It has been another relatively quiet year. Well, it has been quiet for me. We all drove out to Utah in March, and the pups and I have been staying at the new house while Rich has been jet-setting back and forth between Utah and New York so that he can keep working at Radio City.

When we drove out in March, Rich took the diesel, Lady, and a trailer, and I took the blue Jeep and Tyner. We chose a southern route down through Texas to avoid the winter weather farther north. We made a few stops on the way to keep things from getting too dull:

Rich didn't always fly back and forth. One time he flew to New York and came back in the red jeep back with the car trailer. While he was away, I'd find various ways to keep myself busy. For example, Lady and I took a training class at Petco in Orem. That and some long walks have made a world of difference in her behavior. If you'd like to see some more pictures from our walks, click HERE. In May, Rich and I took her to the "Strut Your Mutt" fundraiser in West Jordan. We all had a great time, including Tyner who was relaxing back in Wallsburg.

For Memorial Day we attended a ceremony at the American Fork cemetery.

I spent the summer playing the piano for auditions and rehearsals for the various summer theater companies in the area including Sundance, Scera, and the Utah/Idaho Performing Arts Company. When the conductor for two Mozart operettas fell ill, I changed my hat from "rehearsal pianist" to "conductor" - my debut as such! I was also asked to accompany singers from Utah Lyric Opera for a performance before an October concert by Ronan Tynan.

In July we celebrated the 4th by going to see Jaycee ride in a rodeo as "Pee Wee Princess 2010", and we celebrated Lady's 2nd birthday with "pup"cakes. Also in July, our neighbors invited us to join them to take photos up at Soapstone Basin in the Uinta Mountains.

Speaking of neighbors, there are no words to explain how amazing our neighbors are. They have been so helpful, especially while Rich is away. As much as he hates not being here with us, at least he can sleep at night knowing that if I need anything, I just have to go bang on any of our neighbors' doors. They have dropped off truckloads of firewood, snowblown our driveway, and come by with a steady stream of fresh eggs (from real chickens) and vegetables, baked goods, and other gifts.

A visit from Lisa gave us a reason to go check out the Bingham Canyon Copper Mine and attend a Mormon Tabernacle Choir concert.

On the 24th of July, Wallsburg celebrated it's sesquicentennial, and I witnessed my first "home-town rodeo".

When we arrived in Wallsburg in March, Tyner wasn't doing so well, but the hill in our backyard must be magic because within a few days he would come running - yes, Tyner was running - down the hill from walks with Rich. He even chased our neighbor's sheep! Seeing what a difference our new home made for Tyner, Rich and I discussed choosing a senior dog the next time we adopted. Shortly after that conversation, we saw an ad in the local paper for a senior black lab named "Sadie" available for adoption at the Wasatch County Animal Shelter in Heber. We decided it must be kismet, so we went over to the shelter to inquire. As it turns out, Sadie had already been adopted by an elderly lady, but while we were there, I also signed up as a volunteer. Two weeks later, on August 18, Tyner died, and our hearts broke. He has been such a special part of our family, and we miss him terribly. It is comforting to know that he is at rest at the top of his magic hill with the beautiful view which he helped me discover.

Less than a month later, I got a call from the shelter asking if we would still be interested in adopting Sadie. Apparently the lady who had taken her needed to have surgery and was concerned that she wouldn't be able to take care of Sadie, so she brought her back to the shelter. I brought Sadie home with me the next day after my shift at the shelter, and she immediately made herself at home... and disembowled one of Lady's squirrels. Sadie had spent 8 years with a family, but when they moved and couldn't bring her along, they took her to the shelter. Their loss is our gain, and we are thrilled to have her in our family now.

In September we took a beautiful drive up the Alpine Loop to Cascade Springs to see the fall foliage.

My favorite thing to do at the shelter is to take pictures of the new arrivals for use on flyers and in the newspaper. During one of my photo shoots I met two senior black labs - one male and one female. The male reminded me of how Rich described Tyner when he first got him from the pound: while all the other dogs were barking and yammering, Tyner just sat quietly in his kennel, looking up at Rich and wagging his tail. I knew that if Rich met this little guy, we would be bringing him home. Sure enough, Rich came to help do some handyman work around the shelter and totally fell for this pup. We didn't want to bring him home right then, though, because we would soon be driving back to New York and didn't want to put the old guy through that. Luckily a family agreed to foster him until we return in January.

But there was still the problem that Sadie - who weighs in at just under 100 pounds - was too big to fit comfortably in the back seat of the diesel with Lady. We talked about perhaps trading in for a Suburban, but when Rich found a Chevy G20 conversion van for sale right here in nearby Midway, we knew we had found the solution to our problem. Rich went over to the shelter a couple more times on his own while I wasn't feeling well and stayed home, and guess who came home with him. Rich decided that in our new "Luv Van" we would easily have room for one more pup to ride comfortably back to New York, and so he brought home Gibbs. (Yes, Rich named him after the character on CBS's NCIS.) We don't know anything about Gibbs' history, but we figure he's about 10 years old, and he has a limp - possibly from an arthritis-riddled old injury. When he got here he looked pretty scraggly and he was severely underweight, but after a few weeks of healthy food and furmination he looked like a different dog! The other happy news is that the foster family that had been lined up for Gibbs agreed to take in the senior female, so now neither of those two poor old dogs have to sleep on that cold hard floor any more!

Once in a while we see something in Wallsburg that is new to us city kids. For example, in July we saw lots of sheep being dragged around by ATVs in preparation for 4-H events, and in October a pygmy goat was trapped on our porch by the neighbor's border collie.

Lady, Sadie, Gibbs and I are looking forward to having Rich home for Christmas.

Love,

Ronnie, Rich, Lady, Sadie & Gibbs

PS: If you sent a Christmas card to us in NYC and it got returned as "undeliverable" you can resend it to our Utah address. Our NYC mail carrier is completely incompetent and has apparently decided to not deliver our mail any more and instead use our mail box as a storage place for her rubber bands.