30 Days of Memories: Day 17

This is a picture of me and Robs at the bottom of a cliff face between Manarola and Riomaggiore in Cinque Terre. We were walking from Manarola south to Riomaggiore and found a set of stairs that looked like they didn't go anywhere, so naturally, we had to try them. They led down to the water of the Italian Riviera, which was not by any stretch of the imagination a beach. The stairs basically led to a cove-like area where we took pictures and dodged the spray from the waves.

I would love to one day return to Italy. Someone once said they couldn't trust anyone who didn't love Italy (Rick Steves, maybe?), and I have to agree. One trip, and I will forever love it.

30 Days of Memories: Day 16

Well, I've officially made it more than halfway through my self-imposed 30 days. I'm still thankful I didn't specify 30 successive days. :)

I swore I'd never get married again. In fact, I was pretty content with the idea of just being a crazy horse lady, but Ashinator worried about me. (I think the boys did, too, but she was much more vocal about it.)

I threw a temper tantrum that eventually led to me meeting Jay and a few weeks later we were engaged. Compared to the whirlwind courtship, our engagement was really long - exactly eleven months. We got engaged on June 14 and married on May 14. We celebrated our sixth anniversary this year, which doesn't seem like that big a milestone, but for someone who swore off a relationship, it's pretty big.

I was married the first time right at seven years, though we were separated for six months before the divorce was final, and my other serious relationship was about five and a half years, making my marriage to Jay my longest relationship. We've got a long way to go to match my Great-Grandparent's sixty years, but I think we've got a good start. I mean, we're 1/10th of the way there!

30 Days of Memories: Day 15

My great-grandparents' 60th wedding anniversary. I can't imagine being married that long, and when we did the math, Jay and I realized we will be well into our 90s if we ever make that mark.

I have lots of fond memories of growing up with Great-Grandma Wheeler. I was not at all her favorite - that would be Nebalee - but she was the one who picked me up from school when I was in kindergarten and played paper dolls with me. To this day, I can't figure out how she could take a sheet of paper and end up with a string of dolls. We pressed flowers between sheets of waxed paper and she always had a bunch of newspaper paper for me to draw on. On Sundays, after church, we'd swing through McDonald's and I could get a Happy Meal. Great-Grandpa would always have a Filet o' Fish sandwich and he lived for the Shamrock Shakes in March.

My memories of Great-Grandpa aren't as sharp as mine with Grandma, probably because he was off working at the cement plant when I was little. He had an amazing garden that was fully half an acre and I clearly remember getting in trouble for flushing the toilet one day when he was watering the garden. I was little, how was I supposed to know that it would kill the water pressure? From that time on, I was afraid to use their bathroom. I don't recall him being a hard man, but that one time getting in trouble certainly stuck with me.

He loved to go fishing at a nearby lake, and we'd always stop at the fish hatchery on the way. While he spent his time fishing, I would troll the water's edge for snails. There were so many! And I loved to pick them all up off the rocks. Once in a while, I'd be allowed to take a snail friend home with me in a plastic container of water with a rock or two in it.

Most of my memories of Great-Grandpa are from young adulthood when Parkinson's disease was ravishing his body. It was awful to see such a strong man slowly deteriorate. Great-Grandma and Grandma Nita helped care for him until the day he died. Shortly thereafter, Great-Grandma was diagnosed with colon cancer, so Grandma Nita took on the caretaker role again and cared for Great-Grandma until her death.

Their house and acreage has been sold and I about cried when the people who bought the house immediately ripped out their beautiful, HUGE picture window and put in a tiny "efficient" one. When I was younger, I was pretty certain their house was haunted, but I'd give just about anything to have their house (picture window intact) back.

30 Days of Memories: Day 14

Holy cow, it might take me 30 weeks to get my 30 days in, but, by God, I am going to persevere. I am, I am, I am!

Today's picture is in honor of the Avalanche's Opening Day.

One of the first years we traveled to Disney's Wild World of Sports for the National 3v3 Soccer Championships, we were wandering around the Epcot Center. The four of us stopped at a food cart and the operator asked us if we were hockey fans. Well, yeah! The Colorado Avs were in their heyday and we were all fans. The operator then told us to head over to Canada, because they had the Stanley Cup on display.

It took us about half a second to change whatever our plans were and we made a beeline to see it.  We expected to have to stand in a long line, because the year after the Avs won their first Stanley Cup, the lines were hours long to see it when they brought it home to Colorado. We were pleasantly surprised to walk right up to it.

I had just purchased a popcorn while we were at the food cart and set it very carefully on the table, so as not to dirty it. A gust of wind immediately knocked over my popcorn as soon as I sat it down. I was mortified to have sullied the sacred cup, so I quickly righted the box of popcorn and brushed all the offending pieces to the ground.

Somewhere, one of the four of us has a picture of us all kissing the cup, but this is the only picture I have. My right thumb is caressing the engraved Avs name.

I couldn't tell you much about that trip, other than we had a great time and I got to kiss the Stanley Cup! It was truly a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and a memory I'll cherish forever.

30 Days of Memories: Day 13

Five living generations of females. My Great-Grandma Wheeler (lower left) was so excited. When Digger was born, we had our five living generations, but Great-Grandma really wanted to have five generations of women and she finally got it when Ashinator was born.

I don't think there are many families anymore who can boast the five living generations thing, and Great-Grandma died within a year after Ashinator was born. One of my childhood friends posted a picture of her grandma with the fifth generation baby; less than 24 hours after she met her goal of five living generations, her grandma passed away. It's funny how goals like that can help keep people alive.

I am sooooo not ready to be a grandma, but there's nothing that would make my Grandma Nita happier than for Ashinator to provide her with a fifth generation female to continue the tradition. It's a good thing Grandma Nita is insisting on living to 100 so we've got some time.

30 Days of Memories: Day 12

Well, coming off of that last depressing post, here's a much happier one from our honeymoon. Instead of spending big bucks on a wedding, we chose to spend a week in Hawaii for our honeymoon. It was so beautiful and we were able to find a secluded beach away from the rest of the tourists, thanks to a co-worker who had lived there and gave us the name (which escapes me) of an area off the beaten path.

We quickly realized that beach-sitting was not for us. Yes, the beach was beautiful, but after about fifteen minutes we needed to get up and do something. We had planned for a few outings, which were definitely boredom-busters. We spend one day at Kualoa Ranch taking the movie set tour, and another day driving around the island. At other times, we just explored. It was beautiful, and I can understand why people would want to live there, but by the end of our week, we were ready to come home.

Hawaii is beautiful, but it's not Colorado.

(PS, if I've scheduled this post right, it should go up on October 1, which is Beel's birthday. Hoppy bird day two ewe, Beel.)

30 Days of Memories: Day 11

I unpacked some more pictures for the shelves today and ended up with more than 30 pictures, so today is a two-fer day.

I think kids need dogs, and I have always had a soft spot for Dalmatians, but there was no way we could afford to buy one from a breeder. When my ex-husband and I bought our house in Loveland, we went on the hunt for a dog for the kids. We applied to adopt from the Dalmatian rescue and when we were approved, went to see the dogs they had on hand.

Jake was this emaciated skeleton of a dog, but he had the best personality and he had to come home with us. Jake's original name was "Sunny" because of his disposition, but that was a dumb name, so it got switched pretty quickly. We were warned that he couldn't digest beef proteins, which is a problem for a lot of Dalmatians, but rescues feed the food that is donated and can't be too terribly picky.

Jakers quickly decided that he was my dog and did not care for my husband. In fact, one night, my ex came home late from a night of drinking and Jake wouldn't let him in the house. He quickly adopted the kids as his pack and never showed one ounce of aggression toward them.

I cooked his meals for months, just to get weight back on him. He went from looking like a walking skeleton to a well-fed (okay, maybe a bit obese) working dog. We had Jakers for about seven years before he started getting cranky. I chalked it up to old age, but when he snapped at one of the kids' friends, I knew something was wrong and took him to the vet. They couldn't find anything wrong and also decided that he was getting old and hard of hearing, but just to be on the safe side, they decided to run some blood work.

I griped about the cost of the blood work - the kids and I had NO disposable income and getting hit with a vet visit and a $90 blood test was definitely not in the budget - but I grudgingly agreed even though I knew it would be negative.

I was wrong. I got the call at work the next day. Jake had end stage renal failure. We could treat him, but there were no guarantees that he'd live any longer and his quality of life (as I could see it) would be in the toilet. He might have two weeks, he might have two months, but the fact was that our beloved dog was dying. I set the appointment with the vet to have him put down, burst into tears, and dreaded telling the kids that night.

How was I going to explain to the kids that we were going to kill their dog? Jake had been with us through so much - a divorce, moves, a flood, first days of school - every major milestone in their lives that they could remember, they had Jake with them.

I explained to them what was happening with Jake and let them decide if they wanted to be with him when we put him down. He was feeling pretty good, excited about going on a car ride, on his last day. The vet and his tech were amazing and took us to a grassy hill away from the clinic. All of our hearts broke as we petted him and watched our Jake take his last breath.

Our trip to Mexico a few weeks later was exactly what we needed to get away and begin the healing process. Jake was definitely a once-in-a-lifetime dog for all of us.