Jeff Here, Island Park, Glen Sick, Sarah Here, Cousin Cuteness

Student driver Brooke is often seen behind the wheel of the family car these days. She usually puts a bright yellow magnet on all sides of the car warning everyone that a student driver is on board.

Whenever her driving practice leads to our home, the grandchildren excitedly run to the candy closet and get their fill of sweets.

The last Sunday in August, Andy and Amanda hosted a family dinner in their backyard. The Goldens attended and it was no surprise that as soon as possible, Caroline had baby Savannah in her arms. 

Caroline, Madison and Spencer were insistent that I go look at the sticky globs that were all over a tree in the backyard. There is always something to do and see in that big, fun backyard.

As always, there were lots of people and lots of yummy food.

Andy and Amanda's backyard is so big and with the sun setting, the shade perfectly covered the tables and the temperature was lovely that night.

Preston and Danielle are on the left (the parents of the adorable baby Savannah). Austin and Lindsey are expecting their first baby soon.

Natalie even drove up from Provo to attend the family dinner.

Maddox is a popular place for us to dine with Rich, Barbara, Ray and Maurine.

Glen discovered an odd-looking bug bite on his inner arm. He said he got it during the night and he called it a spider bite. 

I prefer bug over spider and wondered what kind of creature (insect or arachnoid) had been crawling around inside our bed with us. EEEK!!!!

We were quite surprised when it was bruising a few days later. Weird! I am happy to report it was not a flesh-eating wound and Glen has now fully recovered.

I attended our ward's neighborhood summer backyard party. It was held in Carolyn Zaugg's backyard. 

Everything looked so festive decorated in a lemon theme. All desserts were lemon flavored--YUM!! My preferred flavor over chocolate any day. I was admiring the beautiful centerpieces. 

That same day Glen had been invited to go to lunch with his old work group as a farewell to him. Notice Glen's bare legs. I asked if he was going to wear work attire and he said no way!! He is retired now!!

August was our month of vacations, and we were packing for our third trip of the month. We were going to Island Park with some of the couples in the ward to stay at Bruno and Colleen Kossin's lovely cabin. 

Jeff surprised us when he said he was coming to town to work all week and asked if he could stay in our home. We were sad we were going to be gone all week, so we spoiled him rotten the evening he arrived.

The couples who were at the cabin with us were Bruno and Colleen Kossin, Lane and LaVona Lewis, Rick and Debi Winder, Grant and Diane Stewart, and Bill and Jan Evans. 

One of our adventures was going four-wheeling. 

Don't let this photo fool you. I quickly moved up into the driver's seat when Glen got off to take the photo. Glen definitely did all the driving.

We did a lot of riding through the woods. Going back to the cabin, we were even riding over sagebrush as we had gotten off the meager trail for a while. 

I felt like we had gotten shaken to death. I was thankful I had a very padded seat and seat back. Even at that, I was very sore the next day.

Glen had a good time frequently lagging a little behind so he could give it gas and speed to catch up. Once on that vehicle, he felt the NEED for SPEED!!

One morning Glen, Bruno, Lane and LaVona went golfing. Glen came home in such a good mood having had so much fun doing that activity. 

The Winders, Evanses and Stewarts spent the day in Yellowstone. We met them for dinner at a pizza place in West Yellowstone for dinner.

On our drive there, we could see a forest fire off in the distance and were hoping it got contained quickly.

The Yellowstone group of couples had gotten to town early and had walked along Main Street and commented about the candy store right around the corner. 

I wanted some fudge, so after dinner, Glen and I grabbed our play tickets, hurried to the candy store, bought some delicious fudge for me and some Neccos candies for Glen, which he hasn't been able to find for a long time. We headed back the half block to go to the play. 

When we got inside, we saw a whole empty row in the center of the theater three rows from the stage. Where were all of our friends? They had been on their way to the theater when we were on our way to get fudge. We couldn’t figure it out! The play was starting and still no friends. What was going on??!!??

Finally, Rick called Glen to tell them a woman had let out of her car an angry pack of dogs who had run up to Colleen and one of them had bitten her on the calf. There were puncture wounds and blood dripping down her pants. 

So they were getting medical help for Colleen and contacting the police to report the incident and let them know the woman had fled the scene. No one knew if the dog had had its vaccinations. 

Half our group ended up not going to the play. Two of our couples straggled in halfway through the first half.

Bruno and Colleen ended up going to Rexburg to get further treatment—antibiotic and tetanus shots. What a crazy thing to have happen to our poor, unsuspecting friend!!

Meanwhile, back at the play—we were watching “Singing in the Rain.” Glen and I had just seen that play last month at Hale, so we weren’t that excited about seeing it again. But, I tell you what!! The second we stepped into that theater and saw the energy of the actors and heard them singing—in their pre-show entertainment—I was enthralled. 

It was 2 1/2 hours of nonstop theatrical enjoyment. The two lead men tap dancers were amazing!! The lead actress, who also sang beautifully and danced spectacularly, was mesmerizing. I couldn’t believe how much I was enjoying the show.

I kept looking over at Glen all through the play and he looked miserable. 

He sat there all stone-faced, not smiling and never clapping. I thought he must be bored because we had just seen the play. Then during the second half, I was noticing that he was coughing and knew he was getting sick. 

He had been so happy and thrilled at his morning’s golf game. He seemed fine all afternoon. It just hit him hard during the play, which made it an endurance test for him to sit through that long performance. He later told me he was trying so hard to hold in coughs all through the play.

Lane and LaVona hitched a ride home with us and had us stop at the police station after the play to see if they had found out any more information about the incident. 

The police found the local woman (who people say is loco…) and she was ordered to appear in court. It sounded like her dogs are immunized, but the police and a veterinarian were going to verify her records. 

We had planned to spend the next morning with our friends and go home after lunch, but the second I woke up, Glen announced he hadn’t slept all night and was so sick and we needed to get out of there immediately. We were both afraid of spreading germs to the other couples.

The poor man said he would be able to do the driving the whole way home, but he was feeling downright horrible. Thirty minutes into our drive, he was telling me he needed to go to the doctor as soon as we got home. 

That seemed awfully out of character for him, so I knew he must be recognizing how sick he was and if he didn’t get help quickly, it would be an awfully miserable sickness for him.

Sure enough, we unloaded the car and he jumped back in it to go to urgent care. His head was stuffed, he had a headache, his chest was hurting and his coughing was deep and awful. He said he had been fevering in the night. 

The doctor gave him an antibiotic and cough medicine. It took a few doses for him to feel like the medicine was kicking in. We just could not believe how quickly he had gotten so sick.

I banned him (and his germs) to the basement. 

Sarah’s family had arrived, which brought Rebecca’s family up, which meant there were a whole lot of people around that we didn’t want to catch his germs. 

It was interesting planning on Jeff and Sarah's part for Jeff to be here for a while and then he left just as Sarah and the boys were arriving. 

She wanted to be here for the Labor Day weekend since her boys had some days off school. Jeff spent the weekend with his family in Cedar City.

Ben’s family was finally well and he refused to bring his family over when Sarah was here because he didn’t want to chance them getting sick again with whatever illness Glen was dealing with.

Thankfully, Glen was willing to wear a mask to try to avoid contamination. The question was…would I be able to avoid getting sick? I was sure around him a lot in his first 24 hours of illness. (I can now report that I was thankfully able to dodge his germs and did not get sick.)

Glen was so sad to not be able to go to the prison that Saturday and Sunday. He said he was also sad about missing the play at Hale on Saturday, but at the same time, it was a BYU game day and he was able to watch that in real time. Rebecca was thrilled to take his spot going to the play.

Rebecca and I ditched Sarah to go see the play The Unsinkable Molly Brown. If my memory is correct, I think Sarah had made plans to meet up with her friend to play for a while at a park with their children. 

It was fun having Rebecca at the play with our usual group of Dad, Mom and Nani. 

Rebecca ditched Sarah and me on Sunday when she went out of town with Dallas for a few days, leaving me in charge of her children.

It was fun for all the cousins to have some play time together. I was glad to have Sarah here for company since Glen was banned from coming near us.

I asked Brooke to bring up a small table and chair for Glen to eat his dinner. I laughed when I noticed she had placed the table as far away from us as possible.

Sarah was our Come Follow Me master teacher. What an attentive audience.

We pulled out the frowny/smiley face Ben used to use every Sunday for his pick of a song for our Family Home Evening. Jonah was a willing helper holding the visual aid while we sang.

The Golden grandchildren were excited to get to spend a few nights here and it was especially fun for them that one of the nights overlapped with the Excell grandchildren here.

Two cute cousins, Carson and Madison, reading bedtime stories together. 

As sick as Glen was, I was not happy when he kept saying he was going to go outside and mow the lawn on Monday or Tuesday. I certainly did not think that would be wise with as much coughing Glen was doing. Surely that physical exercise would definitely aggravate his cough.

Sarah had planned to go back home to Las Vegas on Monday, but she said Eli wanted to mow the lawn for his grandpa before they left. He had helped Glen mow the grass during a previous visit and felt confident he could do it himself. Which he did!!

When I called Glen up from the basement to go outside and tell the Excells good-bye, Glen got tears of gratitude when he realized the mowing had been done for him and he could relax and continue to get well. 

What a loving act of service from Eli.

I had a little accident while everyone was here. Two electronic devices were put up on a shelf in the cupboard and when I opened the cupboard, they fell and the edges of those things cut my arm in three places. 

For days I wore a huge wrap on that arm, which took a long time to heal. I was especially thrilled when I needed a blood draw and it took three tries before success, so then I was sporting four wraps.

When I was a child I used to look at my legs and wonder if they would ever not have cuts, scrapes and scabs on them. 

Now I look at my arms and wonder if they will ever heal and if I will ever not have red spots on them.