04/07/26 Trip to Italy, Day 15, Tuesday, Venice to Paris to SLC to Home, Oh my.

We ended up traveling 28 hours from the time we got up (at 3 a.m. in Italy) until arriving home in St George at 11:50 p.m. Again, I don't think there were any pictures taken...but if I find some I'll add them later.

We got up at 3 a.m. and at 3:30 a.m. met a taxi out front of our hotel. The airport was less than a mile away but it was $25 for the ride. (Which I guess was a deal? ). Our hotel clerk set it up. When I looked online it was $85 euros!!! Goodness! In theory, we could have walked -- but it's dark at 3:30 a.m. and a long way to go with luggage. So we opted for the taxi.

We flew from Venice to Paris. Again in Paris we had a long haul to get from one plane to the other and a short time to get there. We made it without incident.

Our final flight was Paris to SLC, 10 hr 45 minutes. Long flight! We were fortunate to all get seated in the last row of the plane and it wasn't too bad. I watched 4 movies tho, and we still weren't there yet!

When we got in we were able to find the Global Entry office and set up our "fast pass" for future flying. Then Bryce picked us up and we hung out there for a little while, then at Dallas' house for a little while. Then started home. And got into some icky traffic. And sat a little while in stop and go.

Eventually we got rolling again and arrived home at 11:50 p.m. Tired! I had the hardest time staying awake the last hour or so. I don't know how Andy does it.

When we got home there was a loud squeeling sound in the garage. It was the landscape water. I turned it off and went to bed cause I was too tired to figure it out.

The mystery has not been solved yet...but here' what I know so far. On Tuesday at 3:30 a.m. our water started running. A lot. Like 600, yes 600 gallons per hour or more. by the time I turned it off at 11:50 our meter says we used over 10,000 gallons. In a day. And here' the kicker...we can't find water anywhere.

I have had two different guys come out and one spent one hour, the other two hours. Digging and listening and probing and they couldn't find the leak either. So tomorrow is April 13 and I'll have to get a guy that has some kind of radar equiptment to see if he can find it. Sadly, my guess is it is under the concrete by the pool and I anticipate this will be an expensive fix.

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01/12/26 Just a couple of things going on

Every Monday night we do family night pizza. This has included Eldon and Diane for quite awhile now. They left on a round the world cruise and will be gone from January - May. So we sent them a pic of these two cuties and told them we missed them. Found this fun scratch off -- you can mark everywhere you've been. We want to travel in our retirement and thought this would be a fun way to keep track of it. (We also have a world map but I think 1 on the wall is enough). SO this is our little inspiration wall to remind us to get out and see the world! Holly painted this picture on her wall a couple of years ago. I added some words and music notes in vinyl to it. I'm working on turning her bedroom into my music sanctuary. The WELCOME pineapple sign was starting to peel off. I took off all the vinyl and painted the words instead. Gave it a nice refresh! We signed up for classes at the college too -- currently we are taking World travel, AI (artificial intelligence), Aging an...

01/13/26 How Many Cookies?!?!?

I planned to visit Washington City and go to the ladies luncheon (they do it monthly on shut off day). I found a new recipe that included putting smashed pretzels in the mix. (I had smashed pretzel, cereal mixture leftover from Christmas). The recipe said it would make 22 cookies. I figured I would triple it and have 66. Welp...they must have been some BIG cookies they were making...cause I got 126 cookies!!!! What the heck?! I backed 24 of them and put the rest in the freezer. Someone will have a nice treat another day!

08/23/25 Organ

The Washington First Ward Building was sold to the City of Washington. Part of my responsibilities included dispensing of the organ and pianos in the building (along with other things). It is an Allen, approximately 1970s. I put the organ up on the auction. There were a couple of other people that were bidding on it, but I ultimately won the bid (for under $100). On the day I won the bid I was able to arrange a mover!!! I paid $250 to have someone from the piano store move it to our house (I have no idea how he managed to get that into the back bedroom....but he did it!!!) Then, it wouldn't work. 😭 I waited for approximately 6 weeks before a guy (who had to be 80 years old) came down from SLC and repaired the organ. (So the organ wasn't actually broken, it had to do with the electricity and the house talking nicely to one another.) It took him a couple of hours to figure it out. He charged about $200 and voila! I have a working church organ. Cool, eh? Now, I got...

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