Barbara's Gift of Love...

This is my best friend/sister Barbara Harris. She is not my biological sister, but my "Soul Sista" . We first met 22 years ago while living in the same ward in Mesa, Arizona. She was my visiting teacher when I realized I was expecting Roman 2 months after giving birth to Riley...they would be 11 months apart. I cried...a LOT. Barbara had the same experience and gave me permission to be sad and to cry, because once I held my baby everything would be okay. She was right.

She was with me through that experience ( as well as traveling out to California to help out when Royal was born )

A short time after Roman was born, Barbara had a tubal pregnancy that had added complications and she ended up having an emergency hysterectomy. We went through that together. Needless to say - we have gone through a lot of happy, and sad times. Depression, skin cancer (twice), kidney failure, dialysis, kidney rejection (twice) and finally successful kidney transplant. we have gained weight and lost weight, gone grey and colored our hair... but mostly we have shared our hearts and supported each other without fail.

Barbara has many , many talents. She makes the most beautiful cards, jewelry and quilts. She is infamous in her family for her quilts. This Christmas she surprised me with one of her beautiful quilts made with Ladybug fabric. It is the most soft and warm, yummy quilt I LOVE it!!! And I love her.

Heavenly Father has blessed me in so many ways, but one of my favorite blessings are the friends He has placed in my life.

Virginia & Washington DC

A bench outside of the graves of President Madison's Family

The Air Force Memorial
(both Ray's Dad & mine served in the Air Force)

Outside

the Smithsonian



A gentle new friend.

One of the beautiful random roads we explored.

The Vietnam Memorial

In September we drove Royal up to Oregon and dropped him off at college. Our baby...and the first to go away to college. Wahhhhh! I miss him!Yet I am so proud of him, he set the goal to play basketball for college and he is doing just that.

( Arlington Memorial Cemetery...Reverent)

When we returned, I kept busy helping to direct out ward's youth Roadshow..."Dickens Unplugged". We had 3 weeks to put it together and perform it. Unfortunately I was not going to be at the performance. Ray & I had already planned a trip to Virginia & Washington DC. It was an amazing trip...and it was also really fun to be laying in bed, at midnight,( time difference) and receive text messages and phone calls saying we had won first place for our Roadshow. That was so cool!!!!

While in Virginia, Ray and I spent an entire day driving around to small towns, and going through antique stores. At first we went there because I love antiques; however, it soon became exciting for Ray as well. He collects old coins, and every store we went in, he found old coins that sold for really cheap. He would then check his catalog for it's value. He spent about 85.00, but had in value over 200.00. He was loving it! I found lots of beautiful things as well, mostly gifts for my children and friends.

We also turned down any road that looked intriguing...which is how we discovered this beautiful covered bridge. Also, for meals, we consulted our GPS. Haha seriously! We entered the restaurant sight and looked at the list of places in the area.If we found a name that intrigued us, we ate there. The places were all mom & pop places, and without fail, we ate some really good food. The only chain eatery we went to was while on our guided tour of Washington DC ( and that meal was yucky ).

The tour of DC was incredible!!!!!! From seeing all the memorials to standing in the Jefferson Memorial reading those beautiful inspiring words, from walking the mall to the Lincoln Memorial and touring the Library of Congress. WOW what an incredible country we live in, and those founding fathers were foreordained, I have no doubt.

We also went to the Washington DC Temple. Ray's mission president, Keith Wilcox, was one of the Architects, so it is special to Ray. Our family has always had this tradition when vacationing...the first person to see someone from home, gets a dollar. At the temple I got the dollar. Elder Earl C. Tingey is the temple president and we saw each other there in the hall. We became friends when I worked at the Church Office Building. That was a fun surprise.

Another thing we did was a Civil War Tour. That was so enjoyable and heart breaking. To hear the stories of bravery and of tragedy

So many people asked what was my favorite thing we saw or did. The answer would be... "D All of the Above". There was not a single second we didn't enjoy. I guess my very favorite part was being alone with Ray the whole time. Ray and I spend a lot of time together anyway, one would think we would tire of being together so much, but we don't. Maybe making up for lost time from years past when other things pulled at our attention. We look forward to our next trip...which will probably be traveling to Oregon to watch Royal play basketball.