I with Laura and Lindsey drove to Oregon to see Todd and Lara and then on to Seattle to see Jen, Robby, Asher and little Hazen. In Oregon we went to a cool restaurant called Montage. They specialize in Macaroni and Cheese. You name it and you can have it in Macaroni & Cheese. We mainly hung out in Seattle and played with the grandkids. We did make a trip to Pikes market.

After Seattle, we drove to Forks, Washington where the Twilight series is based. Looking into the deep, dark forests, you can nearly imagine the vampires and wearwolfes. My camera broke in Seattle so I don't have many pictures.

Girls Camp

Laura, Lindsey and I went to girls camp. We had a blast. The theme was "Camp Survivor". We did some surviving since the generator that pumps the water broke so we had very little water (no hair washing). Also whoever was supposed to arrange the outhouses to be pumped didn't. 3 of the 4 outhouses were very full (a bit of splashing when using them). Therefore, 200 girls used one outhouse.

Laura and Lindsey were junior leaders. They did a great job. They were on the campfire committee so they had to get everyone to sing camp songs while waiting for devotionals to begin. They did a great job with lots of enthusiasm as you will see in the slide show.

We have a guy in our Stake who loves to be the Priesthood leader at girls camp. He has a trailer full of pranks he uses on the girls and let's the girls use on eachother. He created these "Lost" posters of some of the girls. Here are Laura and Lindsey. When found they had to be brought to the Stake camp site and received a candy. If they were kicking and screaming they got 2 candies. Laura and Lindsey were brought numerous times - the kicking and screaming was a show just to get the candy. Be sure to read the sign.

Glasgow Reunion

Where dad lived on the base

Furniture made by Dave from old barn wood. He tears down the barns and builds furniture.

Standing by Dad's first car. Just kidding. They had a car show and dad liked this one. Probably because it is yellow.

The Glasgow LDS Church. They are building a new one that will open next week. We took a tour through it. Don't know what they will do with this old one.

Dad with Gene and Connie at their cabin in Island Park

Dad really wanted to go to Glasgow, Montana for his 45 year reunion. So as a good sport I took a very long drive (15 hours) to the top northeast corner of Montana to mingled with a bunch of old folks. The reunion was celebrating 100 years of the high school so anyone who every graduated from there from 1908 until 2008 were invited.

We stayed with a high school buddy of dads. His name is Dave Bailey. He and his wife Marion were excellent hosts and drove dad down all the memory lanes. We spent hours talking about this person or that person. Dave has stayed in touch with many. It was Dave that tracked dad down about 9 years ago when they planned the one we went to in 2000.

We drove out to the airbase which closed around 1970. It is amazing that the military just closed down and walked away from hundreds of homes, two elementary schools, bowling allies, officers clubs, etc. The buildings had 38+ years of weathering and many had sunk roofs, peeled siding, etc. People are buying them for dirt cheap and fixing them up pretty nice. However, the house across the street is in shambles so not a real good view. The house that Dad lived in had been purchased and fixed up which was nice. In 2000 it was pretty run down.

On the way to Glasgow, dad's new GPS took us through Island Park. We stopped and surprised Michelle's parents and saw their beautiful cabin. What a beautiful area.