Seventy-six year old Ray Holdiman of Basin City, WA is to be married once again on February 5th, 2011 to fifty nine year old Louise Byng. These two lovely people met forty-three years ago in Colville. Ray’s older brother was married to Louise’s older sister. So they knew each other already. Good friends actually. Even though Ray was already married to another young lady, he knew it was love at first sight the moment he laid eyes on Louise. I guess they were pretty compatible and seemed to hit it off when they met up once again years later. By this time they were both widows. Both were tired of being alone and enjoyed each other’s company. On their first real date, Ray’s mother Lucille asked Louise when she was going to be her daughter in law. Great grandma was really excited when they started dating.
Months went by and Ray just knew that she was the one. So on November 16 2010 he got the nerve to call her up and pop the question over the phone. Real classy grandpa! These two fine people were ment to be together nothing makes me happier then seeing my grandpa happy once again. Thanksgiving Day came and he knew it was the right time to tell everyone the news. I guess after everyone knew things just snowballed from there. I mean everyone was doing so much to figure out what they could do to help with the wedding.
There were only a few people unhappy with this decision and thought they were moving along too fast. And those few people were Louise’s kids Cj and David. They do have a point there I mean they were only dating two months before he popped the question but it’s not like he has his whole life to figure out if she’s the one or not. They both said that it was love at first sight so by the first date they were already in love from years before. Like what Ray says’s “I robbed the cradle with this one”.
Everything is going smooth and well. They hope it continues to be like that for a while. They don’t have to worry about a lot of things with their wedding; for the most part everyone has a job. The only thing Louise is doing is the cleaning of the house and walking down the aisle. My sister’s Tonya and Melissa are making their three tiered, baby blue laced ribbon, white fondant cake. It will look amazing. “I’m really looking forward to see how well you young ladies do with our cake, I bet it’ll look beautiful” say’s Louise Byng.
My grandfather had always dreamed of getting married in the temple but with his first wife he couldn’t and now not even with his second. But even though he can’t get married in the temple he’ll still be getting married in the LDS church of Basin City on Saturday February 5th at 11:00 a.m. “I love Louise and don’t care where we get married, just as long as she marries me” says Ray with joy.
Ray’s life went downhill around the time Edith my grandma his first wife went into the nursing home. She had a stroke and couldn’t get taken care of living at home. He went and visited her everyday, but she kept getting worse. His property was becoming more sp a junk yard then just a mess. He knew he had to do something, but didn’t know what it was he had to do. So when Ray and Louise got engaged, it was his house they wanted to live in. Louise say’s “I thought about calling the search and rescue team just in case someone got lost helping me clean up around here”.
So far so great, every Saturday we conduct a cleaning team to go out and help clean up the place. We even bought them new flooring to re-do the floor in their kitchen. I personally think they should just tear down the whole house and build a new one. Louise says “I like Ray’s kitchen better then mine, it has a way better stove and the kitchen is larger then mine, well actually his whole house is bigger then mine”.
By the end of January Louise Byng should be all moved in with the house looking spotless. And By the end of February we’ll have happy newlyweds in our family to celebrate with and to love.