Grumpy Trout turns 65 June 30, 2013 -- Surprise party June 29, 2013 -- back to the Pacific Northwest

My husband, Trout, couldn't attend the HHS reunion because he had a race in Portland, OR that same weekend.  The following weekend was his 65th birthday.  He kept telling me that I didn't have to come back from San Antonio for his birthday, but little known to him, I had arranged an immediate family only surprise birthday party for him at his favorite restaurant, the Fife City Bar & Grill, for the evening before his birthday.  All his kids and grandkids were there, as was his ex-wife. 

Some of you may remember that I swore I'd never have kids, or that by the time I would be settled down enough to want them, I'd be too old to have them.  I got lucky and married a man with 5, including one set of identical twins.  Over the past 25 years (our 25th anniversary was April 1st) they got married and had their own families.  We now have 13 grandkids.  See the list at the end of these party pictures for the breakdown.

Yes, it was a zoo, but a fun one.  The food was great.  The kids got there early and decorated the place.  They did a great job.  These are some pictures from that evening.  Unfortunately, I don't have pictures of everyone, but when I finally get on Facebook, I'll be able to see the pictures many others took.

The woman in the purple and green in the foreground is Ramona, the youngest who just graduated from UW and is now in an archeological field school on the island of Gotland, Sweden.  The kids have Scandinavian heritage on both sides, Swedish from their mom, Sarah, in the white on the right and Icelandic from Trout.

 

The 33 at 65 banner is all about his racing.  His car number is 33 and the colors are blue and yellow.  That's our son, Lee, taking a picture of me while I take a picture of him and GK Brynne looks on.

 

The balloons marked Trout's spot at the table.

 

This is Jason, Ramona's husband.  He recently got out of the Navy and is studying forensics for his civilian career.  He spent much of his time in Naval law enforcement, so it's a good match.

 

In the foreground is Dorothy, one of the twins.

 

Trout looks all alone here.  I think he's enjoying a break.  It was a good time for all the kids and grandkids to get together.  The last time they did that we know of was in Utah on a camping trip the first week of April, 2010.  It was very cold.  Not all of the GKs were even born then.

 

This is Audrey, daughter of our oldest, Katie.

 

This is Dorothy, daughter of one of the twins, Ruth.

 

Here is Sarah and Katie.  I loved it when Katie turned 39, the same age Trout was when we got married.

 

Left to right, this is Kaya, the oldest GK, her sister Phaedra and their aunt, Ruth.  Yeah, when they were very little, they did confuse her with their mom, Dorothy.  As did her husband, Aaron.  He wasn't able to be at the party because of truck trouble.  After the party, we helped them out a bit with that, Trout more than me.  We missed you, Aaron!

 

This is Melissa, Lee's youngest daughter.

 

 

This is Dorothy, with her youngest, Gavin.

 

This is Kiersten, with her little sister, Dorothy.

 

Now we have the group pictures.  Missing spouses are not there because they weren't there or because they were taking pictures.

 

I wondered what Trout was pointing at in some of these pictures, but I realized he's "directing" the Happy Birthday song.

 

 

The chef and owner of FCB&G, Diana, made a red velvet cake to die for.  She also made some chocolate espresso flan, also to die for.  And for the honored guest, she made a special little bowl of gazpacho as an appetizer earlier, complete with a birthday candle stuck in a dinner roll beside it.

 

When Brynne, whose parents both have dark hair and eyes, was born with red hair and blue eyes, we thought she'd be teased by her older sister, Morgan, about not being a part of the family.  Then when Lee's youngest, Melissa was born with light red hair and blue eyes, we decided his wife must have some Scandinavian heritage, too.  We missed you, Hilary!

 

This is Ramona and Jason's only, Aidan.  

 

And here's Morgan, Lee's oldest.

 

A good time was had by all, I think.

 

 

 

 

 

Now here's the cast of characters:

 

Trout -- Father and grandfather.

Lo -- Step-mother and grandmother.

Sarah -- Mother and grandmother.

Katie -- the oldest.  Husband - Jim.  Kids - Jimmy, Audrey, Joe.

Lee -- the only boy.  Wife - Hilary.  Kids - Morgan, Brynne, Melissa.

Ruth -- one of the twins.  Husband - Aaron.  Kids - Kiersten, Elijah, Dorothy.

Dorothy -- one of the twins.  Husband - Phill.  Kids - Kaya, Phaedra, Gavin.

Ramona -- the youngest.  Husband - Jason.  Kid - Aidan.

 

Some of you may be wondering what this racing thing is all about.  Trout wanted to do it from the time he was about 12, but he never had the money until the mid-to-late 80's.  He loved the sport so much, though, that he worked turns and did lots of other volunteer work at the tracks in British Columbia, Oregon and Washington.

 

When we moved to Tucson, he was hoping that the racing here would be good, but so far it is not, so he goes back to the NW during the summer to race there.  If it was good here, he'd race in the winter down here.  He keeps hoping...

 

These pictures are not all recent.  They are just some favorites of mine.  He calls his "team" Rainbow Trout Racing, hence the colors on the shoulders of his suit.

 



 

Most people only know about Nascar or some kind of racing on oval tracks.  We find there aren't many followers of Formula 1 or open wheel, road racing.  This is his car.

 

Here he is on pre-grid.  

 

And on the track.

 

And back to the paddock safely.

 

In 2012, he raced a lot.  He ended up with the 2nd place trophy for Formula Club Ford from the International Conference of Sports Car Clubs.  International you say?  Remember that part about British Columbia?  Whether the race is there or Washington or Oregon, both the Canadian and US flags are flown and the anthems are played.

 

Now for a little attitude...

 

Back to Tucson -- the Scenic Route via New Mexico

After 3 days of Roberts Reunion fun and 3 nights of warm clothes and campfires, we all split up camp and headed our separate ways. Trout and I had orginally planned to go to Lubbock to visit my uncle, stopping by Santa Fe on the way to visit our friend Jodie there.

My uncle begged off, having hurt his leg and not feeling up to the visit. We did spend the night in Santa Fe, but Jodie had just gotten out of the hospital and could only visit with us for a short time, so we stayed in a fun hotel (El Rey Inn) instead of her fun house.

These pictures cover the route from Zion National Park to Farmington NM. We stopped in Farmington for the night. I hope the link shows the route okay. It's scenery like this that make me love the west.

As you can probably guess, these are all taken from the passenger side of the Highlander.

This is going over the Colorado River near Glen Canyon Dam.

We called this the "talk to the hand" rock.

We thought the part of this formation on the right looked like a cat.

This is getting close to Farmington, but maybe not quite as close as you might think. Those are the Sangre de Cristo mountains north of Santa Fe.

For you Hillerman fans, this is Shiprock.

Now we skip to a few days later. This is heading back home to Tucson along I10. The poppies were in full bloom.

In between, we visited my long time friend, Anna Lynn, and her husband, Tom, at their place in Ruidoso. Many Texans escape the Texas heat there or in Cloudcroft.

Theirs is one of those romantic stories. They dated in college, went their separate ways, found themselves single much later in life and got back together. She kept her 1st husband's name, too.

I just realized in posting these pictures that Anna has Mickey Mouse ears from the painting behind her. I don't remember if she was a member of the Mickey Mouse Club when we were kids or not.

This is the view from their back porch. It's a ski mountain when there's snow.

Anna and I haven't done the greatest job of keeping up with each other over all these years, but we have known each other since 1st grade. We were both mid-termers. That means we started school in the spring term instead of the fall one. She was a little behind because her family had been living in Venezuela. I was a little ahead because my folks enrolled me as soon they legally could with my birthday in January.

We went to Hot Wells Elementary. Here we are in the 2nd half of the 1st grade in the fall of 1952. I am the one in the back row on the far left with the silly bow in my hair. I'm 6 and Anna is 7. If you click on the picture, you may be able to see through the rungs of the chair in front of me that I have on cowboy boots. Anna is the one in the back row on the far right with the suspender skirt on.

Below is the fall 1953 class picture for the 2nd half of the 2nd grade. This time I'm in the back row on the far right with the headband, glasses and earrings. You can never have too many accessories, even if you are only 7. It is Texas, the girl next to me does have on cowboy boots. For this picture Anna is 4th from the left on the back row.

Special note to the Roberts family -- especially the Hathaways: Does the boy with the suspenders sitting on a chair 3rd from the left in the 1st picture and standing just right of the middle with the Space Ranger T-shirt remind you of anyone? He was quite the character, and a kid after Trout's own heart. He especially loved to kiss the girls and did so any chance he got.

We really enjoyed our visit with Tom and Anna. We hope to do that again before too much longer. They haven't totally retired from their cotton farming (him) or cattle raising (her) operations near Abilene, so they aren't as free to travel as you might think, but they did do a great Rhine River cruise all the way from Amsterdam to Basel this summer.

Comparing notes, it turned out that Anna and I have done many of the same things -- especially when we were single. She was much braver than I was though. She finished college and took off for Europe with $200 in her pocket and only a chance of a teaching job in Germany. I waited until I was 30 to do something similar. You remember the infamous "sold all my stuff to generate $2000 so I could go to Europe" story. And I didn't actually move to Europe until I was 36 and knew for sure I had a job in Germany. What a wimp I was by comparison!