Big Bend BBQ Sunday 2/18 8:30 PM

Hi from here....

As Susan noted, it is still cold here overnight and even with the great sunshine we had today it doesn't seem to get far over 20--but we haven't had much snow since last weekend.

Very pleased to have had our guests arrive around 2PM about the same time we picked up the carry-out chicken. Mark, Calvin and Capri arrived first; then Susan and Jay followed in a few minutes by David, Ellis and Finn. Enjoyed our chicken in the sunny family room and we learned some things about Capri's week-long evening theater workshop in Jefferson with a culminating Friday night performance of Robin Hood. Finn, Ellis and David filled us in on the Disneyland adventure with some highlights about different rides and the convetible in 50 degree weather. Bridget is working a lot of hours at Alpine, so she could not come, but we heard some reports on activites of Colin and Bridget.
Those who had talked to Michele this week talked about their phone visits.

The chicken was good and we had some "store bought" Valentine cookies and lemon and chocolate bar cookies Mom had made for today and our Big Bend Vernon Senior meeting desert on Wednesday.

I don't think anyone saw any racing here, but Mark had brought a short video of Domino's performance yesterday at a Show Dance preformance program she was in yesterday as the Ft. A. high school hosted a
competition featuring a number of other schools. She was unable to come today because she had been selected to represent her school in
De Kalb, IL with a few other students in another music event. Just as
Mark was leaving here, he had a call from her and she was back home because the music instructor had missed the correct date and it had happened last weekend--so they made a long drive for nothing! At least she was safe at home.

Maura and Tim were missed, but we were glad to see that M had a yellow flag or two to give us some blogging. Mom and I spoke with her for a number of minutes yesterday, so with the blog entries we are right up to date with Baraboo. Our retired educators convention in May is at Chula Vista, so we will be in the area from Sunday to Thursday, so will hope to spend some time with them then.

The news from South Orange and Mount Holyoke is appreciated. When we get up tomorrow we'll think about Magdalena having already arisen for the first day of crew and Kevin heading for work and Lyn and Declan --and Michele--having a holiday!

Our temps are predicted to be somewhere in the 30's for daytime highs this week--with some snow or rain--, maybe 40's by the weekend. This means a little warmer for times we'll be spending in the RV getting things organized. Had hoped to leave on Thursday or Friday. but Mom has some follow-ups with two doctors this week to check on some tests and trial medications, so it will more than likely be Sunday. That way we can get to mass on Saturday evening and not have to try to find a
church on a travel day in Oklahoma or in the Amarillo area. Plan now to go first to the Phoenix area for the beginning days of March and see the relatives and friends in that area then on south to Tucson, Green Valley, Patagonia and Sierra Vista the following two weeks and then
head across mid and Rio Grande valley of Texas at the end of the month and be home around April 4. Have some folks to see in TX, too. Ann and Ed will be in Green Valley for the month of March so we will be able to do things with them during those middle weeks. The "80's" we learned about in today's papers in stories about baseball spring training in AZ sound pretty good!

Love,GMA and GPA