For My Grandfather

Dear Grandfather,

It’s hard to believe you’ve only been gone a short while and already I miss you more than I can say. Thank you for sharing your life with me and for being such an amazing grandparent. I can honestly say that nobody else I know or have ever known or probably ever will know had grandparents like I did. All of my best memories have you and Grandmother in them. My childhood was one of a kind thanks to you and all you did for us. I don’t even know where to begin-all my memories are so jumbled up in my head. There’s just so many of them!!

Thank you for taking me on all those family reunion road trips even though I didn’t have a clue who any of those people were (and yet they all seemed to know who I was!!). I remember the night before the first road trip I went on. I was so homesick & we hadn’t even left yet. I was sleeping in the “Pink Room”. I was complaining of an upset stomach but you saw right through it! You came and sat on the bed and talked to me until I felt better. I had the most fun on that trip with you and Grandmother! Good thing you talked me out of going home!! Thank you for taking us to Kings Island all those times. What did you do the whole time we were in the park!? Again I don’t know where you were but I knew you were there! Thank you for operating the video camera so faithfully at all the family gatherings, line dancing in the basement, Easter Fashion Shows, Christmas morning, the Nativity re-enactment, 4th of July parades in the backyard, and whenever else we wanted to record ourselves! Thank you for BBQing in the summers. You were a one of a kind chef! Hamburgers and hot dogs don’t taste right to me unless they’re burnt to a crisp! Thank you for letting us ride the horses and for helping us get up into the saddle when we were too little to do it ourselves and for helping us trot them around the yard. Thank you for hiding the eggs at our annual Easter party and for not remembering where you hid them all enabling us to find some missing ones at next year’s party! Thank you for speaking at my Baptism and for the tender little talk you had with me afterwards. I have that moment captured in a picture & will keep it forever.

Thank you for marrying Grandmother and for loving her so much. Thank you for sealing our big, crazy family together. I love them all so much. I can’t imagine my life without all my cousins. Thank you for all of our time at Knollwind. It is truly the treasure of my childhood.

I want to tell you that I love you. I love you for the quiet way you sat in the background & let Grandmother be the center of attention (as I’m sure she preferred to be). I can’t honestly say I remember what you were doing all the time but no matter what was going on you were there-probably video taping!! I love you for how excited you would get when we would come to visit and how you just loved to hugs us & scoop us up in your arms! I love to see you sitting in your yellow recliner watching the news at 6:00 with your trusty glass of Pepsi with the crescent shaped ice cubes in it and to see that you’ve once again fallen sleep! I love to go feed the animals in the barn with you and to help gather the eggs. I love to play on all the broken down trucks & flatbeds scattered across the yard next to the barn & to ride around on all the farm equipment even though most of the time I was too afraid to climb up on them! I love to hear you play “Edelweiss” on your harmonica. I love to hear you call me “Missy” and want you to know that I hold that name in reserve only for you and Grandmother.

I’m glad you’re back home with Grandmother. I know you’ve missed her so much since she’s been gone. Even though I am so incredibly sad that you are no longer here with me and that I will have to live the bulk of my life with you so far away, I am that much happier that you are once again with the one you truly love. Please give her a hug for me and tell her that I love her so much. The greatest desire of my heart has always been that you would see me get married. Please come and see me on that day.

I know I will see you again and can’t wait for that reunion and for you to scoop me up in your arms and hug me. Goodbye….for now.

Nobody loves you like I do.

Love,

Missy

Man I'm Such A Great Friend!!!

So check it: I am such a great friend! Not even gonna front about it! Who else do you know that would drop EVERYTHING they’re doing to drive 4 hours just to eat dinner with you and then drive another 4 hours back home?!?! I’m pretty much the greatest friend ever cuz that’s just what I did when my Precious came to Utah last week! Before I start my tale let me just say for the record that I’m still a little fussy that said Precious didn’t inform me that he was arriving in Utah-hello I could have been down there all day to play instead of the measly 3.5 hours that I was able to be there on such short notice! RUDE!! Ok now that I’ve gotten that out of the way let’s begin my story!
My dear, sweet friend Joni made the little trek with me & it was such good times! We cranked up our tunes & had plenty of nonsense to talk about! The ride home would be a different story but we’ll get to that in a minute! We managed to get down to Provo just a little after 6:00 & only ran in to 1 area of “road construction” wherein we had to stop & wait for traffic to clear up. Why is there always road construction going on but you never see anyone actually constructed anything!??! Utah’s a mess!! We got to Provo & retrieved Johnny at his sister’s apartment. What a great little reunion! And Joni got to meet him too! Or maybe I should say that Johnny got to meet Joni! Whichever! After retrieving Johnny we went across town to Kristy’s house so Johnny could meet little OP! 1st of all we drove Joni’s vehicle down which happens to be a stick shift which I happen to hate driving but what can ya do!? So after we picked up Johnny I go to back up from our parking spot & find that I don’t have it in reverse. We go forward instead & I am ALL up on the car parked in front of us which just happens to be Dad Turner’s car-that’s great! I tried unsuccessfully a couple more times (as did Joni) to get that crazy car in reverse & it just wasn’t happening! And then when we did finally get it in reverse I was too scared to try & back up as I was convinced we were gonna hit Dad Turner’s car! So Joni & I switched spots so she could back the car up-you know like I was at my 1st Driver’s Ed class!! She backed the car up & we switched seats again! We are retarded!! So we get to Kristy’s & OP was in quite a jovial mood which is quite a change!! I wish I would have taken some pics of that little OP & his booty shakin that he does now! Oh I love him!! Next we went to the Cracker Barrel for to get some grub! I love that place! They have GREAT mac ‘n cheese which everyone know is my one true food love!!! Delicious!! We had a delightful time at dinner discussing this & that & the other-simply delightful! And of course we had to have a photo session with ourselves! It’s how we do!!!

Dear Johnny-he is but my dearest friend!!!




New BFFs Johnny & Joni!!! I love it!!!




I am cute!! And look how tan I am!!! Apparently Johnny thought he was at a GQ photo shoot!!




So precious!!!



So after dinner we had to get to getting so we could get back home. Good grief the drive home was LONG!! We had run out of things to talk about, nothing was sounding good on the ipod, & we were straight up exhausted!!! I thought I was going to die!!! The road just kept going & going & going & going-when are we going to be home?!?! We started talking absolute nonsense just to keep ourselves awake!! Absolute nonsense!!! We finally made it home about 2:00 in the AM & I crashed!! But I also had to get up & go to work like 4 hours later! I am so sure!! I certainly hope John Turner appreciates me!!!