Today begins another year! I can't believe summer is over already! Didn't it just start yesterday? The kids are all very excited to get back to school and see their friends and teachers again. They didn't want me to drive them today - this is the first time I haven't taken them on the first day. Jared didn't want me to take him because "It's too sad when you leave." How cute is that! So, I walked them to the bus stop, did hugs and pictures and last minute mom reminders. I waved good bye to them as the bus pulled away, and then I bawled all the way back to the house. Ok, not full on bawling - but I will admit I cried more than anyone else did this morning - and that includes Joseph!
Here's the gang...I can't believe how big they're all getting to be!
Maddie - 6th Grade
Maggie - 3rd Grade
Jacob - 5th Grade
Jared - 2nd Grade
Jason - 8th Grade
*sniff*sniff*
I'd include pictures of the stay-home-kids, but Malorie is still in bed and Melanie and Joseph are still in jammies watching Wonder Pets - we're heading in to McDonald's Playland to meet some friends in a little bit - maybe I can get some pictures there.
Jason is doing so well in his new troop! (And I have to admit, I'm sincerely enjoying being the Committee Chair for the unit also!)
He had a Court of Honor this last week and was awarded: First Class Rank Advancement and Scholarship, Leatherwork, Swimming, Rifle, Citizenship in the World, First Aid, Orienteering, Emergency Preparation Merit Badges. He's very anxious to complete his Star and has his Eagle all planned out - he's shooting for Christmas time 2008! If he stays as enthusiastic about scouts as he is now, I don't doubt that he'll make it!
Jason with Mom & Dad receiving his 1st Class Rank Advancement!
Later receiving his Merit Badges - (Lucky for mom, they make a cool sticker stuff to attach these puppies to his sash so she doesn't have to sew them ALL on!)
Maddie and Maggie entered some things in the Community Fair this weekend and surprised themselves by how well they did. I spent the last few days leading up to the fair reminding them "this is your first fair" and "you're both just kids"...I didn't want them to get their hopes too high - of course, we knew they'd place, we just had no idea how great they'd do!
Madilyn - Grand Champion Award on a skirt and vest that she sewed in her sewing class with our dear friend Shirley.
Madilyn - Blue Ribbon on her decorative pillow.
Madilyn - Blue Ribbon on her tied quilt.
Madilyn - Blue Ribbon and White Ribbon on pictures she took at Grandma Janet's house.
Megan - Blue Ribbon on her decorative pillow.
Megan - Red Ribbon on her tied quilt.
We're so proud of the girls! This is Megan's first year of sewing. Madilyn has been doing lessons for three years now and she just keeps getting better and better! It's a cinch they couldn't have done any of this without Shirley and Grandma Janet!
Yesterday, we spent the day at Silverwood. It's a great little theme park that we affectionately refer to as "Earl's Disneyland". It was great fun. We spent hours at their waterpark and then hours running from ride to ride. There are a lot of pictures - and even a few videos. Don't feel obligated to view them all.
We weren't sure WHY Jared liked sitting under this waterfall, but he did.
Wow, I think if you look closely, you can see clear to her toes!
Melanie stayed close to mom, but had a great time.
See, she ventured a few steps away from me now and then.
Joseph and Maddie waiting for the antique car ride.
Jason, Megan, Jared & Jacob on the bumper cars.
I forgot what this ride was called...
Oh yeah, it was the "Not for mom's" ride!
Megan and the girlies had a great time in the helicopter.
Jason, Maddie, Jacob, Megan, Jared & Marilyn on the Corkscrew!
Yes, I realize this isn't a flattering picture of me (very few are), but I did want it documented that I WAS there! LOL And so was our friend Marilyn - she takes care of our kids like a mom, spoils them like a grandma, and does all the cool things with them like an aunt...what more could we ask for??
Ferris Wheel Cam
Mom stuck to the sissy rides this year - I'm turning in to MY mom! LOL
This is Marilyn, Megan, Jacob, Jared, Jason & Madilyn. Malorie and Marilyn coming down the log ride - they got SOAKED at the bottom!
And, not to be out done, dad and Melanie also got soaked at the bottom!
This innocent smile and wave was about 2 seconds before the water cannon fired and SOAKED him! I sure do love him...even when he's soggy -
- maybe even more!
I know this is a blurry picture - don't forget our little camera is on it's last leg. But it's funny because the girls and I rode that Merry-Go-Round 3 or 4 times IN A ROW and they would have gone more! Luckily some other people finally came and got in line so we "had" to get off!
For our anniversary, Brandon gave me a Flip Video recorder! I'm LOVING it! I used it last night to take a video of the family watching the Muppets "on the wall". I've had several people ask me what I mean when I say, "We watched a movie on the wall last night" - I posted some pictures of it a while ago, but here's a video I took of it...WITH my Flip Video! (30 second video)
And for fun, I found a video of Glen Beck talking about the Flip - sorry, I love Glen Beck, if you're not a fan, don't feel obligated to watch the video, we can still be friends anyway! :) (5 min video)
Brandon got a new pair of tennis shoes (yes, that's a lame anniversary gift, but if you could see how badly he needed them....) and the new Brian Regan DVD! I still highly recommend all of Brian Regan's comedy for the whole family!! My kids quote this guy every single day and it's always hysterical!
"14 years ago, right now..." Oh come on, you know I've been saying this all day!!
Today Brandon and I are celebrating our 14th wedding anniversary! Where have the years gone? Oh sure, we've had ups and downs - who hasn't? But I can honestly say, our ups far, far out-number our downs!! I'm married to a man who caters to my every whim! I love him for so many reasons - but the most important is that I know he loves me and I know he loves our children. There is nothing more I would ask of him.
I was going to slap some of our "posed" wedding pictures in here - *yawn* - but instead I grabbed the album of our candid pictures that friends and relatives gave us that they'd taken!! I love these pictures so much - I love to see the people in the background. I would love to go back and spend today in 1993. I wouldn't want to do it ALL over again - but spend just one day in the happiness of newlywedness. One day of having loved ones who have passed on, one day of no worries or responsibilities, one day of believing the world revolves around us, one day just living in the moment of the most blissful love imaginable! That was our day. It was perfect!
Now remember - these are from the "Candid Album"...
Our first "husband and wife" photo!
We do better when we don't know we're having our picture taken!
The formality of standing by the cake and pretending to cut it - no, we didn't smash it into each other's face!
I can hear Edith and Archie right now..."Those were the days!"
Brandon's family.
Shiela's family.
I think of all the pictures we had taken, this one is my most favorite.
I think when I was a kid, there was a movie called The Day of the Animals. I remember it scared the pants off of me! Of course now that I'm "older" it just seems silly. Yesterday, however, was a weird Day of the Animals for us! We went to my mom's house to visit for the day. Brandon had to work in the office up there, so the kids and I rode along and spent the day with grandma - then we took everyone to see Harry Potter. Ok, back to the animals. These pictures were taken in my mom's front yard (how I envy her GRASS). I know I've posted pictures of several more deer than this in my own yard - but the difference is, my mom lives a block from Safeway. A block from a Building Supply store. A block from a city park. The road in front of her house is "Main St" for crying out loud, lol - what's a DEER doing here? She actually gets a lot of deer at her place - it was just funny to my kids to see a deer "in town".
We were "almost home" around 8:15pm so it was still "light" outside, but not day-light, light. About 2.5 miles from our house I noticed something that seemed to be hanging from the power pole on the side of the road up ahead. My first thought was that maybe it was a bird nest - but it was hanging so funny, it just couldn't be that. We got closer and I thought it was a person - and from there about 50 gross scenario's ran through my head of a Power Co worker being electrocuted, etc. When we got about 15 yards from the pole I told Brandon it was a PEACOCK! By the time I spit it out, we had passed it, so I stopped the van in the middle of the road (remember, we live in the sticks now, so it's ok to do that, LOL) and we backed up. Sure enough there was a HUGE peacock sitting on top of the power pole! We're hicks, we unloaded all of the kids in the middle of the road, in the middle of the night, and showed them the peacock. I could hear Jeff Foxworthy making some comment about our "Redneck trip to the zoo"! LOL It was great fun and a fun memory to have!
Sorry abt the quality (or lack thereof) of these pictures - it was getting dark, and all I had with me was my cell phone. The pictures of the deer were taken w/ my cell phone too!)
For 10 years now, Brandon and I have dodged having pets by telling the kids we needed to wait until we lived "in the country". Well, the kids held out - and when the opportunity to adopt 2 kittens from Aunt Kandi and Uncle Carson arose, they pointed out to us how they had met our terms of pet ownership! LOL So, we now own 2 kittens, Jasper (Siamese) and Jypsy (black & white) and yes, you have to spell Jypsy with a J because, well, that's just what we do with boy names around here! Brandon semi-qualifies as a J name because when he was little, his older brother went by Jon - Brandon said for the longest time he answered to "J-Brandon", so it counts. ;)
Now, we've had these cats since Monday - and I would have submitted this entry back then, but we had a little mishap. We had to go and pick them up and drive them home. It was a short 2 mile drive, but it was over the worst wash-board dirt road I know of. I often take the little-bit-longer route to get home from BIL/SIL's house just to avoid it! Anyway, we hit the wash-board and the cats flipped! They were squirming and hissing. Finally they both ended up on the dash board of my van howling and hissing and trying to jump out the front window. It would have been an impressive site if I wasn't sitting there fearing that they were going to jump on my face and claw my eyes out! I had to stop the van and get Jasper (the calmer of the two) and held him the rest of the way home - driving w/ my knee. Jypse ended up under the driver seat and I was totally expecting him to claw his way up my leg but he stayed put.
When we got home, I had the kids get a plate of food and some water. They already had a little bed/box made up for them. I told the kids to let the kittens settle down from the ride, so we all came in the house to let them eat and rest. In my mind, I pictured they'd eat a little food, drink a little water, and then they'd curl up in the box that we had provided for them to sleep in. They had other plans! When we went back outside about 1/2 hour later, they were gone. We called them (like a cat ever comes when you call them - especially when we were calling them by names they'd only had for 10 minutes). I stood at the door like a dork yelling "Here kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty..." in that obnoxious, neighborhood cat-lady voice! Nothing!
I felt awful. The kids, especially Megan and Madilyn, were so excited to have kittens. "Here girls, you finally get to have cats - ok, now you don't - hope you had a fun five minutes." We truly had owned cats for less time than it takes to ride the Tilt-a-Whirl!
Long story, long enough - the cats showed up at bedtime. They had climbed up under my van and were sleeping on the spare tire. What a relief! Everyone went to bed happy!
Joseph has fallen in love with having baths in our kitchen sink! I think he looks so little in there. He sure makes a big mess splashing though! I can't believe he'll be 16 months on Monday!
We can't decide (since I know some of you will be examining the background of the picture) if we want to do a ceramic tile backsplash or a formica ledge back...that's why it's still neither one!
