Thought my son's and their families would like to see a picture of my first cousin Byron Blomquist. Pictured on the left is Byron, and on the right is his wife Gretchen Blomquist. Byron and Gretchen had a very nice home built in Cortez, Colorado a couple years ago.(Pictured above is their new home in Cortez, CO.)

Byron has a Phd. in Chemistry, works on upper atmospheric studies for the NOAA at the University of Hawaii. Gretchen has worked for the American Indian Affairs Department of the government for some years helping the tribes with engineering projects such as irrigation, and other important needs.

Both Byron and Gretchen served with the U.S. Peace Corps some years ago, and I believe both met there. Gretchen just received an opportunity to transfer to the CDC or Centers For Disease Control, and took the position. She will be stationed in Zimbabwe, Africa.

So Byron and Gretchen are putting-up their Cortez, CO home for sale and are going to set up "home" in Zimbabwe. Byron will still work about 6 months out of the year for the NOAA at the U. of Hawaii.

I had sent a Christmas card to Byron and Gretchen letting them know that we had a travel trailer, and wondered if they had room for us to come to Cortez and visit them there. They certainly have the room! Well, I guess we missed-out on that opportunity. I still want to get a chance to head out that way anyway again as me and Mom did two summers-ago. The Grand Canyon was incredible!

See yah for now, Love, Dad B.

Byron and Gretchen in Zimbabwe

Rain, Lovely Rain!

Two years of drought might be ending for us here in San Jose, California. This week(Jan 11th-22nd) are our wettest of the Winter months out here.

Our middle son, Ben, makes his living working outside in sheet metal construction, and the weather doesn't bode well for job-prospects for him. Ben is taking it in stride, never the less.

I Dad Blomquist, am sitting here in our humble little office-room on Stratford Drive, enjoying a calm, quiet day, typing my first blog entry.

News? Well, Mom Linda is heading out on a women's church retreat with our daughter in law Melissa. They leave this coming Friday(Jan 22nd), and enjoy a three day weekend with 40+ other women from our church in the beautiful seaside city of Monterey, California.

Ben will have son Logan, and daughter Lavender to care for, while Mom, & Melissa are off at the retreat. Dad/Gary/Grandpa Blomquist will do bachelor chores along with son Ben. We've got NFL play-off games this weekend to keep us occupied.

What have I done lately(Dad B.)? Well, last week I completed pruning our backyard trees. What a pile of branches I ended up with! I got out my McCulloch electric wood chipper and went to work on making those branches into wood chips for my compost pile. It took about two days to grind down all the branches. I seem to have pulled a muscle in my middle back on the right-side. It doesn't want to ease up. Mom has given me a couple hard, Swedish back rubs in the last couple days. It hurts when she does it, but in other ways it feels good. Afterwards I take two extra strength Tylenols, and off to bed, I go.

Next: Well we finally re-did our will, and it is now in the form of a estate trust/will, that is protected from probate stealing-away what we pass on to our sons. We were way overdue on completing it, but we finally did it. This indeed is a relief for Mom and I. Our old will was done via a kit that we bought, and did ourselves with no legal help.

I'm still attending Bible Study Fellowship and am in my 4th year. It as been very rewarding, and not an easy bible study. I meet with roughly 200 men once a week who come from various churches. This year we are working on the New Testament book of "John".

What's ahead so far? Well, we are planning to fly out to Ohio in late May 2010 to be at our youngest son, Thomas Blomquists', medical research thesis defense to earn a doctorate. His oldest brother Michael, wife Andrea, niece Britneigh, and newphew Andrew are planning to drive from their home in Glenwood, Iowa(700+ miles) to meet us for this special occasion.

I will be posting pictures to go along with our messages when I figure out how to use Photo Bucket.

So long for now.......Dad/Gary Blomquist