Watercolor Wall Hanging

I made this a couple of years ago, the border is yellow, doesn't show up really good. Then the smaller inner border is purple and the outside is purple. I really enjoyed making it. It's from this book:

Dogwood Tree and Sleeping Kasey

This was a Dogwood Tree at my Mom's house. I thought it was really pretty. We took Kasey to Mom's while we went to a City Council meeting. As we drove up the hill, he yelled, "yeah, yeah" and clapped his hands. When we went to pick him up, he and Grandma were on the couch, Kasey sleeping away. They were so cute. I think she had been sitting with him like that for at least an hour.

Thinking About My Life

My Grandpa Bob came to live in Lebanon about 3 months after Kasey was born. He's my father's dad and I had never met him until about 7 years ago, I guess. I knew about him all my life, but he and my dad were never close and didn't really have a relationship. Grandpa Bob and my grandmother divorced when dad was really young and their lives were just too far apart. So about 7 years ago, I had done a little research about the family and learned that his 2nd wife had died. That really made me think about things like what if my Grandpa Bob died, would I even know? And would I even realized what I had missed in my life by not knowing him? So I decided to take the first step and make that call to him. So I did and I am so pleased with how things have worked out. That first year, we took a long trip to Maine where he lived in the summers. He had 3 children with his 2nd wife and we got to meet all of them and their families. Being an only child, I now have 2 uncles and an aunt and a half dozen cousins! That was amazing to me. So over the years, we have gone to his home in Florida and he's been to our house a couple of times. He is now married to Carole and the last time they came up to visit right after Kasey was born, they decided to move up here.

I was never fortunate enough to remember my maternal grandfather, I do remember my maternal great-grandfather though. It is really nice to have my Grandpa Bob in town with us now and my Grammy Carole!

So what has got me thinking is that my Grandpa Bob has written all of these stories on paper. I think there is probably about 40 pages. He writes a lot about his military stories and they are really interesting. I love the fact that this is about his life and the things that were important to him. I will have something to give to Kasey to remember his great-grandfather. I don't think many people are that fortunate to have a document like that in their families.

I have posted Grandpa Bob's blog on my favorite blog listing, along with my favorite quilting blogs, so he's in good company. I don't always understand his blogs, they are usually political in nature, which I'm not really too up on, but I enjoy reading them and commenting on them. Keeps him on his toes. :)

So here are a few pictures, we went to a Mexican Restaurant for my Mom's birthday, April 22nd.
Starting at the left is Grammy Carole, Grandpa Bob, Nicky, my Mom, Me and Kasey. (bad pictures of mom and me, but that is the best I could get from Mark taking the picture and Kasey being onery!!!)

Here's Kasey playing peek-a-boo. He loves to flirt with everyone. We went to Hardee's yesterday and he walked around the whole restaurant and waved at everyone and said "bye-bye, bye-bye".

This is a good picture of my Mom and Kasey. We were at the Civic Center, they were having a showing of Eagles. It was really neat and he liked watching the birds.
So what I have been thinking about after reading Grandpa Bob's narrative, is that I need to do something for Kasey like that. I found an old scrapbook document that was called "Journal Jar". It has about 10 pages of double spaced questions that help you to document your life. So I have started a document and have been surprised about how easy the words flow when you just type in a question. Here are a few of them:

• Did you walk to school or ride a bus?
• Tell about your first car
• Describe your Sundays as a child

So I already have about 10 pages typed and it is just my growing up years. I think I am going to divide it up by 3 sections, my growing up years, my life before Mark and my life with Mark. I think it will be a neat way to document things I have done and what my feelings are. I have to get my mom started doing this. She has so many cool stories about our families and as much as I try, I can't remember some of them and usually get them all confused anyway! So, Mom, are you up for the challenge???

Blogging seems to be a great way to share your stories with your family and friends, but this is just one other way to do so. What makes it easier is if you are a fast typer too! I think it has made it so much nicer having the laptop too because I just take it where ever I feel like typing.

Miranda Bag Pattern

Well, I have been reading about these Miranda Bag patterns on blogs. Everyone seems to be making them, so I finally have broke down and ordered the pattern. I really like how the inside has all the organizer pockets. I think I will use it a lot. But I don't like the small handles, I will try to make it with bigger handles, if I can.

Mark's Gall Bladder and My Bad Tooth

Well, Mark went in for an ultrasound on his gall bladder but we don't know anything yet. The lady that did it wouldn't let me take a picture of him with his belly showing and jelly all over it. That wasn't fair. When I had the ultrasound with Kasey, they would let him take a picture.

Then I've been having tooth problems, one of my back teeth hurt when I eat on it. So I went to the dentist to get my teeth cleaned and there is a fracture in my tooth, so I will be getting a crown on it. They can't do it until June, but at least I don't have to get it pulled.

Well, that's all that's been going on with us.

Kelly

Spring Quilt

Here's a spring quilt I made last year, I found the pattern in a magazine and used a jelly roll, but I can't remember the fabric name right now. Just wanted to post the pictures of the quilt. Kasey had fun while we were trying to take the picture, he wouldn't stand still long enough for me to get a picture with him in front of the quilt.

Here's Kasey in the bathtub. Daddy was putting spray soap all over him. He loves playing in the bathtub...

Well, Mark has been feeling sick for the last couple of weeks, he is bloated and having pains in his chest. We went to the doctor Wednesday and they think he might be having gall bladder problems. He's scheduled for an ultrasound this week so we will see what they find out. I guess that greasey foods really upsets the gall bladder if you're having problems.

Well, not much else going on this week.

Holiday Cups

I thought it would be fun to start collecting these holiday plastic cups. They would just be something fun for Kasey to use and I could switch them out with every holiday. I have the following:

• Valentine's Day - pink and red
• Easter - bunnies and eggs
• Snowmen - blue
• St. Patrick's day
• 4th of July

I guess the next holiday that I can buy cups for will be Halloween, since I already have 4th of July, which would work for Memorial Day too. Then I can get Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Don't you think that's a neat idea? They are usually $1 or 8 or 10 of them. Anyone else doing something like this?

Visiting with Michelle

Michelle and I met for coffee tonight and went through a computer lesson! She has finally posted a blog and I showed her how to use igoogle, how to setup bloglines and how to upload pictures to her blog. We took a few pictures so she could try it. Here's the link to her blog, My Five Little Sweet Peas, how cute is that? It was a fast visit, probably about an hour.

Nicky Won Electric Company Essay Contest!

Nicky entered an essay contest at our local rural electric cooperative. There were 124 entries and the judges picked 10 that they liked, Nicky was one of those 10, 5 girls and 5 boys. Thursday night, she had to read her essay to the judges. After everyone was done, they announced the runners up. They named the first girl and it wasn't Nicky, then they named the 2nd and it wasn't her, then the 3rd and it wasn't her! We were going crazy, it was so close, then they named the 4th one and it wasn't her either! Which meant SHE WON!!! Oh my gosh, it was so exciting.

She won a small PDA device, I don't know what it is for sure, but I guess it has Office 2007 on it, Internet, a GPS system and all sorts of things. I can't wait to see it. But the BIG prize was an all expense paid trip to WASHINGTON, DC in June! Oh my gosh, we are just so excited. There will be 82 kids from Missouri that get to go for 6 days! I dont' think it's sunk in for her what an honor and what a prize this is!

Course, she did forget that I had told her the week before that if she won it, I would give her $100 spending money! When I told her that I was out $100, she was like "Oh, yeah, I forgot!" HA! I told her she had to buy me a t-shirt. Course in DC, you can usually buy t-shirts for 5 for $10, so she'll be able to buy everyone a t-shirt real cheap!

Here's her proud pappa! He said it was really his night to shine... :)

We voted!

Yesterday was a big election day in our town, the mayor and 4 city councilmen. The opponents ran on a ticket of Open, Honest and Transparent Government. They all WON! We were so excited. The guys that were in office were secretive, dishonest and out for their own personal gain. It was wonderful to see the people of our town get out and vote them out. The new mayor won by a 70% margin over the old mayor. It was great. I am now so proud of our town.



So this is Kasey's 2nd time to go vote with us. He was so cute after I voted (we vote on paper ballots), he ran to the machine and pointed to it, he knew that was where that paper was supposed to go. I let him push the ballot in, he thought that was a lot of fun . Then we got a sticker for him.

New Washing Machine, Cat Food and MicroFiber Towels

Well, here's a picture of my new washing machine. It's an LG. The really cool thing about it is that it has a delay timer, so when I want to wash something to put in the dryer for the next morning, I can tell it to start in 6 hours and it will start the load and be done when I get up and everything doesn't sit in the washer for hours getting moldy. The only bad thing is that it doesn't match my dryer. I can't really justify buying a new dryer just so that they match, can I? I am trying to tell Mark I need one and we can use that economic spending tax money on that... But he doesn't like the idea too much. So the little yellow sheet that comes with the dryer said that if you wash 8 loads a week, it only costs you $15.00 a year! We got it from Home Depot, they were a lot cheaper than Sears, plus they had a 10% off coupon and free shipping and handling. It was a good deal, they hauled the old one off too.

So I have to explain a couple things on the washer/dryer picture. The cat food is on top of the dryer because if it isn't up there, Kasey will eat it! That being said, when the cat jumps up there, she scratches the edge of the dryer (another reason we need a new one, right?). Then there is a note on the front of the dryer that says "KEEP THIS DOOR CLOSED". Which was only put on there because Nicky tends to leave the dryer door open all the time. There's a light inside which means it's on all the time when the door is open. The note helped some to reminder her to close the door... Ah, teenagers... :)

Then there was the cat food container that I found tonight when I came home. When we were at Sam's, I bought 10 lbs of cat food. Mark put it all in containers today and I guess decided to put the rest of it in the fabric softener container. He made sure it had plenty of labels on it, just in case we might decide to pour it in the washing machine as fabric softener! I was wondering if that would hurt the cat, but I opened the container and it doesn't smell like fabric softener, so he must have cleaned it out really good. I wondered then if he dried it out really good, I picture water in the bottom and the cat food in there and then it all MOLDS! YUCK!

Ah... husbands... :)

So the other thing I have to tell you about are my new microfiber towels. I love these things towels. I got them at Sam's - there are 32 of them in a package for $10, I have bought 2 1/2 packages (my mom and I split a package). I got a full package of blue and a full package of orange, then we split the green and yellow. These are wonderful for everything! Windows clean great with them and they absorb water really good. The only bad thing is that you can't wash them with fabric softener (also known as cat food.. ha) because it breaks down their absorbency. I just store them in a laundry bag and throw them in with something that doesn't need fabric softener. I have enough of them that I can go a month or so. Then my mom said she cut hers in 1/4ths and uses them as washcloths. So I followed her lead and cut them up, they work great in the kitchen. I even love the smaller size too.

So I think this must be the longest post I have ever made on here.

I am really excited because my Grandpa Bob called me today and wanted me to show him how to start a blog! I can't believe it, he just had his birthday this week (and I forgot !!! - bad Granddaughter!) and he's 85! (Hope that's right, maybe that will make him post a comment on his real age, he's either 84 or 85.) I think he's going to post all about politics, but I guess that will be ok. I will post a link to it on here when he gets it started.

Well, maybe my mom with post a comment too, she reads each one of these about 10 times but never posts anything, except these anonymous ones that say "what a beautiful child" or something like that. She tends to be a little proud of her grandson.

Kelly

Our Concrete Bench was Stolen!

We have a concrete bench that sits by the road on our street next to our driveway. It's just nice to walk up and down the street and sit on it when you want to watch the neighborhood or just relax. Well, this morning it was GONE! I couldn't believe someone would steal it. I was really mad. So I called our neighbor (Tommy) on his cell phone and left a message, he has a camera on his house and I thought it would have recorded that area and we'd be able to catch our thief. He called me back in a couple of hours and was bringing the bench back. Apparently, one of his prankster buddies had stolen the bench, thinking it was his and not ours. He had left it at a house where my neighbor was planning on going that day thinking he would get the joke (seeing his bench sitting in the middle of this person's driveway!). But my neighbor didn't get it because it wasn't his bench. So once he got my message, he knew what had happened and brought it back to us. I'm glad I didn't call the police, I was going to, but Mark told me to wait awhile until we heard back from Tommy.

I looked outside my window Friday at all my yellow daffodils coming up and Kasey had pulled all the flowers off the stems. They were laying all over the place. Guess he thought they shouldn't be there! Should have taken a picture of that. :) I'll do better next time.

Finally, A Post From Me

Well, I have been terrible about posting the last 2 weeks. I had originally planned to post at least every couple of days, then I just fell off the face of earth for awhile! Not too much going on in my life, so wasn't sure what to post! I took this picture the other day outside of my work. The City is doing some road construction and put up "Detoer" signs. I thought that was so funny. Apparently, it looks like the U came off the Detour sign so they put an E on it.

My mom, Nicky and I went to Springfield shopping today. Nicky needed to get some shoes for Prom (why, oh, why is prom so expensive now????) and a dress to wear out to dinner before prom. So we hit all the stores, Marshall's, TJ Maxx, Kohl's and Gordman's. She found a dress at Kohl's and then we went to Gordman's. I laughed and said, "I bet you'll find one in here you like better." She said, "No, I won't. I'm really happy with the one I got." After wandering around a while, I found her and guess what she had? Yes, another dress! I really liked this one better than the first. So we got it and took the other one back to Kohl's. Plus she found some really cute silver shoes with rhinestones on them. Our last stop was Sam's Club for diapers and wipes. I found Kasey a couple of books, I Can Cut and I Can Trace. Retail price on this website showed $13.99, but Sam's had them for $7.49. That was a good price. They also have I Can Color, I Can Fold and I Can Paste. I thought I Can Cut and Trace would be pretty good for his age right now, 22 months. We did a little bit with the I Can Cut, but he was tired, so I will do a little with him each day. It's really cute, they are colorful pages and you can tear each page out as you do it.

Here's a pic of Kasey, we had hamburgers and corn on the cob. He is pretty good at eating the corn, but liked to pull the skewers out and stick them back in. I am going to have to remember to use the ones that are plastic screw type rather than the metal stick ones. He could hurt himself on those. He thought it was fun eating the corn with those.

Here's what we did tonight before going to bed. He loves to play with this magentic farm book. He takes all the magnets out and puts them on the page. After he's played a while, he wants to put it all up in the plastic holder and put it back in the bookshelf. Usually we read a couple of books every night. My favorite are the Dr. Seuss books. I have a ton of them, probably at least 75! I just love the rhymes and silliness of them. I think he's going to like them too!

I haven't been doing much on quilting. I worked on my Triple Treat Quilt some, but nothing really to show.