Walk For The Cure!

Well, here we are at the Walk! We arrived around 9 a.m. and Sydney and Taylor, (our neighbor) promptly got their hair colored! The morning was brilliant. They had fun games and blow-up toys for the kids and were serving breakfast. After some warm-ups, of head, shoulders, knees and toes and the chicken dance, we were ready to go. What I thought would be a 5 or 10 mile walk, ended up only being about 1 mile and a fun little jaunt around the neighborhood. (I spied with my little eyes some For Sale By Owners). When we returned to the park they had drinks, hot dogs and chips ready for us. It was only 10 a.m???. Oh well, after playing some more games the kids were hungry Ian especially loved the Doritos. He loves licking all the cheese and salt off! MMMMMmmm. The walk was a success, and Utah County alone raised $230,000!!! Thanks you all soooo much! If all your love and support could cure diabetes, it would have been cured a long, long time ago!!! Next year, we are planning a team of our own, so be thinking of a good team name, and we would love for you all to come and walk for us. It's usually the third Saturday in September, so mark your calendars now.

Now it is raining. Lynn and Cody took the trailer to somewhere up by Vernon so he can be ready to hunt on Wednesday. The kids are running around crazy, playing with their sticky hands and getting sticky all over the wall. (What was I thinking when I painted the walls with flat paint??)

Thanks again for all your donations. Love ya all!!!! Millie

Homesick

I can't express enough gratitude and surprise in which you have all supported our goal of raising money for Walk for the Cure. When Sydney was diagnosed four years ago, naturally we were all heartbroken and devastated. I knew Sydney was sad, when we brought her home from the hospital, but I never really realized the extend of her grief until today. Sydney would say, "I want to go home," several times everyday. I would say, "You are home, silly." Home was no longer a place of comfort, she still had to get pricked by needles, and endure several blood checks everyday. I knew somehow that she wanted things to go back the way they were before the hospital, but I never really made the connection.
When Wesley died, I remember Virginia telling me that Greg and Darrin had feelings of homesickness. A huge hole was left in their souls. A hole that couldn't be repaired. Grief.
This morning, as I was getting ready for the day, Ian said, "I want to go home." I made the connection. His world had changed thanks to me. Since I have gone back to work, he has spent time at the babysitters. No more long days hanging with Mom and watching T.V., or playing, or reading. He is mourning the loss of that time. The way things used to be. Homesick.
Unfortunately, things change. Our comfort zones are challenged, or lost, or we find new comfort in other things. But we never really forget, what we yearn for the most, what we found comfort in, Home. And all things associated with home. Which is why I believe when we are homesick, we can still connect to our "Home in Heaven." Our souls are linked directly, and if we are quiet, we can hear our souls whispering, yearning for our Father, who will comfort us in our grief, help us overcome our challenges and disappointments and move forward.
May you all be blessed! I love you all! Millie

Donate To A GREAT Cause!

Greetings!
This year our family has decided to join with another family in a very special cause on September 22nd. I'm posting this on my blog to ask everyone for support in helping us reach our personal goal of raising $300 for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation Walk to Cure Diabetes.
Along with a half-million other walkers across the country, Our goal: To raise $90 million to help fund research for a cure for type 1 diabetes and its complications.
Type 1, or juvenile, diabetes, is a devastating, often deadly disease that affects millions of people--a large and growing percentage of them children.
Many people think type 1 diabetes can be controlled by insulin. While insulin does keep people with type 1 diabetes alive, it is NOT a cure. Aside from the daily challenges of living with type 1 diabetes, there are many severe, often fatal, complications caused by the disease.
That's the bad news... and yes, it's pretty bad.
The good news, though, is that a cure for type 1 diabetes is within reach. In fact, JDRF funding and leadership is associated with most major scientific breakthroughs in type 1 diabetes research to date. And JDRF funds a major portion of all type 1 diabetes research worldwide, more than any other charity.
I'm writing to ask for your support because now more than ever, EACH of us can be a part of bringing about a cure. Each of us can make a real difference
Won't you please give to JDRF as generously as you're able?
Together, we can make the cure a reality.
Thank you,
Millie Abplanalp
P.S. Anyone can join us on Sept. 22nd for the Walk!
Please visit my Walk Web page if you would like to donate online or see how close I am to reaching my personal goal:
http://walk.jdrf.org/walker.cfm?id=86765918

Camping

Hi ALL!

Finally after two years, we decided to brave camping again. Lynn wanted to go down by Vernon to scout out deer for his deer hunt at the end of the month. So he loaded up the 4-wheeler and trailer Friday night, after he had already made a trip down to take the camping trailer, stopped at Walmart for food and etc. . . and arrived at our destination at 11 p.m. The next morning, Ian woke up and looked around at the sage brush covered mountains and said, "Where did our house go?" He had fallen asleep on the way down, and he was very confused when he woke up in the trailer, but it was in a different place. It was a relaxing weekend, and Lynn saw some big deer, (but on private land). I finally got Eclipse read, a little disappointed, now I will have to wait almost a whole year for the next book to come out! Ughhhh. We went fishing at the Vernon reservoir, where Sydney caught the most fish, and everything else that was in the lake, (crawdads) and Ian screamed like a girl when the fish touch him. The band aid on his eye is a result of a run in with the babysitters couch. He won't take it off. Sydney also saved his life, after he fell in the mud and they both came back to the trailer bawling their eyes out and covered head to toe with mud. Then Ian started throwing up because he had mud in his mouth and I couldn't get it out fast enough. It was a great weekend!

Lynn is heading down to Miami this week for business, so look out Greg and Darrin. We wish we could all fit in his suitcase. I almost have all my training classes done in SLC and now I am spending more time running my business out of my home, I have some real live clients! I will be showing them some condos this weekend. Whoo hooo!! That will be fun. Real Estate is more difficult than I thought. My perspective of it keeps changing daily. I hate prospecting, but I try to see it as a game: how many people can I get to know and help. It is totally out of my comfort zone to be outgoing and putting my self out there. But I realized this weekend, that I really do like people, (It was a very quiet weekend) weird I know, but I've always considered myself a loner of sorts. So a new perspective has formed and I am going to be more relaxed and open when I am faced with new people and new situations.

I had an opportunity to practice my new perspective when we got home from our camping trip. I was cleaning out the trailer when a car pulled up next to the gargoyle house with two couples. They got out and started looking through the windows. Lynn said, "You should go show them the house, but you are all sweaty and gross." I quickly related a story to him I had heard in training. A real estate agent was in the grocery store, she didn't have any make up on and was totally in her grubbys, when she was on her way out she saw some people standing next to the stand with the real estate books and she heard them say, We need to buy a house today. Well, the agent just walked on by, after all, she wasn't working and she looked horrible. I guess after she had told this story to someone, she was "helped out of real estate." So, with this story in the back of my mind, I went over and introduced myself and asked them if they wanted to see the house. They did, and I apologized that I hadn't showered for 4 days! Ha ha. Anyway, it was good realtor practice. I think I was too embarrassed to ask for another appointment. But I did give them my card.

The kids are back in school and life is returning to some sort of schedule, thank goodness. Sydney loves school, and Karlie loves the social aspect of it. It's more of a fashion show for her. Ian cried this morning when we dropped the kids off at school, he wanted to go too. I can't believe it will only be a few more years and I will be driving him to school. So I am hanging on to every moment I have with him. Not that I don't value the time I have with my girls, Ian is just the last one. I feel very blessed for the beautiful family that I have and try every day to count my blessings, which include all of you! Love ya!! Millie