Home.

We are home, having arrived at 4 PM yesterday after spending 2 days in Oregon with Navy buddy Gary and his wife Judy who was Clyda's best friend from early school days. While there, Gary and I tried our darnedest to best the ladies in multiple games of Sequence and Five Crowns, all to no avail. We will get them next time for sure.

Our next stop was in Walnut Creek to visit Gary and Cindy. Always a nice stop. We even managed to take in a movie called Eye in the Sky. It is about the new drone technology used to track and eliminate terrorists. Quite a tense story while the political vs Military aspects were debated under real life conditions.

One memory from the trip is how green everything was all the way from home, up to Lynden, and back. All the fruit trees were in bloom which made it very colorful.

Trees in bloom at a rest stop in northern, CA.

We had our taxes done today. Still waiting for one piece of paper however.

Final thoughts.

The service for Candi was held on Sunday afternoon in the Rotary building in Lynden. This building was used as it was thought that more people would attend than the regular church Mark and Candi attended would hold. In fact somewhere between 250 and 300 hundred did attend. It was a beautiful service with Mark, daughter Dawn, and daughter-in-law Lizzie speaking. All had eloquent words to say. This was followed by a slide show set to music put together by Mark from all the thousands of photos the family has. It was a very nice synopses in photos of Candi's life.

On Monday family members started leaving for home. We took Mark out to dinner Monday night. Clyda and I waited until Tuesday to leave so we could do last minute things, like laundry for all the beds, towels, etc. We drove to Portland to spend a few days with our friends Thomas and Debbie. They had driven to Lynden for the service on Sunday.

To all those who sent cards, flowers, and thoughts, we would like to thank you for thinking of us in this very difficult time.

Candi was 55 years old and in the prime of her life. She had two new grand children under the age of 6 months. A lot to look forward too but the good Lord had other plans.

A beautiful bouquet of white lillies. Candi's favorite flowers.

In memorium.

Much has happened this past week.

First, Clyda's sister Candi passed on Thursday morning. It was not unexpected but it happened very fast. She had been on Hospice care at home but had been moved to a Hospice house on Tuesday. 

 

I had decided to drive to Lynden on Wednesday afternoon. I drove because Clyda suggested that we rent a car and drive home so I thought I might as well drive up also. Airfares were quite high as they would be last minute. I reserved a rental car and a motel and left home at 5:30 AM Thursday. It was a fairly easy drive to Weed, CA where I arrived about 4 PM having driven 600 miles. All the hills were nice and green and all the fruit trees were in bloom. A very nice drive.

I started again at 5:30 AM on Friday in the dark and driving rain. Within a few miles I drove out of the rain but did need to use the wipers intermittently all the way to Lynden. The trip through Portland was fine, however as I approached Seattle it all went to heck. With construction on I-5, multiple interchange construction, and heavy Friday traffic my progress was slowed considerably. There is no easy way around Seattle. I finally arrived in Lynden about 7 PM after driving another 650 miles.

My days have been spent on the computer, scanning photos, etc for a slide show at the memorial service this coming Sunday. Candi had so many photos, both hard copies and digital. She had over 29,00 digital photos alone.

We have so enjoyed the 2 new grand babies. Both Michael and Lizzie's Mathias, born in January and Mat and Dawn's Samantha, born in October.

Clyda and I will probably leave for home next Monday or Tuesday depending on what needs to be done here.

Catching up on the to-do list.

Clyda went back up to Lynden, WA 2 days after we came home from our winter trip. Her sister is not doing well and Clyda wanted to be there for her.

I in the mean time have a long list of to-do items. The most pressing was to get control of the weeds in the garden area and the flower beds. The rains that we did have while we were gone greened up the local hills but also made the weeds grow. The garden area was tackled with the lawn mower which made short work of them. The tree areas and the flower beds took much longer. Basically I did it on my knees using my gloved hands to do the pulling. This works fine except we have lots of cactus which require fineness and the use of forceps to get around the sharp thorns. Over the last week I have filled 3 of the large green waste barrels. They were emptied yesterday so that was good.

We are expecting rain over the next few days and hopefully it will amount to something. The hills are still nice and green and rain would help keep them that way. Anticipating rain, I bought a 6 foot length of tubing to direct rain water from a shed roof into garbage cans to be used to water plants later. We are still under a severe drought restriction by the water district so every gallon counts. I also direct our wash machine water into 2 plastic barrels and from there it flows through a hose onto the side yard. It isn't much, but it does keep the grass green.

The other things on my list involve the RV. I have several major things that need doing none of which would prevent me from using it if I needed to but they do need to be done. I need to replace the kitchen faucet and I need to work on the pump switch.

I did get the rig vacuumed today and the floor scrubbed so that is done. I need to run the two Honda generators as it has been more than a month since I last used them. They need to be run periodically so they will start when needed. When I don't plan to use them for some time I drain the gas from the carburetors. This is recommended by the local Honda dealer.

I had a long list of people to call after I got home. Some of that is done with more to call next week.

While we were in Willcox I took a photo of an old building on a back road. It just caught my eye.

Safe at Home!

We arrived home this afternoon after several days on the road. We spent 3 days in Willcox, AZ visiting an old Navy buddy. We had a great time with JD and look forward to more visits with him.

We visited Apple Annie’s, tasted a little wine, and found time for a DQ while in Willcox.

We then drove through Douglas, AZ planning to stay in Bisbee but I missed the road to the RV park and the next place to turn around was 16 miles later. RV Parks in Tombstone were full so we continued on to Cochise Terrace in Benson where we have stayed many times. It is a real nice park. Very clean. Our stay included tickets for a free meal the first night. It was served in their clubhouse and was very good.

After a 3 day stay we moved back to the Elks Lodge in Casa Grande for one day to again visit Clyda's cousin Rod and his wife Clara Lynn. Their daughter Nikki came down from Mesa and we all went to dinner. Really nice to see Nikki.

We then moved on to Quartzsite with a stop at RV Pitstop to get a propane tank re-certified and filled. With that accomplished we found a spot on Plamosa Road for the night. The next day we moved on to Kelbaker Road on old Hwy 66 between Needles and Barstow. We have stayed here before but this time there was a lot of wind so we spent little time outside.

The next morning we drove to Bakersfield through Tehachapi where the California poppies on the western hills were unbelievable. Huge patches of orange on the hillside. We stayed with Budd and Brenda for 2 days. Always fun to spend time with them. The ladies beat the guys BADLY in Sequence as usual but us guys got back at them playing Jokers and Marbles last night.

Today we drove home via Santa Maria with all the hills so green. Unless we get rain soon it will be it's usual brown before long.

Sorry, no photos tonight.

Happy Valentines Day!

We moved from Jack and Judy's property on Monday, Feb 8^th to the Elks Club at Casa Grande. We have been here many times before but it is a convenient place to stay, and cheap, while we visit Clyda's cousin Rod and his wife Claralyn. We had dinner at their house Monday night.

Tuesday we bummed around Casa Grande and had dinner at Culvers which meant we also had a frozen custard for dessert (Eat your heart out Budd and Brenda). It was good.

On Wednesday afternoon we moved to the old Pinal Fairgrounds 7 miles east of Casa Grande for the 3 day gourd festival. We camped with friends Jim and Michelle. Michelle is the “gourder” in the group. I have done a few gourds but am no where in her class.

The weather was perfect, warm and sunny. Evenings required only a light shirt to ward off the chill. We camped right near the festival grounds which was great as we could come and go as we pleased.

One building contained all the “juried” gourds. Those submitted for judging and another had booths for sellers. 

 Gourds supplied by Wertz farms.

 

 Juried gourds

 

 

Story teller given as a prize (Clyda really wanted this but no luck) 

 

There were food stands between them and music on the stage throughout. We ate lunch from the available food which was of a great variety and all very good. A very enjoyable few days.

Today we moved on to Willcox, AZ and the Elks Club. We are here to visit an old Navy buddy of mine, JD. I made contact with JD through my other buddy Gary in Oregon. JD will come by the RV tomorrow morning.

After a few days here we will move on. Where? We don't know at this time. We do plan to be home by the end of the month however.

Clyda is here.

I moved over the mountain (hill) last Tuesday afternoon to Jack and Judy's lot South of Bouse. They weren’t here as they were in San Diego helping her father clean out some stuff from his house. I got parked by myself which isn't real easy as I needed to back in next to their shed without hitting utilities, etc.

On Wednesday morning I drove to Parker to the Safeway store for groceries. I had last shopped in Las Vegas except for a few items from the local store in Quartzsite. The one thing the Quartzsite store does have is a good butcher shop and good meat. I bought 2 small filet's and BBQ'ed them on Friday night for Clyda's arrival dinner.

On Thursday I did laundry all morning and gave the rig a good cleaning in the afternoon. Friday morning I drove to the Phoenix airport and picked up Clyda after her 1 hour plus flight. We stopped on the West side of Phoenix for lunch before driving back.

I had filled up with diesel on the way to Phoenix and again when I got back and using the Gear Vendors Over/under drive at 75 MPH (posted speed) I got almost 22 MPG. Not bad!

Since Clyda has been here we haven't done much as it is really cold with a bite to the wind. We also had a wind, rain, lightning and hail storm Sunday night.

Today we went in to Quartzsite for lunch and so Clyda could do some shopping. There is not much there right now. Most vendors have left already. They did not have a good year as the weather didn't cooperate and many Canadians stayed away due to the difference between our and their dollar. For every US dollar they spend it costs 1.5 Canadian dollars. That is a steep price to pay.

Tomorrow the guys will go ATV riding and the ladies will go to a quilt show.