Happy Birthday Clayton! and more...

Well, today is Clayton Arnold Bruce's 89th Birthday! HAPPY BIRTHDAY! (He is sporting his new buzz.) His hope and wish is that he gets to go for a ride! Today, we will take him out to lunch and visit a new park in town. I hope he has a great birthday!

This picture was taken on Memorial Day. He had just walked the length of the hall and was taking a rest. He wants to walk and keep up the strength in his legs. It is a hard life at this age.
Last Thursday, Epic Church had a Concert in the Park to raise money for their Africa trip. Cory's friend, Rico, brought his new puppy. This is the cutest dog. It is an African Ridgeback. Adia will grow to be about 90 pounds! They are specially bred and have many requirements for the owners when they can purchase this dog.

She is smart, obedient, and such a pup that she curled up on my lap and went to sleep for a lot of the concert. Thanks Rico for sharing!

Guess who came to the concert....The German! It was nice to catch up with Alex and find out what is going on with him. Now that he as graduated and is a working man living in Fresno, we do not see him very often. We love you Alex!

Jordan and Sara's band is great! It was a nice evening of 3 different bands, with Jordan's band finishing off the night. The pipe that is stretching across the front of the stage was a visual aide to let the people know how much money was being donated. Different lengths of pipe were sold for $10-$40. The hope was to stretch all the way across the stage. It was 3/4 there when we left a little early. We don't know if they reached their goal, but the music, fun and friends was a great evening for us! Thanks guys!

Then, Sunday evening, the Symphony Orchestra preformed in their Concert Under the Stars.

They have a new conductor and sound incredible! They had a singer who's voice was so clear and beautiful. This is a yearly event for us and we were glad to be entertained by these accomplished musicians! Hanford is a fun place to be in the summer with all the things that are scheduled and the good friends we love to see.

It is good to be back online with our new Internet provider..ATT. We will be getting out our new email address on Monday or Tuesday...after Nate makes some adjustments on our computer.

Retirement Celebration

Well, on Wednesday, May 20th, Hanford Elementary had their "Employee Recognition." I was called up for 30 years of service for HESD. This year I received an 8 inch bronze statue of a girl sitting and reading a book. It was nice. But my big moment came when our superintendent, Dr. Terry, called my name for RETIRING! That was my big moment! He introduced me as "The Advisor to the Superintendent." We both grinned! Although a bit blurry, you can get the idea. Board member Dennis Hill give me a big hug. I am not sure if he is going to miss me, like he said, or if he is just relieved that I am going! (Dennis and I have been through a lot with standing up for better education....most times in the past we were minority on the direction of the district and the superintendent.)

We are now blessed with a fabulous superintendent, who is turing the district in the right direction! It is an honor to be picture with Dr. Paul Terry. I love and respect this man for the decisions, vision, and witt this man has brought to our school district. He really cares about the children, teachers, and our reputation! Although I will miss working with this man and HESD, retirement seems like a lot more fun. I am not reconsidering! 9 days to go!!!!!

Busy Bruce's

It is time to catch you up with our happenings.
Last Friday night we went to Kristian's surprise birthday party. He was brought to the house in blindfold. He was welcomed by many friends and a Simpson German Chocolate Cake made by his mom. He acted surprised...but a hard guy to surprise!

Food and friends were great!

Lyle decided to celebrate with one of Cory's hats. I think he looks pretty cool in it!

Steve was taking a lot of pictures. I was just getting him back. I am posting a nice one instead of a bad one. I hope he is as kind to me on his blog!

Well, this is the look of the old shed about 2 weeks ago. It continues to be Lyle's work in progress. He is on his 6th or 7th dumpster! He is making progress daily!

One of my last projects for my school was to get the school sign painted above the stage. Student Council sold over $455 worth of pencils to help pay for the sign. This is Ruben Munoz on Saturday painting the outline. He will return tomorrow, to put in the gold color. It will be a time the kids can watch him finish it up.

Today was a 6th grade field trip to Tulare County Museum at Mooney Grove Park. These 90 kids were the best behaved group I have ever taken on a field trip. It was a lot of fun not having to do discipline all day.

Not pictured, but part of the day, we went to College of the Sequoias. We had a nice tour then got back to school for icee's, and a Read-Aloud from The Bronze Bow...one of my favorite books to read to 6th graders.

This is going to be a busy week of adventures for our classes. Tomorrow my scientist neighbor, Don Lord, is going to share his collections of trilabites and prehistoric artifacts. Thursday, author of the book "Double Luck, Memoirs of a Chinese Orphan," Lu Chi Fa, will be our guest speaker. If you don't know this book, go to: www.doubleluck.org It is a wonderful book! He is a very nice man from Morro Bay. Friday, I take the kids to the Jr. High for orientation. So...a very busy week. I may post, or not. Hope you enjoyed!

Easter, TEA and Nate

On Easter, we all enjoyed seeing and holding Avery Dedekian. She was 2.5 weeks old and just loves to sleep. Uncle Leonard is loving this! Addison got to hunt Easter eggs with no competition this year. She gets lots of help on colors to look for and locations to look from all the adult helpers. She had a great time!

Even Hazel got to enjoy a little Easter with the family this year. It was a fun time. Thanks Bob and Linda for having us!

Well, April 15th was our day to protest TAXES. We participated with hundreds of other people in and around Hanford about the over-extension of government in our lives. We were happy that there were more than Republican there.

Yea! On Friday Nate came to help us! We really appreciate Nathan's willing heart and effort to help us in our time of need. Lyle has been working on cleaning up his dad's old place which is currently a rental. Lyle has built and rebuilt fences and is now working on cleaning out his dad's old shed area. Not only is it an eye sore, it has had varmints in it. Nathan drove all the way to Hanford to help his dad with this dirty project. Thanks Nate! Clayton has been wanting a "Field Trip," so Lyle brought him over to watch. Clayton loved the outing and was treated to McDonald's lunch.

The back part of the roof is now removed thanks to Nate and Lyle's hard work on Saturday morning.

Although this is a lousy picture, I wanted to get Nate's picture on the desktop to let everyone know how much he helped me with my new computer. Annie and Bee are on my screen saver, but Nate showed me how to take pictures of us with my new Mac Book. He set it up and showed me more than I will ever remember...But, THANK YOU! YOU ARE FABULOUS, NATE!

Here is a better shot of my wonderful Birthday Toy from Lyle. Thank you! I love my new computer! It is something I have wanted for a long time.

Looking forward to doing marvelous things with my new machine. After all his hard work, Nate took his grandma Lois to lunch on Saturday. He spent the afternoon with her. She love that! And after going to church with us on Sunday, Nate treated me to an early Mother's Day lunch at Figero's Southwestern Mexican Resturant. Thanks again, Nate. We had a great weekend with him!

Vegas Fun in April

Spring Break is a wonderful thing! We got away to Las Vegas for 3 days. We like to see the new and ever changing sights. These are new sky scrapers called City Center in the place of the old Boardwalk...where we used to take the kids to the Surf Buffet for inexpensive food. Yes, that building has the illusion of leaning over. I spent some time taking pictures of Lyle because it was his birthday!

We tried to do things that he wanted to do. This is inside the Wynn Hotel. It is beautiful. The floor is white mosaic with colorful florals incorporated into the design. This is inside.

This is outside the Wynn Hotel. What a beautiful setting. This hotel was built where the Desert Inn used to be. It has a beautiful, expensive golf course built behind.

We walked next door to see the new Palazzo Hotel. We watched being built from our window at the Wynn 2 summers ago. The colorful umbrellas and the high waterfall features (over Lyle's right shoulder) were impressive. They resembled a high waterfall.

Then we drove way out west to Summerlin Planned Community to look at houses. Well, Marlene fell in love with the first one we saw! This is the last house in the Crown Series at Kingwood at The Vistas community. This model home was being sold AS IS! EVERYTHING COMES WITH IT! TV, new oversided WASHER & DRYER, Kitchen appliances, bedding, window treatments, pictures...you see it....it will stay...except they will clean the carpet. Oh My.....It is gorgeous! Unfortunately...it is out of our price range! But enjoy my dream!

Can't you see Lyle cooking it up in this beautiful kitchen?

The formal dining room has a little patio out of the sliders to the side yard. (Although not pictured, the backyard was all hard scape except a 8' square of grass...(don't know if it was fake or real...but not much to mow! Just enough for Dottie!)

The master bedroom is downstairs. It is beautiful and grand.
Fabulous bath with high double sinks and huge closet.

Also downstairs, but not pictured, is the laundry room and another front bedroom/office with a separate bath. It is down a hall that we missed the first time we did the tour.

Now upstairs, you enter to see the turret! Yes, there is a quiet sitting area in the turret!

There are 2 more bedrooms and a bath upstairs that I did not post the pictures....but they are nice!

Well here is one last look at the family room....remember all the furnishings come with this place. The realtor said they would probably accept an offer of $390,000. Just too much for us.

Too bad....but a nice dream!

We traveled on to The Kingwood Crossing, a neighboring set of houses. These are 3 of my favorite shots from the house I liked the best. These were listed about half the price of the 1st place...still nice! But not a close out...

Bee this room is for you! The bed skirt is black with white polka dots. It was darling! Lyle was setting the mood by showing one of the outfits from the closet.

On the other side of the room, the Bee theme continues....soooooo cute!

Well, we are back home...rested and relaxed from our adventures. With 38 more days of teaching....It was fun living the dream of no school during the week.