Cindy and Don

Hi all,

It was so nice to here all the most recent news.

Uncle Bill you will be in my prayers for your surgery.

It was fun hearing all about the adventures Will has encountered. We will have to have a family gathering to see pictures of the trip.

We have been very busy trying to get our house in order for the sale. The kids just don't get the fact that the house has to be clean every day just in case we need to show it. Not much interest yet but it doesn't help that the temperature has been below zero here.

During our family reunion this summer Don told Jenny he would take her and her boyfriend Brad out fishing if she could get him to come visit. Well Jenny called yesterday to set up a date to come. We are so excited to have them come visit us in Bismarck and of course Don is always looking for a reason to go fishing. Looks like they will be here the beginning of July. The Summer will fill up fast. We will be moving into our new house in May and going to a high school reunion on Don's side of the family in Wisconsin. Once moved we will be getting settled and putting in a yard.

Love hearing from everyone.

Take Care

Cindy

NEWS FROM HOME AND A NEW WRINKLE IN TUCSON

Dad Doing Fine!

Things are going fine at the home base, Dad says, although he'll miss seening Mavis and Ron for 10 days while they run off to Jamaica. Fortunately, he'll be well looked after by Luke and Tara, as well as Shawn and Tracy. Vicki Dunbar will be helping out as well. It was zero degrees with a little snow on the ground, not enough to keep him inside.

Luke was upstairs looking after Abbie, while visiting with Dad, and got on the phone to say hello. They are doing fine as well.

Lila Doing Better

Lila is managing quite well in her apartment, and says she feels much better than when she came home from the hospital after her Christmas ordeal. It was the worst illness episode she has had, and is not something she wants to go through again! She had one trip to the emergency room because of a breathing problem, but didn't stay long.

She said Cindy and Don have put their house on the market, and hope to sell it themselves without a realtor. They are putting some of their things in storage until they can move to their new house when it is completed.

Tim has a "new" vehicle and introduced it to Lila by taking her out to coffee!

And in Tucson

I learned yesterday that age is having its effects on certain parts of my body. For years I have had a condition referred to as GIRD (Gastrointestinal Reflux Disease) that sometimes causes erosion of the esophagus, which leads to trouble swallowing. Upon x-ray examination it turns out that the opening to my esophogus has narrowed causing a small pocket to form--called Zenker Diverticulum. The upshot is that I must go through a surgical procedure to have the pocket removed, and the opening to the esophagus widened. Not a fun prospect. I'll be in the hospital a couple of days (probably in mid-March) and then will not be able to eat any solid food for two weeks (nothing but liquid and a straw the whole time)! Fortunately, I'll have great nursing care at home (her name is Marie!).

Cheers,

Bill

MARILYN AND ISSY COMING TO TUCSON

Hi,

We plan to drive to Tuscon on Sunday, getting there sometime in the afternoon. We are not early risers!!! (Ha) We would stay over Sunday night and leave in the forenoon on Monday. We have a luncheon date in Casa Grande with friends there.

We have just planned trips to Palm Springs for Valentines Day, and another bus trip to Death Valley (We neither one have been there) for Feb. 24, 25, 26. Then it will be time to start thinking about going back home the middle of March.

It has finally warmed up here. The shorts are back out and Issy gets to sleep in his lounge chair outside. Hope it continues!

Hope all is well and we will see you on Sunday.

Love, Marilyn & Issy

LETTER FROM WILL!

Hello everyone!

I made it back to Buenos Aires again. The last big trip I took I managed to make it around the world, this one I managed to make it to the end of the world! or "El fin del mundo" as they say down here. Trista and I just made it back from Ushuaia, Argentina. It is the southern most city in the world, hence the nickname. It is only 600 miles from Antartica. and a little too close if you ask me. It is the height of summer time and I thought it a little too cold for my tastes! It was usually in the 50s but the wind and the rain made it a little on the miserable side much of the time. There were however some very beautiful sites to see! We went to visit a national park which was quite nice and also cruised the Beagle Channel and saw lots of penguins and sea lions.
From there we flew to El Calafate. Which is the main town for glacier watching. We were there for four days and visited the Perito Mereno Glacier along w ith a few others. They are awesome to see! We also did a little horse back riding and a lot of trekking.
We then hopped on a bus and headed south to Puerto Natales, Chile. Very interesting bus rides down here because much of the ride is on dirt roads! We didn´t stay in Puerto Natales for long, we immediately boarded the Navimag ship and the next morning begain sailing on our 4 day trip to Puerto Monte. The boat ride was very nice although not exactly what we expected. Our room seemed to have a few extra people in it.......16 people to be exact. oh, and towards the end of the ride it begain to smell a little more like a barn yard since there were several truck loads of cows, sheep and horses just outside our room`s window. All in all though it was still a pretty nice ride. We did however find out the Trista gets a little sea sick. One of the days we made it out into the Pacific and it was a little rough. About half the people on the boat didn´t report for supper that nigh t... m ore for me! even though it wasn´t usually very good. We did stop once on the way at Puerto Eden and got off the boat and walked around for a couple hours. Beautiful but I dont know how people can live there. Very , very remote, it can only be reach by boat and it is 2 days trip from anywhere.

Once we made it to P. Monte we had mass confusion in getting our bus lined up, but I guess that is to be expected when the tickets are booked in a different foreign country in a different language and yet we still got it figured out and caught and 8 hour bus ride to Bariloche, Argentina.

Bariloche was a beautiful town up in the mountains of Argentina it reminded me of Bozeman but probly more set in Switzerland. Very nice. We ended up spending a week there just enjoying the chocolate shops on main street. We went white water rafting which is always a blast. The river we rafted took us all the way back to the Chile border. If we had rafted any further we wo uld have had to go through customs again. While we were in Bariloche we went up to the top of Cerro catedral, which is a premier ski resort here in the winter time. Very nice view of the lake and surrounding mountains. There was still some snow at the top where people were sledding. Bariloche is big on the tourist seen, we managed to run into people we had met on the boat ride a few different nights and having a lot of fun.
From there we caught a 20 hour bus ride back to Buenos Aires where I am now. We are waiting for our Brazilian visas to get processed which takes $110 each plus 4 days! what a pain in the butt! and then we have to go to the Paraguayan consulate and get visas for there. Only $50 each and one day but still a pain. Argentina is very easy to visit, they just stamp your passport upon entry and it takes about 30 seconds.

Any ways, I hope all is well in all of you lives. Let me know what you have been up to! We are headed to a bea ch tow n in northern Uraguay for a couple weeks so I`ll be writing again when something interesting happens!

Ciao

Will

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MOLLIE WINNING SPELLING BEE

Mollie at the microphone when she won her school's spelling bee.

Mills Lawn School

Mills Lawn School

UPDATES ON THE LASSEY CLAN

Dad Wintering Well

Dad says he is getting along just fine and feels pretty good. He had a chance to see a bunch of his family and friends at church on Sunday, and had just enjoyed dinner at Mavis and Ron's with more family. He says the cold weather doesn't bother him that much after 92 years!

Lila At Home

We talked to Lila this morning (Martin Luther King Day, January 16) and were very pleased to hear her clear voice from her home phone rather than from the hospital. She is generally taking care of herself, but with help from her kids, a nurse, and a woman who buys groceries and does other chores. She says she remains pretty weak and can't sleep well, but much prefers to be in her apartment as compared to the hospital or a nursing home. However, she is staying inside because it was 22 degrees below zero this morning in Bismarck!

Shawn and Tracy in the Bahamas

Shawn and Tracy left today for 10 days in the Bahamas. Sounds like quite a lark for the middle of January when temperatures are below zero! Mavis and Ron are hosting the grandkids, but they get to go traveling also--to Jamaica for a week later in the winter.

(I wish we could we could go to a warm climate. It was 21 degrees above zero in Tucson this morning--pretty cold for here, and a bit hard to get used to after temperatures in the 70's for the first part of January!)

Will and Trista on a Cruise

Will and Trista continue to explore South American, and this week are on a boat cruising from the southernmost city in South America, going north through a beautiful inland channel. When they get back on land they will travel overland to Buenos Aires and will then spend a couple of weeks in Uruguay. What an adventure!

BIG NEWS FROM SHAWN AND TRACY

Mupper wanted me to get this picture on the Lassey Blog. Ronnie and Mavis went down to Valley City to help Carol celebrate her 50th birthday. They had a great time. Hope everything is going good with you all, Shawn and I are getting ready for our big trip to the Bahamas on Monday. With this cold spell we are having right now, I can't wait to get out of here. Thanks, Tracy

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CAROL

Carol's 50th Birthday party in Valley City!

MOLLIE THE SPELLER!

Dear Dad and Marie,

Just a note to let you know that
Mollie won the all school Spelling Bee yesterday, and
beat out all the kids in the school including 5th and
6th graders (she is in 4th grade)!! The photos should be up on the school
website in the next few days. You can google Mills
Lawn Elementary School, Yellow Springs, Ohio, and I would
imagine her picture will be on the front of it.
Otherwise look for the spelling bee. Also, go to the
archives for the 2006-7 school year and look up
Chasing Vermeer and Wool Fine Arts Project to see
other activities we have been up to! Mollie is also in
the Aladdin play if you want to look at the photos of
it, but there are no photos of her.

Love to you both!

Dione

Hola! De el fin del mundo, FROM WILL AND TRISTA

Date: Thu, 11 Jan 2007

Hola uncle Bill,

Will here, I checked out the blogspot and it is very nice. I was going to try to upload some photos but it gives me all of the directions in spanish and it seemed to prove itself difficult. I may have to try again later.

Travel is going well down here, Trista and I have been in Argentina for a little over a month now. We spent the first 3 weeks in Buenos Aires and then flew to the end of the world, Ushuaia. I would guess that Mat and Maureen stopped there on their cruise last year. We are now in El Calafate and have been visiting different Glaciers the last couple days. The Perito Moreno Glacier is quite spectacular to see in person. We are getting ready to hop on a bus for 5 hours this afternoon that will take us down in to the Chilean town of Puerto Natales where we will board a boat and sail up the Chilean Patagonia region for five days. It should be interesting!

Take care,

Will

CHRISTMAS PHOTOS IN TUCSON

LIFE AT ST. ALEXIS

Charlie took this photos while Lila was in critical condition at St. Alexis hospital in Bismarck. My how much fun it must have been sleeping in the waiting room!

A LETTER FROM CHARLIE

Uncle Bill,

Thought I would send some pictures of our visit to the hospital in Bismarck.The first night we had to sleep on the floor in the waiting room because it was "touch and go" with mom, and the doctor wasn't sure she would make it thru the night. However, she proved him wrong once again. She is on the mend, thank the lord! She is out of ICU and in the Telemetry unit until Tuesday, then she is suppose to be going to the Transitional Unit. She is definitely a trooper and has a strong will to live. We keep teasing her that she has nine lives, and she's used up 4 now. She definitely wants to go back to her apartment and wants nothing to do with a Nursing Home. I do believe she will be able to take care of herself with help from Home Health.

I'm attaching some pictures that I thought everyone might enjoy. We had lots of visitors, including Ron, Mavis, Grandpa, Susi & Harvey from Detroit Lakes, Julie from Garrison, Karen's kids who live in Bismarck plus her oldest daughter, Julie (and boyfriend) who drove up from Iowa, Linda's daughter, Jenny ,and her husband, Dallas, then all of us kids. Seemed like a mini family reunion in a time of crisis, but having all that support sure was wonderful! Thanks to all of you! All the prayers really helped mom pull through.