March ? Hup, 2, 3, 4 . . .

OH ~

the month. What happened to February? Life is on cruise control pretty much. Rod and I did take a weekend trip over Valentine/Pres. Day to Flagstaff to visit Margo. Enjoyed our time there and got a good dose of snow piled everywhere. Margo can't see out of her bedroom window it is piled so high. Luckily the weather was beautiful and the roads clear. We even made the 2-hour drive to the Snowflake Temple where Margo did baptisms and we did a session. It was Rod's and my first time seeing that temple. We stopped in nearby Woodruff to visit Rod's aunt for about an hour then made the 2-hour return trip to Flagstaff.

Margo introduced us to Cracker Barrel Restaurant. We went twice - for dinner and breakfast. A lot of good food for the price. Rod ordered an apple cider to drink (the good kind that is made from the whole apple) and was shocked to get refills. His last refill at the end of the meal the waitress brought to him in a paper cup with a lid so he could take it with him. That impressed him so much he tipped her extra. We also, in honor of our 31st anniversary, tried Black Bart's. It has live entertainment in the form of NAU music majors performing musical numbers. The food was OK for the prices charged.

Cracker Barrel again? - YES!!

Black Bart's again? - NEVER

March is much looked forward to for me because of SPRING BREAK ! Yes ! Margo and I will head to Salt Lake City that week to attend my niece Jennifer's wedding. She is 3/4 of the way through her first year of teaching 3rd grade. Hmmmmm. Seems I remember us getting married about 3/4 of the way through my third year of teaching. I quit a month later because the hubs got a job in Wyoming and I didn't want to be separated from him for 2 months while finishing out the school year. But that was 31 years ago. We are excited to see family members. I even get to see my newest great-nephew, Bryce, who will be about 6 weeks old.

Unfortunately, Rod won't be able to come. Every March is a dreaded month for him due to work at the power plant. A turbine unit is shut down and partially torn apart to do maintenance, repairs, and upgrades. This begins the first weekend of March and goes for 4-5 weeks with everyone working 6-7 days a week, 10 hours a day. I just keep reminding him that all that overtime pay (- extravagant taxes) will go into our retirement savings. To make it a bit easier for him, I am going to do better at having dinner ready, or at least planned, every night. I am such a slacker at this. I told Rod before we got married that I was good at fixing the "big" dinners but horrible trying to figure out what to fix every night. And this is just dinner. I mean, so far it's been 7 days x 52 weeks/year x 31 years = 11,284 dinners!!!!!! Granted, I haven't actually cooked every day due to vacations, sickness/surgeries, eating out, etc, but I'm sure I'm well over 9,500 by now. Seems it was easier when we had a houseful of kids. Ahhh, the life of empty-nesters.