2000

It seems like only yesterday when many people (but not Smoot) were worried about Y2K and now we’re almost to Y2K+1. (Not that we’re anywhere near Arthur C. Clarke’s vision for 2001.)The year started with our having just returned from a delightful holiday visit with Jency James to the Kinkead-Weekes clan in Ramsgate, England. Because we were gone for Christmas we gave an Epiphany party at the cabin. Not long after we returned, we had a chance to visit with Jane and Jerry Jensen and their girls in College Station - a very different place from England, but it was fun to visit with more good friends. Jane had made a lovely hanging to go into our new home in Arizona.

The biggest news of the year, of course, was our move from Austin to Phoenix. Well, really to Scottsdale, one of the communities outside Phoenix. Smoot’s computer company merged with another firm based in Phoenix, but after some looking, we ended up finding a house we liked in Scottsdale. That means Smoot’s commute is around thirty minutes, more than we had wanted, but we’ve discovered you have to drive a long way to just about everything here in the Valley of the Sun. Smoot had been working in AZ during the week and commuting back to Texas on the weekends since November, 1999 and was ready to have his family with him. Charlotte was excited by the prospect of not having to work, at least outside the home. She was looking forward to being able to spend time cataloging her large collections of scifi and family papers.

February and March were busy getting ready for the great move. Charlotte had lived her entire life in Austin, Smoot since 1963 and we’d been in the house on San Gabriel for 25 years - half our lives. Needless to say we had a lot of stuff to go through. We leased a house in AZ in February and drove Smoot’s pick-up truck out with enough supplies to hold him until the official move. After over six years trolling for dollars, Charlotte left St. Edward’s University’s development office at the end of February. She was feted with lunch at her favorite Indian restaurant and given a typically crazy and great fun going away party with a Star Wars/Star Trek theme. In early March we had a House Cooling Party, as opposed to a house warming party where you bring something, the idea was for guests to take something away from the garage sale we had at the same time. It was great fun and we appreciated Jency and her niece, Ashley, organizing and handling the entire garage sale for us - a very big help.

In late March, we made another trek to AZ, this time in a 15 foot Penske truck loaded with Charlotte’s scifi collections and family papers, none of which she trusted to movers to transport. Smoot was amazed and none too pleased with the amount of stuff he had to get into the truck, but it meant we could take our cat, Muffin in a separate run from the dogs, which was better for him and us. Smoot had arranged to come back into Austin on Wednesday, March 29th, the evening before the moving van arrived. Charlotte was pleased he could get away from his busy job or so she thought, but at 7 am Thursday morning, he received a call from work, something had gone wrong and they needed his help. Looking back, that seems to have been an omen of things to come.

That evening, we had a going-away party with our Gang, Jency, Frances and Leonard Johnson and Angela and Ron Vasey at the Johnson’s. It was exciting to be moving to a new place, a new adventure, but we knew we were going to miss our many Austin friends. Friday, March 31, we loaded up our mini-van with our three sedated dogs, two turtles, several plants and luggage and said good-bye to Austin and to 2836 San Gabriel. We had decided not to sell, but to lease the property and found a renter who wanted to move in as soon as possible. Bob Lee was a great help in getting the house ready for a new occupant. The second trek from Austin to Phoenix in two weeks was long but mostly uneventful, except for going through a snow storm on April 1, appropriately April Fools Day. It took several weeks to unpack and settle in, but Charlotte enjoyed the challenge of it and Smoot was glad not to have to be part of the SW Airlines cattle call every week.

In May, we flew to California for two family weddings. Smoot’s nephew, Theron Stanford and Charlotte’s niece, Beverly Beall married the same day - one wedding in Pasadena, the other in Redondo Beach. We split our time between the two and got to visit with lots of family.

On June 20th, Smoot turned the big 5-0. Because we were so far from family and friends, Charlotte decided to do something different and throw a surprise Card Party, asking as many people as possible to send him cards that he could enjoy at his leisure. Smoot figured out that something was happening as more and more cards and e-mail began arriving. It was great fun to hear from so many of our friends and family. Charlotte took roses, doughnuts and a birthday cake to Smoot’s office on the big day, but to show how busy he and his colleagues were, they didn’t have time to cut the cake until the next day. Imagine, computer geeks too busy to eat cake! The next week our first visitors from Austin arrived. Chris Williams, my boss at St. Ed’s and her mother came by. It was great to see them and to reminisce about SEU.

Our first overnight visitors arrived in late July. Frances and Leonard stopped by for a couple of days on their way to California. We had a nice visit, even if the 110+ temperatures kept us from doing a lot outdoors! In early August we came back to Austin for a week. We had back-to-back joint 50th birthday parties at our cabin at Red Rock over the two weekends we were there. Since Jency and April Floyd were also turning 50 this year, it seemed appropriate to celebrate. We also got to visit with lots of friends during the intervening week. In a way it was like we’d never left, but in another way, we knew Austin really wasn’t home anymore. Charlotte turned 50 on August 26, but unfortunately Smoot had gotten sick so the celebration was more low key - a trip to the Phoenix zoo and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Talliesen West and a night at one of the many resorts in the area. Now we’re both official members of AARP and plan to become even more outspoken and crotchety as we get older!

Late October found us back in Austin for Betsy Yahn’s wedding. Smoot had been pleased to be asked to be a chalice bearer for the event at St. Michael’s. It was bittersweet going back to the church where we had been so involved for so many years. It was fun seeing friends, but it wasn’t our church anymore. In November, Jency came for a weekend visit. It was great having her with us and getting a chance to show her Smoot’s office and Charlotte’s daily routines around the house.

Our Christmas letter is usually only one page long, but this year we went longer because of the special events of the year. We aren’t sure how long we’ll be living out here. Smoot’s company, ClearData Communications, is still going through growing pains and, in spite of the name, it isn’t clear what its future will be, but Smoot is very proud of the team he’s put together. He is the Director of Network Services, and as the fateful early morning phone call in March foresaw, he seems to have become the Answer Man, the Miracle Worker, the one who keeps everything functioning smoothly, well, at least functioning. Who knows what the new year will bring, but no matter what, it should be interesting, no matter who the president of the country is!

2001

We might not be on a moon base or a monolith floating in space, but 2001 has still been quite an odyssey for us. We started the year thinking we’d be moving back to Austin, but after a couple of months of Smoot commuting from AZ to TX, his Austin based computer company merged with one head quartered in Phoenix so we decided not to move. It was a good decision because not long after the merger Smoot decided to cast his fate with still another company here. He is now the Senior Unix Architect for Corio, a computer company based in CA but with an office here. He’s worked for four companies in the less than two years we’ve been here, a good example of the volatility of the dot.com world. But he’s gotten a raise with each move so we’re not complaining! Charlotte has continued to work on organizing her familypapers and sci fi collections. It's been an interesting juxtaposition for her, from reading letters written in the first decades of the 20th century to cataloging collectibles of the future.

We had some great trips and visits with friends and family. And heard the famous theologian Marcus Borg in Jan. We hosted a surprise 70th birthday party for Fran Johnson at our Bastrop cabin in March. Later that month Smoot’s niece, Emily Stanford and her new husband, Chris Colson spent the night with us on their way to the Grand Canyon for their honeymoon. Charlotte’s cousin Barbara Rugeley drove alone all the way from CA for a short visit in April. Jency came for a short but fun visit in May. The day she left, Charlotte’s former boss and her husband, Chris and Frank Williams, arrived to stay with us while shopping for an RV. (Not surprisingly, the Valley is a center for RV sales.)

In June we went on our second trip to Ireland, visiting such places asBlarney Castle, the Waterford Crystal Factory, beautiful, Tolkien-esque Glendalough, and historic Dublin where we saw the Book of Kells. We drove through Belfast, Northern Ireland, avoiding The Troubles and arrived safely in Moville for a week of golf with Smoot’s Austin golfing buddies John and Jeff Kistner and Donny Crook. The wives, Mona, Leslie, Dena and Charlotte got to shop and relax and do a little touring. It was a wonderful two weeks. In July Fran and Leonard came through for a second visit with us since we've been here. In August Smoot had to be out of town for Charlotte’s 51st birthday, but he made up for it by taking her to the 35th anniversary Star Trek Convention in Las Vegas in September! Jency joined us for the fun event.

November was a very eventful month. We celebrated Smoot’s nephew Geoffrey’s wedding in Austin on Nov. 10th. But the celebration was tempered by sadness at the death of Smoot’s mother, Paulette Montesi Mitchell on Nov. 8th. We flew to Virginia for the memorial service the next weekend. Charlotte created a scrapbook of pictures from Paulette’s life to honor her and so that the residents in their retirement home as well as her grandchildren could see her as she was a beautiful, sparkling, intelligent and gracious woman and loving mother.

The next big news in November was the sale of our house in Austin and the purchase of one in Scottsdale. We are very excited about moving into our new home. Charlotte is especially excited about the separate studio building for her collections!

2002

The year started with our settling into our new house. Charlotte’s sister Catherine came on Jan. 2nd for a fun visit and to help organize family papers. (She found a Lexington Minuteman ancestor!) The day she left, Jan. 7th, the movers came to transport our furniture, appliances, books and other large items. Since our new house is close to the old, Charlotte made lots of trips transporting all the rest - her collections, family papers and the smaller household items over the next several weeks. Getting the boxes unpacked and all our stuff put away took several weeks, but it took over a month to finish unpacking and displaying her collections!

We’re pleased with our yard and fruit trees, especially our lemon tree. It produced enough fruit for us to freeze 5 half gallon containers of lemon juice and still have 57 pounds of lemons left over to take to the food bank! Smoot fixed our fountain (getting spattered with muck for his trouble) and Charlotte put a small pond in the atrium off the master bathroom, hoping to create an area that would attract birds and be a nesting spot for her turtles.

The one negative about our new yard was the noise from the nearby 101 freeway. The constant roar made staying in the yard uncomfortable and

talking almost impossible. A neighborhood group was forming to encourage the city of Scottsdale and the Arizona Highway Dept. to lay rubberized

asphalt on the areas of the highway closest to homes. We joined the group and also got involved in the Home Owners Association. Even though

Smoot said he wouldn’t get involved in local politics for a while, our neighbors had other ideas. Because of his background on the Austin City

Council, Smoot was elected treasurer of the HOA in March. After serving as church treasurer for five years, here he goes again!

On March 10 we gave our first party in our new house. We were calling it our 7 Friends Party since that’s how many people we had invited, a

much smaller number than we used to invite to our parties in Austin! Unfortunately three of the seven couldn’t come so it ended up being a 4

Friends Party, one of Smoot’s Corio colleagues and his wife, Ray and Brandee Sears and one of Smoot’s golfing buddies and his wife, Jay and Martha Campbell. Not able to come were Mark and Pam Ansboury and our realtor, Marcia Schaeffer. Since we haven’t joined a church

and Charlotte is a hermit, Smoot’s work and golf are our two social communities.

In April we had our first overnight visitor, Kathleen Jenkins. Later in the month, Smoot joined his father, sister Suzanne and brother Rick on their first ‘family vacation’ since 1965 and to the amazement of everyone, they not only survived the experience without killing each other, they actually had a good time. After a trip to Utah and a night in Las Vegas, the group came to our house for a few days of rest and recovery. The pool was too cold for swimming, but we enjoyed soaking in the hot tub.

Jency came to visit us May 4-10. The weather had warmed up enough for us to play in the pool as well as the hot tub and it was great fun having her with us. May also found Charlotte in line for the midnight showing of Star Wars: Episode II, Attack of the Clones on the 16th. Smoot joined her in line at 11:30 to take part in the phenomenon. She has slowed down in her collecting of Star Wars and Star Trek goodies, but only because she’s running out of room in her 700 sq. ft. studio! In June an accident claimed the life of one of Smoot’s former ClearData colleagues and our house became Central Station after the funeral. We had a wake/party that lasted until 2:00 am, way later than our usual bedtime, but since it was the first time many of the group had gotten together since the company’s bankruptcy, it seemed to be a cathartic experience for everyone. Smoot’s current job at Corio has been frustrating but he’s once again become the mentor for his group and Mr. Fix-it for the entire company.

In August, we celebrated our 29th anniversary in an unusual fashion, by attending the International Comic Convention at the San Diego Convention

Center! Over 65,000 people from all over the world attended the four day event. Smoot played golf one day and did some work, but Charlotte was at

the convention from morning till night taking in panels on Star Trek, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings and many other popular culture topics, getting to hear Ray Bradbury talk about his career, take part in a ‘mockumentary’ by Mark (Luke Skywalker) Hamill, visiting the booths in the huge exhibit area and generally having a wonderful time. Later in August, we had a visit from Barbara and Con Rusling and Smoot’s Uncle Ralph and Aunt Ann Mitchell. For Charlotte’s 52nd birthday, we drove down to Bisbee in southern AZ, toured the town and its famous mine, then wandered down the wooden sidewalks of Tombstone, the site of the shoot-out at the OK Corral.

In Sept. we spent a week in Austin, having a great time visiting lots of old friends and enjoying our cabin for the first time in almost a year. In November we drove to Redondo Beach, CA for Charlotte’s niece Beverly’s baby shower. We got to visit with both of Charlotte’s sisters, two of her nieces and a cousin! We had taken 7 boxes of Charlotte’s mother’s and grandmother’s pictures with us for family members to go through and Charlotte had written a family history, incorporating information she’d discovered in her work on the family papers.

Angela and Ron Vasey joined us for Thanksgiving and spent several days with us. Between their two dogs and ours, the house was hopping and our cat was mad!

We spent Christmas back in Austin, giving us more time to visit friends and family. It was nice seeing so many of Smoot's family. Smoot's brother, Rick and Dad Mitchell came down to visit Rick's son Geoff and his wife Kursten. Because so many Mitchells were going to be together, Dad's brother Ralph joined us as well. When we all got together there were three generations with five Mitchell men in one place. It was a Mitchell extravaganza and fascinating hearing Dad and Ralph reminisce about growing up in Utah.

The photos above are from the party at Alfred Stanley and Kathy Guido's house on Dec. 28 showing us (in the tops Catherine gave us for Christmas) and a high-powered strategy session by leading current and former Austin Democrats.

These photos are from the delightful New Year's Eve dinner we shared with Joe and Mickey Moldenhauer.

2003

When the year began, we were still in Austin celebrating the holidays. We were there for two weeks, great for visiting, but also long enough for Smoot's allergies to kick in. By the time we drove back to AZ, he was sick. But the desert warmth and dryness soon cleared him up, just in time for us to harvest 169 pounds of lemons from our one very fecund lemon tree.

Another special event in January - we added a new member to our family - a great niece. On Jan. 8th (Elvis' birthday!) my sister Madeline's daughter Bev had an 8 lb, 14 oz. baby girl she and her husband Steve named Ava Beall Siniscalchi. A big name for a big baby. (This picture above right shows Ava, Bev, Steve, and also Megan and Stevie his children from a previous marriage.) Starting at the end of January and culminating in April, my sisters and I sold our ranch near Cisco, Texas. It had been in our mother's family since 1902.

January was not a good month for work related things. Smoot's job situation kept getting worse and worse including a 10% pay cut. He had been looking for a new job, but hadn't gotten any nibbles. With his years of experience, three books published and breadth of expertise, companies should be lining up to offer him jobs, but life seems to reward mediocrity and brown-nosing instead of excellence. And to add insult to injury, I was turned down as a volunteer at my local library! I've got a MLS and was willing to shelve books and other menial duties for free just to see if I would want to get back into library work out here. And I was turned down.

In February, I took part in the Great American Backyard Bird Count where people are asked to count the type and number of birds they have in their backyards to help scientists get an idea of the bird population. We've got the common types, House Sparrows, House Finches, Great Tailed Grackles, Mourning Doves, Inca Doves and one fat pigeon, but we've also got a bunch of beautiful Anna's Hummingbirds with bright red heads and green bodies. My flock of hummers got bigger and even pushier. I had four feeders and in one of them I had to replenish the sugar water every two days. One night there were four hummers at that feeder at the same time, unusual since they're so territorial.

We added a Fire Bellied Toad and Japanese Fire Bellied Newt to our household. They're cute but not real active! So now we had a cat (Muffin), two dogs (Fritz and Anya),

two turtles (Mr. ‘One Spot’ Turtle & Lady Turtle), two Cockatiels (CiCi & Cuervo who died in Dec) and assorted fish including our pond Goldfish and our bathtub Oscar.

In March, we had some nice, if short, family visits. On the 8th, Smoot's nephew Sean Stanford came by and on the 31st, his brother Rick did. They were both in town on business and made time to see us. It was fun catching up with them.

April found us back in Austin. Smoot had been appointed to the board of Encompass, a national HP users group and their board meeting was the weekend of the 11th. It turned out my 35th high school reunion was that same weekend, so we both squeezed a lot into a few days. I got a tour of the new HRC building and had lunch with Suzanne Casey and Maria Wells

Smoot and I were also able to get together with The Gang, our group of close friends, Jency, Fran & Leonard, and Ron & Angela. Leonard's brother Larry was visiting so we celebrated a belated birthday party for him at the Johnsons. The weekend in Austin also included a sad event, the funeral of the Rev. Frank Doremus. Smoot wasn't able to attend, but I did and got to see lots of old (and some new) St. Michael's friends, Betty Doremus, Frank's wife, had been ill with Alzheimers for several years. She died the week before Thanksgiving making it a sad year for the Doremus family.

Also in April, I finished the article on my Carl family for the Summitt Family newsletter. Doing the article was the impetus to finally get my website started. Another nice outcome was that it forced me to contact family members I hadn't talked to in ages, if ever. I began a delightful phone and e-mail correspondence with Wanda Carl Pyburn, the daughter of one of my father's cousins, Tommy Carl. I had a nice chat with Tim Word, a grandson of one of my father's uncles, Newt Carl. I've also been corresponding with Laurette Carl Lamb, daughter of my father's cousin Lee Carl After I finished work on my Carl line, I switched back to work for a while on my maternal grandmother's Perkins and grandfather's Ramsey line. I made contact with several distant Perkins cousins and found them to be delightful and helpful people too. Nancy Naylor was especially helpful in getting me in contact with other Perkins relatives including Bob Bull, and Rick and Lothrop Perkins. And Nackie Aldrich, Mary Lou Follett Holm's daughter was willing to be my contact for her side of the family. They are all descendants of my great grandfather Noah Cushman Perkin's brother Lothrop Perkins.

In April the weather was especially nice - our prim roses were blooming, the wild birds were flocking to our feeders, our turtles were sunning themselves on their rocks and all seemed right with the world. Especially since I had finally gotten my new printer! I had asked for a photo quality, flat bed printer for Christmas, but it turned out my computer was so old, in order to get a printer/copier/scanner, I had to get an entirely new computer system. Smoot got me a desktop I-Mac. So now I've got my PowerBook for sitting on the couch, catching up on my e-mail and doing genealogical searches. And I have my I-Mac with a photo quality printer to copy, scan and print out photos and documents. I've been a happy camper and have put a lot of mileage on my new system. The photo shows my genealogy work table with my wall of photos.

May was a month for graduations. Over the same weekend of the 16th, Smoot's niece, Emily Stanford Colson, graduated from Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk, and my nephew Ben Beall received a master of science in information technology from Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh. We are very proud of both of them. If we'd had a transporter, we could have made both events, but we didn't so we were only able to attend Emily's celebration, staying with Rick and Marilyn in Virginia Beach. We enjoyed seeing their house and visiting with so many neat people, including Dad's friend Joyce who, sad to say, died in August..

June was a month for politics, birthdays, books and malfunctioning machinery. On the 7th, we went to a gathering of Democrats. It was a fundraiser to help raise enough money to open a Democratic Party campaign headquarters in Scottsdale. U.S.Rep. Barney Frank was the guest of honor. On Friday the 20th, Smoot reached the venerable age of 53. We went to lunch with his colleague Ray Sears and Ray's wife Brandee. (In the photo, you can see Brandee in the mirror; unfortunately Smoot's face was covered by the flash.) Then we went home for the usual gifts and cake.

On Friday afternoon June 27th, our air conditioner compressor died - on the last business day of the week AND when the temp was supposed to get to 114! Our old unit, original to the house so dating to the 1980s, was not worth fixing and we had to wait until Monday to get a new unit installed. Every minute without AC meant the house was getting hotter and hotter. We moved ourselves and the animals to the studio building, sleeping three nights on the futon, but at least it still had AC. The temp in the main house got up to 97 degrees! The animals were not pleased with the change to their routine, but it got hot enough that even they were willing to stay in the studio without too much complaint. The new unit was put in on Monday and we were back to our usual spots, sitting on the couch in the living room with our computers on our laps. Life could resume.

By mid July Smoot's work situation had settled down to the point we were once again able to go to Comic Con in San Diego. Smoot and I signed up for the Star Wars Fan Club breakfast with Jeremy Bulloch, the actor who played the original Boba Fett. I'd heard him speak before and have a really cute picture of him and me. He's English and really quite sweet and funny, for having played a ruthless bounty hunter in the original Star Wars films. At the breakfast, I sat next to fellow Trade Federation member Peter Bateman. It was a busy and interesting weekend. Smoot spent the mornings watching the British Open on TV except when he played golf on Friday the 18th. He joined me for some of the talks and to meander around the gigantic exhibit hall. The event was even more crowded this year because of the big name stars who appeared. I didn't get in to see any of their presentations, but was kept plenty busy with what I was able to see and do. Overall it was fun, but not quite as much fun as last year.

The week after we got back from San Diego, Fran and Leonard Johnson came by for a visit. They stayed with us for a couple of days going out to and coming back from California to visit family and friends. It was fun to see them, even if we didn't do much but hang around and chat. In between their visits, Rick came to town again so we got to see him again too.

The big event of August and really the year was our 30th anniversary on August 4th. I had asked Smoot to get me some flowers so who should I run into at our local grocery store on the big day when I was getting some stuff? Smoot, buying me four dozen roses (since they were on sale, buy three dozen, and get one free)! He had just come back from a meeting at his office and was most surprised to see me walk up. But since he had a phone meeting in 15 minutes, he dumped the roses in my cart and let me pay for them and bring them home so he could scuttle off to his meeting! For the picture in the middle, we wore our wedding attire. I was surprised we could still get into them.

My 53rd birthday was on Friday, August 26. I’d wanted to do as we did last year and drive to some interesting places in AZ, do some touring of our own state over that weekend. But the gas crisis put an end to that idea and Smoot was still recovering from his sinus infection. We ended up stuffing ourselves at Ruth's Chris Steak House. (Also amazing, it's been 20 years since we went to China. 20 years ago I celebrated my b'day in Hong Kong. The years go by quickly.) We waddled back from the restaurant for ice cream and cake and gifts.

Smoot continued to be really depressed about his work situation. He had applied for two jobs in the area and as usual hadn't gotten any response. The company that his golfing buddy from HP was going to form was put on hold. The University of Phoenix got back with him about teaching but they pay so little, Smoot decided it wasn't worth the time and effort. He finally had had enough frustration with Corio and submitted his resignation at the end of August. His last day was to be in early Oct. so we could have medical coverage till the end of the month but it kept getting extended as his boss tried to come up with a way to placate him and keep him on staff. We thought about making an RV vacation since he'd have the free time after he quit, but that didn't happen.

In the middle of September our bees went rogue. We knew we had bees in our front yard. They hadn't caused any problems that we knew of. But when our neighbors, Marilyn and Maurice Shupe, told us that our bees had chased the yard men down the street and gotten into their back yard and stung Marilyn, we knew we had to do something. In the midst of this craziness, Smoot relaxed by playing golf. He was in a tournament league and played in their two day championship on Sept 20 and 21. The Alice Cooper Blood Bath tournament was the 19th so he had three intense days of golf. He says it almost killed him. But he got to meet Alice Cooper, who lives in the Valley. Turns out he's much shorter than he appears on TV!

Just when we thought Smoot would be leaving Corio without another job in hand, he found out about a position and was hired. On Monday, October 6, he started work for Distributed Techtonics that has a contract with IBM Global Services that has a contract with Honeywell. It was a six month contract position which means he doesn't get sick or vacation leave, but he does have a medical plan and best of all, it pays him more than he made at Corio. But ironically, he's working less for more money. At Corio he was constantly busy and constantly frustrated with the terrible management. But he got to work from home. Now he was expected to be at the office, at least four days a week. His office was in Tempe, about the same distance as his old Corio office. But he didn't have to go to his Corio office very often. Now he was in a dreary, window-less, Dilbert-world cubicle and not happy about it. He was also not being kept busy. He'd gotten used to getting up early so he left home around 6:30 AM, works through lunch and was home around 4. At least he missed the worst of the traffic.

Our Austin friends, Linda Colbert and Steve Fildes came to visit us on the way back from their trip to the Grand Canyon. They stayed with us from October 11-14. They were tired from their trip so we didn't do a whole lot. We went to Cosanti on Sunday and since Steve is an architect, they of course had to tour Talliesen, Frank Lloyd Wright's winter studio. It was fun and touching having them with us. Linda was especially moved by getting to see her dogs again. Fritz and Anya had belonged to her and her late husband before she had to give them up and we adopted them. Seeing them, she burst into tears from the memories. She admitted we'd taken good care of them and that they looked healthy and happy.

A project I worked on in Sept. and Oct. was getting my website officially up and running. In September, Smoot took the place of the president of Encompass at a professional training in Chicago and returned to the Windy City in the first week of November for an Encompass board meeting. We had originally planned to spend a week in Austin after the Chicago meeting, but with Smoot's new job, he didn't feel he could take the time off, so our trip was cancelled. We don't know when we'll get back there.

We had a quiet Thanksgiving. At one time Ron and Angela had considered coming out again, like they had last year, but their plans changed. Then we hoped our wonderful neighbors, Marilyn and Maurice, would be able to join us, but they too had other plans. So for the first time I can remember, we were alone on Thanksgiving. That didn't keep us from being thankful for all our blessings including family and friends we wished we could see more often.

I broke down and decided to get into the holiday whirl early. I usually wait until after Thanksgiving, but stores started putting out their Christmas decorations after Halloween, some even before! I started by treating myself to an O-27 gauge Lionel train set to go with my Christmas village scene. Then I decided to get an HO (smaller gauge) train set to go around our Christmas tree.

And then after Thanksgiving I set up my nativity village.

In addition, in our front yard I've put out our (electric) luminarias, mesh lights on our bushes and tube lights up our tree. And the most recent purchase, two lighted deer. Our most recent home improvement project was another replacement. The pool cover started tearingAdding the cost of that to the several thousand smackers we put out for the new AC/heater, it's been an expensive year, but that kind of thing happens with a house, as I'm sure you know. Above right, our very fruitful grapefruit tree. Smoot goes out every morning, picks two grapefruit and has naturally cooled grapefruit juice with his breakfast! Now if only our spindly little orange tree would grow up.

In December we went to two fun neighborhood parties. The first was at Bob Willey's; the second was a board meeting of the HOA at Jane and Ted Bensen's that was also a party. Then on Dec.13, we attended the opening of the Democratic Party headquarters in Scottsdale. Smoot has volunteered to help with their e-mail and computer projects. The Governor, Janet Napolitano and Scottsdale Mayor Mary Manross both spoke and afterwards Smoot got to meet them and tell them what a good job he thought they were doing.

On Saturday, Dec.20th, we decided to go check out some of the holiday lights. Then we went to the Railroad Park, enjoyed looking at some of the amazing train set-ups they have and walked around the lighted park. It was lucky we did the viewing when we did because on Sunday I was struck down with the flu. And we'd both gotten flu shots. Not a very convenient time.

I recovered enough to celebrate Christmas though. It was low-key, but fun.

Smoot also continues to play golf, though now that he has to go to the office almost everyday, he can't sneak in a quick game during the week like he used to and can only play on the weekends. His handicap, that had gotten down to 8, has crept back up to 10, much to his chagrin. I continue doing my genealogical work. This year I decided to go through the many boxes and scrapbooks of photos I have and pick out pics that show winter scenes from the early days and holiday gatherings from the later days. I ended up with 113 sets of images from 1913 to 1996. I put them on a CD and shared them with the family. I also posted them on my website.

2004

The year started with our decision to sell the cabin in Red Rock. We hadn't been able to get back to Texas as often as we'd hoped so it didn't make sense to keep it. On Jan 14, we had a quick visit with Fran and Leonard Johnson at the Phoenix airport as they were on their way to CA for his step-father's funeral. From the 25th to the 30th, Jency James came out and stayed with us. She took me to the State Capitol to see Jency's friend Janet Fisher and my friend Richard Pearce-Moses with whom I’d worked at HRC many years ago. Both Janet and Richard work for the Arizona State Library located in the AZ state capitol. We also visited Talliesen, Frank Lloyd Wrights' studio. It's fun having visitors and that seems to be the only time we get out and do touristy things!

Earlier in Jan we'd discovered a new trick by our Cockatiel, Cici. We'd been trying to get him used to being held when he suddenly jumped out of his cage, something he'd never done, and when Smoot put his hand on the floor to try to pick him up, the bird walked up his arm and sat on his shoulder! You can see Smoot holding the heavy leather glove we thought we'd need to pick him up without being bitten or scratched. Cici must have been trained to do that, but we hadn't known it until his accidental escape. We started to let him out to fly around the kitchen, and occasionally even the living room, blocking off our other animals, of course. He seemed to enjoy the outing, but is always ready to go back in his cage.

Smoot and Mark at their laptops. Smoot, Rich and Mark check out R2D2.

February started with a visit from Mark Ansboury, Smoot's former boss, the one who brought us to AZ. He is working in Cleveland and was back for a visit. We had supper with him and Rich Kittle, Smoot's Linux Best Practices colleague.

Smoot was working for  Distributed Techtonics on a contract for IBM at Honeywell doing system architecture. He was required to work in a soul-less, Dilbert-world cubicle, something he'd not had to do for quite a while, having finagled working from home in his previous positions. He was not a happy camper and became even more unhappy when, out of the blue, his contract was cancelled early and he was officially unemployed at the end of Feb. (The higher ups wanted to terminate him at the end of Jan, but his immediate boss got him extended through Feb.) But as he had done several times since we moved to AZ, he immediately got more work, this time a contract job with Intertel. He'd been frustrated for quite a while with the management of the high tech companies where he'd been an employee and since contract work seemed to be coming in, he decided to go back to what he'd done years ago, being a self-employed computer consultant.

On Valentine's Day 2004, we celebrated by going to a Star Trek convention in Mesa. I got my photo taken with Chase Masterson, the actress who played Leeta on Deep Space Nine. Above right, William Shatner was the guest of honor at the convention. I hadn’t been able to buy many new things for my collections; I was running out of room in her studio, much to Smoot's relief. But I picked up a few things at the con. March started with Smoot going to Cupertino March 4-6 for an Encompass board meeting. Then Sharon Maynard, Cici's previous owner came over for a visit and got to see him up close.

We were in Austin from the 14th through the 21st, to visit friends, clean out the cabin and for Smoot to have some business meetings. On the 14th we visited with Larry and Susan LeVieux and saw their new condo. On the 15th we joined with The Gang (Jency, Fran. Leonard, Angela & Ron), Rose & Russ to celebrate Fran's birthday. On the 16th the UT School of Business presented a one day symposium for people thinking about becoming a consultant. Smoot already has been one, but he thought it might be interesting to attend and see what they had to say. On Sat Mar 20 we had a Cabin Cooling Party to visit with friends and have them take away as much stuff as possible.

We filled a 10 ft truck but still had a lot of stuff to leave for Jency to dispose of. After cleaning out the cabin, we had the long two-day drive back to AZ and the challenge of finding places for all the items we'd brought with us, especially the family history boxes. I put up more plastic shelves, but they looked cluttered so I came up with the idea of creating a curtain wall that we thought looked much better.

On Apr 4, we attended the AZ book festival and got to hear Ursula K. LeGuin, Alan Dean Foster, who lives in the Valley, and Clay Thompson, author of the very popular Arizona Republic column Valley 101.

We had nice chats with some members of the Star Wars 501st and the Rebel Alliance.

On Apr 7, Rich Kittle was in town again and treated us to pizza in Mesa at the Organ Stop that has the biggest Wurlitzer organ in the world, with over 5,500 pipes! In mid April Smoot went on two business trips, to Cleveland and Morristown, New Jersey. On Apr 19th Smoot began consulting for Harley-Davidson's financial division in Carson City, NV - a short gig that turned into a long one.

From May 1-8, we took a fun trip to New England. Smoot was to give a talk on Linux/Open Source on Tuesday in Nashua, NH, May 4 so we flew into Providence, RI the previous Saturday to do some sightseeing before we had to be at the seminar. We spent Saturday night at the historic Biltmore in downtown Providence. Sunday morning we set off for Cape Cod. On the way, I wanted to go through Middleboro, MA where Noah Cushman Perkins was born and raised before he moved to Ottawa, IL. We decided to go all the way to the end of the Cape and spent the night in Provincetown. Smoot had wanted to see the Cape and I wanted to tour the Pilgrim Monument and Museum there in P'town, as the locals call it. On Monday, we drove to the Minuteman Center in Lexington, MA. From Lexington, we headed north. Smoot's talk went well on Tuesday as did the other talks on Wednesday. We had supper Wednesday night with the seminar founder, Rich Kittle and his wife Karen, and some of the other participants, all of whom Smoot knew and had recruited to give talks or attend. On Thursday, we left Nashua and went to see the Clydesdales at the Budweiser plant near there in Merrimack, NH then drove into Maine. We tried to see the Naval Shipyard Museum in Kittery, but with the war on, they weren't allowing tourists on the base. Smoot wanted to see the Maine coast so we drove along the old highway that wound its way through lots of little towns full of vacation homes. We had lunch at Fox's Lobster House next to the very picturesque Nubble Light House. We spent the night in Portland, ME, where Smoot got sick. The next day he was up to a little touring so we went to see Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's house. We rested the rest of Friday and on Saturday started the drive back to the airport. We took a slight detour to see the new bridge and 'big ditch' in Boston, then back into Providence. The flight back seemed long, and we went from temps in the 60s to the 100s in AZ, but it was still nice to be home. Traveling is fun, but coming home is nice too. More info and photos are at http://www.charlottes-web.com/Family,Friends_Only/2004_New_England_trip.htm.

We went to Cape Cod, saw the Pilgrim monument in Provincetown, MA, the Minuteman statue in Lexington, the Clydesdale stables in Merrimack, NH, and Smoot took a dip in the hotel hot tub in Portland, ME.

The biggest event in May 2004 was the birth on the 29th of Harper Charlotte Mitchell, Geoff and Kursten's daughter and our great niece. She weighed 8 lbs 9 oz, and was 22 inches long. I was so surprised, pleased and honored that they named their first child after me.

June 4-6, 2004, I joined Smoot in NV and spent the weekend at Lake Tahoe, an area as beautiful as its reputation. We drove the 60+ miles all around the lake, then through scenic Truckee, saw the famous Donner pass and it's Emigrant Trail Museum and Pioneer monument at the Donner Memorial State Park, and then had lunch in Virginia City. VC reminded us of Bisbee AZ because of its location on a mining hill, and of Tombstone because of its old west now tourist town appearance. A fun but short weekend.

For Smoot's birthday on June 20, we went to a Mexican restaurant with his golfing/HP buddy Jay and his wife Martha Campbell, and later had ice cream and cake at our house.

Above left, John Kerry in June. Above right, the Beall-Siniscalchi clan at the 60-40 celebration in July 2004

On June 29, 2004, we went to hear Democratic presidential candidate, John Kerry speak at the La Raza convention in Phoenix. Also in June, I bought a fancy new scanner to help me with my genealogical work. Back in Jan, I’d started on This Is Your Life scrapbooks for Madeline and Billy's 60th birthdays and 40th anniversary celebration on July 4th. The scanner helped make the project possible.

On July 10, 2004, Fredi Bleeker and her fiance Paul Franks came to visit. And on July 24, 25, Jane and Jerry Jensen stayed with us and enjoyed a tour of the Heard Museum.

Celebrating our 31st anniversary at the Cousins Reunion. Above right, a tour of earthquake damage.

On Aug 4, we celebrated our 31st anniversary and the next day flew to Marin County, CA for a reunion of the Mitchell cousins. I’d worked very hard for many weeks to produce illustrated family trees and biographical sketches on the family going back six generations and down to the present day. Loretta Nixon was indispensable in the compilation of info on and photos of the ancestors. In the process of compiling the scrapbook, we were lucky to get in contact with Cheryl Mitchell Smith, Smoot's cousin. We hadn't seen her since 1980 and it was nice to get back in touch. She wasn't able to attend the reunion, but said she would try for the next one. The reunion was Aug 6-8 and included Suzanne Mahoney, Marti Rutishauser, David Rampton, Claudia Bowles and us. We visited, toured, shopped, ate, reminisced a little and talked about plans for a bigger reunion in the future. More photos from the reunion are at http://www.charlottes-web.com/Family,Friends_Only/Mitchell_passwd/2004_Cousins_reunion .htm. And the Mitchell histories I did are at http://www.charlottes-web.com/Mitchell_index.htm.

Aug 15-21, 2004, Smoot attended HP World in Chicago in his capacity as a board member of Encompass, an HP users organization.. We celebrated my birthday on Aug 26, 2004. We went out for Indian food, my favorite treat. Then Smoot gave me some fun gadgets. First, a pair of binoculars with a digital camera inside so I can watch my birds and take digital photos of them. Secondly and fanciest, a digital camcorder., a timely gift with the family gatherings coming up in the fall

We had been trying to decide on a time to fly to Austin to meet my namesake and visit with Geoff and Kursten. By sheer luck, the Federation of Genealogical Societies was holding its annual meeting in Austin Sept 8-11 so we decided to come then. We got to meet beautiful Harper Charlotte Mitchell. We arrived on Tues, Sep 7, visited with Geoff, Kursten and HC then on Wed I attended the first day of the conference that was to last from 8-6 through Sat. It was so intense that by Friday noon I was pooped and on top of that, I got sick with an intestinal bug. We celebrated Jency’s birthday early on Sep 11. We stayed at a very nice B&B, Brava House, in old west Austin. We drove by our old house on San Gabriel and were disappointed to see that our bright colors had been replaced by less flashy ones.

Photos of Pico and Annie that were attached to Chris’ request for new homes for them. Chris, Scotty and Rudy. Pico & Annie in their new home.

On Sep 19, 2004, Chris Williams sent out a very touching mass e-mail to friends and family asking if anyone could adopt their three cats. Chris and Frank were going to start living and traveling in an RV and their cats couldn’t handle the new environment. We volunteered to take the two indoor cats, Pico and Annie. Chris and Frank were driving out to CA to get their new RV so they stopped on the way to deliver our new cats to us on Sep 26, 2004. They were keeping their two Japanese Chinn dogs, Rudy and Scotty, because they loved to travel. We gave the cats our guest room while they and Muffin learned to get along.

Dad Mitchell’s 85th birthday celebration. Dick, Ralph, Ann, Smoot, me, Rick, Geoff. Four generations.

The big event in Oct 2004 was our trip to Virginia Beach Oct 7-11 to celebrate Dad’s 85th birthday at Rick and Marilyn’s. As a special gift for Dad, I expanded on the work I'd done on the Cousins Reunion scrapbook and created a This Is Your Life book for him that covered his entire life with photos and biographies not only of him but his kids, grandkids, siblings and ancestors. Rick bought a scanner for me to use while I was there. Mr. Mitchell had brought 8 photo albums and lots of loose photos and Ralph had brought an album of old family photos too. I spent every free minute scanning.

We flew back on Mon Oct 11 and that Wed, Rick came out to Phoenix with Fran Bartlett, the head of a company for which Rick is doing consulting and we got to have a short visit.

On Oct 19, 2004, there was a Daily Texan article on Smoot in their Where Are They Now? series.

Smoot was in Austin in Nov and stayed over to celebrate Leonard's birthday on Nov 9.

After having worked for Kerry’s presidential campaign, I was very upset when he lost. After the election I decided I needed a faith community to support me through hard times and the upcoming holiday season. No more wandering in the wilderness. Since we hadn’t liked the Episcopal churches we’d visited, I said let’s check out a Unitarian church. Little did I know they were Unitarian Universalist and had been since 1961! We found information online on the closest church and went there on Nov 14, 2004. John Burciaga, a former Baptist now UU minister preached a powerful sermon on the election and the choir was good. The people weren’t very friendly. No one talked to us at the coffee hour, but we decided we wanted to get back into a choir so talked to the choir director, Connie Clemons and asked when practice was. We missed a Sunday because of our trip to Pittsburgh for the wedding but went back the next Sunday. On Dec 1, we showed up at choir practice and ended up practicing songs in several languages including Spanish and Hebrew and later Swahili. We wondered what we’d gotten ourselves into, but we kept going back and UUCP, the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Phoenix became our second home and the choir our second family.

The big positive event in Nov 2004 was Ben and Denise’s wedding. We flew into Pittsburgh on Nov 18 and stayed at the elegant Renaissance Hotel. The ladies had high tea at the hotel. We got to meet and visit with Denise’s family at the rehearsal dinner on Friday night and the wedding was on Sat Nov 20, 2004. The wedding was at The First Presbyterian Church near the Renaissance hotel where we all stayed. The lavish reception was held at the hotel. Being old folks and having an early plane to catch the next morning, we left the party early.

The three sisters and the family group at Ben and Denise’s wedding.

We'd gotten a bid in Oct on the cabin and on Nov 30, we closed, ending our era of multiple homes (and mortgages). It had taken a long time to find a buyer, but another bit of our history had come to a close. We enjoyed the cabin while we had it. We had Thanksgiving dinner on Nov 25, 2004 with Jay and Martha Campbell. It was chaos, as we expected. Martha has 14 grandkids and all but 3 (I think) were at the gathering. We tried to stay out of the way, chatted with Jay, Smoot's golfing buddy and enjoyed the food!

Ann and Ralph came to visit after Thanksgiving. We went to see the holiday lights at the LDS temple in Mesa. Annie and Pico settled into their new space.

I'd been thinking about what we'd do the first time we had overnight guests since the kitties lived in the guest room. I'd decided that I'd move Annie and Pico's stuff into our bedroom since they seem to have reached détente with Muffin. I didn't expect that situation to be very soon. Then Ralph and Ann called and said they'd be in the Valley over Thanksgiving and wanted to see us and for Ralph to play golf with Smoot. Great! But what they didn't tell us until they got here was that they expected to spend the nights of Fri Nov 26 and Sat Nov 27 with us! I tried not to faint, sent Ralph and Ann out to pick lemons and frantically moved the cats' things, vacuumed the guest room, changed the sheets and generally got the room and bath ready for their use. I hoped Pico would figure out where her food and litter box were even though I expected her to stay hidden under the guest bed. Luckily she did and even decided to change her hiding place to under our bed. So I decided to keep the new arrangement and it worked.

On Dec 5th we joined other Democrats to celebrate the 1st anniversary of the opening of our district office in Scottsdale. On Dec 9th we joined other people who love animals for a party honoring the new president of the Humane Society of the United States, Wayne Pacelle. Dec has been a time to make new connections in our community. On Dec 11, we went to dinner at Ray and Brandee Sears new home and saw how well they'd settled in.

On Sun, Dec 12 we sang with the UU choir for the first service. The choir did well; we got applause three times. We also wore choir robes for the first time. Smoot said we can't let our old St M choir friends know we were in robes! But since the UU choir only wears them when the spirit moves them or when the guy who paid for them attends the service that seemed quirky enough to be almost like the old St Michael's. We’d decided several months before to celebrate the holidays at the Grand Canyon. We did that before in 1993 and loved seeing the Canyon with a mantle of snow and fewer visitors. Before we left for the canyon, we took our traditional Xmas photos with the critters. The one with the dachsies came out cute.

It turned out the trip wasn't as peaceful and relaxing as I'd hoped. The Canyon was overwhelmingly beautiful, as usual. I was disappointed that it didn't snow while we were there, except for one almost fog-like little flurry while we were driving on Monday. The weather the first few days was clear and in the 50s, good weather for photos, but not for snow. It was also more crowded than we'd expected or remembered from our last visit. Lots of Japanese, but we heard Spanish, German and we think Polish being spoken too. We’d brought our gifts and a little tree and opened them on Christmas morning. The remaining days we walked and drove to lots of different viewing areas around the Canyon. All magnificent, beyond what words and photos could show. We also watched a great Imax film on the canyon. We were surprised when we saw the director of photography was Reed Smoot, who, according to Loretta is a direct descendant of Smoot's great great uncle Reed Smoot, the first US senator from Utah and who lives in the elder Reed Smoot's home in Provo. The canyon was spectacular, but we were ready to come home. We got back in time to attend the choir After Christmas party at Connie and Richard’s on Dec 29. We watched a video of the Christmas program they’d done, Christmas is Canceled, that moved me to tears. It was a nice way to end a busy year.

Smoot continued to golf and was doing consulting for Subimo, a company that develops health care decision support applications and clinical information analysis. In addition to my genealogical work and pets, Charlotte discovered two new mystery series I liked, both of which have cats as part of a detective team. The first is Rita Mae Brown’s series ‘co-authored’ by Sneaky Pie, her cat. The second is The Cat Who series by Lilian Jackson Braun. They’re both really fun. Speaking of pets, we've mentioned our Cockatiel and kitties, but we still have our other critters, Fritz and Anya our dachshunds, our two red-eared slider turtles, our fire-bellied toad and our numerous fish, the three biggest of which live in our bathtub! We also feed the outside birds and have a bunny and just recently a Roadrunner that have moved into our backyard.

A longer version of 2004’s description with more photos is at http://www.charlottes-web.com/Family,Friends_Only/Xmas_Letter_2004.htm.

2005

2005 was a year of extremes for us, great things happened but terrible things did too.

Mark in Jan and in Feb, LadyTurtle on one of her walks in her pink halter top (to make her more visible in the leaves of the back yard.

On Jan 22, Mark Ansboury came to visit us. That month we took the new UU class at UUCP, in preparation for officially joining the congregation. On Feb 14 I found a baby turtle, sadly it was dead, but it proved our mated pair of Red-eared Slider turtles could reproduce. Feb was a month for travel, all work related for Smoot. On Feb 5, he flew to Cupertino, CA for a meeting, returned the next Monday and then Tuesday we drove back to CA to Solano Beach, near San Diego so he could attend a Linux Desktop conference. Then the week of the 14-18, he was in Carson City to do consulting at Harley-Davidson. Then at the end of the month, he flew to Dallas for still another computer meeting. That made up for the fact he hadn't had to do any work-related travel since the previous Oct. In the midst of all this, on Feb 13 we joined UUCP and on Feb 19, we got together with Terry, our UUCP mentor and his girlfriend, Kay.

There was tragic news that month. On Feb 11, my niece Becca , was raped at knifepoint in Denver. Her family gathered around her to support her after her horrible ordeal. The monster that did it was caught and sentenced to over 100 years in jail. On a lighter note, we had several weeks of rain making the desert so green, Smoot now calls it the Sonoran Meadow! Our lemon tree outdid itself. We estimated we got almost 500 pounds of lemons - from one tree! Whatever we couldn't foist off on friends or use we took to a food bank.

As of March 2005, Smoot’s status changed from a consultant to a regular employee of Subimo becoming Director of Operations. He was also VP of Encompass, the HP users group and was getting more active with that group. That’s what the trip to Dallas was for.

Terry and Kay. New UU dinner at Carolyn & Brad’s on March 4, 2005.

On March 5, Smoot, Ray, Ms. Jorjaria at the funeral of their colleague. Us in our Democratic Party t-shirts Karen and Lew had given us for Christmas. We attended a meeting of the District 8 Democrats on March 17. The guest speaker was Charles Goyette, the radio talk show host on Air America.

Cabaret at UUCP - A Night in the Tropics on March 19, 2005

Above, our first Cabaret. Smoot sang a Don Ho solo. On March 22, we gained a new family member when Nathan Siniscalchi was born to Steve and Bev Beall Siniscalchi.

On March 24, 2005, a pair of Lovebirds visited our seedblock. On March 31, we received the Mitchell’s old dining room set that Rick had had. On April 17, we did a concert at UUCP.

April 20-23, we attended Star Wars Celebration 3 in Indianapolis. We stayed in a train/hotel room. I got photographed with some costumed fans and met a group Trade Fed members, l to r: Matt Borchers, Chris Rinaldi aka SithGorilla, Matt's wife, Charlotte. Sharon, Amy, Bob Martinazzi and far right, Bill Cox. Right after we got back from the trip, Smoot had to go to DC for a Subimo business meeting. He was sick the whole week, flew back sick, a miserable week.

On May 20, 2005we went to see Star Wars Revenge of the Sith and that night hosted an End-of-year choir party at our house.

Sadly, on May 27, 2005, Smoot found Fritz dead in the swimming pool. He was used to the pool so we think he might have had a stroke or seisure and fell in. It was a very sad day. June was also an up and down month. Smoot went to Denver Jun 3-6 for Encompass. On Jun 15 I found another dead baby turtle. But on a happier note, we celebrated Smoot’s 55th birthday with a set of Invader Zim DVDs with a Grr action figure! We celebrated Independence Day a day early when we got together at Ginny & Joe’s on July 3rd.

July - Barbara & Anya. Us at our ‘offices’. Aug 4- Our 32nd anniversary

Barbara Rugeley came to visit us July 17-19. Her previous trips had been earlier in the year so she didn’t believe us that it wouldn’t be a good idea to go for a run even as early as 7 am. It was just too hot. She staggered back in about 10 minutes, having learned the truth about AZ summers. And on top of that, when I returned from taking her to the airport, I noticed something strange about the heavy-duty plastic shelving in the garage. One of the support posts, made to hold 250 pounds, had melted and buckled from the heat. Luckily Grandma Ramsey’s china wasn’t broken. The boxes it was in landed on the truck and didn’t crash to the concrete floor. We celebrated our 32nd anniversary with a nice dinner at Ruth’s Chris Steak House.

Smoot and Ray. Jency, Smoot and the computer. The Murray Museum.

Ray’s birthday is on Aug 15, but we celebrated on the 14th and his and Brandi’s computer set up. We went to Austin on Aug 25 and Smoot gave Jency his old lap top computer. I got to go see the ‘Murray Museum’ at France Leggett’s home, the amazing collection of family papers, photos and even clothes from her Jessie Ramsey Murray.

C’s b’day - Longacres. Sm, HC & Geoff. Karen, Lew.

Allan and Barbara Longacre threw a birthday party for me at their house on Aug 26, 2005. The old group got back together – Leonard & Fran Johnson, Joe & Mickey Moldenhauer, Ron & Angela Vasey, Bill & Nancy Yahn. We got to meet our newest great niece and my namesake, Harper Charlotte Mitchell. We also got to visit with Karen & Lew Gould.

Aug - The Minors and LeVieuxs. Smoot and Linda.

We went to Whole Food and had breakfast with the Minors and the LeVieuxs and also got to visit with Linda Colbert and Steve Fildes. Tragedy happened next. Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast on Aug 28. We’d called them the previous Sat asking why they were still home; Catherine was baking cookies! Holly had obeyed the order to evacuate New Orleans and went to Baton Rouge. Catherine and Gayle left Gulfport, got Rusty in New Orleans and brought him back to their home which they thought being over 100 years old could withstand any storm. They were wrong. Their house was hit and they had to leave through a broken window. They spent time in shelters until they were rescued by Holly on Sep 3 and ended up driving to Monroe, LA then accepting the offer of a free apartment in Chapel Hill, NC. We were supposed to have visited Holly in New Orleans in Sept, but that trip never happened obviously.

Oct- Sm, Connie, Jeanne. Us - Carnival.

On Oct 8 we joined Connie and Richard and our new Interim Minister, Jean Wahlstrom at the Greek festival. Smoot went to the HP conference in Orlando in his role on Encompass. Even after all the turmoil in their lives, Catherine and Gayle decided to go on the cruise to Europe they’d arranged months earlier in honor of her 60th birthday on Oct 30. On Oct 31, Smoot and I were Lord and Lady Dracula at the UUCP Fall Festival.

Nov- Ladies Circle at Bill’s. Leonard’s 70th.

On Nov 6, 2005, Bill and Joan hosted another choir party. Then we flew back to Austin on Nov 9 to be with Leonard at his 70th birthday party. I did a scrapbook for his gift.

Geoff, Kursten, Sm. Sm, G, firetruck. April, Joel, Michael.

We got to visit again with Geoff and Kursten and see his fire station. We saw April and Michael Floyd and their grown-up son Joel.

Geoff, Adam and Fredi look at the scrapbook I made for Fredi. Fredi & Paul. Steve, Smoot, Linda and Cici.

We drove from Austin to Houston to attend the wedding of Fredi Bleeker and Paul Franks. The next week, Nov 17-19 Steve Fildes and Linda Colbert came from Austin to visit us and our menagerie. We had a very interesting Thanksgiving dinner at Dan and Sonny Roberts.

Dec- Connie & Richard & us at NAU concert.

On Dec 4, we went to Flagstaff with Connie and Richard to attend the NAU Holiday Dinner and Concert. Also in Dec, we added another family member, Kiera Danos Stanford. That meant Smoot and I had a total of three great nieces and one great nephew, amazing!

Ginny, Smoot & Joe on Dec 12. Our first caroling outing on Dec 16

On Dec 12, we had Ginny and Joe DeMarco over for a holiday themed dinner. As the holidays drew closer, I’d asked Connie if the choir did caroling. They had in the past but hadn’t for several years. I said we should start doing it again and helped organize the event. We’d compiled a list of 13 places to sing but even starting at 4:30 we only ended up getting to Diana Forrester, Ruth, Ray and Gretchen, Paula H., Ellie & Bob, Rosie and Frank. Then we went to wrong house and ended up singing for strangers until we realized we needed to be next door at Nick and Julie Erfle’s! We ended up back at our house for hot cider and snacks.

I put lights on our house. We had the obligatory holiday photos taken with our pets – Anya, Muffin,

Annie and even Agnes the Flying Cat.

2006

On Sunday, Jan 1, Joe and Mickey visited us on their drive back from CA. There was a choir party at Richard’s on Jan 7.

Smoot went to Chicago Jan 10-13 for Subimo and Encompass. He was asked to be church treasurer, was elected and introduced to congregation on Jan 29, 2006.

For Ginny’s b’day, Feb 9, I re-started the tradition of celebrating choir b’days and made a special b’day card for people to sign. On Feb 14, Smoot took me to the grocery store to buy the roses I wanted. The variety turned out to be Charlotte!

On Mar 12, 2006, we heard Bishop Spong speak at the New Vision Center. As usual he was eloquent. Cabaret was on Mar 16. The theme was Ed Sullivan’s Really Big Shoe/Show. Smoot was one of the Grandpas and Grandmas. I had physical therapy for my shoulder Mar –May. On Sun Mar 26, we went to Mary and Bill Wardlow’s house for a gathering of our new UU class. Only we and Carolyn could attend. At the UUCP canvas dinner Apr 1, Smoot got his face painted.

In April 2006, I created brief illustrated bios on Noah, Lothrop and Charles Perkins to put on my website. I found a woman in Scotland willing to help me with one of my Scottish lines, the Black. I also discovered a woman who was a descendant of Hugh McCowan, a brother of Ann McCowan, John Sinclair's mother and Belle Sinclair Ramsey's grandmother. I knew I had a scan of a photo of Hugh and his wife so I e-mailed the woman, Lou, and told her about my photo. She responded enthusiastically, wanting a copy and suggesting I also contact Pam McCorquodale. It turns out Lou and Pam are both my 5th cousins. We share gr gr gr gr grandparents, Alex and Florence McCorquodale McCowan! They are the furthest relatives I've dealt with so far.

Also in Apr, Lady Turtle had gotten into her roaming mood, looking for a place to make a nest. I took a photo of her floating in the pool, next to our pretty wildflowers, overgrown bushes and laden lemon tree. In May, I looked out the bathroom window and saw her standing on her back feet at the door to her enclosure. She wanted out! I wish I'd had my camera. She looked so funny, standing on two feet. On a semi-regular basis, Sandy, Robert and Bob come over to our house to work with Smoot.

Apr 27, 2006 I got a very special gift from Cynthia Leggett Norwood, a shoe box full of DVDs and a videotape of the home movies of the Murray and Bailey families. On the Murray one, there are lots of great images from Ramsey/Murray family gatherings in the late 1930s. There were some cute scenes with Jimmy and baby Charlie, the first grandchildren. The Bailey one shows family members at Margaret and Joe’s wedding in 1940.

On May 8, 2006, I had my 15 minutes, no really less than 1 minute of fame regarding the terrible experience I had with the woman who sat next to me and took 3 phone calls during a movie and whose husband tried to attack me for asking her to turn off her phone. A big article ran on cell phone abuse in our local paper and my experience was mentioned, among many. (The article is at http://www.azcentral.com/families/articles/0505fam_cellphone.html) Smoot was especially impressed with the guy who snatched the phone from a jerk yakking in a movie and smashed it against a wall!

The choir sang a music service with *5* anthems on May 7 and repeated them on May 14, 2006 at Chandler. The hardest was Cloudburst.

On May 15, 2006, we visited with Suzanne at the airport. She was flying back after driving Meghan to Boise, Idaho. On May 27, we drove to Globe to visit with Chris and Frank. Luckily the trip to and back was uneventful, but the next day, when we got in the car to go to church, the engine made a horrible grinding sound. Our generator belt had split and the car was un-driveable! Thank heaven it hadn't happened the day before when we were in the middle of nowhere.

On Jun 4, 2006 we had an End-of-choir party at Richard’s We also celebrated his and Smoot’s b’days and honored Ruth for her many years of sevice as librarian. We got a chalice necklace for her but then discovered she already had one so we bought it from Connie and considered it one of my b’day presents.

Back on the family front, on Jun 9 we acquired two more great nieces when identical twins Aubrey and Liv were born to Kursten and Geoff Mitchell.. In Nov, Geoff sent us a note saying he’d finally found a way to tell the twins apart. I thought he meant he’d noticed some small difference between them. No, this is what he meant, initials on their foreheads!

On June 20, 2006we celebrated Smoot’s birthday at a sushi place. His best gift from me was Roomba, a robotic vacuum cleaner. On Jun 28, had supper with Ray and Brandee. We hadn’t seen them for ages.

On June 30, 2006 it was ten years since Mother died, I wanted to honor her and created a timeline of her life from birth to her marriage in 1940 and put it on my website. On July 9, Suzanne Mitchell Mahoney celebrated her 60th birthday. I did a timeline of her life. I sent Madeline and Billy the large nativity set in order for it to arrive between her and his birthdays. It didn’t get there until Aug. I also sent a birthday gift to Becca. She was to be with her parents. And Catherine sent a golf club shaped wine holder to Steve in NY for his 50th birthday on Aug 10. On July 16th Connie did the Sunday service with Jay Alagia. She talked about the spiritual path as found through music. She asked the choir to help her by singing a folk song by Joe Bethancourt

On July 17, 2006, Annie decided to deposit herself in the basket of clean clothes! On July 20, I started working with Connie as music librarian. We found videotapes from past Cabarets. I suggested putting them on DVD to better preserve them. On July 26, Susan offered her kids’s work to put the music list in Excel. Annie and Muffin kept me company while I downloaded the tapes in August.

On July 27, 2006, I told Leonard about our big rain. Some parts of the Valley had flooding, downed trees, torn off roof, but luckily not around us. A storm a few days before had brought down one of the big limbs from our Eucalyptus tree in the front yard, falling on our neighbor's garage roof. Smoot luckily had our chainsaw from the cabin. It was hot as Hades, but Smoot chopped the tree up and stacked the wood neatly. The rains brought the temp down, but also brought more humidity.

On Aug 4, 2006, our 33rd anniversary, we went to eat at what was supposed to be a neat old restaurant, founded as a girls' school back in 1934 when it would have been out in the boonies, El Chorro. Our waiter took our photo outside with famous Camelback Mountain behind us. With the first anniversary of Katrina coming up, I bought commemorative pins to send to all the adult members of my family as a reminder of the tragic consequences of the storm. On Aug 18, the cooling vest Karen sent for Anya arrived. Poor Anya was getting old and thin.

On Wed Aug 23, 2006, Smoot and I drove in our rented Prius to the World Science Fiction Convention in Anaheim. The con included a celebration of Star Trek’s 40th anniversary. On Thurs, we visited Bev and her family in Yorba Linda and celebrated my b’day early. We celebrated my 56th b’day on Sat with Marti.

Having seen the cute geese that Barbara Rugeley had on her front porch wearing little rain slickers, for my b’day, I followed her example and got myself two plastic geese that can be dressed in cute seasonal outfits. At UUCP, we celebrated August birthdays – Art, me, Myra and Paula. On Sat Sept 2, 2006, Sharon and Jesse Hise gave a back-to-choir party at their place.

It rained the night of the party and when we got home, I left the umbrella out to dry. Muffin decided that was a nice place to sleep. On Sept 4, 2006, I snapped a picture of this dramatic sky from our backyard.

On Sept 6, 2006, Clyde Poole was in town and came by for a visit. His car had a neat GPS system. On Sept 17, we had a volunteer fair at church. I created a brochure on our music program. On Sept 23, we drove 2 hours to a church picnic at the Waddell’s. We go there at the end of the art lecture.

Sept 26, 2006 was the 2nd anniversary of when Annie and Pico came to us. They’ve gotten enough used to each other that they’ll sleep on the bed together. On Oct 6, I checked out the first of Sue Grafton’s novels, A is for Alibi. I’m now up to Q is for Quarry. Oct 13-15 Sarah Dan Jones joined us for a music retreat, having used one of Smoot’s free airline tickets to fly here. She worked with us on Sat and led the music service on Sunday.

Oct 27-29, 2006, Barbara and her friend Sherna stayed with us while they attended a storytelling festival in Mesa. We had pizza at the Organ Stop.

On Sun, Oct 29, 2006, we had the second annual Harvest Festival at UUCP. We again dressed up in our costumes, but this time Smoot, as treasurer, was Lord Buckula! Myra declined to do her green make-up again because it was too hot and ran in the heat.

The geese wore SW doggie costumes for Halloween 2006.

On Nov 5, 2006, Richard Jahrmarkt’s daughter Kim O’Neil hosted a bridal shower at our house for Connie.

Nov 10-13, Catherine and Gayle came to visit us. We didn’t tour as much as we’d planned, but they came with us to a church fundraiser and a Sunday service. On Nov 16, 2006, we had our photos taken for the church directory.

Thanksgiving was on Nov 23, 2006. Since Smoot was going to be playing golf Thurs morning, he smoked a turkey Wed night so we had two Thanksgiving dinners, one on Wed and one on Thurs!

The geese wore their Pilgrim outfits for Thanksgiving 2006.

On Nov 25, 2006, Connie and Richard got married. The choir sang Te Quiero, a capella.

On Nov 28, 2006, Ginny brought Joe’s niece Adrienne over to see my collections. Smoot was in Chicago. On Dec 1, we joined Richard, Connie and his friends again in Flagstaff for the NAU Holiday Dinner.

I showed Connie the rollup piano and glockenspiel I’d gotten. On Sunday, Dec 3, 2006, a group of choir members joined MusicaNova for a concert. We did a medley of holiday music.

Carolyn couldn’t sing with the regularly scheduled caroling so she organized a separate outing on Dec 13, 2006. We went to four homes including Helen Votichenko.

We had a holiday open house on Sat, Dec 16, 2006 and then went caroling on Dec 17. Above, the group with Eleanor Vargis.

Then after caroling we had another party for the singers. I’d always wanted to try Mother’s advice of having two parties back to back since your house was clean and you could use the same refreshments. Well, she must have been younger or stronger than I am because I’ll never do that again, I was exhausted! On Dec 22, 2006, we went to see Glendale Glitters

I went all out in decorating the house for Christmas 2006. Above left, the geese in their Santa suits.

Cici got to fly around the living room, ending up on the metal family tree and Christmas tree. Muffin and me.

We sang at 2 services on Christmas eve since it fell on Sun. Our choir After Christmas party was at Connie and Richards on Dec 27, 2006

On Dec 31, 2006, we went to the New Year’s party at Ellie and Bob Murphy’s.

2007

On New Year’s Day, Jan 1, 2007, we had lunch with Ginny and Joe DeMarco.

On Jan 2, 2007, we did our traditional visit to the McCormick train park, looking at the model trains, riding the train through the display of holiday lights and standing by the smiling locomotive.

On Jan 27, 2007 we went to the local Comic Con. I didn't even know Phoenix had a Comic Con. It was small by San Diego standards and there weren't any panels I was interested in attending, but I did enjoy being with my fellow geeks! I took several photos of the SW themed costumes some people were wearing. They seemed to be the hit of the event. There were a few SW fan films shown, but other than that, no Star Wars focus. And nothing on Star Trek at all. There were two stormtroopers who provided some security, appropriately, and a guy dressed like Darth Maul who was surprisingly friendly and happy to tell me about his costume, including the itchy contact lenses to make his eyes yellow. Those guys really go all out. The Emperor was good too. They were all impressive. None of the troopers I talked to had been in the Rose Bowl parade, but they knew people who had been. I treated myself to three things. I hadn't gotten anything in so long; I couldn't resist!

Chris and Frank Williams visited us on Jan 29, 2007. Chris got re-acquainted with Pico, who had originally belonged to her. We adopted the calico female when Chris and Frank decided to live and travel in an RV, something Pico and Annie didn’t like. We got Annie at the same time, but she wouldn’t come out to say hi until after C and F had left.

Cabaret was on Mar 10, 2007. The Rockettes of Ages made their debut. (I’m on the left.) The Cabaret theme was a UUSO show. Smoot wore his father's Navy uniform and I look like a "USO Show Coordinator"! We took part in other Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Phoenix events such as walking with our church group in the Gay Pride parade, singing at the special music services at UUCP in May and in Chandler in June, singing in long-time pianist Ed Grobe’s tribute in June and helping organize the 10th anniversary presentation for Connie Jahrmarkt, our choir director, in November. We also hosted a baby shower for Heidi Parmenter, our church administrator in May.

On Mar 24, 2007, we went to the Renaissance Festival with Connie and Richard.

On May 5, 2007, we hosted Heidi’s baby shower. We experienced sadness when our 16 year old dachshund, Anya died in February but also happiness when around June 1st our Red-eared slider turtles finally produced a living offspring, aptly named Baby! Our menagerie of 3 cats, 3 turtles, 1 bird and fish continues to entertain us.

On Jun 10, we had lunch with Carey and Otis Odell. We celebrated Smoot's birthday on June 20. I gave him a mini helicopter.

It was a year of travel for us. The biggest trip was our marathon 3 week, 17-state and DC, almost 4,000-mile family history and visiting driving vacation in June and July. We first flew to Austin for Joe and Mickey’s 50th anniversary celebration on Jun 22 and saw Leonard & Fran in San Marcos on June 23.

Leonard, Angela, Smoot, and Jency after belatedly celebrating Angela’s and Smoot’s shared birthday. On Jun 24, 2007, we got to meet our newest great nieces, Aubry and Liv Mitchell. We drove to Burnet, Cisco, and Corsicana, TX, Bentonville, AR, and Ottawa, IL where I was able to do genealogical research. On the way we stopped in St. Louis, MO to see the Arch and in Springfield, IL to see the new Lincoln Museum.

Calvin Bain, a Carl cousin showed us around during a visit to Bentonvlle, AR on June 29, 2007. We celebrated July 4th with Suzanne & Dad in Annandale, VA.

We also got to visit with Brenda. Visiting Madeline and Billy in Federalsburg, MD on July 6.

We were able to have a quick visit with Rick and Marilyn in Virginia Beach. On Sun, July 8, Rick and Smoot played golf. We got to visit with Denise & Ben in Huntersville, NC on July 9 and Gayle & Catherine in their brand new home in Pendleton, SC

In early August, we visited with Leonard at the airport. The Mitchell Cousins Reunion in CA took place Aug 17-19. We celebrated my birthday with high tea at The Phoenician resort on Aug 26.

We celebrated Rick’s 60th birthday in Virginia Beach, VA on Sep 22. Smoot and Rick gave a presentation at the Redfin reunion on Oct 13.

Nate, Bev & Ava visited us in Scottsdale on Oct 26. We had important family events. Our nephew Theron & Monika added Natalie to our family on October 8 and our youngest niece, Emily turned 30 on October 26. We had Thanksgiving with Connie & Richard on Nov 22.

At the Rotary Club holiday dinner with Sandy and Robert Blackwell on Nov 30. (Smoot’s showing off his Santa golf tie!) We again went with Connie and Richard to the NAU holiday concert on Dec 1.

On Dec 15, a group of 32 people went caroling from UUCP. It was fun but after almost 5 hours of driving and singing, we were pooped. We celebrated Christmas Day at Pauline’s with Connie and Richard. (Paula and Stan were out of town.) And on Dec 29, Smoot and I hosted the traditional After Christmas Choir Party at our house. We had 30 people for the potluck. Needless to say, our house was full!

After the After Christmas Choir Party at our house on Dec 29. I’m starting to clean up and Smoot is back at his computer! He was still with WebMD, enjoying working from home and playing golf whenever possible.

We visited the Railroad Park on Dec 30 with its lighted, smiling locomotive and a ride on the miniature train. (I’m wearing my conductor’s hat!)

On Dec 31, we helped with and attended the UUCP New Year’s Eve Masquerade Ball. We wore our Lord and Lady Dracula costumes and Smoot played bridge. It was great fun, lots of good food and music. A fun end of an eventful year!

2008

When the year started, I decided my motto would be Great in ’08. In many ways it has been, including the election of an intelligent, capable president, but in others, especially the economic meltdown, it has not. For Smoot and me personally, it was great until he was laid off in December.

We started the year by helping host a surprise 80th birthday party for Pauline Gay on Jan 3. Over the weekend of Jan 26, we attended the Phoenix Comic Con in Mesa and got to see and hear several Star Wars and Star Trek actors including Peter Mayhew, who played Chewbacca. (More photos from the con are at http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_Phoenix_Con.htm.)

On Jan 27, 2008, drove up from Tucson, in the rain, to have dinner with us at Organ Stop. On Feb 13, the choir gave me a surprise party to thank me for being their ‘den mother’ and upcoming Cabaret producer. Their gift was a GPS, something I’ve long wanted. (More photos at http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_2-13_SurParty.htm)

On Feb 15-16, Smoot went to VA to check on his dad. On Feb 18 Esli Dalferes died. On Feb 19, I went out our bedroom door to get a hummingbird feeder to refill when I looked down and there in the dirt and gravel was a baby turtle! My pair had produced another living offspring. On March 8, the choir presented a Colorific Cabaret at the end of which I was honored for my efforts to organize it. (More photos at http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_Cabaret.htm)

Mar 17-21, 2008, Smoot was in Portland. On Apr 15 we visited with Larry and Carole Deuser who were in town. We had time for breakfast before we had to go to the dentist. On Apr 19 Smoot, Maurice and Marilyn played in a golf tournament to benefit Boxer Rescue.

On May 3, 2008, we had to have Muffin put to sleep. He'd had a tumor then seemed to develop kidney failure and went down quickly. It was so sad and so hard to let him go. We'd had him for 18 years. On May 4, we sang Sources, the UU Cantata at UUCP. We sang it again on May 11 at Valley UU in Chandler. (More photos at http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_5-4_Sources.htm)

On May 12 we flew to Austin to take part in the festivities for Jency James’ graduation from the Episcopal Seminary of the Southwest with a Masters in Counseling. On May 18, we got to see the amazing garden and renovation at the Leungs open house.

On May 24, 2008, we helped celebrate Jon and Rick Jahrmarkt’s 40th birthday. On May 26, we had lunch with the Rusconis.

On May 28, we joined other UUCP members for a baseball game between the Diamondbacks and the SF Giants in which choir member Susan Morris and her viola group played the national anthem. On June 4, Connie hosted an awards banquet for the choir. We also celebrated the choir’s two June birthdays, Smoot and Richard. (More photos at http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_Jun_Bday,Awards.htm)

Smoot’s award was for being “Financial Advisor and Renovation Czar” and mine for being “Choir Librarian, Archivist, Social Director & Cabaret CEO.”

On June 8, we celebrated Roberta Haskin’s last service as Interim Minister at UUCP. I created a memory book for her and we had breakfast with her and Dennis on June 13. (See http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_Rob,Den_bk.htm)

On May 26, we found the first living baby turtle from the late spring clutch. By June 19, we’d found five.. That makes *7* in this cycle, 5 that lived, as opposed to one living baby last June and one last Feb. On June 20, we celebrated Smoot’s 58th birthday. Smoot was taken out to a new golf course that morning by his golfing buddies. That night we had a low key celebration. We went to a Middle Eastern restaurant and got dinners to go, coming back and enjoying them at home. Then we had the traditional cake, ice cream and gifts. In addition to three books on WWII, some golf related things, stuff for our trip and a self-counting coin bank, I gave him a big card with a Star Wars motif and music. The music is quite loud and surprised him!

From July 6 – 26, 2008, we went on a driving vacation out West. We ended up touring 12 states, 14 national parks, 6 national monuments, 2 historic interpretive centers, 4 cities (Lake Havasu, AZ; Port Townsend, WA; Butte, MT; Lead, SD) 1 state park, 2 historic sites, 1 dam and 1 mini family reunion in Lacey, WA. And we drove 6,411 miles! We saw a lot of beautiful and interesting places and visit with friends and family. (More photos at http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_Trip_West_rept1.htm and http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_Trip_West_rept2.htm)

On Aug 2, 2008, we welcomed a new member into the family, Ben Fezza Beall, the son of Ben and Denise Fezza Beall. On Aug 4, we celebrated our 35th Anniversary. (See http://www.charlottes-web.com/Anniv_montage.htm)

On Aug 17, we had lunch with the Rusconis. Aug 18-21, Smoot was again in VA to help relieve Suzanne. On Aug 23, we drove to Las Vegas and on the 24th spent the entire day in Star Trek: The Experience. It closed in Sept so my birthday gift was a last chance to see it. (See http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_LasV_trip.htm.)

I did still get a cake and ice cream on my actual birthday on Aug 26. And on Aug 27, the first choir practice in the fall, we celebrated all our Aug birthdays.

On Sep 12, 2008, the Leungs invited us to join them for Susan’s birthday dinner. On Sept 16, we adopted two black kittens, Cash (from Johnny Cash who always dressed in black) and Bagheera (the black panther from Jungle Book. They’d been rescued by Sherri with Paw Prints on Your Heart. (See http://www.charlottes-web.com/2008_Kittens.htm.) On Sept 25, the kittens got to play on their brand new kitty tree.

On Oct 3 we joined Jesse and Sharon Hise on the First Friday Art Walk in Phoenix. On Oct 10, we accidentally showed up at Julie and Marshal Smart’s home.

The dinner was actually to be on Oct 17! On that day, Sharon and Jesse Hise joined us. On Oct 26, we had a special service where the Rev. Domokos Rusz, the minister at our partner church in Romania, gave the sermon. I offered to download the tape to DVD. Because of that the Romanians, the Rev Domokos Rusz, his wife Eva, congregation president Gyuszi Littasi, and his wife Csilla, Paula Kulina and Ernest Garcia came by our house, saw my collections and met my turtles.

On Nov 21, we hosted a choir potluck at our house with our new minister, Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray. On Nov 27, we went to Maggiano’s Italian restaurant for Thanksgiving. New choir member, Bobbi Hess joined us.

That Thanksgiving evening, we joined the Leungs for homemade pie. On Nov 29, Jimmy and Elizabeth Leung and we went to the Star Trek exhibit at the Arizona Science Museum. I met Steve Kelly, a fellow Playtrekker and author of a book on Star Trek collectibles.

On Dec 4, we joined Connie and Richard Jahrmarkt, his brother and sister-in-law, Larry and Carole Jahrmarkt at the NAU holiday concert. The next morning we all went to breakfast together. On Dec 6, 22 singers from the church went to carol 16 people.

After caroling we had a party at Bill and Joan’s. It was a busy day! On Dec 8, I took this photo of Cash and Gheer sitting on their kitty tree. Soon after this photo was taken, Smoot got the news that he’d been laid off from WebMD. Our future, once so promising, was much less sure. And just before the holidays.

On Dec 23, a small group of us went caroling to a family who had requested it for a birthday celebration. Sadly, the birthday boy wasn’t able to be there. We sang anyway. On Dec 24, Pauline and Paula had us over to their place for early Christmas dinner. I was able to admire Paula’s little N-gauge train set.

On Christmas Day 2008, Cash investigate d the tree. I’d decorated the ficus instead of putting up our artificial tree. I was afraid the big tree might be too tempting for the kittens to climb and hurt themselves. We both had our hands full holding them. Just a few months before we’d been able to hold them in the palm of our hands.

I also took a picture with Pico. Little did we know it would be her last Christmas. Smoot with his WWII shadow box from Catherine and Gayle.

We had Christmas dinner with the Leungs, Duke and Susan and Sarah Carlson.

On Dec 26, 2008, Boxing Day, we went to a party at Gary and Ann Ezzel’s. On Dec 27, we made our regular holiday visit to the train park. And on Dec 30, the choir After Christmas Party was at Connie and Richard’s. A fun way to end the year.

2009

My motto for the year was Fine in ’09. Even though Smoot had been laid off in Dec, we tried to be hopeful and it was a good year overall.

On Jan 3, Ralph and Anne came for a visit. We had lunch at Aladdin’s. On Jan 5, Sandy, Kelly and Calvin Blackwell came to visit to see my collections.

Jan 10, we had a choir retreat.

On Jan 15, I snapped a photo of the baby turtles stacked in their tub. On Jan 18, I took a photo of Cash ‘helping’ me put away Christmas linens.

On Jan 23 & 24, we went to the Phoenix Comic Con. We especially enjoyed the Geek Panel with Wil Wheaton and Battlestar Galactica’s Aaron Douglas. Above right, the Star Trek Next Generation panel with Wil Wheaton, Marina Sirtis, and Brent Spiner

On Sat, Jan 24, Jason Shelton, who was in town for Rev Susan's installation, gave a workshop for song leaders. On Sun, Jan 25, 2009 the choir sang at the installation of the Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray at UUCP. We sang a song composed for the occasion by Sandy's son. The first month of the year ended sadly when on Jan 29th, we took Pico to the vet to be put to sleep. She was 18 years old, just like Muffin had been when we had to euthanize him the previous year.

On Sun, Feb 1, we watched the Superbowl at the Leungs’ house. Sadly, the Cardinals lost.

Feb 2, Cash ‘helped’ Smoot with paperwork and on Feb 6, he checked out the baby turtles in their tub.

On Sat, Feb 14 we drove to Pioneer Village. We were very surprised when the first thing we saw was a Nazi on a motorcycle! Turns out there were battle simulations not only of the Old West, but also of the Civil War and WWII. The re-enactors wore amazingly authentic uniforms. Above left, the guy on the left is Austrian army in WWI, the one on the right is a member of the WWII Waffen SS! Above right, Smoot had an interesting chat with a former Nazi soldier.

Feb 20, Connie and Richard came over and played on our Wii. Feb 26, as on many other days, the kittens ‘helped’ Smoot read the paper.

On Sat, Feb 28, we helped Ellie and Bob Murphy celebrate their 50th anniversary. On March 7, a small group of us choir members went to Prescott to help the UU church choir practice for the Sources performance at DA in May. It wasn’t all work; we ate Mexican food afterward.

On March 8, I took a photo of our three cats together, looking cute. On March 11, the choir surprised me with a St. Charlotte's Day celebration.

On March 21, 2009, the choir presented Cabaret with the Theme - Hittin' the Road. Richard and Smoot did a UU hotdog vendor skit - Make me one with everything! I was in The Rockettes of Ages who were joined by the other choir women for Chattanooga Choo Choo. Smoot sang with the tenors and basses for We Sail the Ocean Blue. I joined the women for Hit the Road, Jack and got flowers for being Cabaret CEO.

On Mar 23, Smoot judged at the ASU Science Fair. On April 1, Cash tried to pull an April Fools’ Day trick on the baby turtles!

On April 6, we had Kat, Kate, Kelly and Ron over for dinner and Wii. On April 11, we went to a post-Cabaret party at Bill and Joan’s.

On April 14, I snapped a photo of Cash playing in the bathroom sink, on the 17th a picture of Lady Turtle surveying her domain.

On Apr 19th, Gheer checked out the baby turtles now in the bathtub, not noticing his tail was floating in the water. And on Apr 24th the kittens checked out Lady Turtle while she made a progress through the house!

On April 24, we went to a Europa concert at Connie and Richard’s. And on April 25, I went to the Green Workshop at UUCP.

On April 30, we hosted a Sources practice at UUCP with singers from VUU and other churches in AZ, CA and NM. On May 1, we sang Sources: a UU Cantata at the opening ceremony of the PSW District Assembly being held in Mesa.

May 2nd was Free Comic Book Day. The Leungs helped me get books and Kat and Paula joined Smoot and me in the hunt, even braving the 501st!

On May 5th, we had a Star Trek viewing night at the Leungs. On May 8th, Smoot and I went to the premiere of the new Star Trek movie.

On May 9th, we went to Jon and Nando’s wedding and the party afterwards at Richard and Connie’s. Us with Sharon and Jesse.

Suzanne visited us from May 17-20. We went to the Chihuly glass sculpture exhibit at the Desert Botanical Gardens. Our luck, it was 106 that day! We broke a record for the most consecutive days over 100 in May. We also went to the Phoenix Art Museum and played on the Wii.

After Suzanne left, the kittens struck an artistic pose while they gazed out the guest room window. On May 25th, we,celebrated Memorial Day and Jon’s birthday at Connie and Richard’s.

On May 27th, Connie hosted the second annual Choir Appreciation Night after practice. Smoot’s award was for “2^nd year Financial Advisor, Renovation Czar, caretaker of the Choir librarian.” Mine was for “Choir Librarian, Archivist, Sharing/Social Director & 2^nd year as Cabaret CEO, photographer”

On June 4th, I snapped a photo of our Quail family with their new babies.

On June 5th, we had supper with Sharon and Jesse to see the beautiful stole she’d made in honor of Connie’s certification. The stole was presented to Connie that Sunday, June 7th. Because she’d said she wanted one, Smoot and I gave Connie a sage bush!

On June 7th, , we had another Star Trek viewing night at the Leungs with ST themed food including Klingon Rokeg blood pie and Gagh, and Bajoran Hasperat. On the way home, I took a picture of a cloud rainbow, something I’d never seen before.

On June 11, I snapped a cute photo of Cash trying to play with Lady Turtle through the glass door.

On June 15, the Leungs took us out for a sushi lunch to celebrate Smoot’s b’day early. On his actual b’day, he had to attend a church board meeting at which he had a celebration, until Jimmy dropped the cake on the floor and Smoot had to sweep it up! That night Smoot and I tried the new Italian restaurant near us and he got a free piece of keylime cheesecake and then had cake at home. Lots of cake eating that day!

On June 23rd there was a potluck for UUCP bloggers at the Leungs.

June 28th was Kate’s last Sunday with us. We helped her pack up her apt that afternoon and got another kitty tree out of it.

On June 30th we went with Julie and Marshal to Aladdin’s for lunch then played Wii afterward. Cash did his dog imitation and asked Julie for tubby rubs.

On July 1, we had a Star Trek viewing party at the Leungs with the Featherstons.

On July 4th we had an impromptu choir practice and party at Bonnie and Dave’s and watched fireworks from one of their decks.

At Susan L’s suggestion we did a Harry Potter-watching marathon leading up to the premiere of the new HP movie, Half Blood Prince. Around that same time Alan Horn moved down here to work with Smoot. We had our first HP viewing on July 10th. Alan joined us at the Leungs.

Friday, July 17, Susan, Elizabeth and Katherine began their weekly volunteer cataloging project starting with my Star Trek collection. They would catalog for an hour and play on our Wii for another hour. That night we had another HP viewing. And another that Sunday, July 19th. Elizabeth drew a cute HP picture for the event and gave it to me.

On Tuesday, July 28th, Sharon, Susan and Elizabeth and I went to the fabric arts exhibit at the Mesa Children’s Museum. On July 31, S, E and K came over for more cataloging and Wii.

On Aug 4th we celebrated our 36th anniversary. On Aug 14, Smoot and I joined Susan, Eliz and Katherine to taste cupcakes at Let Them Eat Cake.

On Aug 15th, I snapped a photo of Cash checking out the quail family. On Aug 19th we took Alan out for dinner and then for a visit to the train park. He left the next day.

On Aug 22, I took Susan and Elizabeth over to Lucienne and Bob Rusconi’s to see her artwork since E is a budding artist.

On Aug 23, a group of choir members went to visit Mark Schmitz as he convalesced from his illness. This was the start of Jerry’s Outreach Music Ministry.

On Aug 25, the Leung’s took Smoot and me to Manuel’s for an early b’day celebration.

On Aug 26th, I used b’day deals to get a free breakfast at Denney’s and a free sundae at 5 & Diner. That night was the first choir practice so my free Black Angus meal had to wait. I took my Star Wars cake to practice and celebrated with other August b’days, Duke, Diana, Heidi and Dante.

On Aug 30th we went to a potluck at the Leung’s. It was the official start to the Lego robot project for which Smoot was one of the mentors with Susan. Meetings were held almost every Sunday afternoon until the Dec 5th competition.

On Sept 5, Becca and Chad came to visit and saw my collections. We had lunch at Aladdin’s.

On Sept 7, Connie and Richard had us over for a Labor Day dinner. On Sept 11, I finally had my free b’day dinner at Black Angus.

On Sept 12, we went to the joint b’day party for Susan and Katherine at Tranquility Trail.

On Sept 16, we celebrated the first anniversary of our getting Cash and Bagheera. They’re much bigger than they were a year ago.

On Sept 17, we joined Susan, Elizabeth and Katherine to see E’s art on display at a local bank then we had dinner afterward. Jimmy had to work.

On Sept 19, we had our fall choir retreat. Only the tenors had their full complement there.

Sept 25th was Katherine’s actual b’day and since it was a Friday, she, Elizabeth and Susan were schedule to come catalog and Wii. Jimmy was off that day so he could come over too. We had a surprise party for Katherine with a Star Trek cake and figures.

On Sept 27, Bill and Joan gave a choir party at their house and showed off their new kitchen. On Sunday, Oct 4th we went to Star Wars In Concert, a multi-media extravaganza in Glendale. It was a big splurge for us. The tickets were $80 each and the program was $30!

On Oct 9, Susan’s mother, Fran Bull came with S, E & K to catalog and Wii.

On Oct 10, we went to Bill’s 60th b’day party. On Oct 16, we had barbecue with Bonnie and Dave Cunningham to celebrate Smoot’s consulting gig in Austin. He left Sunday, Oct 18 for his first week there consulting for Cort.

On Sat Oct 17, a group of congregation members gathered at the Leung’s to make gifts for the people we carol. I was part of the ornament group as opposed to the pillow-making group.

On Oct 21, I spoke to the Unicare annual luncheon about our Sharing our Stories projects. Jerry talked about his Outreach Music Ministry. On Oct 23, the Leungs treated me to a visit to the State Fair.

On Oct 28, I went in my red-eyed phantom costume to choir. Others dressed up too!

On Fri, Oct 30, Connie and Richard threw an early Halloween party to which I took Pauline and picked up Smoot at the airport to attend. On Sat, Oct 31, we celebrated Halloween with more ST viewing at the Leung’s but first showed up both in red-eyed phantom costumes.

On Nov 7, Mark Ansboury and his wife Kelly went to dinner with us, after seeing my collections.

On Nov 9, Smoot, Jency and Leonard got together in Austin to celebrate Leonard’s birthday.

On Nov 15, I wore one of my Next Gen uniforms and greeted people coming to the service encouraging them to come to our event. We did the Together Time to advertise the upcoming ST talk. I wore my TOS top for that!

Donna had written a play based on Devil in the Dark.

On Friday, Nov 20, Donna, Jimmy and I hosted Susan Sackett talking about Humanism in Star Trek.

On Nov 22, what would have been my mother’s 98th birthday, there was a pizza party at the Leung’s at which the robot team showed their presentation to their families and us.

We had two T’day celebrations, the first on Thursday, Nov 26 with the Leungs where we watched the DVD of the new ST movie and the second on Friday, Nov 27 with Paula and Pauline where we had the traditional turkey feast.

On Dec 4. Susan, Elizabeth and Kahterine came over and helped me set up my holiday decorations in the studio and my train.

On Dec 5, the robot competition was held at Supai Middle School.

We delayed celebrating JL’s Dec 4th b’day until after the robot competition. Then we went for Thai food and ice cream.

On Dec 6, we went to a Messiah Sing-along in which Connie, Emily and Derek played.

On Dec 11, we went to the Volunteer Lunch Heidi hosted at UUCP. On Dec 12, we went to the Bunanza holiday party at TTAS.

On Dec 13, we went to Bob's 88th birthday party. In between all our parties, I tried to work on our holiday cards.

On Dec 18, we had our holiday with the Leungs, exchanging presents and looking at lights.

On Dec 19, we went caroling and then partied afterward.

On Dec 20, we went to Emily and Doug's new home for a holiday blessing and party. On Dec 21, Annie and Cash both decided to sit with Smoot. Cash was especially cute when he rolled over on his back on Smoot's keyboard, 'helping' him work.

Smoot and I decided our old dishwasher had died so we got a new one as our joint Christmas present to each other. The cats had to check out the box. (Smoot decided to go with what Consumer Reports recommended and we got the Kenmore.) Then at our Christmas eve service the choir gave me a Darth Vader helmet and cape and a Star Trek t-shirt! They know my obsessions. : >

On Christmas day, Smoot spent time (along with cursing and banging) putting in the new dishwasher. In the photo above middle, Smoot is 'exhausted' from his hard work. After he recovered, he worked on the train set with the cats help.

We opened gifts and took video of the kittens in their holiday collars. I got a digital photo frame and the Wii Dance Revolution.

Then we went over to Pauline and Paula's. I joined them for a visit to Ruth Thistlethwaite and then we all had dinner. We’d originally planned to have Christmas dinner with Ellie and Bob Murphy, but a family crisis changed that and P & P asked us to join them.

On Dec 27, 2009 we joined Connie and Richard for a post-Christmas dinner at their house along with new choir members, Gary and Linda Lawrence.

On Dec 29, 2009, Alan Horn came to town and because of his allergies couldn’t stay in the house so lived and worked with Smoot in the studio. On Wed, Dec 30, Sandy Thompson hosted the traditional Wed-after-Christmas party at her house. I wore my Star Trek shirt and the sweater Pauline had given me for Christmas.