My Family

Visit my granddaughter's site for pictures of Cami's wedding, the grandbabies, and family pictures (click Gallery on the menu).

Chris works from home at his web site business, Fueled Media.

Here we are at my oldest son's wedding (center). Left to right are my husband, Laine, me, my son Chris, my daugher Cami, and my son Cody.

Chris is 31, Cami 30, and Cody 28. Chris and Cody live in Phoenix and Cami and her husband, Justin, live in Denver.

Laine and I moved here in 1980, where Laine was hired as a minister for the Church of Christ. He had preached full time in Deming for two years and had then served as Youth Minister in Albuquerque for two years. After the first year here, the first "copper crunch" hit and the congregation was not able to support a full time minister. So, Laine went to work for Phelps Dodge at the copper smelter in Playas, preaching when he was off. The men of the congregation filled in for years, both before and after we were able to hire a minister.

In 1999, Phelps Dodge closed the facility here and laid off all workers. The school in Animas dropped from 650 (K-12) to around 300 within two years. Unemployment in the county skyrocketed.

Laine had to find work elsewhere and I stayed in the school system, continuing to live at our house. He worked in Deming for one year (70 miles away) and lived in a travel trailer. Then, he worked on Johnston Atoll (800 miles southwest of Hawaii) for two years at a facility that neutralized chemical weapons and missiles. He then lived in Umatilla, Oregon, doing the same kind of work, for three years. We saw each other only once every few months for five years. It has been hard, but in May, Laine was hired by New Mexico Tech, which bought the Playas townsite to operate a training facility for military personnel, law enforcement, and emergency response crews. He is the Safety and Environmental Director there. It has been an answered prayer to have him back home, even though I had sold the 4 bedroom house we built in Windmill to move to a small trailer on the school grounds. After a year there, we moved to Playas to a company house. We plan to stay here at least three more years, so that I can get full NM retirement.

I hate to leave Animas, which has wonderful people and incredible students. I absolutely love my job here, teaching technology and English at the high school. But, eventually, we want to be closer to kids and grandkids and I want to teach at the college level.

I have two wonderful grandchildren, Alannah Brienne (3 years) and Logan Christopher (1 year), thanks to Chris and his wife, Krystal, who Laine and I took as a foster child when she was 14. She is an awesome person!

Cami married in July of 2004 to Justin, who is a delightful addition to our family.

The picture below was taken at Christmas, four years ago, when Alannah was a baby.