A Day With Daddy

A day with Daddy brings out the wild side of TM and TL. After spending the day swimming, Daddy wanted to capture just how tough his little guys are. The first pic they are posing as power rangers. The second pic they are muscle men. The pics were taken a couple of weeks ago using a borrowed camera. I have no idea why the odd dates are printed on them.

BJ's Children

The best gift BJ's daughter and son-in-law brought us was this picture
with all four of BJ's children taken at her daughter's wedding at the botanical gardens at the state park in Hartville, OH

We Have Been Very Blessed

Memorial Day week-end: BJ's only daughter and son-in-law drove down here from North Carolina to bring us gifts. They brought each of our boys 2 new outfits, took JR shopping and got her all kinds of cute clothes and let her pick out tons of favorites from the grocery store. Also lots of stocking stuffer things from Christmas they never got around to sending that were gems brought this much later. They were so kind, loving and gracious they touched all of our hearts.

Second week of June: From Caregiver Assistance we received a check made out to Goody's for $300 for clothing for the kids. When we got to Goody's, they had this grand sale going on that actually allowed us to purchase $600 in clothing! The kids are dressing mighty fine these days and all they need for school is socks, underwear things and shoes (they also sent us a check for $150 made out to Shoe Show).

Life is good and we are blessed!

Thanks to the generousity of an organization here in TN, Relative Caregiver Assistance, me and the rugrats spent an entireday at Lake Winnie literally within 15 miles of our house. We rode rides, ate too much junk and walked and walked and walked. GB became addicted to the centrafuge ride that used to be called The Round-up. TL and TM paddled boated their big grandma across the lake and back again----bless their tiny little skinny legs! JR an GB piloted airplanes. JR won purple beads for making the bell ring on the stong-man sledge hammer game and the two little ones each won a blow up guitar (ya'all know this IS Elvis country). We walked and rode and played all day. The last ride of the day we all rode the boat shoot. Everyone got sprinkled except me-----I got drenched. I made sure all the kids had sunscreen on and then I burnt to a crisp! I am posting these postcards for my siblings as it reminded me so much of our childhood neighborhood amusement park. Meyers Lake Park--I can remember "kids day" each year when every ride was only a nickle. Ok, so I am gonna be 52 in a couple of days. All in all, we had a great day as a great family.

Birthday time!

We are all busily preparing for JR's 14th birthday. this is the first party we have hosted since we came here. Funny how my home looks fine on an everyday basis, but when I know company is coming, I view my home from someone else's view and I see all the things I can ignore on a daily level. I won't go into detail about the carpet spots ,the unwanted wall decorations, or the Christmas things still not in the attic at the end of May. But I will say trying to clean and organize a house with 4 kids as my only partners is a challenging endeaver. I have discovered that white vinegar is a Godsend. I put some in a spray bottle and it works on carpet spots, and mouthy kids. They hate being sprayed with it more than they like to fight.

TM is an official 1st grader!

This is my youngest grandson, thus far. He graduated from kindergarten May 17, 2007. My son (his daddy) and I attended the ceremony at the elementary school. The kindergarteners wore their caps and gowns, complete with "07" tassels. The background music was "Pomp and Circumstances" as the tiny grads' procession entered the gym from outside and continued until every grad was seated. The seating for the spectators was limited to the small bleachers on one side of the gym. Many parents, grandparents and other family members quickly filled the bleachers to watch 6 different kindergarten classes graduate. I sat on the bottom step of the designated walkway of the bleachers and my son sat on the gym floor directly in front of me. I could easily rest my arms on his back and did so as i realized I was watching my youngest watching his youngest graduate----even tho it was only into the first grad, my heart was warmed. The designated keynote speaker read aloud the book, _I"ll Love You Forever_ and that was the end of my composure. I had bought and read that book to my sons years ago.

I love my computer, don't get me wrong. But it has so many secrets, it baffles me. If I can ever figure out how, I would love to post some pics.