Great Grandpa Nielsen

I have posted an audio file that has Great Grandpa Nielsen reading a letter written by his brother in law regarding a deer hunting trip a long time ago.

It is accessed via

Nothing like posting our blog on a regular basis, every six weeks or so. We are having a quiet Sunday evening at home. Reed keeps trying to send the dogs to Donna, which doesnt work, oops I'm wrong, Prada is sitting here whining to go out into the cold dark night. We are planning to travel up to Canada this summer in our tent trailer, and both of us are looking forward to it, since we haven't been very far up north. Our basement now has a functioning shower , toilet and sink, so all that's left is trim, carpet, closets, window frames, on and on, but progress is being made. We are boring, but it's fun to do our own little things. Hope you are all well.

We had a great time with Will, NIkki, Cosette, Reed B, Eva, Amariah, Tristan, Jonathan, their dog Breezy, and our two Gummy and Prada. They all stayed overnight in Nephi, sleeping on the floor, (sorry, Will) and sharing our Christmas. We have decided not to do that again, so next year will probably be in Rexburg. We are getting very good at painting, sanding, repainting, tiling, etc. since we are working on the house in Nephi at the same time we are trying to finish the basement in Rexburg. We hope you had a great holiday, with less snow than we got here in good old Iceburg. Since we are all spending less money now that we are in a recession, I won't tell you what we got for Christmas, except for the wonderful digital pix thingey from our kids. Reed bought one for me too, so we have two and we like it so well we kept them both. Thank you.

We are home after an eventful Thanksgiving week. We are still working on the house in Nephi, and not making great progress. Painting, sanding, mending, replacing baseboards. Reed was suffering from aching joints, maybe gout, so it was slow going. We piggybacked on Patti's family get together in Garland, along with Reed and Eva. Saw lots of relatives. We came home and Reed spent two days tiling the downstairs bathroom. We are acknowledging the paint I chose for the family room, called Fossil Butte, is really a dark puke green, and I get to go get another color and try to rectify the choice. Facebook is turning out to be interesting. We get more hits every day. We are planning a quiet month without much Christmas fuss since we are going to Nephi again. I'm beginning to look forward to unloading that house. Reed & Donna

old and slow

Today we are feeling achy and old. I have what I think is an inner ear infection, dizziness, running into doors, general malaise, and Reed has aches in joints & bones, sort of like mild flu. We staggered over to Sacrament meeting holding each other up, then staggered home for a long afternoon nap.
Reed is speaking in Stake Conference next week, so is practicing his talk. I understand why a speechwriter is so handy. You can blame them if the talk is boring. Of course, he won't be boring.
This past week marked the first time I've been home for a full week in a month, so of course I mess it up by getting sick. I came home from Virginia Beach (I'm beginning to think Ken and Norma should name their house Bleak House because of all the sickness they keep getting), and was home two full days when Ana called to say appendicitis was knocking. I spent a week with them trying to convince myself that I was useful. She recovered quickly, and has many helpers in her house.
We plan to spend Thanksgiving week in Nephi, and Thanksgiving day in Garland with Patti and David. Christmas will also be spent in Utah.
We mortgaged the farm, (what's left after the Stock Market collapses) and got tile to do the bathroom in the basement. Now as soon as we stop being old and sick, we can start another project that's sure to shorten our life times. Since we probably will outlive our retirement at this point, we need several more of these jobs. Hope you all are doing well, or at least better than us. Love Donna

Here's some slides of our trip to Peru. It is a power point show. Hopefully it will be viewable by all.

Try this web address to see if you can access the spread sheet.

http://docs.google.com/Present?docid=dd5zvrhw_0gtzqh5qs&invite=hgx698x

We just got back from three lovely days over at Yellowstone. We stayed in the HOliday Inn, and did not visit the park. We went to the Bear and Wolf Discovery Center, and took many pictures of the bears. I am not fond of wolves. We went to the Imax and watched the two story screen of Lewis and Clark's adventure. I felt slightly seasick several times. After that we visited all the little touristy shops, ate food, took naps and read in the hotel. Fun! We got a painted pony (ceramic), and had our picture taken shooting bears from the back of a moose. Reed looked very fetching in his black hat and red bandanna, but did not take shooting bears very seriously. It was cold. We had to wear our coats. We spent some time looking up the restaurant we ate in when we were there last in 2000. Reed remembers stuff like that.