90 Years!

We celebrated my Gramma Ward's 90th birthday this month with a party at her house! I think it's quite impressive that she's 90 years old! She lives by herself, is in good health and is still quite "with it."  Stephanie and I made the picture frame in the pictures below and had a fun time putting it together. My Aunt Cheryl, who I haven't seen since I visited her in 2011, came to Omaha for the party and it was nice to see her again and have her meet Ross, Lucy, and Molly. Gramma had quite a few friends and neighbors stop by to wish her well. It was fun to meet some of the people I've heard about from her for years and years!

Aunt Cheryl, Gramma, Dad, Aunt Janice

Libby's Favorite Radio Mix

I've had this CD in my cd player/radio alarm clock for probably 15+ years. It's a cd I made, circa 2002, of my favorite worship songs. I made several of them back in the day and loved giving them as presents. :) Molly likes to play with my alarm clock (which I never use anymore for the purpose of an alarm, just for the purpose of a clock) and turn on the cd player. She's done this a few times before and we usually end up listening to only half of the first song and then turn it off. Well, one night she turned the cd on and we ended up having a dance party in our bedroom!

It was so much fun! We listened to several of the songs and danced all around the room. It was great to just be free, dance around, and be silly. I had so much fun and felt so good during this dance party. I hadn't heard these songs for several, several years and they brought back fun memories from college and my early to mid-twenties.

The next day I was thinking about how great I felt during that dance party and wondered if I felt that way because it was fun to hear these songs and the good memories they brought up, or if it was because of the songs. The songs are all Christian praise and worship songs and really, our dancing was like dancing for Jesus and praising Him. I'm sure there's more of a sermon or devotion to this, but I'll let you think on that yourself. :)

As a side note......the first song on this cd is "Red Letter Day" by Newsong. I remember I asked for a radio alarm clock with a CD player for my birthday one year, specifically for this song. With this particular alarm clock I could have a cd play when the alarm went off instead of the beeping sound or the radio. I thought it would be so great to have "Red Letter Day" play to wake me up - how could I have a bad day when listening to a song talking about how great of a day it was going to be. What I didn't realize, though, was that when I hit the snooze button (which I would do at least 2 times) the cd would start over from the very beginning instead of playing where it left off when I hit snooze. It just didn't work out quite like I wanted and thinking about this makes me laugh. :)

July 4th Fun!

We had a fun 4th of July day spent at my parent's house. The girls spent the night the night before and Ross can I went out there after lunch. We had a fun afternoon of swimming and then after dinner we had fun shooting off some fireworks and playing with sparklers. It was a nice, relaxing day!

The Last Time . . . You Never Know When It Will Be

It's funny how you never know when the last time will be to do some things. For example, we moved Molly up to a big girl (twin-size) bed in April. We had been talking about doing this for quite a while and finally just decided to buy a bed and move her on up. We explained this to Molly and she was pretty excited about it. Ross picked up the bed on a Saturday afternoon and we had planned on setting it up the next night, Sunday, because we had plans for that Saturday night and might be home late. Not knowing how it would go having her sleep in the big girl bed we decided it'd be better to start it on a "normal" night at home. I was also glad about this because I had planned to take one last picture of Molly sleeping in her crib that Saturday night before I went to bed, and take a picture of her in the morning when I woke up.

Well, our plans changed that night and we were going to be home instead of going out, so decided to go ahead and take down her crib and set up her big girl bed on Saturday instead of waiting for Sunday. I really didn't mind, but a little part of me was sad that I wouldn't be able to put her down or get her out of her crib one last time. In reality, I had already had this one last time the night before and that morning, but just wasn't aware that it was my one last time to do so.

Kind of like the last time I put a diaper on Molly. The day Molly started potty training was not planned at all and took me by surprise. She basically decided to potty train herself when she said she wanted to wear panties one morning. I said okay and there was no turning back after that. She wore panties from then on and no more diapers were needed.

It's just funny how time goes. I can't even begin to count the number of times I put a diaper on each kid or put them down/got them out of the crib. It's something that's such a common, mundane task that isn't really a big deal until you don't have to do it anymore. If only we could know when the last time some of those tasks were, maybe it would make everyone growing up a little easier. :)

Objects In The Rear View Mirror May Appear Closer Than They Are

I needed an extra holder for some cupcakes I was making so I asked my mom if she had something I could use. I specifically asked her for a Tupperware pie carrier I remember her using when we were growing up. She used it for several different storage purposes, I'm sure, but I mainly remember her putting a pie plate in it, so it's a pie carrier to me.

I was surprised when I got it from her because it was a lot smaller than I'd remembered. I even wondered if she had two different sizes of this and gave me the smaller one instead of the larger one. Then I realized that no, this is the only one she had, I just remembered it being bigger than it actually was. I was thinking of it with my child-mind memory instead of my adult-mind memory. Kind of like the saying on rear view mirrors, "objects may appear closer than they are." I need to keep this in mind that when remember things from childhood, they might often seem much bigger and grander sometimes than as an adult.

Another example of this is an anniversary party I went to for a dear friend that I used to teach Sunday school with when I was in high school. The party was held at the church I grew up in and where we taught Sunday school. I hadn't been to that church for quite a few years and wanted to walk around and see how it had changed. It really hadn't changed much at all, but I was so surprised when walking down the hallway because everything seemed so small to me and not big like I remembered it. I was thinking of it with my child-mind memory instead of my adult-mind memory.

Bowling For Molly

A few weeks ago we went to a birthday party that was at a bowling alley. We hadn't ever taken the girls bowling and they didn't really know what it is. We explained to them what bowling was and Ross decided to show them how to bowl using Molly. You can watch Ross bowl for Molly here...it was quite funny!

Cow Appreciation Night!

Yesterday was Chick-Fil-A's Cow Appreciate Day and we had a great time participating! If you dressed up as a cow and went to Chick-Fil-A yesterday, you would get a free entree of your choice. The girls each got a free kid's meal and Ross and I each got a free 12-piece nuggets box. I also have their Cow Calendar for the year so I got a free bottled water for my July offer. We did buy some waffle fries to go with our chicken, figuring we could afford to spend $2.69 since we got the other $24 worth of food for free!

It was a lot of fun and so easy to pull together our outfits. I found the masks and "eat more chicken" signs online, printed them, and Lucy helped me cut them out and get them ready to wear. I found the cow bandanas at Hobby Lobby for $.99 each, and the shirt I have on (which kind of looks like a cow pattern) is from my closet!

We decided to go to the Chick-Fil-A at the mall instead of the two other locations in Springfield and I am very glad we did. Lucy is scared of the cow mascot that is sometimes at CFA with events like this, and I figured it wouldn't be at the mall so that's why we went there. It was not busy at all and there were lots of places to sit since it was the mall food court. We did feel a little silly walking in the mall with these outfits on, but it was a great time and I look forward to participating again next year!

Molly's Suckers

Molly has always loved dum-dum suckers and loves going to the bank because she knows she will get one there. I recently bought a package of the suckers to have at home and gave her a sucker when we got home from the store. I left the opened package on the counter and didn't realize until later that she had helped herself to a few more. I found these fully eaten suckers on the piano bench later that afternoon and just laughed. Molly is such a fun little girl. :)

Summer Fun

We've had a fun summer so far. We've had really hot weather so have spent time at our pool, Gumma and Poppy's pool, White Water, and splash time at an area pool. We go to the gym every MWF morning for my class, and then try to play after that and always do something fun on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We have been to the aquarium with friends, the art museum, story time at the library, Petsmart to look at all the animals, and lots of fun just playing at home. The girls have also enjoyed eating popsicles. Summertime is the absolute best to me and I look forward to more fun as it continues.