Pictures

I will try to take lots of pictures from our trip to post, but you know how I am.

Maybe I should just give Chris the camera.

-Della

Vacation

Chris and I are leaving tomorrow morning for Washington DC.

I have spent the last 2 days organizing all the details of where our boys will stay and who will take care of them.

We had a few last minute hiccups, but I think we figured it all out. When we come home on Sunday we will have to go to 4 different places to pick up our 5 boys.

Nevertheless, once they have all left for school tomorrow, and I have made a few last minute phone calls, and delivered one more set of overnight bags, and walked the dogs the last time, and gone to the bank, and finished packing for myself, and turned around at least once to come back for something important that I am sure we will forget, we will be off for 3 days.

Chris' birthday is Friday and we have tickets to the Jazz/ Wizards game Friday night. We will try to find a local stake center to watch President Hinkley's funeral at on Saturday. Other than that we have no concrete plans at all other than to relax, do touristy things and eat. Yes, eat.

I can't wait.

The hotel has computers I can use to blog, but I won't be able to post pictures of our trip until we are home on Sunday, so be sure to check back then.

C U soon.

-Della

2 Puzzles today

1. If six winkles and three wonkles cost 15¢, and you can buy nine wonkles and three winkles for the same 15¢, what will it cost to buy one hundred wonkles?

2. My friend Albert the butcher wears a size 13 shoe, is six feet tall, and wears a 42-long suit. What does he weigh?

Financial Planning

Dan was a single guy living at home with his father and working in the family business. When he found out he was going to inherit a fortune when his sickly father died, he decided he needed a wife with which to share his fortune. One evening at an investment meeting he spotted the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Her natural beauty took his breath away. "I may look like just an ordinary man," he said to her, "but in just a few years, my father will die, and I'll inherit 20 million dollars." Impressed, the woman obtained his business card and three days later, she became his stepmother. Women are so much better at estate planning than men.

Ain't that the truth

President Hinkley

Tonight at about 7:00 Utah time, that's 9:00 my time, the prophet Gordon B. Hinkley passed away at his home in Salt Lake City.

This is a very sad and very happy thing.

It is a very sad thing for people like me who have come to love this man so much over the last 12 years that he has been president of The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints. It is also sad, I am sure, for his family who loved him.

For him, I believe, this is a very happy time. He is finally able to lay this mortal by, leave behind his imperfect body and rejoin his wife, Marjorie, and enter the presence of the God who he served all 97 years of his life.

I will copy a page from his own book, Stand a Little Taller, where he himself comments on death.

For April 23,

A Better Life

"Consider on the blessed and happy state of those that keep the commandments of God. For behold, they are blessed in all things both temporal and spiritual; and if they hold out faithful to the end they are received into heaven, that thereby they may dwell with God in a state of never-ending happiness." -Mosiah 2:41

What a wonderful thing is death, really, when all is said and done. It is the great reliever. It is a majestic, quiet passing on from this life to another life, a better life. We go to a place where we will not suffer as we have suffered here, but where we will continue to grow, accumulating knowledge and developing and being useful under the plan of the Almighty made possible through the atonement of the Son of God.

-G. B. Hinkley

My talk

So I gave my talk in Sacrament Meeting today.

I used the Visitors Day at the Insane Asylum joke as my requisite beginning of talk joke. I even inroduced the joke as my "requisite beginning of talk joke'. (I considered using Liz's bad-week-to-quit-smoking-crack joke, but Chris said I wasn't allowed).

Then I told them that my talk was on a stack of paper. (It was about repentance).

It must have been good because about 20 people caught me in the hall to tell me so. I've never had that many people compliment me on a talk before.

Then one lady asked me if I'd talk to the young women at girls camp, and I got asked to give a lesson in Relief Society.

It was fun, and I felt good about it.

After church I came home and took a nap.

It was my requisite sunday afternoon nap.

I'll try and post something more fun later if I can get a turn on the computer that has all my fun pictures saved. That's Chris' World of Warcraft computer. It's a miracle that I even got a chance to use that computer long enough to save pictures on it.

-Della

Puzzle

Harper and Rose Lee were debating the major purchase of some candy. They found out, by looking at the prices, that they could get three tiny bags of jellybeans and two tiny bags of chocolate chips for 24¢, which was under their limit of a quarter. They could also get four tiny bags of chocolates and two tiny bags of jellybeans for the same 24¢. How much did each tiny bag of chocolates cost?

This puzzle isn't too hard if you have time and brain power to think about it. I am personally running out of brain power as it is 11:30 pm and I have been busy all day.

I think my talk for Sacrament Meeting is about ready. I just need to brush it up and trim around the edges. I have spent more time preparing this talk than any other talk I have ever given.

Maybe that's not because I actually focused on it, but because I was interrupted about four thousand, three hundred times while I was working on it.

Okay, that's an exaggeration. It was only about half that.

I'll give the answer to the puzzle in a day or two, or after I give up on anyone figuring it out.

-Della

Tagged

Jordan, the Goddess of Sewing tagged me. What this means, to the best of my understanding, is that she was tagged and had to answer the following questions on her blog. Now it's my turn to answer these questions, after which I will tag at least 2 people to do the same on their blogs.

Here we go:

Two Names You Go By: 1) Mom 2) Miss Della

Two Things You Are Wearing Right Now: 1) Lucky Charms t-shirt 2) danskin sandals from Walmart

Two things you Want (or have) in a Relationship: 1) A true helpmeet who probably does more for our family on a daily basis than I do 2) If there is such a thing as a soul mate, I have one.

Two of Your Favorite Things to do: 1) go back to bed for 2 hours after the kids go to school and then go to lunch 2) Curl up with a really good book and read uninterrupted.

Two things you did last night 1) Taught Cubscouts, (if trying to control an out of control game of Kung-Fu-Rock-Paper-Scissors counts as teaching). 2) Walked my dogs.

Two people you Last Talked To: 1) Sisters Chesney and Bangerter (I know there are two of them, but they are comps so they kind of count as one- they are awesome). 2) God (We chatted while I walked my dogs tonight).

Two Things You're doing tomorrow: 1) Pine Wood Derby 2) Finish writing my talk for Sunday.

Two Longest Car Rides: 1) Utah to Virginia 2) St. George, Utah to Mexico and back, (we went for tacos. Not kidding.)

Two Favorite Holidays:(As an adult) 1) Christmas Eve 2) The first day of school (Yes, that counts as a holiday.)

Two Favorite Drinks: 1) diet cherry pepsi 2) Cherry vanilla italian soda with cream

Two Things About Me you may not have known: 1) When I put away my Christmas decorations I write myself a letter and put it in the box to find next year. 2) I personally own 2 motorcycles.

Two jobs I have had in my life: 1) Labor and Delivery Tech 2) Group Home live-in Teaching Parent

Two Movies I would watch over and over: 1) Braveheart 2) Love Actually

Two of my Favorite Foods: 1) Chinese Hot and Sour Soup 2) Cajun Chicken Penne

Two places I'd rather be right now: 1) Utah, to visit my family and friends there- but just to visit. I love VA 2) Alone with Chris, shopping, running errands, whatever, just us.

Did you learn something about me?

I now tag (drumroll)

Holly

Christi

Liz

(Come on, just copy and paste the questions. For me? Please?)

-Della

My favorite Author

Anyone who knows me well knows that my favorite poet/ author is Shel Siverstein. When my brother Mike was here last week we talked about Shel Silverstein and Mike reminded me of one of his books that I had read once but never owned. It was called "Uncle Shelby's ABZ Book".

Well, today I got an anonymous package in the mail that contained "Uncle Shelby's ABZ Book". I can only assume I owe a thank you to Mike, (Thanks Mike).

You might think from the name of this book and from Mr. Silverstein's reputation that this would be a children's book. However, I would advise against letting your children read it. For one thing, the alphabet as he teaches it is somewhat out of order. For another, it gives children ideas that good parents might not want their children to have. However, adults who appreciate somewhat twisted humor (like myself) might get a good laugh from it.

Here are a few of my favorite pages:

D is for Daddy.

See Daddy.

See Daddy sleeping on the couch.

See Daddy's hair. Daddy needs a haircut.

Poor Daddy. Daddy has no money for a haircut.

Daddy spends all his money to buy you toys and oatmeal.

Poor Daddy. Daddy can not have a haircut.

Poor poor Daddy.

See the scissors...

Poor poor poor poor Daddy.

L is for Lollipop

L is also for Lye

Do you want a nice red lollipop?

Go pour all the lye into the toilet.

Now tell Mommy you have eaten the lye.

(That is a fib or a little white lye).

Mommy will take you to the doctor in a taxi cab.

After the doctor pumps out your stomach,

he wil give you a nice red lollipop.

O (which in this book comes after L) is for Oz

Do you want to visit the wonderful far-off land of Oz where the wizard lives and scarecrows can dance and the road is made of yellow bricks and everything is emerald green?

Well, you can't because there is no land of Oz and there is no tin woodsman and there is no Santa Claus!

Maybe some day you can go to Detroit.

X is for xylophone because X is always for xylophone.

Riddle

I haven't done a puzzle for while, so here is a good riddle.

My first is in kendo but not in Olympics.

My second is in hurdles and in hunting.

My third is in bowman and in bowling.

My fourth is in cycling and in golf.

My fifth is in flying and not in swimming.

My last is in running and not in dancing.

My whole is a sport. What am I?

Clue: the first letter is K

FROGS, (Yes, again)

I don't know why I keep coming back to frogs, but I got this story in an e-mail and thought it would be good for the blog. (Maybe I should rename this the Frog Blog?)

This is the fairy tale that should have been read to girls when they were little:

Once upon a time in a land far away, ~~~~~~~~

a beautiful, independent, self-assured princess ~~~~~~~~

happened upon a frog as she sat contemplating ecological issues on the shores of an unpolluted pond in a verdant meadow near her castle. ~~~~~~~~

The frog hopped into the princess' lap and said: ' Elegant Lady, I was once a handsome prince, until an evil witch cast a spell upon me. ~~~~~~~~

One kiss from you, however, and I will turn back into the dapper, young prince that I am ~~~~~~~~

and then, my sweet, we can marry ~~~~~~~~

and set up housekeeping in your castle ~~~~~~~~

with my mother, ~~~~~~~~

where you can prepare my meals, ~~~~~~~~

clean my clothes, bear my children, ~~~~~~~~

and forever feel grateful and happy doing so. ' ~~~~~~~~

That night, as the princess dined sumptuously ~~~~~~~~

on lightly sauteed frog legs ~~~~~~~~

seasoned in a white wine and onion cream sauce, ~~~~~~~~

she chuckled and thought to herself: ~~~~~~~~

I don't freakin' think so.

My Weekend

I haven't had much chance to blog this weekend.

All the boys were out of school for the 3 day weekend. We had to problem solve and make up a sign in sheet for the computer so everyone had a chance to play World of Warcraft for 30 minutes at least once every 3 hours. I would think we are going over board with this but it seems to be such a bonding experience. Even those who aren't playing often sit around the computer to watch the others play and talk about it. So it feels like a family activity.

The downside is that since I am the only member of my 7 member family who does not have a W o W character I didn't feel a need to put my name on the waiting list for the computer, and didn't get to blog, or view all of my other favorite blogs, much. I did however, (finally) get all the Christmas lights and decorations down, cleaned and organized the garage, drained the water heater, did the dishes (about 3 times), scrubbed the kitchen counters and cabinet fronts, mopped the floor and scrubbed around the edges and corners with a brush, baked brownies, deep cleaned the boy's bathroom (gross!), washed and folded 4 loads of laundry, took Mark to the game store, and made dinner (Jambalaya!). And that was just yesterday.

On Sunday after church all I did was watch the playoffs and took a nap, so I guess I felt like I should do more on Monday. But the 2 teams I was rooting for won. It's going to be the Patriots and the Giants in the Superbowl. I haven't decided if I'm going to root for New England to have a perfect season, or for a second Manning to get a ring a second year in a row.

If I was a betting woman, (or knew a local bookie), my money would be on the Patriots. They are unreal this year.

The kids are back to school today (Hooray!), but we have appointments most of the day so I will be busy again. No rest for the weary, -or the insomniacs, (which I seem to be becoming lately).

T's quote

This is the quote that T found yesterday:

As we live on earth we must walk in faith, nothing doubting. When the journey becomes seemingly unbearable, we can take comfort in the words of the Lord: "I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, I will heal thee." (2 Kings 20:5). Some of the healing may take place in another world. We may never know why some things happen in this life. The reason for some of our suffering is known only to the Lord. --President James E. Faust That's pretty awesome.

Sunday Post

Sorry I didn't post till late today. I had a hard time getting a turn on the computer. World of Warcraft is taking over my house.

The whole family made it to church today, which was awesome and a huge blessing. Between Chris feeling sick (again) and some behavior issues, we weren't sure we were going to make it out the door until everyone actually went out the door. Then I looked around and realized I was the last one left in the house.

I was especially glad we all made it, for one thing because I enjoyed it, but for another because everyone else seemed to.

Earlier this week I drove the sister missionaries to another sister missionary apartment for transfers, (Sister Taylor got transferred, -tear-. But now we have Sister Bangerter, who is going to be awesome), and at their apartment they had a place on the wall dedicated to miracles. A 3' by 3' area was covered with colorful post it notes marked with miracles they had seen. Everything from investigators who committed to baptism to a sick member who was able to use the bathroom.

It was a really neat idea, but I think I will try to do it differently and list some of the miracles I witness here.

For example, it was a miracle that we all made it to church today. Some days I think it is a miracle that J is still here. But he is, and actually, -here is another miracle- he is doing really well.

Every day I think it is a miracle that I get to do this job. I have the coolest job ever. Really, I could list at least 20 more miracles without racking my brain too hard, but I will cut it short with one more.

T asked me earlier this week why God lets us live this life if he knows we are all going to screw up and people are going to do bad things.

I answered him as best as I could, which passified him for the time, but didn't seem to fully satisfy him.

Then today at church he found a program from last weeks service (which we didn't make it to) in one of the books. It had a quote on it that I can't repeat verbatim, but it said that God knows what we are going through, and he will help us through it. God gives us trials for reasons, but sometimes he is the only one who knows the reasons.

I think that quote answered T's question and set helped him understand a little better. Even he said God was giving him a sign by helping him find that. He said he has a lot of questions to ask the missionaries next time they come over. Ok, I said I was going to cut it short with one more miracle, but that wasn't really short and it was actually about 3 miracles. Sorry. Thanks for reading. -Della

Visitors Day at the Insane Asylum

It was Visitor's Day at the Lunatic Asylum.

All the inmates were standing in the courtyard, singing "Ave Maria." They were singing beautifully. Oddly, each of them was holding a red apple in one hand and tapping it rhythmically with a pencil.

A visitor listened in wonder to the performance, and then approached the conductor. "I'm a retired choir director," he said. "This is one of the best choirs I have ever heard".

"Yes, I am very proud of them," said the conductor.

"You should take them on tour," said the visitor. "What are theycalled?"

"Surely that's obvious," replied the conductor."They're the Moron Tapanapple Choir."

Sleeping Indian Mountain

When I was younger we would go on family trips every year. I have a memory of passing a mountain several times as we traveled to the same place a few different times. (I think the mountain was in Colorado). When viewed from the right angle the mountain looked like a (tremendously large) person laying down to rest. There was a legend that went along with the mountain, but I don't remember what it was.

It might have been something about an indian squa (is that spelled right?) who traveled around searching for the indian brave she loved. I think she couldn't find him so she laid down to rest and never got up again.

Perhaps one of my family members remembers the legend better than I do. If so, please comment and help me out with it.

Anyway, I saw this picture, and while it is obviously very creatively photo shopped, it reminded me of those trips, the mountain and the legend.

So if you know what I'm talking about, hopefully it will bring back memories for you too. If not, sorry this was a hopelessly useless post, but I hope you enjoyed the picture. (It is a cool picture).

Truly God Given Talent

OK, some of my family members will have seen this because I got it in an e-mail from family, but it is worth seeing again. Or maybe twice if it your first time checking it out.

http://tinyurl.com/yxewot

Wow.

Totally useless information

Did you know there are 119 ridges on the edge of a quarter?

You do now.

Quiz: Find one word that (with different spellings) meets the following definitions.

-To regret

-a thickening sauce added to soups and gravies

-a street in France

Update on Me

I realized that while I post something every day I don't post a whole lot about me. So I thought I'd make a few comments about how I am doing.

In general things are going very well. Our family is going through some growing pains as it got a little bigger a couple of weeks ago. But really, that is expected and we are making positive forward progress with it.

This last weekend my brother Mike stayed with us. It was great to have him here. This was his last weekend in the states before leaving for Iraq where he will spend the next 15 months. He said he was glad to spend his last weekend with family and we were glad for the same reason.

Every one in my house loves Mike. He has visited us several times over the last 6 months, though before this weekend he has had his wife and kids with him.

We will miss him while he is gone, but while he was here he got us hooked up with Skype which is a free online video conferencing service. With it and our webcam we will be able to talk to him face to face.

Mike also got his wife, our parents, and our brother that lives in Alaska on Skype so we can all conference with each other. It is very cool.

It is hard to live far from family. Even though we have a large family, our nearest family member is about 1500 miles away, so we don't see each other much. Being able to see people that I love on Skype this last weekend was really cool.

Anyway, (I apologize if I am rambling), it was hard to say goodbye to Mike, but I am very proud that my brother is willing to fight for freedom.

It seems like it is unpopular to support the war lately, but I have never worried about being popular before, why should I start now.

I recognize that this war has not been handled as well as it could have been and mistakes have been made along the way, but I believe that this war is incredibly important to bring peace to the people of this world and to fight terror. Leaving the job unfinished would be a tremendous mistake.

Go Mike! We love you.

Quotable jokes

A few one liners I found today:

-On the keyboard of life always keep a finger on the escape key.

-A picture is worth a 1000 words, but try saying that with a picture.

-If you don't have someone tracking you down, you haven't exhausted your credit options.

-Did you hear abour the duck who went into the drugstore? He told the pharmacist, "Give me some chapstick and put it on my bill."

-People are more violently opposed to fur than leather because it's safer to harass rich women than motorcylcle gangs.

Funny pic

Absolutely no good reason for this picture. I just think it's funny.

Puzzle

I am eight letters long - "12345678"

My 1234 is an atmospheric condition.

My 34567 supports a plant. (the same word, spelled differently is a favorite meal).

My 4567 is to appropriate.

My 45 is a friendly thank-you.

My 678 is a name.

Q: What word am I?

This a good puzzle except I don't understand the friendly thank you part. Have fun.

Quotes

Yesterday I was able to attend an open house to celebrate the recent wedding of 2 of my friends. Kim Curtis was married to Matt Rowe in the Mount Timpanogas Temple (where I was married almost 11 years ago) on December 27th.

They have returned to Virgina and had their open house here. At the open house they had a scrapbook which had a quote on each left hand page and a picture of them on each right hand page and room for friends to leave notes to them all around.

I especially liked 2 of the quotes from their book and will repeat them here.

"To have JOY one must share it" -Lord Byron

"The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved." -Victor Hugo

Congratulations Matt and Kim.

Puzzle

pThis puzzle seemed a little hard at first, but when you think about it all of the clues make sense.

My first is a number, my second another, And each, I assure you, will rhyme with the other. My first you will find is one-fifth of my second, And truly my whole a long period reckoned. Yet my first and my second (nay, think not I cozen), When added together will make but two dozen.How many am I?

Clue: This was used in a very famous speech.

Frog Legs

I recently posted a picture of a boy holding a frog and talked about how FROG stands for Forever Remember Our God.

I received 2 comments that are noteworthy. So in case you haven't bothered to go back and read every comment from every post, I thought I would repeat what the statements were.

The first was from my brother in law Drew (sometimes known as Tom), husband of my sister Lillie. He said that FROG also means Fully Rely On God. A good addition to the original post.

The second was from my sister Lydia. This was her reply:

DEEP FRIED FROG LEGS

Med. frog legs (dressed)

1 c. flour

1 tbsp. lemon pepper

1 tsp. salt1 tsp. black pepper

2 eggs (beaten)

Cracker crumbs (fine)

Vegetable oil for frying

Wash frog legs in cold water, drain. Put flour, lemon pepper, salt and black pepper in a bag and shake to mix. Shake frog legs in the seasoned flour to coat, dip in beaten egg and roll in cracker crumbs. Deep fry at 365 degrees for 7 to 8 minutes or until golden brown.

Both comments were very thoughtful. I appreciate those that leave comments. It makes

reading this blog more fun for both readers and poster (me).

Me First! Me First!

Remember always hearing that patience is a virtue? At least one of these guys didn't get it. He'll get the bill though.

Good Quote

I found this quote last week and it has been running through my head the last few days. It makes a lot of sense to me.

"Never argue with an idiot. He'll drag you down to his level and beat you with experience."

-anonymous

I know when I hear that I have a few specific people come to mind that I need to be sure to avoid arguing with. Who do you think of?

Brain teaser puzzle

Even if you don't like cats, you should be able to determine the following words.

Each of these includes the word CAT.

A dreadful event:_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

A robber who climbs walls:_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

A systematized list:_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Old lady joke (nothing against old ladies)

Joke

This has been one of my favorite jokes for a long time. I am blogging it now because I am reminded of it by a few episodes of insomnia that I have experienced lately. What do you get when you cross an insomniac, an agnostic, and a dislexic?

Answer tomorrow.

Our missionaries

These are our missionaries.

Top left: Elder Taylor, right: Elder Ord

Bottom left: Sister Taylor, right: Sister Chesney

(The Taylors are not related). We had both sets of missionaries over for dinner on Saturday as well as an investigating family. The biggest hit was the geotracks.

I have spent several hours with the sisters and have really enjoyed getting to know them. Though they usually ask about me and don't talk about themselves too much I have learned some really interesting things about them really gotten to love them. Both of them truly care about other people and want to help and show love for everyone they meet.

They are true examples to me of Christlike love. Plus they're just really cool.

The elders are great too, but Chris has spent more time with them than I have, so he would have to tell you how cool they are. They recently got a commitment for baptism from a woman that Chris has been visiting with them.

Getting to know them has been a great experience for us.

The other fun thing when the missionaries were here was nerf dart guns. They found out that the little suction cups don't stick to name tags because they are engraved. But they had fun discovering that.

-Della

FROG

I publish this today, not just as a cool picture, but actually as a Sunday message.

I have a sister, Lillie, who loves frogs. She collects them. Not live frogs actually, but figurines, plush frogs, mugs with frogs, frog shaped lamps, etc. It wasn't until one of my other sisters (I can't remember if it was Lydia or Carrie) explained to me that I understood why Lillie loves frogs so much.

You see, FROG stands for Forever Remember Our God. So frogs aren't just a cute thing to collect, they are a reminder to Lillie to remember God.

So when you see this picture, (and it is a picture that should catch your attention), don't just think about the huge frog and the cute kid holding it, think about God who made that frog, and gave that boy parents who encourage him to explore the back yard and bring the things he finds inside. Think about the God who made you, and loves you, and wants to help you find joy and happiness in your life.

I hope you don't need frogs to remind you to remember God. (I can assure you God doesn't need any reminders to remember you). But whenever you see a frog, a live one, a plush one, a beanie baby frog, or a frog shaped lamp, remember God. He really does love you.

Note: If you would like to learn more about God's love for you, please leave a comment. I have some good friends who would love to share His message with you.

Self update

We had a really great Christmas and it was a lot of fun to have all the kids home from school for a week and a half. But it was even more fun to send them back.

We didn't get much of a break though, because as soon as we got the kids off to school we met up with our friends at the city and got started on our new project.

We've been going on it for 4 days now and so far things are going well. It is interesting to watch the dynamics change when you throw a new factor in to the mix. I am sure things will get very interesting.

Am I being sufficiently vague? Sorry I can't say more.

We are excited about this anyway.

-Della

Confused priorities

Number Puzzle

Use the clues below to figure out a 3 digit number.

The difference of the first and last digits is greater than 3

The difference of the first two digits is less than 3

The sum of the first two digits is equal to 5

The product of the last two digits is greater than 7

The sum of the digits is greater than 7

The product of the first two digits is less than 18

The sum of the last two digits is less than 13

The product of the first and last digits is greater than 14

The difference of the last two digits is greater than 3

The sum of the first and last digits is greater than 11

Cool t-shirt

Puzzle

First unscramble the letters in each word below, then unscramble the word order to create a Tom Swifty sentence. (This is a sentence spoken by Tom).

MOT I VTERENAINIAR LYLEAR OT EB A NTAWED DIAS PYEULNATLT.

In case you questioned my sanity...

I get it from my family.

This is a picture of my brothers going for a swim on New Years day.

You might have to enlarge it to see it clearly, the guy doing the belly flop is Mike and the guy in the red shorts is Von.

But this is something I wouldn't do, so maybe I'm not that crazy. (At least not that kind of crazy).

On making goals

"In the end, you're measured not by how much you undertake but by what you finally accomplish"

-Donald Trump

"The tragedy of life doesn't lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goals to reach."

-Benjamin E. Mays

No New Years Resolutions

Call me cranky, but I don't believe in making New Years Resolutions.

I do believe in making goals and working to achieve them. And perhaps the beginning of a new year is a good time to do that because it gives you a good timeline to reach your goal by. But I don't believe New Years Resolutions work.

My theory is that if you have a goal that you want to achieve and you are motivated to work toward it, it doesn't matter what time of year it is. On the other hand, if you are not committed to making a change it doesn't matter if it's a new year or a new decade.

But I wish all of you success in your goals, for the new year or otherwise.

-Della

Happy New Years

This will probably be the last Christmas comic for this season. Maybe other winter type comics might appear though. But I couldn't not put this one up. It was too good.