What? July is OVER?

July seemed to pass by in a blur for me.  It looked very much like June with the exception of getting my Mom ready to move into a one-bedroom DOWNSTAIRS apartment.  Her dog, Pepper, tends to pull on the leash and she simply isn't that steady on her feet.  But after culling and packing, the movers came and loaded all her stuff. We still have to unpack and figure out what goes and what stays. It's difficult to get rid of things that were from her house in Dallas, but have no place in her life here.  And living amid boxes and packing paper muddles her thinking quite a bit - so we're all spending a lot of time together.

I'm giving lots of thought these days to coping with aging parents, and focusing on compassion. My mom turned 82 this month - on the 21st.  We celebrated with lots of food and family. We even took a little trip to Dallas for her to see her sister, Marilyn. My Uncle Jack, her brother, died a year ago last August. They
were all three very close at one time.

Alyssa's still wedding planning and working a few days a week at Milk & Honey.

Katie's working at Cinemark and daydreaming about her move to Los Angeles in September.

Michael's Nicaraguan adventures continue. He's planning to come back for the wedding next April and Ron and I are going to go see him in November. (That reminds me to get working on my passports!)

Ron gets to the boat 2-3 weekends each month. I even went and had a great time! I'm no sailor, but I can help Popeye out from time to time. Of course, when we went the wind died down as a storm approached. So these are photos of the windless afternoon and the evening with the storm in the background.  On our drive home, the storm clouds just kind of stuck on I35, so we traveled in rain all the way home.

And, me, I'm still working on my health issues. Trying to manage my food, and working out at the gym 5 days/week.

Life certainly looks different around here!