My Grand Parents

Here's another photo from my cousin Randy. This one is of my Grandma Helen when she married Clarence in 1940. Dad is the little guy in the lower right hand photo.
Paper from Wimpychompers Creations “An Autumn Stroll Add-on.” Chain from Kylie M. Designs “Charmed” kit. Beads from Julie O. of Stone Accent Studio “Mother Earth” kit. Heart Cluster from libd “Sampler.” Circular from Patscrap “Cerchi” kit. Stamp Trio Frame from Linda Walton’s Bon Scrapatit Designs “Walking in a scappy Wonderland. Circular Pearls frame from Reality Bytes “Sophisticated” kit. Ribbon with Bow from Vicki Parker’s A Work in Progress “Dandelion Dream” kit. Heart Stamp from Shabby Princess “Splendid” kit. Roses from Sazonia44’s “Valentine” kit.

Later.

Merry Christmas

The reason for Christmas is Christ. Let us rejoice in the peace, joy and hope the season offers.You can download our Christmas Letter here in pdf format. My Christmas wish above was scrapped using pieces from various Christmas Around the World kits.

Later.

Goodbye to Mom

We made it back to LA on Thursday and met with my sisters and brother to go over the eulogy. Gene & I did go back to San Diego for clothes and I was able to print up the Memory Book I scrapped for the funeral on our long drive down from Canada. Download a copy of the pdf Memory Book here. The visitation was Friday and the funeral was Saturday. My sister hired a coordinator who did an excellent job. She left us with these wonderful words to live by.

What Really Matters—

Ready or not, someday our lives, too, will come to an end. There will be no more sunrises, no minutes, hours or days.

All the things you collected, whether treasured or forgotten, will pass to someone else.

Your wealth, fame, and temporal power will shrivel to irrelevance. It will not matter what you owned or what you were owed.

Your grudges, resentments, frustrations, and jealousies will finally disappear. So, too, your hopes, ambitions, plans, and to-do-lists will expire.

The wins and losses that once seemed so important will fade away. It won't matter where you came from, or on what side of the tracks you lived, at the end. It won't matter whether you were beautiful or brilliant. Even your gender and skin color will be irrelevant.

So what will matter? How will the value of your days be measured?

What will matter is not what you bought, but what you built. It's not what you acquired but what you gave.

What will matter is not your success, but your significance. What will matter is not what you learned, but what you taught.

What will matter is every act of integrity, compassion, courage or sacrifice that enriched, empowered or encouraged others to emulate your example.

What will matter is not your competence but your character. What will matter is not how many people you knew, but how many will feel a lasting loss when you're gone.

What will matter is not your memories, but the memories that live in those who loved you.

What will matter is how long you will be remembered by whom and for what. Living a life that matters doesn't happen by accident. It's not a matter of circumstances but of choice.

May you choose to live a life that really matters.

Later.

For Mom

We left Big White on Tuesday. I did get in a couple of runs on Monday between packing up, crying and cleaning the condo. It was -5°F when we left at 1 PM. The roads have been horrible with snow and ice and cold temperatures. This morning it was snowing in Wenatchee, WA. We thought we would be facing snow fall all day but we just hit patches of bad roads and snow, and mostly on the passes. Gene did great driving all 12 hours. I'm exhausted.

I put my travel time to good use and started on some layouts as part of a tribute to my mother for her funeral. I am still having problems coping with the loss but scrapping memories of her is helping. Here's one of my favorite LOs.
Later.

For my Mom and Dad

Yesterday, my mother died unexpectedly. I was shocked when my youngest sister called to tell me. My Mom was only 81, and while not in the best of health, she was doing pretty good.

My Dad died just this past February.

As I am sitting here trying to work all I can think of is how much I miss my parents and all the selfless things they did for us five kids. They started with nothing and gave us their love, faith, unity, guidance, values, self esteem, ambition, and an education so we could become who we are today. What more can a child ask for? I have so many wonderful memories but it's not the same as them being with us. Later.

LO of Mom's Yearbook

Yesterday was spent in Los Angeles. First I visited my Mom, then went to pick up an award presented to me for work I've done for the LA Council of Ski Clubs and lastly saw the play "Spring Awakening" at the Ahmanson Theater. It was fun visiting Mom and she feed me well. I was honored to receive an award— it's always nice to know you are appreciated. The play was dark, interesting and very creative but not for everyone.

The best part of the trip north was that Mom unearthed some boxes of old photos and other stuff. I got through two of them before I had to split. I made this layout of my favorite— scans from her 1945 yearbook. I used Barbara Lee's "Bear Kit."Later.

Cabo Bound

We are off to Cabo later today. This is our beach time between water and snow skiing.

I been working long hours to get all my jobs done so I can relax and enjoy our vacation. I've been squeezing in a bit of scanning of old photos and found this wonderful one of my mom and dad on their wedding day in 1948. I believe it is the first and only time my mom wore make-up. They look so young and innocent. They moved to LA from Milwaukee on their honeymoon and settled in to do a wonderful job raising us five kids.

Howard & Frances Ohl, October 30, 1948

Later.

Day Trip to Los Angeles

Los Angeles was wonderful, warm and relatively clear. I had a nice visit with my mom and scanned in a bunch of old photos. The sunset from San Dimas looking toward the city, with all the smoke from the fires, was amazing. What wasn't amazing was the way the LA Dodgers played and now they are out of the World Series.

Isn't this a great photo. It was taken by my father of my mom in 1948 before they were married.

"9 to 5" was fun, pretty true to the movie with lots of new songs and dancing. The staging was awesome. Allison Janney stared as Violet. This play is definitely for chicks. The guys must have been at the Dodger game seeing them get their butts kicked. But since the San Diego Padres were dead last in their league, guess I should keep my mouth shut.

Now we are off to the Colorado River for some water skiing and our traditional deep-fried turkey. If the weather holds we should have a great weekend. Will be back late Sunday and will have no phone, no TV and no Internet until then. Yipee.

Later.

Play Date

This evening I have a play date in Los Angeles to see the new "9-5" musical. I've had these same seats at the Ahmanson Theater for more than thirty years and I can't seem to let them go.


I'll be stopping by to see my Mom on the way to the play. She just returned from Milwaukee, WI and Huntsville, AL and brought back more than 100 photos from relatives. I can't wait to see them all. I'm bringing my scanner and laptop. Should have plenty of time to go for dinner afterward.

Most of yesterday was spent backing up the files on my computer. I've got to stop renaming files. It's a double edge sword because I rename a file so I can find it easier but then I create a bunch of duplicate files on the back up devices.

Later.

Scrapping

Took some time today to work on my family scrap book. It is so very difficult identifying relatives in old photos. Here's a two-page layout of my immediate family. Being the oldest of five, you will find me in the bottom row, far left.


It's best that I get back to work. I need to finish up a slide show movie from Pacific Rim's recent ski trip to Argentina. We were in Bariloche for a week where we had some fresh snow but the best skiing was in Ushuaia, otherwise known as the End of the World. We also spent a few days in Buenos Aires and Iguazu Falls. It was really a great trip. The Falls were breathtaking.

Later.