February 2026

Tuesday 2/3

Just in time for the Winter Olympics . . .

This cute "Winter Games" coloring book was delivered by Amazon. Linda colored these two cute giraffes for our granddaughter, Cora Mae, who is C R A Z Y about giraffes.

Friday 2/6

After 18 years, the numbers on our mailbox were looking so sad that they could barely be read. Last month we decided to buy some new numbers and have been waiting for a warm day to put them on the front of our mailbox.

Today was that day !! 

A couple of weeks ago, Steve sanded off the old, individual, numbers. Today it was over 50 degrees and a perfect, sunny day, to put this new, one-piece, reflective set of numbers on the mailbox door.

Tonight, marked the beginning of the 25th Winter Olympic Games hosted by

the country, Italy.

We watched the opening ceremony that was broadcast from the San Siro Stadium in Milan Italy. Team USA is the largest delegation with 232 athletes, marking its biggest-ever Winter roster. There will be competitions in both Milan and at the Cortina mountain resort which is 250 miles (nearly 5 hours) away from Milan. The Olympic flags were raised and the Olympic Cauldrons were lit in both Milan and Cortina. 

Monday 2/9

Linda has been working on creating a book with pictures of all the Christmas decorations we've had since getting married. She has been searching for old pictures and has been taking some new ones for more than a year.

 

After several months, she finished creating the book on our laptop and ordered it from Shutterfly last month. Today . . .  it arrived !!  It turned out beautiful and will be a wonderful "memory" book for our family.

Thursday 2/12

A couple of weeks ago we ordered our 2025 blog book. We order it from a company located in the Netherlands called "Into Real Pages".

It arrived today!

The Forward:

"This has been a busy year for updating our home, visiting family, and having fun! Making memories for us and our family is important, even more important are the pictures that will remind us of our family, time together, happy times along with the sad moments and heartaches that come with life here in mortality. We love our family and hope that our blog will be a source of reminders and memories for all to enjoy"

We started having our blog made into a book back in 2012 so this is our 14th book. It turned out beautiful and, as usual, we have been having fun looking back at the year and all the things we did. There were fun times as well as sad, times to laugh and times to cry but all in all, 2025 was a good year!

Friday 2/13

Today we purchased a new range for our kitchen!

We bought it in the scratch & dent department but it is brand new.  When it was delivered to the original owners, it was gas.... they ordered electric. Since it had been unboxed, it couldn't be sold as new and ended up in Scratch & Dent. It is a very nice LG, with a convection oven. It will be delivered on Tuesday, the 17th.

Tonight, our Star Ward had a Family Dance for Valentine's Day.

It was unfortunate that this was a "holiday" weekend and many of our Families were out of town. There were only about 20 people in attendance, but we managed to have a great time together. There was a photo booth, cake & punch, and a table with supplies for making valentines. There was a DJ and we had a good time dancing the night away.

Tuesday 2/17

The truck arrived right on time and the guys got right to work!

They removed our old range and put it in our garage then brought the new range in and got it all set up. As we looked at it something didn't seem right. We opened the oven door and it was covered in caked-on grease... we looked more carefully and the burners were also dirty... this was not the range we looked at in the store! We noticed the LG logo was in a different place and the control panel was smaller. Linda scanned the QR code and it came up with a different model number than the Model LRGN6325X we had purchased. We told the installers and they documented the problem. We called our salesman and after checking things out, said our stove was still sitting in the store. The exchange will be made tomorrow.

Wednesday 2/18

For the 2nd day in a row, the RC Willey truck pulled up in front of our house. While they were disconnecting the 1st new range (that really wasn't new at all) they asked Linda to go out to the truck and make sure they had brought the right range this time, so she did. When she opened the oven door, the handle came loose in her hand. The the delivery guys said it looked like the handle had been damaged in the warehouse. They took pictures to document it and our salesman ordered a new handle.

They took the 1st new range out to the truck and brought the 2nd new range into the house and got it all hooked up. They were able to tighten-up the oven handle well enough that we could use it until the new handle gets here. This range has a griddle that fits over the center burner, and because it has a convection oven, it has a large air-fry basket. We are excited to learn how it works and begin using this beautiful new range!

We have been getting some unevenness and some gaps between the boards of our hardwood floor so . . . today we had Mark, our hardwood floor guy, stop by to give us some advice.

 Mark looked at the floor and determined it was likely caused by dry air in the house. He recommended we try running a humidifier. We already had one so we are now running it and trying to get the humidity up!  It doubles as a colorful nightlight by our front door. While it is on and "misting", it cycles through the entire color spectrum.

Friday 2/20

Today Linda "seasoned" our new cast iron griddle with oil then baked it on in the oven. 

Tonight … we used it for the first time!!

Sunday 2/22

Today was the end of the 2026 Winter Olympics. The ceremony was held, for the first time ever, in the Verona Arena. The Ancient Roman Amphitheater is 2000 years old. Of course it has been updated for structural integrity and modern technology. It is currently being used as a Premier open-air venue for operas, concerts, and cultural events.

 In Milan & Cortina, The Olympic flags were retired, Kirsty Coventry (IOC president) declared the Olympic Games "Closed", and The Olympic Flames, in both cities, were extinguished. The USA came in 2nd overall and won a USA record for the number of Winter Olympic Gold medals and came within one of matching the 

USA's "total number of medals" record. 

Friday 2/27

Recently, we noticed that 3 of the 5 ladders on one of our blinds were broken. We started calling around to see about getting them fixed. Once we decided on a place, we took the blinds down and hung up a beautiful blue sheet!

Last week, on the 19th, we dropped the blinds off at "the Blind Gallery" in Boise and today we picked them back up. The cords were broken right at the top. Three were completely broken and two were literally hanging by a thread. We took the sheet down and slid the blind header back into the brackets then replaced the valance.

It's good to have our blinds back, even though the sheet was very colorful and served its purpose well, we really do like the blind better!!

Saturday 2/28

Last week Matt came out and leveled our new range for us. Because it is convection and has a fan on the back, it doesn't fit up against the wall like our old one did. In fact, there is a two inch gap! Eventually, we will move the electrical outlet down, allowing the range to sit a little further back and closer to the wall, but until then, we had to get just a little bit creative.

We found a shelf on Amazon and it is designed  just for a situation like ours. Once we received the shelf and knew it would work, we ordered a few décor items to dress it up a bit. It's not perfect, but it works!!

Today is Linda 77th birthday and it has been a wonderful day.

First thing this morning, Steve gave her a beautiful card and some earrings.

A few days ago she received these cute PJ's in the mail

This afternoon, This bright bouquet of flowers was delivered to her

And tonight, we used the Chili's gift card we got for Christmas to have a delicious Birthday Dinner. In addition to all of this, Linda has been receiving Happy Birthday wishes all day long via social media, text messages, and phone calls. YES... it has been a wonderful day and at the end of the day, she is feeling very special and loved. 

Thank you everyone !!

This month Linda has been working on reviewing her memorizations. 

When we were on our mission in Colorado Springs (2010), the Relief Society challenged all the sisters to memorize the Living Christ. Linda took, and completed, that challenge. That challenge inspired her to try and memorize the Family Proclamation. She did that one, then the First Vision and The Restoration Proclamation. She remembered the Articles of Faith from her youth and has added them to her list of memorizations. 

We have enjoyed this month and doing a few little projects, watching the Olympics, and celebrating lots of birthdays. March is promising to be warm but wet as it ushers in the Spring Season.