Monday, July 24, 2006

Joni's Dad, Ralph Marone, Passed Away

Joni’s Dad Passed Away July 24, 2006


On the morning of July 24, 2006, we received 2 phone calls, one from Joni’s Mom and one from Joni’s brother, Rich. Joni knew something was terribly wrong right away before she even listened to the messages.

Joni’s Dad had awoken the morning of the 24th and complained of “not feeling good”. Joni’s Mom called 911 and Dad was taken to the hospital immediately. He passed away about 1 hour later in the emergency room of a heart attack at the age of 87.



Our whole family arrived in Florida to be with Joni’s Mom and for the funeral.



Joni’s brother, Rich, stayed for a week to help get Mom back on her feet and then had to get back to work. We were able to stay for 3 ½ weeks to help as well. It was very very hard to leave her alone. We will go back to Florida for the winter.

Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Fun Valley with the McKies

July 13-18, 2006

This year was extra fun at Fun Valley, CO. Our Trophy Club friends, Kathy and Skip McKie joined us for a week in Colorado.


The McKies decided to rent an RV and meet us at Fun Valley. They flew to Albuquerque and rented their RV, then drove to Fun Valley from there.

It was a fun packed week as we tried to do everything we could in just 1 week. As usual, Kandy and Val Franklin came for 2 weeks, as did our other “regulars”. The McKies and the Franklins also know each other from Trophy Club.


Activities included: rafting down the Rio Grande in Fun Valley, horseback riding, biking, pot lucks and music.


We were sorry the McKies had to leave so soon and hope they will join us for more adventures in the future.

Thursday, July 06, 2006

Terry and Terry Vance in Minnesota

Terry and Terry Vance
July 6, 2006

Our next stop took us to Eden Prairie, Minnesota and a visit with our long time friends, Terry and Terry Vance. Yes – both husband and wife have the same first name, so to make things easy, I will refer to them as Mr. Terry or Mrs. Terry.



Terry and Terry have tried to get us to visit them ever since they left Trophy Club about ten years ago. They have come back to Texas many times and stayed with us as they visited friends and family. We made up for all those visits all at once by staying with them a full two weeks. We all had a great time.

Mrs. Terry is a great decorator and seamstress. She has fixed up her house so beautifully inside and out. After checking out our motorhome, Mrs. Terry offered to make us a few decorative pillows and to update Joni’s flower arrangements. She did a GREAT job and has made our home look warm and cozy.


Mr. Terry enjoys the garden. He enjoys it sooooooo much that they decided to build a small garden at the entrance to their street and it wasn’t even on their property. As you can see, Delton helped Mr. Terry and got the job done quickly.


Mrs. Terry is a great cook and hostess. They gave a Sunday School party on the second evening of our visit. We met many of “the Terry’s” friends and saw them again when we went to church. Shown are Mr. Terry and Delton enjoying the party.


A highlight of our visit was going to the many lakes in the area and going kayaking and sea doing.
Many lakes are close to their house and as you can see we had a great time.

Mrs. Terry had fun learning how to kayak, but decided that Joni's hard kayak was alot easier to paddle than the blow up one.


Another highlight of our visit was a day on the golf course. We played one afternoon on a very difficult course. They had just held a tournament and had let the grass grow longer than usual which made the rough very hard to play out of - and we were in the rough a lot. Mr. Terry is just learning the game, so he was anxious for Delton to give him a few pointers.


Delton and Joni have been playing a lot of tennis lately and took advantage of the many tennis courts in the area. We all went to a local park and enjoyed a “hot” afternoon in the sun on the court.

July 4th took us back to the same park we played tennis in. We brought our chairs and enjoyed a spectacular fireworks display over the lake.

We really enjoyed our visit with our Texas friends in Minnesota. They plan on moving back to Texas one of these days. Both of their boys, Damon and Ryan, live in Texas. Ryan has given them two grandkids so there is great incentive to move back. Maybe next time. we will visit each other in Texas.

And now we are on to our next adventure - Fun Valley, Colorado.