In Memory of Joe Valenzuela: 1971-2009

Joe Valenzuela

Joe with Baby Raia

Joe and baby Jesse and Grandpa Kipp

Today was a sad day. We said goodby to Joe. I thought since I do a family history blog and as far as I am aware, nobody in Joe's family or past family does, I thought I would like write a little about him. He was only 38 years old when he died.

He married my granddaughter, Felica Featherstone in my backyard in 2002. They are divorced now. Together they had two children, Raia and Jesse. They are my great grandchildren and Joe was their father and I feel the need to say a little about him even though I did not know him well.

Whenever I saw him, he was always happy and smiling and was always very friendly. He worked at Wal-Mart for a while and I would see him there. He was a musician and today, at his service, I heard his recordings for the first time and he had an excellent voice. The service was touching and song THE DANCE by Garth Brooks touched my heart. I feel for his family and a mother should never have to bury a son before she dies. I always worry that may happen to me someday and I hope I never have to live through it.

Raia and Jesse are so young to have lost their father. I do know that they were with him the day before he died and that is a good thing that got to see him before he passed suddenly alone in his apartment in Orem. I could tell by everyone who was at the service that he was greatly loved and had close family. I will miss him even though he really wasn't part of our family anymore. But Raia and Jesse will always be my family and in that regard, Joe is as well.

We will miss him greatly.

The Dance by Garth Brooks

Looking back on the memory of The dance we shared 'neath the stars alone For a moment all the world was right How could I have known that you'd ever say goodbye And now I'm glad I didn't know The way it all would end the way it all would go Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain But I'd have had to miss the dance Holding you I held everything For a moment wasn't I a king But if I'd only known how the king would fall Hey who's to say you know I might have changed it all And now I'm glad I didn't know The way it all would end the way it all would go Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain But I'd have had to miss the dance Yes my life is better left to chance I could have missed the pain but I'd have had to miss the dance

Some Minor History

This is Randy's sister Terri and her husband Joe. They live in North Caroline. We may try to go out and visit them sometime.

Getting the Kitchen Ready

We are setting up the kitchen for Thanksgiving and we put the outside table in and it really made the cat's day. Randy's cat March decided to climb up on Randy's back while he was busy in the kitchen.

Happy Thanksgiving

Me Celebrating Halloween


Halloween has come and gone. I enjoyed celebrating it with some of my family. I wish a very Happy Thanksgiving to all of the Carrillo bunch. I wish we could all be together like in olden times. May you have a wonderful Thanksgiving Day.

The Holidays: My Thoughts

The holidays are a little hard on me. This is because of memories long ago about how much Alex enjoyed the season and how he loved to give. I also miss the joy of small children and the excitement in their eyes. Also the excitement I enjoyed as a child waiting for my dad to put up the real Christmas tree. I really miss my parents. I miss the lights that Alex used to put up every year. Even if we put them up now, it would not be the same. Randy has a hard time with Christmas because he was always on the road driving and never got to enjoy any of it. I am hoping now, he will get to enjoy it because he has a family now.

I love the music, but that is even not as enjoyable as it once was. This I believe is because of all the memories (good ones but sad) that I have. I guess because I now realize that life just goes too fast and we lose loved ones. I still love the lights and the music but with a sadness none the less. I like to look at snow but I don't like that fact that it is cold and days are very short. I never have liked the commercialism of the season. It's like all of us have to rush out and buy the best stuff to outdo others and make people happy by what we give or how much we spend. I wish the season would be more peaceful but I find that hard in today's world. I often feel stressed at this time of year. And I find that people EXPECT me to be merry and if I am not, that puts stress on me.

I do enjoy my family of the present and being with them. I am looking forward to Thanksgiving with Tammy and her family at my house and of visiting Jennifer and her family in Seattle for Christmas. So my real joy of the holidays is looking forward to being with my family and just a little sad about the ones who have left me.

November Birthdays

November 9: Kathy Carrillo 1967

November 15: Cherise Carrillo 1968

November 19: Chris Johnson 1947

and J J Riehle 1983

Hope everyone enjoys their birthday this year!!

Congratulations to Cherokee

http://www.kidk.com/news/local/64504637.html

Cherokee and her fellow FFA classmates at Rigby High have made it to the finals and are going to Indiana. I am so proud of her and her many accomplishments and her good grades. I am also proud that Chevy is in the FFA as well. Keep up the good work!

October 11 is Tammy's Birthday

This month we celebrate Tammy's birthday. She is a very special person. She has overcome a lot of diversities in her lift. She is a wonderful mom. She has a good heart. She will always be my baby girl. She has many special gifts. The is an excellent creative writer. She is very spiritual. I love her very much.

Family Vacations

Today I would like to reminisce about some good times we as a family have enjoyed in the past. My parents were the best. We always had a happy time together doing many things and even when we were poor, we always found fun ways to do things together. We once went to California and Disneyland when Disneyland was first built. My brother and I both loved the ocean. I could not wait to get to the beach and dodge those waves. My brother loved it so much that he got really badly sunburned and we had to put Disneyland off a day so he could recover. Disneyland was OK but I loved the ocean much more. We would stay with my mother's relatives when we went to California to save money. Sometimes we stayed in motels and the motels back then had kitchenettes. It only cost about $8.00 to stay one night but we thought that was a lot.

We also enjoyed going to Fisherman's Wharf once when we were there. We went to Knott's Berry Farm and The Hollywood Wax Museum and to The Forest Lawn Cemetery where many famous people are interred.

Our family would play softball every evening in the summer after dinner. We just used an old board and rubber ball and it was a blast. We also played hide and go seek when it was dark and my parents did too. All the neighbors came to our house. Their parents were dull.

My dad always took us on vacation no matter what. He even built a homemade camper once. We even stopped to eat our lunch in the camper and if there was room, we played softball before we journeyed on.

After I was married, we often continued to travel with my parents. I remember going to the Grand Canyon and John almost falling down in the canyon. We took moving 8 millimeter movies of it and the kids enjoyed watching those home movies more than watching TV. Alex would set up the projector and put an old sheet on the wall and we just sit back and watch and play the film backwards sometimes.

We once went with my parents to the Oregon coast and stayed at a sand dune campground. Alex laid the kids down in the sand and buried them up to their chins. We took pictures and it was a blast. We visited Lake Powell with my parents and toured the dam there. My dad thought it was so funny, he would say: "This is the Dam elevator" when we were going up to the dam and "this is the damn dam." He would laugh. It gave him the chance to say a bad word.

Our family may have traveled on a budget, but we always went someplace and always enjoy ourselves and being together. I will write more about our family vacations later. There are so many experiences that it would take hours to jot it all down at once. But as a family, we were truly blessed.

"I want some Wah Wah Lemon!"

You'll always remember what funny things kids say. For my brother I specifically remember the food items, "wah wah lemon" for watermelon, "your-gut" for yogurt, and "sanyo" for sandwich. It's Matt's birthday today.

Matt will always be my big little brother. After all his nickname is Biggins. He's a pretty big dude, could be a football player if you asked me.

I remember the big mole he had smack dab in the middle of his belly, the time he came home from the hospital after surgery when he was only 2 or 3, and how his heart sounds - swish swash swish swash. I remember how mad I got after finding that he had colored on my doll with yellow crayon. And most of all how I remember how he loved to play with balls and water. "Ah ah ah ah ah" was the way he used to laugh.

I admit for a while I was jealous of him. After all I was the baby of the family for almost 9 years, so why was he so special all of a sudden? How come he never had to have hand me downs or leftover toys from the other kids? How come he got a new bike and a trampoline and all to himself nonetheless? But who could deny that cute little boy! Glad I got over that. I think he sometimes feels like he missed out though since he practically grew up as an only child.

I remember babysitting him in the mornings for one summer and he would lie there in the mornings on the front room floor with his Big Bird "blangie" and watch Today's Special. Yes it was public programming and we did not have cable TV yet. The next year is when we did get cable TV and he and I loved watching Disney cartoons and thought we were the coolest on the block.

I can't believe he's already 29 years old. Time flies by! I remember hanging out with him a lot when we were both single. It was a lot of fun to go to movies and just be ourselves together and to watch him have "buzzard's playtime" with my boys. They needed a big brother after all they went through and I can never thank him enough for that.

Matt has always been very caring with a warm heart. He does not let anything bother him and chooses to love everyone around him regardless of their faults. Guess that is why I thought it would be cool to introduce him to his wife. What's not to love? He's just a big sweet teddy bear. I did it when he was 3 and took "wedding" pictures of him and the next door neighbor girl named Tia, so what was wrong with doing it again?

Have a happy birthday Matt, make it a great one. After all it is your last year of your 20's. Next year you will be all growed up!

New Mexico, Home of Alex' Birth

Hoping the Negative Can Become Positive

This past week there has been a lot of negativity in our family. I feel there is no one person that is to blame but all of us for not communicating and praying for God's spirit to be with us. So I have been praying daily and I will ask Him for the spirit to be me. Then maybe I will able to have His spirit with me before I speak or make judgements. If all of us would have had the spirit with us, things would have been much different.

I do pray that the negative astmosphere that has been a part of our lives for some time, even though we really didn't see it this way, will be resolved.

Sometimes negative forces can make a person re-evaluate their lives and then there they can be more open to communication. It's kind of sad that it takes such negativity to open our eyes. I do hope that we can be more spiritual in the future and that it won't take all this negitivity to get us back to communicating and to be a loving family again.

Because of all that has happened, this may take some time. But I shall pray everyday and make it my goal to do so. Of course a lot of it has to do with others and I bear no grudge against anyone and do hope that all of us can start walking in the light again.

This is my prayer.