2011

THE YEAR IN REVIEW

Reed served as 1st counselor in the Bishopric of the 1st Ward in the Logan YSA 1st Stake. Therefore, church work, meetings and activities occupied a lot of our time. Sundays were an all day affair with bishopric meeting in the morning, the 3-hour block, ward prayer at night and other things in between. We hosted FHE in our home on Mondays, attended talent shows, linger-longers, planned pizza parties etc. It seemed like all we did was feed the students. Reed was also employed as a substitute school bus driver.

I enjoyed working at the Logan Temple two days a week. I served as secretary/treasurer of the Sunflower Camp of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers.

Our family did not grow in numbers during 2011. It looks like we’ve topped out at 31members. We are proud of our family and love them very much. Our 19 grandkids range in age from 1 to 16 years. They are growing up! We now have grandsons who are much taller and/or heavier than we are. We have 11 granddaughters: Courtney, Hailey, Ashley, Natalie, Ashlyn, Brynlee, Katelyn, Olivia, Brooklyn, Aubrey and Abby. Our 8 grandsons are: Riley, Mason, Tanner, Jayse, Kaden, Landon, Owen and Miles.

Grandson, Landon, was baptized in April. Niece, Staci, married Matt in May. Nephew, Brandon, got married to Maria in July and another nephew, Ben married Ally in October. Aunt Idella died in October.

We were in charge of the Ransom and Conlin Family reunions. Both were held at Willow Park in Logan. I, along with cousins Mary Ann and Jerry, started planning the Prigmore reunion for July 2012.

Perhaps the biggest news is that we sold our home in Nibley. We had lived there for 6½ years. We decided to downsize and not have as much money tied up in our home so we can travel and play more. We felt fortunate that with the state of the economy and housing market to have been able to sell our home on our own with just a sign in the yard and receive what we felt was a fair price. We moved in with Jill and Brandon and their family in Providence on June 1st. Turn about is fair play. (They lived with us while they built a new home) We had hoped the living arrangement would be short-lived but it didn’t turn out that way. Hunting for a home became a full-time job for us. In the end we couldn’t find anything we liked that would meet our needs and be in the price range we desired. We ended up starting construction on a new home in Smithfield in December. In the meantime half of our household goods, our pick-up, boat and 4-wheeler trailer are in storage units. Kim and Bryan are storing our shop and yard things. We sold some of our furniture with the house; we gave some of our belongings to the kids, donated to Deseret Industries and threw the rest of our junk away.

Without having our ‘toys’ with us, we didn’t do as much boating, fishing and 4-wheeling as we would have liked to have done. We usually go see about one movie per year. We actually went to three in 2011…”17 Miracles,” “The Help” and “Contagion.” What we did do a lot was go out to eat. And now we are fatter than ever!

By August I was released from the Temple, Reed was released from the Bishopric, I quit DUP and Reed gave up driving school buses. We hang out at the library and read lots of books but that doesn’t replace being busily engaged in something constructive. I look forward to having projects to do in a new home and yard and being involved in our own ward.

We enjoyed about 60 days of travel during the year. We had fun with family and friends. We saw many incredible sights and had great experiences. Details of these excursions are chronicled on my blog. In January we flew to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida and embarked on a Panama Canal cruise. We made stops in the Bahamas, Aruba, Curacao, Panama and Costa Rica.

In March we drove to New Braunfels, Texas where we joined the Hawkins family. In San Antonio we went to the Alamo, the Riverwalk and San Antonio Temple. We visited Carlsbad Caverns on the way home.

In July we stayed a night in Boise, one night in Seattle, seven nights on an Alaskan cruise, five nights with the Coles on the Oregon Coast, another night in Boise and then home.

We attended our family camp-out up American Fork Canyon during August. We spent a night here or there in Salt Lake and a few nights in St. George.

Oh, and we finally got a texting plan.

The gospel is true, we have much to be thankful for, life is good but will be much better when we are settled in our own place.

P.S. Previously I have posted a reports on 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 but skipped over 2010. Well, I did write one paragraph a year ago but never finished it.