Married

So my sister Katie was married a while back. Here are some of the pictures from her wedding. Jordan, Alex and Grant taking advantage of some game time when they think mom's not looking.

Grant would not leave Dan's side. He loves the guy.

My dad, uncles and brothers. I found them like this several times during the day in a crcle telling stories as my dad laughed his head off.

Here is Diane Schwartz with my brother Andy. She surprised everyone by showing up to the wedding after traveling over 12 hours to get there. I haven't seen her in probably 12 years.

Here's the quilt I made for Katie. I was cutting off the strings to the matching pillowcases on the way to the wedding. It was a close call.

My Uncle Jeff and Jordan.

Em with the nephews and neice that were there.

My amazing Aunt Steff who decided to run a half marathon the morning of the wedding. Did I mention the wedding was in the morning?

Waiting for the bride and groom.

This is the only group picture I got--oh well!

Schools Out!

I've been dreading summer for the last few months. I love the kids but hate all the fighting and begging to play the computer all day. I changed my attitude just in the nick of time though (from listening to Dr. Laura's book Stop Whining, Start Living book) and started looking forward to summer. I talked to one woman who helped me realize that I don't have to provide the entire summer entertainment. I never really provide great entertainment but just feeling like I should is exhausting. So before school got out we had the kids come up with a personal list of things they would do when they feel bored. We also initiated a summer rule: if you say, "I'm bored" or anything like unto it, you will be given a job to do. So far so good--its been 3 whole days.

One other thing that's hard for me about summer is the lack of schedule. Some people love this I know but I don't work well without some kind of structure. So here's this summers routine. Before playing or doing anything fun you must first:

Clean your room

Do 3 jobs--assigned by mom

Practice piano for 30 minutes

Read 1 hour

Write in your journal (yesterdays topic was "if you were an inventor what would you invent")

Math flashcards/written math drills

New chart made from tiny envelopes I picked up at the dollar store. Each child has a different color strip they place in envelopes when finished

This way we get the house peacefully clean and all the other naggable items have been taken care of.

After the work is done then the kids can play their 15 minutes of computer and use the rest of the day to do whatever they can think of.


The other summer idea that the kids are really excited about is cooking. The three oldest kids each have a day of the week to plan and prepare 3 meals with my help. Its so great to have kids to do at least half of the work.

Bridal Shower

It happened a little while ago. But since she's already married I thought I'd better post about Katie's bridal shower before I post about the wedding. My little Katie was there and strangely we didn't get one picture of her. We also didn't get a picture of Cindy and Holly (those girls are so funny).



Mostly we ate and talked but we also played a couple of games (Katie wanted to be sure we didn't play anything too embarrassing). One was a "guess Dan's answers" game. My little Katie made up most of the questions. Here they are a few with answers included:

What is your favorite: Food: Chicken Alfredo Pizza

Activity: Watching March Madness

Flower: Sunflower

Holiday: Independence Day

Tipe of Dog: Australian Shepherd

Pet: Possum

Musical Instrument: None

Tree: Willow Tree

Computer Game: Warcraft

Toy: Dominoes

Bird: Falcon

My sister Katie was pretty stumped. I guess they had never talked much about important subjects like trees, pets, and flowers. We laughed pretty hard about the questions and Dan's silly answers to them.

Candace

Jodi with daughter and Katie

really great food--the 7 layer greek dip was amazing

Mom, Andrea and Katie

Katie and friend

Amy and Leigh--had both just lost 20 pounds

Old Dog Update

Some of you were wondering what happened to Cooper, our yippy, white dog. We didn't actually give him to an unsuspecting family member. It turns out they asked for him. We were planning on driving him all the way to his original home sometime in June but since someone wanted him for their daughter, we (actually Carl) willingly gave him up. The only problem is this particular family came to visit while Katie, Jordan and I were running errands. They asked for Cooper out of the blue and Carl sent him home with them. He thought it would be fun to see how long it took the kids to notice he was gone. Big mistake. At bedtime Katie asked with terror in her eyes, "where's Cooper? I've looked all over for him and can't find him anywhere. His kennel is gone too." I started looking around with her, not knowing what in the world went on a few hours before. Finally Carl (who at first acted like he didn't know either) tells us what happened. Katie was in tears (Cooper used to sleep in her bed). Alex, who was there when Cooper was given to the cousins, also remembered the entire bad experience and cried for the second time that day (so Carl told me). Of course they were sad-to have their favorite furry guy taken away from them so suddenly. It was shocking. They needed more preparation. Carl is neither sentimental nor emotional so he had no idea that giving away the dog would be such a problem (still doesn't probably). Though I felt bad for the kids and totally understood their sadness I can't tell you how happy I was that Cooper was gone. Is it okay to smile and feel bad at the same time that one of my favorite family members is listening to endless howling, yipping and dealing with chewed up underwear. So happy it isn't me.

Happy Mother's Day

What do you get when you cross Mimi (her grandma name) with a bunch of grandkids?

patience with grandkids jumping on her bed early in the morning (she loves it)

lots of hugs

love-she's great about letting the kids know she cares about them

How did we get so lucky!

P.S. Thanks for the sweater mom. Its just what I always wanted.

Thinking WAY ahead

Let me explain. Alex has this fascination with tarantulas. He has probably read 20 books about them and can spout out all kinds of information about spinnerets, the difference between different types and where they are located. He has even held one and experienced their stinging hairs (you should wash your hands before touching your skin). When he asked me if he could get one I replied, "absolutely not" which was followed by tears that didn't soften me a bit. When he asked his dad (out of my hearing) Carl said that yes he could get one when we is 12 if he learns all about them. I think Carl was sure that Alex would forget about it in a few months. That was last November. Alex explained to me after writing to Santa that if Santa brought one in place of a stocking (which is all that Santa brings to our house) then he wouldn't have to pay for one. Funny huh! Alex isn't one to leave details to the last minute.

Santa's letter back:

Dear Alex,

So nice to hear from you! I'm still on vacation in Hawaii. I don't ordinarily take requests years in advance. I'll think about it. In the meantime keep being a good boy. Make sure you're really nice to your excellent mother.

Love,

Santa

P.S. Are you sure you want a Tarantula? How about a nice stuffed animal?

Carl gets his dog

(Here Carl and Foxy are playing soccer. She can actually dribble the ball with those short legs.)

After a few years of saving, Carl finally got the Welsh Corgi he always wanted. She's 6 years old and probably one of the best behaved dogs in the world. She doesn't bark (unless Grant is sitting on her head), chew underwear, poop in other people's yards, etc. We love Foxy.

We've been saving for a dog since our MA days. There, the price of a Corgi was $1100. We didn't pay that much for Foxy.

If you're considering buying a dog, here are a few tips:

1) get rid of your underwear eating, whiny, bark when trucks go by dog. Hopefully you'll be able to find an unsuspecting relative to give him to.

2) research and pick a good breed of dog. Its true the small dogs are pretty yippy, want to play all the time and commonly follow you around the house always two inches or less away from your heals. If you want to hold a dog all day, a small dog would be a good kind to get. On the other hand, Corgi's are commonly mature, calm, want to be in charge (at least of other dogs) and smart, a better match for our family, especially if they can outsmart Grant, the great annoyer of dogs.

3) buy an older dog--much less work

4) Change her name. It only takes a few days for the dog to catch on. Foxy came with the name Keyna, which is Welsh for jewel. I told the kids we'd need to come up with something else. "Why not jewel?" they asked. "Are you kidding me?" is all I could respond. Anyway, since nobody would agree to Wonder Woman or Goldilocks we agreed to Foxy, after one of Carl's Corgi's from his farming days. Foxy the first was Carl's best friend. So it fits. We love her.