Happy Easter!...and other stuff

We had a great Easter weekend.  Jay and Cade were out of school Friday and Monday so I decided to take some vacation time also.  I’m so glad I did.  We didn’t do much, but it was just nice to be together after all the craziness we’ve experienced the last few months.  On Good Friday we went to Springfield and did some shopping.  I have to show off my favorite purchase of the day.  I’ve needed some rubber boots for awhile.  It never fails that when Jay is gone and I have to feed the lot is a muddy mess.  I end up wearing his boots which are way too big and it takes forever to walk anywhere in them.  I’ve looked at Wal-Mart before and plain old ugly black rubber boots were around $30.  I refused to pay that for ugly shoes that I don’t need that often.  Friday I found these little cuties in Maurices of all places – ON SALE.  Of course I had to snap them up!  Then I had to lug them all around the mall for the next couple of hours….

And these boots came in hand on Saturday. Some friends from church were having an auction Saturday morning – and the day started out with it pouring! Thankfully it stopped before the sale, but things were still wet and muddy. I got to break in the new boots! Our church helped by running the concession stand for the sale and it was a fun day….fun but tiring!


Saturday night Cade and I dyed eggs. Can you tell I was trying to get pictures for our new profile? I’m never in any pictures because 1. I hate having my picture taken and 2. I’m always the one taking them. So we had to focus this weekend on getting some pictures of me. Yuck! Look closely – this is one of the only times you will ever see me in a hat. Saturday was a day of firsts….first time to wear rubber boots and the first time (in a very long time) I wore a hat. My hair just doesn’t handle dampness at all. I didn’t even try on Saturday.  On Sunday our Minister put his foot in his mouth - it's a good thing I'm not easily offended!  He told my I looked much better Sunday morning than I did Saturday...then he tried to get himself out of it and made it worse.  Later he asked if I had forgiven him yet!  It was funny. 

Sunday we celebrated that He Is Risen!   The men at church always cook breakfast so Jay had to be there at 6.  The rest of us didn’t get there until 8:30.  After church we went to Jim and Sharon’s for lunch and Terry and Megan were there.  Thanks to Megan for patiently snapping several pictures of us that day. 

Because of the monsoon that hit Missouri over the weekend – we hunted eggs indoors that afternoon.  We also gave Cade an Easter basket….a new outfit that he didn’t care about at all – and this Star Wars book that he loved.  This is classic Cade – he is always studying things.  You can see the wheels turning.

I also made an Easter cake like my Grandma Fowler used to.  Of course it was another photo op for the profile book.  Anyone looking at our book will wonder why there seems  to be a lot of Easterish pictures….and why are we wearing the same clothes in several of them....If only they knew about Jay needing to drag down the Christmas tubs so I can get some shots of things I didn't think about in December....

 

Monday I worked pretty much all day on our new profile book.  I really hope the old “3^rd times a charm” saying is true in our case.  I’m a little sick of profile books.  While putting it together I realized that I have decorated with a lot of red in our house.  It used to be our bedrooms had red….then I started sneaking a little of it in the kitchen.  Since I have Fiesta dishes it works…..then with the new family room curtains I added a whole lot to the family room.  I hope that doesn’t appear to crazy to anyone looking at the book.  I was talking about Nana making our quilts and I was going to put a shot of our quilt in the book, but really it was starting to get embarrassing!    It seriously looks like I could turn in to one of those little old ladies who decorate in all one shade…red carpet, red couch, red curtains, red telephone, etc.  It’s time to lay off the red!

Also, can you tell when I spend a lot of time on the computer? When I do that, that’s when I tend to have lots of pictures in my posts. I have to include one more for posterity....See this purse.  It looks innocent enough, but it was almost the death of me last week.  It's the first time I've tackled sewing something like that totally on my own.  Things went really well until it was time for the lining.  I sewed that lining no less than 5 different times because I could not get it right.  Finally on Thursday morning it hit me like lightning - I knew what I was doing wrong.  I went to fix it before leaving for work and I immediately ran out of thread.  I used a whole spool of thread on that tiny thing.  I'd say 3/4 of the thread got ripped out of it.  It was like a mini party in the house for all of us when I got it done....I felt like I had accomplished something....Jay was just relieved it was done and I could get the mess cleaned up out of the family room. 


And I want to say congratulations to the parents of the two sweet babies born on Good Friday. How funny is that – we know two babies born on the same day. Congratulations Morgan and Leslie on Baby Josie and Daniel and Hannah on Baby Kaiser. Can’t wait to meet them both!

And the decision is....

We have finally made the decision that usually ends up being the biggest thing we decide on all year – Cade’s Birthday Theme. Someday his wife will curse me when she has to plan themed birthday parties for him. Drumroll please…..It is a Football theme. Surprise, Surprise. We toyed with a Chiefs/Razorback theme, but my head could not wrap around two different shades of red with the decorations. It was too much for me and felt too all over the place.

While the dress code won’t quite be like the SEC’s we will put on the invitations to wear something from your favorite sport team. I’m thinking it doesn’t even have to be football related. If I were a true SEC girl I’d wear something like this….

I have no idea how those girls climb up the hill that Jay has have to climb to get back to the truck.  It is a killer in tennis shoes, I can't imagine hiking it in a pair of heels.  And we visited Tennesse's stadium in Knoxville last May.  It's also not the best situated place to walk to in a pair of heels either.  It has got to be a southern thing.  Their feet are more accustomed to hills and heels (ha, ha that's funny!).  Definitely more so than my raised 30 miles from Kansas flatlander feet  but I've digressed.... Since I’m not a true SEC girl (and my feet say THANK YOU)  I’ll just wear a t-shirt.   I’m even thinking a Miller t-shirt since that would technically be my favorite team. But just to be safe I’ll get a pre-approval on that from the birthday boy. I also have a Chiefs and a Razorback shirt so I’ll wear the one Cade wants me to.  I may need to balance it out because I'm afraid the house will be swaying very much in one direction....

And for those of you attending who don’t have a sports shirt we will still let you in the door (Charity) because if we will let in someone wearing MU stuff (Megan) we will let in anyone. Ha Ha, sorry I couldn’t resist it. You know we love you no matter who your favorite team is!

The Last of the 12 Presents

When I said I was done with the holiday posts on my last one I forgot I still had to do one more for the 12 presents. We thought we had a pretty good idea who was doing the gifts until the Wednesday before Christmas. All along we thought it was Jay's Aunt LeeAnn. She has come up with some really good ideas in the past. The year Cade was obsessed with pirates LeeAnn and her family and Jay's other Aunt Mary put together a treasure hunt. It was complete with an official looking map with different clues that ended up at an old chest full of pirate related toys. That's why we thought it was probably LeeAnn….until we got a Christmas card from LeeAnn with a gift card to us and a note saying Cade's present was at Nana and Granddad's. That really threw us off…

My sister and I don't exchange gifts anymore, we only buy for the kids….was pretty sure my dad didn't do it….didn't seem like my mom's style….In Jay's words (not mine) it wasn't from his parents because everything was typed…Megan and Terry were about the only other possibility but it still didn't quite seem like their style either…

Saturday morning we finally got to present #12 and the question was answered. It came from Jay's cousin Corey and his wife Kristy. We were very surprised. They included a note saying they sent it because our year had been so tough. I can't tell you how much we appreciate their thoughtfulness with those gifts. By the time I read their card and then read the card Jay gave me along with my snowflake necklace I was pretty teary eyed! Corey and Kristy, along with their three little boys, live in Virginia. We don't get to see them very often, but we love the time we do get to be together. Jay and I are always saying that we wish we lived closer so we could be together more often. They are great people and wonderful parents.

Corey, Kristy and family – thank you so much for what you did for us. We love you guys!!!

Day after Christmas

The day after Christmas we celebrated with Jay's family. You can tell that with each time we celebrated my picture level went down. This was the only one we got on Sunday. I had to get this one from Jay's phone even...Yes, we are pathetic, but I did get several videos.

Nana wrote out some stories about her and Granddad for Cade. This is a picture of Cade reading them to her. It was a neat gift and this was a neat picture of the two of them.

We had a good time with every one that day. We stayed until about 10:00 pm that night playing Mexican Train dominoes. I don't believe I have ever played dominoes, but it was fun.

I did take a couple more pictures today to add to this post. I am at work today and it is so sloooow. I'm counting down the minutes until 4:30 and I can get the heck out of here!!

Here is one of my most unlikely gift this Christmas...a pair of boots from Jim and Sharon. They thought I needed a pair with all of the cattle shows I will be going to over the next few years. What's funny is that they gave Megan money to buy her boots with but actually bought me a pair. Sharon said she knew how I operated and that I would never use the money to buy a pair for myself. After 11 years she knows me pretty well! I got a kick out of that. She did tell me though to go the store and look at all the boots to make sure they were what I wanted. We did that on Monday and I ended up keeping the pair she bought for me. I even wore them for the first time today and every one at work noticed them.


And when you have boots you have to have jeans to go with them. Jay picked me out some new jeans for Christmas. The jeans he bought weren't sold in regular 6, 8, 10, etc  sizes they were in the waist measurements. I think he talked to another lady buying the same jeans and the same time and they guessed my size. He was pretty proud of himself when I tried them on Christmas morning and they fit. So I am wearing jeans and boots today, that I never would've bought for myself, but that I actually like. I feel a little out of character :)

Last is a picture of one of the more thoughtful gifts Jay has given me.  He always does a good job on any gift he gets me, but this year he worked really hard at it.  He wanted something special for all of the stuff that we had been through this year.  We both mentally went through hard stuff, but I also had to go through the physical stuff.  The picture doesn't do it justice, but he bought me a diamond snowflake necklace.  He even found my friend Shelley's number on my phone and texted her about the different ideas he had for a gift.  He wanted something to commemorate the embryo adoption, but yet not be a painful reminder of the 6 embryos we lost.  I think he did a great job.  Yes, I will always remember the embryos, but when I look at the necklace I remember the love and thoughtfulness my wonderful husband put into a Christmas gift after one of our tougher married years. 



And I believe that brings an end to my holiday posts.  New Years Eve is tonight and we have no plans.  This is the first time in years that our church has not had a party.  I feel a little lost!  This is also the first time in several years that I'm not necessarily glad to see the old year go.  I remember when 2006 finally ended we went home after the church party and burnt the calender.  We thought 2007 had to be better.  Three days later we ended up in the ER with Jay - we still laugh about that!  So I guess this year I feel neutral - I have no idea what 2011 will bring for our family but ready or not there is nothing I can do about it.  I guess I will just go home tonight and enjoy the last night of 2010 with my two favorite people in the world, eat some Chinese and play some Wii. Happy New Year everyone.  See you in 2011!!!

Christmas Day

After we were done with presents at our house and got ready we headed to Sheldon for the big Christmas on my side of the family.  My dad is one of 6 kids.  Every year the siblings and their kids get together for Christmas.  It was a huge deal growing up.  I loved the holidays when we were all in one place.  It provided lots of opportunites to play with all of my cousins.  Now that my grandparents have passed away it's dwindled somewhat, but it is still good to be togeter.  It's gotten even more important to me know because it seems like I only see some of them at Christmas.  Since we were gone last year, it's been two years since I have seen some of them.  This year everyone met at my dad's house.  I took videos, but didn't take any pictures with our camera.  I had to borrow these from Charity's Facebook account.  

 Avery got a karaoke machine from Santa.  I think the only CD she own is Justin Bieber.  I think I have a video of Cade yelling at Avery to please turn off Justin Bieber.  I believe that I am getting old because I don't think I had heard a Justin Bieber song until Christmas Day.  I'm one of those people I swore I'd never be - my grandparents.  They never turned the radio on in their car.  I used to think it was something only boring old people do.  Now I understand how a "mature" person appreciates the blessed silence of being in the car with no noise.  Anyway, I guess that may be the reason I had never heard Justin Bieber repeat Baby Baby a million times before last Saturday.  Avery kept telling people she was a Pop Star. 

 This is what Cade did pretty much all day.  He has been talking for two years about playing the Wii with Glynn.  Except Cade can't remember his name.  He calls him the kid with the Wii and the glasses. The game Cade has been obsessed with is a WWII flying game.  At one point on Christmas Day Cade told me had a headache.  I told him he probably needed to take  break from the Wii.  He didn't like that idea.  He had to pass the level he was on.  That was more important than the pain it was causing.  I ended up giving him Tylenol for his head when we got home that night.  What a funny boy.