Our Little Night Owl

I'm starting to think that Lyla might take after her dad and be more of a night person, which is bad news for me!  I like to go to bed EARLY and then I like getting up early and starting my day!  Lyla has been pushing back her bedtime every night this week.  Her bedtime is supposed to be 8:00.  A couple nights this week we didn't get her down until 10:00, last night I was lucky and got her in bed at 9:00.  Ugh...  I don't like when she goes to bed later because then I stay up later than I'm used to because I still have all the thing I like to get done after she is asleep!  So anyways, all this lead up is to show you the video I took of her last night.  While I am sitting in her room waiting on her to go to sleep she likes to go in the hallway and pull out all of her books and play.  So last night I went out to join her for a few minutes! 

And for the record, I LOVE that she loves reading so much!  I really really do... I just wish we could not do it at 9:00 at night thats all!  :) 

Breaking News!!

OMG!!! 
Kate wears glasses!!!

I tore my contact yesterday morning.
So I went home at lunch and got my glasses.
I wore my glasses again today.

I really do not find this to be anything worth talking about, but apparently everyone I have seen in the last 24 hours feel differently!  All my co-workers, the people at Lyla's daycare... everyone has to make a comment and discuss the fact that I am wearing glasses!  Just to let the world know, I have worn glasses since 1st grade.  Its really not a big deal, I promise.  But just to keep them talking I'm going to wear them again tomorrow... lol   ;)

Mr & Mrs Jones

We had Em & Gerald's wedding over the weekend!  Everything did not go as planned, but when does it?  Regardless of a couple of hiccups it was a beautiful day!  And at the end of it all Em & Jones are now married!  Here are a few pictures, some I took, some my friends took:

I hope when the photographer gets the pictures up on his website maybe I can share the link to that with everyone. 

This is my toast I gave:

Dear Em,

You are my little sister.  There is something very special about the way an older sister feels about their younger sister.  It’s always been my job to look out for you.  To show you the ropes.  To make sure that nothing bad happens to you. 

Almost like a parent, I have watched you grow up.  I’ve seen you go from the cute little girl with the long blonde hair and big blue eyes to the awkward pre-teen with the shark tooth!  I’ve seen you through the braces and the acne and then one day you were all grown up!  And you are so beautiful! 

We didn’t always get along when we were younger but I always loved you to pieces.  There is no denying how different we are, we truly are extreme opposites when it comes to a lot of things!  But at the same time we are so alike.  We have our own sense of humor when we are together that nobody else seems to understand!  I feel bad for the boys when we start laughing and they just don’t get it and really, there is no way for us to explain it to them!  Its just funny because we know that it is!

You have grown up to  be an amazing women and now wife!  You learned to cook, you sort of learned how to do laundry!  haha  And you fell in love…

Dear Gerald (Jonesie),

I have known you for six years now.  I feel like I got to watch you grow up too!  When you and Em started dating you were sixteen years old and you had that goofy mustache!  Thank goodness you had Em to clean you up and show you some style! 

You hadn’t got out in the world a whole lot before we met you.  I will never forget the night we took you to Burger King!  The fact that you had never been there cracked us all up!  And last summer when we took you out for your 21^st birthday, it was so much fun showing you what it’s like to go out to a bar.  Even though its not really your thing, you gave it a try and I think you did have fun that night!

You are one of the hardest workers I have ever met.  We have been so proud of you and all of your accomplishments.  Not everyone can hold down a full time job and graduate from college with honors!  I don’t think you give yourself enough credit for all that you do.  I know that you will take care of Em for the rest of your lives.

To you both,

The story of Emily and Gerald is such a classic love story!  You are marrying your high school sweetheart, your first love.  You met at a young age and you were instantly a solid unit.  Nothing has ever come between the two of you.  I have no doubt in my mind that you are soul mates and meant to be together forever! 

I wish for you both to enjoy everything that marriage has to offer!  There will be lots of happy times and wonderful memories!  There will also be rough patches and days that you just want to forget.  But remember to keep laughing together and to always fight fair.  And that advice that everyone is going to give you about “not going to bed angry”, that’s a crock of shit!  If you are mad, I promise you, it’s better to just go to sleep and deal with it in the morning!  Everything always seems SO MUCH WORSE at 2:00 in the morning!  Just trust me on that one!

I love you both so much and I’m so happy to be a part of your special day!

More Grandma Memories

I knew this would happen!  I can't promise this to be the last post either!

• She always had to sleep on a satin pillow because she would get her hair done once a week and the satin pillow "protected it".
• She always had to have her lipstick on.  ALWAYS!
• She would always guess what her Christmas or Birthday presents were right before opening them.  It always really stunk when she would guess right.... haha
• She ate cornflakes for breakfast EVERY morning.
• She never let us waste things.  If you opened up a can of pop and didn't finish it she would just put it back in the fridge and pull out for you at the next meal.  Or the next weekend when you were there.  She didn't care if it was flat - you were going to finish that can of pop!
• Whenever we got strawberries instead of just cutting the top part with the stem off she would give us each a straw.  And we had to take the straw and push it up through the bottom of the strawberry and pop the top off.  It was so weird and to this day I dont' know why she made us do it that way!  But as a kid it was a lot of fun!
• She loved to travel.  Her and Pap got to take a trip to the Grand Canyon before he died, I'm so glad they got to take that trip! 
• She tried not to curse around the kids.  So we heard lots of "Oh Shit - Oh Shinny"  "Hells Bells"

Its going to be a long week...

Its going to be a long week, full of lots of joy and lots of sorrow.  My little sister gets married this coming Saturday and my Grandma passed away yesterday.  Yesterday, today, tomorrow and Thursday will be the sorrow and the pain and the mourning of an amazing lady.  Friday, Saturday and Sunday will be the joy of seeing my little sister become a wife and start her own family!  And the joy of welcoming my new "brother" Gerald to our family.  Where there is a void it will be filled with more love.

For anyone who doesn't know what we have gone through with my grandma in the last 15 years, let me bring you up to speed.  15 years ago, on my 13th birthday, my pap passed away.  It was a horrible time for our family.  He was a wonderful man who is truly missed every day by all of us and his passing really tore us all apart.  When he died that left my Grandma all alone living in a big farm house taking care of a farm.  Of course we all helped her out, but it was still a lot for her to be there by herself.  So after a couple of years we moved her in to an apartment in a senior living complex.  She had her own kitchen, living room, bathroom and bedroom.  She was living on her own but there was help there if she ever needed it.  And one day she did.  Seven years ago she fell, so she pulled one of the ropes for help.  When they took her to the hospital she coded and I believe with every part of my being she should have died that day.  That was how the story should have ended, but it didn't.  With medical intervention they brought her back and she was never the same again.  She had the beginnings of Alzheimer's and couldn't go back to the apartment to live on her own anymore.  So she went to live in the assisted living - nursing home part of the building.  Year after year her Alzheimer's disease got worse and worse.  I was lucky enough that she was able to come to my bridal shower and my wedding, but she wasn't herself.  And as time went on she didn't know who any of us were, couldn't even remember that she had been married or had children - let alone her grandchildren.  So my Grandma has been "dying" for the last seven years, so no, this was not an "unexpected" death, but yes, the timing really stinks with Em's wedding this week.  And for the record, just because a death is expected that doesn't make it hurt any less.  Its funny all this time I felt like I was completely prepared for when she passed away, I mean we really haven't had her around for such a long time.  But I'm not.  I'm not prepared to go to the funeral home tomorrow night and see her laying in a coffin.  Even when she had no idea what was going on, you could still go visit her and she would talk to you and laugh with you - then ask you the same three questions for the next hour.... haha

This is a link to her obituary.

And now for some happy memories of my Grandma!  I might have to add a few new blog entries as I think of more but Em and I were having a lot of fun remembering things last night and I just wanted to share some of it!

• My Grandma was crazy about word search books!  She would keep lists of which ones she had already bought and done.  And I always thought it was funny how she wouldn't circle the words, she would draw a line straight through it.  Even when she was sick, mom would still get her word search books and she would write notes in the margins.  I doubt she ever pulled the books out and read the notes after she wrote them, but they were there.
• Em would always bake pumpkin pies with her.  And Em always laughed about how Grandma would measure every ingredient down to the grain of sugar.  hahaha  What makes that whole thing even funnier is how much I am like my Grandma.  She rarely cooked and we all know I don't cook!  But she did bake on occasion and when she did she was such a perfectionist just like I am! 
• There were always lots of birds around my grandparents house.  My pap always put up bird feeders and liked to watch them out of this huge picture window they had.  Every time a bird would tweet Grandma would always say listen, its saying "pretty pretty pretty"!  Em and I think about that every time we hear birds to this day! 
• She hated to sit at home.  Another way we are so much alike.  We used to make all kinds of excuses to have to go to town.  And she LOVED Walmart!  She used to say we had to go to Walmart so that the people there wouldn't miss her and think that something happen to her.
• She loved to talk on the phone.  I remember as a young teenager hanging out at her house and wanting to go upstairs and have a private conversation on the phone in her bedroom.  She would ask probably 10 times - you know how to use the call waiting right.  Make sure you answer it if somebody calls!
• She genuinely cared about people.  She was a nurse all her life.  A traveling nurse.  She would go to houses that were in the middle of the ghetto to take care of people and she wouldn't even bat an eye at the thugs on the corner.  Usually they knew her name and would tell her hello!  That's just the impact that she had on people.  When she retired her and my pap delivered meals for Meals On Wheels.  Em and I used to go with them when we were off from school.  She would just make those peoples whole day/week I think! 
• Every year on Thanksgiving my cousin Amber and I used to go with my grandparents to deliver Thanksgiving dinners to less fortunate families for the church.  That was always a really happy memory of mine.  We would go in to all their houses and everyone would always be watching the parade on tv and they were always so happy to see us.  A lot of them wouldn't get to spend the day with family so we were the only ones they got to see.
• She used to write with her toes!  hahahahaha  Only my family will understand this I think!  She would take her shoes and socks off and put a pen between her toes and try to write with it.  Its one of those you had to be there moments, but hysterical all the same!
• Along the same lines, she used to balance a spoon on her nose!  haha

I'm done for now, but lets all just smile and remember Grandma like she was when she was healthy!

Best Trip to Aldis - EVER!!!

So I ran to Aldis on my lunch break. 

Cool thing to happen #1:  I had my quarter out and went to get a cart only to see that the last two people to return their carts forgot their quarters!  SCORE!  I made 50 cents getting my cart!

Way Cooler thing to happen next:  I am doing my shopping and happen to glance in the cooler where the milk and coffee creamer is... and there it was...  almost like an illusion... like seeing big foot... like when you see the sign at McDonalds for Shamrock Shakes....

PUMPKIN SPICE CREAMER!!!!!!

This has made my afternoon, my day, my week!!!  It feels like Christmas morning!

That is all, now you may all go back to your day (after you go get some creamer that is)!  <3

MMMMM Tacos!