Phew!!

That phew is because I finally have a weekend where I don't really have anything I need to do. All the January birthday hoopla finally came to and end last weekend. Both Justin and Hannah celebrated birthdays this month, and while I love them more than words and love celebrating another year of their lives, I really do NOT like having to do 3 weekends in a row of birthday parties right after all the Christmas and New Year hubbub. I know, I shouldn't complain, but I am glad that it is all over. The kids did have great birthdays, though.

Justin turned 8 and with skateboarding being one of his new obsessions, we did a party at a new indoor skatepark. It was pretty cool, and I was amazed at how much Justin could actually do. There were a couple friends that weren't really into skateboarding, but even they had a great time after they got going. We were lucky enough to have the entire park all to ourselves for about the last hour, and one of the workers would come out and do all his fancy tricks and amaze the boys. Justin actually went back to the skatepark for MLK Day when they had a full day skate camp. He had a great time but woke up very sore the next day. He did get a lot of money for his birthday and daddy actually took him today to buy a new skateboard, so he should be set for awhile.

The next weekend was a family party for both Hannah and Justin's birthdays celebrating with pizza and cake and ice cream. Grandpa Robert and Grandma Pom also came down for a visit to help celebrate and spoiled the kids rotten as usual.

Then came Hannah's birthday. She had been plotting a sleepover for many months, and that plan did not change in her mind. I agreed as long as there weren't too many girls. She had four friends over, and it really was pretty easy. We got rid of the boys at Grandpa Mike's and Grandma Carol's and dad even had to work late, so it was all girls for most of the night. The girls made their own pizza pockets for dinner and then we went for them to all get pedicures, After getting pampered and their toes all pretty, complete with flower art, we headed home for cake and presents. Hannah has been really into monkeys lately, so we went with a monkey cake. This is the cake that I came up with, complete with a couple bananas out of extra cake. I was thinking the frosting would be a little darker brown, but this is the result. I do think he turned out pretty cute and Hannah was happy with it.

After presents, I pretty much just let the girls loose and they went off and entertained themselves for the rest of the night with games, movies, snacks and lots of talking and giggling. For our first major sleepover, it went very well. The next morning, we had pancakes and another of Hannah's favorites, BACON, and orange julius drinks for breakfast and then the girls headed home. I was relieved that it went so well and Hannah had a great 10th birthday.
Hannah here taking over mom's blog. He, he, he!! I loved my awesome party. I am totally obsessed with monkeys so the cake: pretty amazing! :) I feel like I'm ten now. DOUBLE DIGITS BABY, OH YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Can't wait til next year, just don't tell mom! I love ya mommy for giving me the best B-day ever (and dad and I guess I should meantion my two sometimes awesome brothers) I love you all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Celebrating Life

On this day when a nation is mourning another tragic shooting in which a 9 year old girl was killed who ironically, was born on September 11, 2001, it is hard to not think about life and death. My post today is actually about both these things, but I want to focus on the life and not the death part.

Today, a funeral was held for a wonderful woman, my grandmother-in-law, and I hope that everyone focused on celebrating and honoring her life rather than mourning her death. Dale's grandmother on his mom's side, Grandma Fern, passed away suddenly on Saturday. She was 96, so it can't be said that she didn't live a long, full life. The funeral was held today, and I am guessing that is was a packed house filled with the many people that loved this amazing woman. Despite being pretty much blind and I'm sure having other health ailments just due to age, Fern was very full of life, love and joy, and she leaves behind a legacy of all those things with her 8 children and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She was an amazing example to all of us on how to live with a joyful heart. We do wish that we could've seen her more often and she will be greatly missed, but we know that she is now living in peace with Jesus by her side. We love you Grandma Fern.

Here is a photo of Grandma Fern holding Justin in Oct. 2003

I chose the photo of Grandma Fern above holding Justin because it leads me into my next celebration of life--one that is still young and has a big future. Our boy, Justin, had his 8th birthday yesterday. I know I say this every year, but I really can't believe how quickly the years are flying by. Like his great grandmother, Justin is also full of life, love and joy. He is such a sensitive boy, which is not always great when it comes to his feelings getting hurt, but he is definitely very compassionate and caring towards others, and I hope he never looses that. We love you Justin and look forward to seeing where your life takes you.

Justin on his 1st birthday

Justin at 8 in his new sk8er hat and hoodie

I also just had to post this photo on Christmas Eve missing his 2 front teeth
You know what the title of that scrapbook page is gonna be.

All of this is also a reminder to not take life and your loved ones for granted. A life can be long and full but still ended suddenly, and it can, unfortunately, just as easily be ended much too soon. Hug your loved ones and make sure they know you love them and live the life you have filled with love and joy.

Look What I Did

I'm definitely am not one for New Year's resolutions because I have got to be about the worst person to keep something going. Things just don't become a habit very easily for me, which I guess is good when you're talking about bad habits, but there are lots of good habits I'd like to develop, but my discipline is always severely lacking. Thusly, I don't even bother with resolutions, but I do like all the opportunity and potential that the new year brings. It does feel like a fresh, clean start, especially after getting all the Christmas stuff packed away and clearing away all the dust and clutter before getting all the usual decorations back up. I always feel like there is so much possibility whether I actually follow through on things or not.

While, I'm not going to call it a resolution, because that just sets me up for failure, I would like to once and for all work on all the little projects that I have around the house that just never seem to get done. I am constantly buying frames and things to put up on the walls but then never actually get them up. I have tons of frames actually displayed in the house that don't even have photos in them, except for the miscellaneous people that come with the frame (people probably think they're part of our family), which is so sad given the shear amount of photos that I take and how quickly I could actually print out a photo and just stick it in there. Anyway, all that said, there has been a project that I've wanted to do for a long time that once I decided to do it, it took me maybe 30 minutes from start to finish. We have a large wall in our upstairs hallway that I've wanted to hang up a rod to display some of my scrapbook pages. All this is is a very inexpensive cafe curtain rod from Target and the hanging clips that go with it. I just had Hannah help me choose some layouts and put them in page protectors and clipped them up. I would like to make a series of layouts that actually coordinate a little better but Hannah thinks all the colors make it look better. We'll see what happens. Now on to the next project. Bring on 2011!!!