Happy Fathers Day

Happy Fathers Day

He takes them bike riding, golfing and to the park.

He plays games and has even dressed a doll or two

He makes them s'mores and brownie sundaes

He helps owies feel all better

he says goodmorning and hugs goodnight

he reads stories and holds them tight

He is Dad and we love him very much!

Have you met my brother?

I have mentioned him before...he has even commented a time or two - Brad is my "baby" brother he is 5 years younger than me (bummer) but he is awesome.

He and his wife Anna recently bought a house, on top of a mountain (literally). It is simply beautiful up there and I am so jealous I threatened to put a shack somewhere on his property so I could live their too.

Brad has always been a GQ kind of guy - Armani, Polo - dressed to the T at every turn. He is also a gadget guy - Loves his "toys"

but I wonder if any of us know the REAL Brad?

Beacuse this weekend he had this delievered

and its tires are as big as Hailey

and it sits in his garage next to this

And it makes for great photo opps with the girls...

But something didn't seem right. HIM with TRACTOR?

So we did a little investigating and we found this cozy air cushioned seat inside the cab

and upon closer inspection one can find AC and HEAT controls as well...

You might say this is the GQ Tractor, the BMW of John Deer - whatever you want to call it - my brother owns a tractor and that makes me giggle - but in all fairness to him the GIANT snowblower attachment is going to be a MUST have in the Colorado Mountain winters!

However, I am left wondering if my dad is going to have tractor envy? Because this is his Mtn Property Tractor

Time to go to bed

What time do you go to bed? Your kids? You know they say bedtimes are important. We have bedtimes in our house and we adjust them accordingly by age and need for sleep - however sometimes they fail us miserably.

Case 1:

Hailey -

3 years old -

Bedtime 7pm

Natural Wake Time - 6am

Hours slept per night: 9-10 (on a good night)



Case 2:

Lauren -

8 Years old -

Bedtime - 8:30

Natural wake time - 6:30 weekdays, 7:30 weekends

Hours slept per night: 10 -11



We have attemped many scenerios to increase the sleep hours to the recommended number in case #1. Though we fail, because she wakes up a lot in the night and if she sleeps even 5 minutes in the car during the day she won't fall asleep till well after 8pm. Desperately hoping her tonsils are part of this problem and a natural change will occur after her surgery!

Case #2 was ticking and rolling along just fine about about 10 days ago when she became difficult to wake on school days and no longer represented a natural wake time during the week.

Our solution? Case #2 will get a new bedtime, a bit earlier - moving to 8:00 for the rest of the school year to ensure she gets the sleep she needs and the we get the peace we need! Lauren is NOT happy about this change of events - but I am not going to spend the next 10 years dragging her butt out of bed everyday!


So - what are your bedtimes? Are they working for you?

Good Karma - Good Karmal

About an hour ago I got a pin from my mom saying "go look on your porch" my sick brain got worried "what's on my porch?"

I opened the door to two boxes. after a quick looksy I noticed one was from one of favorite places...

The Good Karmal company!

YEAH ME!

These are amazing! Each is wrapped with an ispiration Good Karma quote and the caramels are so incredible - the melt in your mouth. AMAZING!

Once again my mother made my day!

**Thanks Mom!

Doo Wa Diddy Diddy Dum Diddy Do

That is what happens when Grams and Gramps take the girls for the evening! They come home singing songs like

Doo Wa Diddy Diddy Dum Diddy Do

One Eyed One Eared Flying Purple People Eater

You're so Vain, you probly think this song is about you, don't you

Ricky don't loose my number, its the only one you own

When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, That's amore!

But seriously while you roll those around in your in head for next few hours - I have to give a great big shout out to Grams and Gramps for picking up my sick children and taking them out to dinner so we could have a little quiet time in the house!

YAHOO, it was a hard week - I spent my quiet time working on the wordpress migration that is going to me forever and a day and "he" spent it making this new theme (available on many models)

And now the girls are in bed, I am going back to wordpress hell with a little Doo Wa Diddy in my head.

The rest of the Story

Todays post comes from my mom (or Grams as you may know her) - I hope you enjoy!

The Rest of the Story……..

We all heard about the Banker from Miami (Leonard Abiss) who sold his bank, received a Sixty Million dollar bonus from the sale and gave it away to all of his current employees. He even went so far as to find 72 past employees. He gave it out based on a percentage of length of time employed at the bank. He did this in November, 2008.




He was invited by Michelle Obama to sit with her during the State of the Union address this year. Prior to the event he was asked by the First Lady to provide her with a list and brief description of the recipients of the money. The first lady chose one of those recipients to be at the event with him.



That guest was Geneva Lawson. She is 72 years old and has been with the bank for 51 years.
She is from Chattanooga, Tennessee. She hasn’t traveled much. Went to Michigan twice, and returned occasionally to Chattanooga to visit her sisters. She and her three sisters grew up in a very loving, but very poor home. Her dad was a coal plant worker and died in his early fifties from an accident in the plant. Her mother worked in the millenaries making socks. Geneva left home right after high school, went to Miami and soon went to work for that bank.

Finding out the night before, making the trip to Washington D.C. on a private jet, staying in a “fancy” hotel, receiving a tour of the White House from the First Lady was a once in a lifetime experience for her. She was the Banker’s boss in the print shop of the bank, when he first started at the bank. She held several teller positions with the bank and is now the Safety Deposit person. They didn’t want her to retire, so when she said she might, they offered her that position hoping she would stay, and she did.

Geneva, (Nita is what she is called) has always been a caring, fun loving, positive, person who has lived a simple, happy life. She makes you happy to be around her.

Nita is my aunt. My mother’s baby sister!

And that my friends makes her my Great Aunt - I think this story is sweet, inspiring and selfless. The part my mom left out is the part about how Nita went without dinner one evening while at the State of the Union - she did not know how to "do room service" as was agreed upon by her traveling partner. We sure take a lot of life for granted. The monies she recieved from her boss for her 51 years of service and the trip of a lifetime were truly life altering for her - smile and make someones day today!

Back to the present

Easter was wonderful! The girls had a great day! We hunted eggs at our house and the infamous Hide em and Find em eggs (plus) at Grams house! A lovely dinner with family and early bedtime for Hailey! It doesn't get better than that!

The Hide em and Find em eggs were worth the hunt. They had us all laughing. Grandpa filled the theater with them (it was raining out) and they taunted "I'm over here ha ha ha" and other sayings complete with contagious laughter-

and once you found them and opend them they said SURPRISE you found me and again with the contagious laughter - what a hoot. Oh and Grams and Gramps filled these gems with dollars so it was double the fun for the girls!

We hope you all had a wonderful Easter too!

What I learned this week (early edition)

Welcome to What I learned this week - The Early Edition... (I will link over on Tuesday)


I learned that even though they are well paid, well educated, well intended Dr's and Nurses in the ER are not that competent especially if they don't think you are priority number 1 when you are admitted.

I learned that once they realize that they were wrong as pertaining to what priority the patient should have been given - a team of 6 people will pack a room no larger than a gas station bathroom and rush around in a frenzy trying to make things better.

I learned how bad it stinks to see a parent in the hospital under any circumstances and how much worse it is when the people taking care of her

1. can't find what they need

2. don't know what it is the Dr is asking for

3. Lose 2 vials of blood, mislabel the next two and ultimately have to take blood 3 times from a bleeding patient that has already lost 2 1/2 pints of blood.

I learned that if you leave the hospital at 12am to move your car to the side of the hospital your mom has been admitted to - you will have to walk all the way around the building to re-enter through the ER entrance - you also will do this by yourself, in the dark, in the middle of the night, in chilly Colorado and inevitably you will not be wearing a coat because when you left you left your house to rush to your moms side at her house you were in your PJ's and slippers and did not realize what your night was going to turn into.

I also learned that things improve a bit when you get a rock solid nurse in the ICU who actually cares for the patient and even picks up on little subtleties and adds surprises to your room service order just to make you and your mom more comfortable.

I learned that my mom on Morphine (even at the lowest dose possible) is VERY loopy and she will even try to convince you that the machines in the room were talking to her in the middle of the night. Um mom, the machines don't talk - REALLY and NO they aren't talking right now either (24 hours after the last dose of morphine)

I also learned that I can rearrange the waiting room furniture to meet my needs at 5am when I am still locked out of the ICU and I want to work on my computer (comfortably)

I learned that life does go on around you even when you think it will come to a screeching halt - that your kids and your husband will be JUST FINE without you and that at some point they won't even run to hug you when you walk back in the door. (OK but that stunk too)

I learned that friends and family are AMAZING in crisis situations and even if the hospital is not terribly accommodating you can make sure someone is always with the patient because everyone helps! It is also wonderful to have a family member with a PHD and some experience dealing with Dr's to set people straight every now and then!

I also learned that even though I gave up coffee about 12 years ago their is nothing better than a hot cup of black tar coffee at 3am and 5am when you are cold and bored and waiting to get back into ICU to see your mom.

And Finally - I learned that if you have a nose bleed, not just any nose bleed a NOSE BLEED that doesn't seem to want to stop get your butt to the ER after just 20 minutes or all the above could happen to you too (actually, if you have one of those nose bleeds and do get the hospital in time, MOST of the above will still happen you will just lose a little less blood)

my mom

I am sorry I can not give credit where credit is due, I am tired and can't remember what blog I saw this on. I do know that it was Thursday night that I saw it. But anyway, a blog had a list of questions that you were supposed to ask your kids about yourself as their mom and then post their funny answers.

Well, my family has had an interesting week, to say the least, and so I changed it up a bit and answered the questions about my own mom instead.

1. What is something mom always says to you?
I love you, oh and Thank you

2. What makes mom happy?
Hugs from her grand-daughters

3. What makes mom sad?
Being sick, seeing someone else suffering

4. How does your mom make you laugh?
We make each other laugh just because we do…we do a lot of “stupid” things and end up laughing at ourselves.

5. What was your mom like as a child?
I think my mom was strong child with a will to be reckoned with, she was a fighter and a winner, she was beautiful and kind, timid and outgoing, yearning wanting and often not getting – she was amazing.

6. How old is your mom?
Undisclosed

7. How tall is your mom?
Same height as me!

8. What is her favorite thing to do?
She loves to read. She likes a lot of things as well but I would say that other than family books are another important thing in her life.

9. What does your mom do when you're not around?
Enjoy her “me time”, organize, quilt, do things for other people

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
For understanding "Love Unconditional"

11. What is your mom really good at?
Just about everything she tries that does not involve any extreme heights, but she is a beautiful quilter, a wonderful mother and an even better Grandmother.

12. What is your mom not very good at?
See aforementioned Heights.

13. What does your mom do for her job?
She makes sure everyone in her life gets what they need from her and more

14. What is your mom's favorite food?
Fried Okra.

15. What makes you proud of your mom?
My mom is the strongest woman I know, she tolerates pain, sadness and fear head on. She is an incredible role model and I am blessed to have had her rub off on me, even if just a little bit.

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
I have to name two – She Loves Eeyore so she might want to be Eeyore but I would say she is honestly a lot more like Big Bird – always helping, doing and looking out for those around her.

17. What do you and your mom do together?
SHOP, Laugh, vent – what don’t we do together?

18. How are you and your mom the same?
We are stubborn, honest, strong women with a lot of love to give

19. How are you and your mom different?
oh boy..we do have a lot of differences I for one would NEVER have the patience to QUILT and she thinks I am dork for inheriting whatever gene made me obsessed with coin collecting like my father.

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
Because I know.

21. Where is your mom's favorite place to go?
McDonalds Drive through for a Diet Coke, or maybe it is Hawaii.

What memories are made of

Back in December of 2006 I took this picture of Hailey walking down the road with Grandpa. I loved it then and I love even more now.

Because in January of 2009 I took these pictures of Hailey and Grandpa on the same road. As soon as I pulled them off the camera I had a flashback to the "old picture". Grandpa and I brainstormed when I might have taken the picture in the blue coat on the road...and today I found it.

Hailey had to work pretty hard to catch up with Gramps on this day...

But as soon as he knew she was coming, he turned to wait for her...

and then they walked...

Till Hailey lost interest and came running back to me!

When the kids are away -

Wait - the parents aren't playing! We are getting old. We went and grabbed a slab of greese at our favorite NY Pizza joint (Big Bills -did you know that on 9/11 each year he donates all proceeds to the NY Fire Dept and raises like 30k in one day!!) then we came home, I worked on some of cleaning projects - check out my pantry and the mess I made while doing it

Then I crashed into my computer, leaving several things undone that have to be finished tomorrow....

But- Lauren and Hailey are at Grams and Gramps house for the night! They are having fun and I got this great photo from my mom

FEET - this reminds me of the christmas card at Catholic Teacher Musings! and yes I took the time to find her actual post and if you would click over and see it I think you will giggle!

Then Grams sent this picture too, Grandpa is not quite asleep - but if you know him at all, he will be soon! Thanks Grams and Gramps for the night out...even though I am apparently too boring, too old or just too tired to really enjoy it - I love a little time in a quiet house!!!

I surrender:

Today went a little like this:

Get girls up
Attempt breakfast but the little one refused to eat
Take Hailey and an exhausted Lauren to school
Run around house doing tons of little projects (you know them well)
Pick Hailey up from school
Run to AT&T to replace less than 30 day old phone with malfunction
Run to Printers to pick up shirt order that had to be sorted and delivered tonight
Try to convince Hailey to eat lunch (fail)
Get home; attempt to set up new phone on the fly
Start sorting shirts
Notice Hailey going downhill FAST
In swoops Daddy to the rescue
Watch Hailey sleep on daddy for an hour while I worked
Finish phone (but notice it has an issue too)
Take Hailey’s Temp…102.8
Call Dr. (we have been on the pink stuff since Friday – so this CAN’T be right)
Get appointment
Daddy went to AT&T to return my phone again
Take Lauren’s phone with me to the Dr. with Hailey
Daddy picks up Lauren and gets her an early dinner (rehearsals at 4:45)
Find out new Fever is just a virus on top of the other s%^7

Rush home, get Lauren ready, load shirts in car, set up new phone again, Leave Hailey kicking and screaming, get Lauren to dance, verify pick up time has changed from 9pm to 7:30pm, go home, get Hailey to bed, Send Daddy to pick up Lauren only to get a call from Lauren 5 minutes later saying they are done and it is only 7:00 (glad she has a cell phone) Call daddy and tell him to kind of hustle, realize when he calls about a snack that I haven't eaten 1 tiny morsel since noon yesterday!

Sit down, open Word, Type Blog Post….And this was just the abbreviated version!

Thank goodness for daddy. Now I am going to eat.

UPDATE: Just as I was going to toss the frozen out of the box TGIFriday's Chicken Wings in the oven Daddy showed up with fresh ones from the New Wing Place down the street...was he reading my mind? It was wonderful! needed more sauce but we had Wingman sauce in the fridge so it was perfect. Daddy, did I thank you yet?

Finally - a spring break post!

Call me lazy if you like...I wanted to post nearly every day, even took the time to upload the photos...just couldn't pull together a thought process long enough to actually post. Maybe it was ADD, maybe it was mommy brain...whatever it was I am here now so enjoy!

To start...we were off to Scottsdale courtesy of Grams and Gramps for a big family vacation! Brad and Anna came and we all had a great time. The girls were up before the lizards and off to the pool each day by 8:30 or 9:00. Yes you read that right. We stayed at the pool each day till at least 2pm sometimes closer to 3:00! Here are some pool photos from early in the trip (remember if you click on the slide show it will open it up larger for you!)



We were at the Four Seasons in Scottsdale and the property was amazing. It was so pretty and all the local vegetation seemed to be in full bloom! Besides some glitches with AC issues and a slightly limited menu for non-fish eaters it was all JUST PERFECT! Here are a few photos of the views around the property from our room and the pool.



What else? The girls and I went to breakfast each morning! That was fun. Daddy golfed a couple times, one of his favorite things was seeing all the golf balls literally embedded in cactus! Amazing! We learned a fair amount about cactus and the girls are fascinated by the Teddy Bear Cholla (Mexican Jumping Cactus) will actually grab on to you and just roll over and stay...hard to get off and apparently very, very painful...Grandpa knows!

Here are some more photos from the pool...one of the best parts was Hailey sleeping poolside each afternoon!

and on a final note...the girls were both great on the planes, Hailey even slept a little on the way home, used the restroom during turbulence (fun for mom), Hailey ate at least a cucumber a day on the trip...Lauren loved the eggs in the morning - guess mom doesn't make em as good :) Todd and I ventured off property for an evening at Greasewood Flats...quite an experience...And we saw a beautiful flower bloom on a cactus one evening - it only lasted 2 days but it was beautiful. These last few photos were taken from the blackberry so quality stinks but enjoy anyway!

THANK YOU GRANDMA AND GRANDPA FOR A TRULY WONDERFUL TRIP FULL OF FANTASTIC MEMORIES!!!

First Post

Well here goes nothing! My first attempt at the Family Blog. Since I don't find time to update the website anymore (I know shame shame). Well, anyway, you can shame all you want I will get it done someday.

In the meantime I have a friend that uses this method to stay in touch with family and friends. It may take some learning on my part, but I suppose I should learn now anyway because pretty soon Lauren will blogging and I won't know what she is doing!

So...today is Monday February 25th and we have moved Hailey into the Healthy Zone and Lauren into the Sick Zone. Just a fever so far. A couple sneezes. She is currently sitting on the couch drawing (coming in at 102.8) while I lay here trying to figure out this blog stuff.