Farewell old laptop, welcome new

My laptop gave up on me.  It happened yesterday and I decided to purchase another one instead of fiddling around trying to recover what was lost.  I have the UVAG newsletter to publish in the next couple of days.  I found an almost identical laptop at Walmart online, I believe it was about $50.00 less than if I purchased it in the store from what I could see.  It is a smooth almost pearlized  red.  I have set it up with Gimp and Open Office and when I am able I will load the software for Corel Suite and my scanner and printer.

Cats and coughs

Years ago I knew a woman who had several cats even though one of her daughters was quite allergic to them.  I couldn't understand her point of view.  Later one of my daughters had a couple of cats and insisted that they , stay even though her husband said he was afraid of what they would do to the baby.  Eventually she reluctantly parted with the cats.  At present one of my granddaughters is suffering symptoms of asthma such as shortness of breath and coughing.  I suspected the two cats she lives with might have a relationship to her condition.  I arranged for her to spend most of the past few days and the night between at an Aunt's house.  She didn't take her usual allergy prescription and her condition seems much improved.  She loves her cats although she didn't have them until the family moved a few years ago.  One of them is getting very old and suffers pain from arthritis.  However the other is likely to live for several more years.  On the other hand several of my grandchildren are autistic and I believe I know a partial relief for their condition, but I am not their parent.  I have made mistakes in my parenting and likely some times I made similar decisions with the idea that I was doing the best thing for my child.

Prophets and Projects

Today I dropped Miranda at Mary's home where a birthday party was planned and drove to Provo.  I listened to the morning session of LDS Conference as I drove.  When I arrived in Provo I picked up a length of linoleum I had ordered from Lowes, potentially enough to cover the floor of my trailer with flaps up the side and front and also cover the floor of the foyer of my work room which is currently covered in dirty felt carpeting.  I stopped to pick up my grandson Adam and drove home.  I found that the trailer wheeled jack had been delivered along the the two folding steel wheel chocks.  Adam installed the wheeled jack and helped me cover the floor of the trailer with linoleum which I placed over a layer of corrugated plastic pieced together to form a buffer between the plywood floor with its round bolt tops.  I found that a spare piece of metal meant to support a flat screen TV would work as a support for my trailer tongue box in which I intend to store various items pertaining to the trailer.  Meanwhile Adam and I listened to the second session of conference on my phone.  He commented that it had been an unusually good session, which I believe reflects his growing maturity.  I encouraged Miranda to stay overnight with Mary since she has been experiencing difficulty breathing which I believe is due to the cats that are sleeping with her since her mother is gone and I am using her bedroom with its shutter door to keep out the cats.  I stayed at Mary's house to listen to the Women's Session of Conference and they announced the list of proposed temples, including another in Africa and one in Orem.

Random accomplishments

Today I altered some pants that I ordered in the spring before I lost nearly 50 pounds.  I had previously altered one of the identical (except for color) pairs and they fit well enough to make the venture with the others.  I ordered a roll of linoleum which should suffice both to line my trailer and to finish the foyer of my workshop area.  Then I played hostess to my daughter and her three children and took them along with Miranda, Hannah and Rudy to the park near Tisha's house then to McDonalds for chicken nuggets all around except for Hannah who always has a double cheeseburger meal.  I listened to scriptures with Miranda before she said a prayer.  It has been a good day.

Miranda's Nanny

On several different occasions I have been asked to come along and help care for my granddaughter Miranda. The first several took place when I accompanied my daughter Nancy to a professional meeting and stayed with her daughter during the day  The first two were in Florida, the last in Hawaii.  I go to Florida fairly regularly because my youngest daughter and her family live in St Augustine.  I doubt I would have traveled to Hawaii if not for accompanying Nancy.  At present I am staying in Salt Lake City at Nancy's home while she attends meetings in New York City. Miranda is now a young woman in junior high school and largely self regulates.  She tends to cling to her bed in the morning, a behavior that cost us a tour when we were on an Alaskan cruise.  However for the past two days she has made it into my car in time to be to school in time.  I am not in charge of feeding her.  My routine has been one meal a day around the middle of the day when she is not here and I currently only eat beef, somewhat extreme as a diet for a teen aged girl.  Today I attended the Salt Lake Temple which will soon be closed.  I doubt I would have taken the opportunity to see it in the final months before it is closed for renovation if it had not been for being here with Miranda.

first trip for the trailer

I had not expected to take the trailer out until I returned from taking care of Miranda next week but I stoppped ut  by the house in order to take care of a few items .  Adam came by and suggested that we should take the trailer to the compost yard since we had a load of plum branches and sagebrush ready to go today. I trailer worked well and although she'll at backing the trailer into the driveway I pulled it in with the car are enough that we were able to move it in using a dolly it will be a lot easier when I receive my free old Jack

Tool Apron for Tevita

Today was Tevita's birthday.  I made a 'busy apron' for him using some things I had around the house: small scissors, a multinut tool, five crayons in a plastic box, to fill the pockets and a picture I created by making a picture of Tevita on Presentations and adding some clip-art representing cooking, building, and art.  I think he had hoped for a toy and was sort of bemused and disappointed, but his mother loved it.