A visit with Great-Grandpa

A day with Emma.

Have not had a chance to spend much time with granddaughter Emma lately.  She always like to go down to Purcell and visit her great-grandpa (my Dad) so that was our destination today.  Picked her up around 9:30 and headed south our first stop, Jimye Faye's house.  This was Jimye's first time to meet any of my grand kids.  Emma enjoyed visiting with Gigi, the dog, along with Johnny, a dog that Jimye has been sitting with this past week.  (Actually, this was the least shy I've seen Gigi since I've known her.)

Finally got underway for Purcell, with a stop in Moore for lunch at Jimmy's Egg restaurant.  This place is always a good stop and was very full this morning.  After waiting in line we were seated and got our order in.  Took longer than normal due to the crowd they had today.  Finally we arrived at Sunset Estates Nursing Home in Purcell.  This is Dad's new home.  After a couple of weeks in the hospital it was decided he needed more care than could be provided in the assisted living center where he has lived for several years.

The three of us had a good visit with Dad.  He still has some problems walking and some residual effects from the pneumonia that he had while in the hospital.  He is receiving physical therapy each day but is using a wheel chair to go out into the dinning room for meals.  All in all he is doing pretty good for being almost 94 years old.  After our visit we stopped by my brother Bill's house before heading back to the city.  

We had a good day.  Emma and Jimye Faye bonded well and have become good friends.  It is always good to spend time with family. 

Defending the Caveman

Another evening out, another play.



The Oklahoma City Repertory Theatre (or City Rep) is one of the many acting companies here in our area.  The main difference in this group compared to others is that all member of City Rep must be members of the Actors Equity Guild, the national union for professional actors.  I have attended several shows by this group since my friend, Jonathan Beck Reed, is a principal with them.  Tonight's show was:

This is a one man show dealing with the differences in men and women.  A great comedy that was the longest running one man show during it's run on Broadway.  This production had a very good actor, John Venable, from the Dallas/Fort Worth area. 

Tonight my date was Jimye Faye Baker.  Actually, this has been my companion for most activities the past couple of months.  Although we've known each other since around the second grade it has only been recently that we have gotten close.  Jimye has become a very important part of my life.  So, for my friends and followers who are interested, here is the lovely Jimye Faye:

Christmas Day 2012

Major snowstorm?  White Christmas?  Uh, don't think it happened.

The weather guessers on TV have been predicting for the last week that we would get a major snowstorm come in last night and we would have a very rare White Christmas in our area.  We did get some sleet in the wee hours of the morning that did cause some major accidents on the highways before dawn.  By the time I got out and around the street crews had done their jobs and the roads were fairly clear.

Picked up my mother-in-law around 10:30 this morning and headed east to Midwest City.  We spent Christmas day with my niece, and her granddaughter, Carrie.  Actually it was, like last year, at the home of Carrie's in-laws, Mike and Barbara Carpenter.  Barbara always has a fantastic dinner prepared for all the family and has been very gracious to include my mother-in-law and I in all their holiday activities this past year.

Carrie with her son J.J. and husband John

Before we sat down to a great meal we exchanged gifts.  Carrie gave her grand mother a huge box of chocolate candy (almost five pounds worth).  She gave me a fantastic print of a painting of the ship I spent two and a half years of my life, which included two tours to Vietnam, the USS Newport News.  She had the picture matted and framed.  This is one of the greatest presents I've ever received. 

We headed back to the west side of town in the early evening so we could get back before the wet streets started freezing over.  Once home I made a pot of coffee and built a good fire and am thinking about this holiday season.  This year, without Joanne, has been very hard and each special occasion/holiday has not been easy.  But, now instead of sitting around feeling sorry for myself I'm contemplating how lucky a person I am.  This Christmas season has been good.  Have spent time with all my kids and grand kids along with other members of my family.  I am very blessed to have all of them to love and support me.  Life is good.



Christmas Eve 2012

A evening with granddaughters.

Spent this evening with youngest son, Alan, and his family.  Visited with the girls, who were very excited about Santa coming tonight.  After awhile decided we needed to take a road trip so the parents could prepare the place for Santa.  The three girls and I piled in my car and headed to downtown Oklahoma City to see some Christmas lights.  First stop was at the Devon Tower, the new 50 story building built my Devon Energy Company.  They have some great decorations out on their lawn.  It was extremely cold so we didn't spend much time outside the car.  Otherwise we'd have crossed over the street to the Myriad Gardens to see the lights there and go over by the outdoor ice skating rink.

After leaving downtown we drove over to Heritage Hills to see how the houses were decorated there.  Heritage Hills is an old portion of town just to the north of the downtown area.  This is where the original city founding fathers built their mansions.  The houses in this area are very large and mostly well over 100 years old.  Soon it was time to head back to the kids apartment.  They needed to get ready for bed so Santa could make his appearance later this evening.  Before heading home I had to get a picture of the three in front of their Christmas tree.

Christmas 2012 has began

Good food and plenty of family.

The Stone clan celebrated Christmas a few days early.  Due to family scheduling we decided to have our family Christmas celebration today.  We all trekked up north to Enid, Oklahoma, to the home of middle brother and his wife, David and Elizabeth.  We had a total of 27 family members there today.  My arm of the family consisted of ten of us.

Both of my sons came with me along with their ladies.  Above standing with me is (l to r) Alan and Cathy and Alex and Christi.  Standing in front are Alan's daughters, Aurora and Cadence, on each end and his twin step-daughters, Katlyn and Madison, in the middle.  (My other granddaughter, Emma, was not able to go with us today.)  We were also joined by Cathy's sister, Grace, who is visiting from Wisconsin.  (Grace was taking the picture for us.)

In addition to my group my three brothers were there with various family members.  Oldest brother, Bill, and his wife Nancy; Chester and Susan had eleven members there, all but one granddaughter who was with her boyfriends family down in Texas; David and Elizabeth were joined by their daughter, Lisa.  Of course, our Dad, the Stone family patriarch was with us.  He brought his bag of gifts for the grand kids and great-grand kids.  Here he is with my four granddaughters getting the gifts ready to distribute.

We all shared a great and bountiful meal together and had a good visit.  Nothing like getting together with family.  One thing I have always tried to instill in my children:  "When all fails around you family is always your fall back position."  I am a very fortunate man to be blessed with the family that I have.

Another birthday

A new car and some little cars.

Today we celebrated my great-nephew's birthday.  John Michael Carpenter, Jr., or J.J. as everyone calls him, will turn six this next Monday.  He kept informing everyone he was still only five and would not be six for two more days.  The party was at his grandparents house in Midwest City.

J.J. is the son of my niece, Carrie.  He is definitely into toy cars and just about everything he got for his birthday was in that vein.  At Thanksgiving I had asked him what he wanted this year and he informed me "A 1987 Buick Grand National" just like the one his Dad used to have.  Of couse, he was wanting a diecast model of the original.  Believe it or not there is a site online, out of California, that handles these exact things.  (Here the birthday boy opens his presents while his mom and a couple of cousins look on.)

After the gifts were opened and the eating of some great snacks, provided by Carrie and her mother-in-law, we all went outside to watch the opening of the Batman pinata.  Rather than hitting this pinata with a stick the kids just had to pull the ribbons and out came the candy.  Well actually, the opening in the bottom was rather small so the candy came out with the help of Mom shaking it.  (Assisting J.J. is his cousin Caitlyn with his cousin Alex looking on.)

The top present for J.J. was from his parents, Carrie and John.  This was a self propelled, battery opearated Viper.  J.J. has had a ball cruising around the back yard in his new wheels.

Out and about viewing Christmas lights

Dinner, Christmas Lights and the Park.

Got out to view Christmas Lights with a long time friend.  Have known Jimye Faye since grade school days when our families attended church at Kentucky Avenue Baptist Church.  We decided to catch dinner and then drive around viewing the lights.  Started out a Irma's Burger Shack on the north side of town.  This put us up by the Chesapeake Energy Company campus to start.  This company goes all out in decorating their campus with lights.

Next area was the upscale suburb of Nichols Hills.  This area is considered the "old money" area of the metro area.  This town is made up of very large estates with enormous mansions.  In years past the people living there did a major effort in decorating their houses.  We were a little disappointed this year.  As the residents have gotten up in years they have stopped putting up the lights.  There were several that were very impressive but not near what we would have seen in years past.

After Nichols Hills we headed downtown to the Myriad Gardens.  This is the "Central Park" of Oklahoma City.  This park is directly across the street from the newest structure in Downtown, the Devon Energy Tower, a 50 story skyscraper that recently opened.  In the park Devon Energy has sponsored a large outdoor ice skating rink during the holidays.  The City has offered this rink in years past but it was several blocks away in front of the Civic Center.  By moving it to Myriad Gardens they were able to make it larger.

Devon Energy has also gone all out in decorating the grounds around their new building.  In addition to covering all the trees with lights they have gigantic Christmas tree ornaments displayed on the lawn.  Theae are large replicas of the traditional red balls that people have put on their trees for many years.  This is Jimye Faye standing by the largest of the ornaments.

We both had a good time viewing the lights and reminiscing about life.

A day at the park

Beautiful weather, three beautiful girls, plenty of fun.

The weather here in the Oklahoma City area has been very un-November like.  Today it was in the high 60's - low 70's with plenty of sunshine.  Decided it was time to get out and enjoy it.  With the Thanksgiving holiday this past week most people had a four day weekend.  Additionally, most schools have been out since last Wednesday so the kids had a five day weekend.  That would mean that youngest son, Alan, and his lady, Cathy, have been cooped up in an apartment for five days with three rambunctious little girls.  So, I headed over this afternoon and "kidnapped" the girls and headed out to Stars & Stripes Park on the south side of Lake Hefner.  On the way to the park we stopped at the grocery store and picked up a loaf of bread to use in feeding the birds that inhabit the area.  The picture is of the ten year old twins, Katlyn and Madison, and five year old Cadence.

Usually there would be a large gaggle of Canadian Geese out here.  (These geese have pretty much quit migrating south and seem to live in our area year round.)  But, no geese today.  There were a bunch of ducks and, of course, the enormous number of gulls that hang out around the lake.  The girls had a big time pinching off pieces of bread and tossing it to the birds.  In most cases the gulls will swoop down and catch the bits of bread in midair.

Once the bread was gone it was time to move on to the main part of the park and to the large play equipment.  The girls had a big time climbing on the equipment and using the slides.  This gave Grandpa a chance to sit and relax on the "geezer bench" for awhile.  The play equipment in the park is relative new and can handle several kids at a time.  This was good because due to the great weather the playground was teeming with little ones today.  The girls played until around 5:30 when the sun started going down.  At that point the temperature started to drop pretty fast.

On the east side of the lake is a lighthouse replica that I've been meaning to go photograph.  Since the girls had never seen it this was a good time to go get a picture.  This is located in an area of several upscale restaurants.  We drove around to the restaurant parking area and then walked out to the lighthouse.  The sun was pretty much down by this time so did not get a good sunset picture of it.  We did walk on out behind it to take somewhat of a picture of the sunset.  These pictures also show how low a level the lake is right now.  Our area has been experiencing a real drought for the past couple of years and the lake levels are drastically down.  In the marina just to the south of the lighthouse there is no water and the docks and many sail boats are sitting in mud, with several almost laying on their sides.

The dark area behind the girls (on the right of the picture) is now dry land.  In normal times that area would be completely under water.  Since this is one of the city's main reservoirs (and the one that we receive water at my house) it is really crucial that we get rain in this part of the country.

Thanksgiving 2012

Lot's to eat and good company.

We celebrated a day of thanksgiving in this country.  This is a day where most people gather together with their families to give thanks for the blessings that have been bestowed on them.  This usually includes a large meal and in most cases the meal is set out around a large roast turkey.

As we did last year, my mother-in-law and I drove out to Midwest City to be with Carrie and her family.  As most folks who follow this blog know Carrie is my niece, by marriage.  She is also my mother-in-law's granddaughter.  Again, the day was spent at Carrie's in-law's house.  Mike and Barbara Carpenter have been very gracious in including us in their family activities this past year.

The meal was fantastic, with both turkey and smoked ham plus all the trimmings.  There was nine of us at the table.  In addition to Mike and Barbara, Carrie and John and their son, JJ, we also were joined by John's sister, Kathy, and her two sons.  After this great meal we all adjourned out to the patio to enjoy the great weather we've been experiencing.  The temps today were up around 75 degrees with a very light breeze.

Here are three of my favorite people: Carrie and her son JJ and my mother-in-law, Mardell Priolo.  This was soon after we all arrived and before we sat down to eat.

Vital memories on a sad day

Today marks one year since my beautiful wife, Joanne, succumbed to breast cancer.  Needless to say, this has been a very hard week.

The week started off with my birthday this past Monday.  Although many friends and relatives, including all my kids, sent birthday wishes I spent the day sitting around the house feeling sorry for myself.  Would have been better off getting out and doing something.

On Tuesday I decided it was time to get out of here and see some people.  Went to youngest son's house to spend some time with them during the evening.  His Cathy and her twin daughters all had birthdays this week so I took them their presents.  Alan and Cathy and their three precious girls can always lift my spirits.

Wednesday I picked up my wonderful niece, Carrie, for lunch.  Went to Romano's Macaroni Grill for a good Italian meal.  Spending time with Carrie is also always a great pick me up.  Afterward I was able to spend the afternoon working on cleaning out more of Joanne's clothing and getting it boxed up to donate to the needy.  (I continue to be amazed at the amount of things we accumulate over the years.  So far I've now donated nine very large boxes of clothing to Goodwill Industries and still have more to go.)  On Thursday I took the latest boxes up to the Goodwill Donation Center.

Now we get to today.  I've known for some time this was going to be a hard day to get through.  I also knew that it was also going to be very hard for Carrie.  (As has been posted here several times, Carrie was actually Joanne's niece.)  Sometime back my friend, Jonathan Beck Reed, had given me a pair of tickets to a play in which he was starring so, after a good dinner at Romano's Macaroni Grill, Carrie and I headed down to the Civic Center.  The play was a very intense drama called The Normal Heart.  This play had recently won Tony Awards on Broadway.  This was the Oklahoma premiere of the play and was being produced by CityRep, one of the many local acting companies here in town.  This evening was a good diversion for Carrie and I both.

This week has given me a chance, again, to reflect on the life that Joanne and I had together.  For over twenty-three years of marriage I really cannot fathom being with anyone else.  I have great memories and, fortunately, loads of pictures that we took all over this great country.  We had debated retiring when we did in 1966.  We were both under "normal" retirement age and could have continued to work.  Now, looking back, I am so grateful for those six years we had to travel and spend that time together.