Because She Mattered...

It has been exactly one year since my Grandma died. The other day, I was cleaning our office and I came across a wrinkled piece of hand-written paper that had been erased and rewritten several times. It was the eulogy that I gave at my Grandma's funeral. I wasn't planning to speak, but about two hours before the funeral, I called my mom and asked if anyone was going to talk at the funeral. When she answered "no," I just knew that I had to do it. I think that funerals need to be personal. Take note: When I die, I really hope that one of you will stand up and talk about me. Tell some funny stories. Talk about the time I gave you good advice. Tell the world that I mattered. Because...isn't that what we all want? We want to matter. We want to know that we mattered to someone. And I know, realistically, that it doesn't matter what you say about me at my funeral, because I'm not going to be there to applaud (or to be embarrased or to cry or laugh or feel proud of my accomplishments). I'll be celebrating with the Big Guy, flying with the angels, singing beautifully in the choir (and yes, it will be the first time that I have ever sung beautifully)! I just feel like it's important to eulogize a person at their funeral, and so I got out my pencil and paper 90 minutes before my Grandma's funeral and I wrote her eulogy...because she mattered.

Her name was Norma. But to most us, she was known as Grandma Dell. Our Grandma Dell. She was a strong, tough, stubborn, generous, kind woman, all wrapped up in a teenie, tiny package. At just over 4 and a half feet tall, Grandma stood next to each of us and celebrated as we reached an important family milestone...being taller than her (which most of us accomplished by our teenage years).

But her short stature could not hide her big heart and her love for her family. You couldn't walk into her home without being offered a Coke or a slice of that cheese that she was so good at peeling. She would offer us money...or the last donut in the cupboard. She was a caregiver, a nuturer. At family dinners, she wouldn't eat (or even sit down) until she knew that everyone else was taken care of.

Our Grandma Dell was quick to laugh at our antics and patient enough to let us pull the string on the Christmas bell everytime we visited. Grandma Dell was also a strong, tough lady, enduring the unimaginable loss of her son, and later, her husband, with strength and grace.

Our Grandma Dell set a strong example for all of us. Whether it was a stray cat at the back door or her grandchild knocking on the front door, all were welcomed and cared for in her home.

Two months ago, Grandma told me that she believed in Jesus, but she wondered if she had done enough good things to go to heaven. I assured her that all she had to do was believe, but I know that every one of us could tell of a hundred good things that our Grandma Dell has done for us. I believe with all of my heart that she in heaven with Pappy today, waving at all of us, just as she did every time we left her home.

There is no doubt that she was good enough for heaven.
Her name was Norma...and she was our Grandma Dell.

I miss her. And she definitely mattered.

No Autographs, Please...

A few weeks ago, Steve and I picked up the girls from daycare and surprised them with a trip to a little arcade/go cart place. While we were there, the craziest thing happened. I started talking to this couple who had small children like us. They had just finished miniature golfing and I thought they were brave for handing metal clubs to small children and attemping to golf 18 holes. We have yet to attempt minature golfing with our girls. Anyway, the woman then told me that she recognized me from...my Blog! She even told me she saw Steve in Target a few weeks ago and recognized him while she was there. Isn't that the coolest thing? Someone recognized us from my blog. Ladies and gentleman, I felt like I had finally arrived. It also helped me to convince Steve that yes, there are people (other than me) reading my blog. I'm just bummed about one thing. She didn't ask for my autograph. So, here's a big shout out to Lisa! I hope you didn't stop reading after you met me in real life!

And to make you smile, here's some fabulous pictures of my batting skills. It's been at least 10 years since I've stepped foot in a batting cage, but my athletic ability did not disappoint! Well, there was that one ball that I missed and I was in the slow pitch cage, but let's just keep that among us, okay?

Dolphins and Clown Fish and Sharks, Oh My...

We spent the day at the aquarium last week. I just love that place. Mostly, I love the sharks and the dolphins. They are so awesome and so enormous. Steve and I swam with dolphins a few years ago and we couldn't believe how big and powerful they are. It's definitely intimidating when you're in the water with them! The girls had a great time, but poor Ellie was feeling a little under the weather. In the middle of the shark exhibit she just looked at me with sad, tired eyes and said, "I want to go home...where's the door?" Poor thing. I found out the next day that she had strep throat and of course, I felt terrible for dragging her all over the aquarium. But she was a trooper. And Kate...well, that girl asks a million questions about every single fish, reptile, bird, etc. And heaven forbid that we try to skip an exhibit, because she wanted to see EVERYTHING! That girl is a sponge, just learning as much as she can. I love it!

Giving Thanks: The Spur of the Moment

This week, I've been really thinking about what I'm most thankful for, and I realized, again, that I am so thankful for spur of the moment things...things that don't take a lot of planning...little things that just happen or fall into place. Last week, Steve threw a rake in the back of the car, we both picked up the girls from daycare, and we headed to a local park to jump in the leaves. It wasn't planned and we weren't really dressed for it. If you look closely, Ellie is wearing a nightgown and a pair of dress shoes (which she calls tap dance shoes). It was "crazy day" at her daycare, and that's what she wanted to wear. But here's the important part...some of the very best moments just happen at the spur of the moment. Note: If you look closely in the picture above, Kate is trying to stuff the leaves into her pocket. She wanted to take them home with her. My sweet little girl is a hoarder, I'm afraid, and may one day be featured on a TLC documentary. Ha! Gotta love that girl!The next day, we decided that we needed a bigger pile of leaves. So we headed to my parents house, raked their front yard, and jumped in the leaves for over an hour. This time, the girls didn't get to have all the fun. They had to share the leaf pile with us!
Note: I'm sure that my butt did get off the ground a little more than pictured above (I mean, I was a cheerleader with a seriously mean toe touch back in the day). I think Steve just didn't capture me at the peak of my jump. Let's blame it on his photography skills (or lack thereof), shall we?



Look at those smiles. That's what I'm most thankful for!

And I'm also thankful that Steve has a job with great hours that allow him to be home with us more than a lot of other dads/husbands. I take it for granted that Steve will be home by 4:30 p.m. each day (and some days, when I'm home with two screaming, crying, cranky kids, it feels like 4:30 p.m. cannot come soon enough). But I know that there are many women who wait until much, much later in the evening to see their husbands. I take it for granted that Steve never travels for work and that he rarely gets called in late at night. Without his great work schedule, I know that a lot of the spur of the moment, fun things that we do just wouldn't happen. And so his schedule is definitely something that I am thankful for this year!

Summer Send-Off: Farewell to Fishing

The evenings are filled with crisp, chilly air and the sound of back-to-school bugs (i.e.crickets and Katydids). Those are two sure signs of fall here in my neck of the woods. Fall. Can you believe it is almost here? I was just getting into summer and fall is quickly creeping in to take its place. And with fall comes my much loved and anticipated Summer Send-Off blog posts (I know you all have been waiting for them). So let's say farewell to summer in style. It's time to celebrate ice cream cones and garden veggies, blowing bubbles and catching cat fish.

This year my cousin Chris and my Uncle Bradley took us fishing. Can I just tell you that those two summer evenings were some of the most peaceful, relaxing times I had all summer? I loved it. I even convinced my mom to join us the second time by telling her it was like paradise here on Earth. She wasn't convinced, as the bugs were biting her and the air was a little cooler, but to me...it was heavenly. See?


This little girl loves to fish, but she gets bored easily (kind of like her mama). Thankfully, she found something else to entertain her...flowers! My sweet girl cannot walk by a flower without picking it.
And Ellie was just thrilled to hold the fishing pole...at least for a little while! She got a few fishing lessons from Pappy Bill, and she thought she was big stuff.



Someone else got some fishing lessons from an old pro. Ha! Steve likes to fish but we don't even own a tackle box. It was nice that my Uncle Bradley, Chris, and my dad brought enough gear for all of us. If anyone is reading this...Steve could use a tackle box filled with fishing gear (and the recipe for doughballs) this Christmas!

Finally, after long hours of peaceful fishing (i.e. not a single bite), we hooked one (and by "we" I mean my Uncle Bradley). Kate quickly jumped in to help reel the monster in, but it was hard work....
So a fishing pro was called in to take over. Ha! That's one good looking fishing pro, don't you think?
And of course, I had to pose with "my" fabulous catfish (and by "my" I still mean Uncle Bradley's). He and Chris and Pappy Bill did all the dirty work while I had all the fun and got all the glory. Didn't I tell you it was paradise?

He's a Keeper

Nine years ago this month (I'm a little late...it was June 2), Steve and I started our married life together. What a wonderful adventure it has been. The one thing I know to be true today is that I definitely married the right man. I love Steve with every ounce of me, and I am so proud of him as a husband and a father. He makes me laugh and he encourages me and he supports my crazy dreams. He repaints the family room a million times (just because I've changed my mind about the color) and he takes the trash out every week so I don't even have to think about it. Of course we fight and drive each other crazy (just keeping it real here), but the truth is that I could never imagine my life without him.

Yesterday, we were leisurely sitting in our new plastic adirondak chairs, watching the kids play in their new plastic pool in the backyard (our life seems to be full of plastic these days). Out of nowhere, Steve squeezes a soaking wet ball all over me, starting a large-scale water battle. The girls watched as Steve and I laughed and soaked each other and acted like kids. I'm a 34-year-old mom, but yesterday I felt like a crazy-in-love teenager...giggling and splashing and chasing the cute boy around the yard. That's why I love this man and I thank God for sending him to me!

Here's some pictures from the day we were married. They are actually pictures of pictures, so the quality is lacking. Please notice my hot, skinny body. I do miss it and have been searching for it, but it seems to be forever lost. At least I haven't lost the cute guy standing next to me in these pictures! He is a keeper!

On living...and dying.

The past week has been a difficult one for my family. About three weeks ago, my Grandma got very sick, was diagnosed with lung cancer, and moved in with my parents. The girls and I stopped in often to visit, taking pictures they had painted or bringing bowls of soup and banana bread. It was during one of these visits that we experienced the dreaded diaper incident pictured in my last post.

Ellie came running up to me with a messy hand, saying "ooooooh, yucky." I thought it was chocolate or peanut butter (my grandma loved peanut butter cups and there were several laying around the house that day), but I quickly realized it was a handful of poo. The same poo which was leaking out of her pants and onto the carpet. When I went to search for my diaper bag, I realized that I had forgotten it. Nice. That's stellar parenting right there. After a mini panic attack, my dad helped me strip Ellie down outside and wash her off. He suggested we use the hose, but I opted for a bucket and washcloth. We were still trying to figure out what to put on her when we had a brilliant idea. Ellie could wear the Depends that my mom had just bought for my Grandma. They worked perfectly and Ellie was thrilled with her new outfit. Of course, the rest of us couldn't stop laughing, which was exactly the medicine we needed at such a sad time.

That was the last time that Kate and Ellie got to see my Grandma. Three days later, she went to Heaven to be with Jesus. Those three days were sad and scary. They were exhausting and emotional. They were filled with family and tears, laughter and prayers. I realize now that in the midst of dying...the house was filled with life. We played old country music. We ate pancakes and bacon at midnight. We took turns comforting my Grandma and leaning on each other. We cried and we talked and we prayed harder than many of us had before in our entire lives. At one point, I was exhausted and emotionally drained and I asked my dad when the next shift was going to arrive...who was going to take the next shift? Less than 20 minutes later, as I watched my Grandma take her last breath, I felt a rush of peace and relief, of sadness and celebration, all at the same time. My dad looked at me and said, "I think Jesus took the next shift." And we cried and laughed, continuing to live and believe, even in the midst of death.

Definitely a Happy Holiday...

I loved Christmas this year. It was fun and lazy and cozy and happy. The girls are still too young to get super excited about it, so they slept in until 8 a.m. and we lazily rolled out of bed and headed downstairs. Kate was excited when she saw the presents, but both girls were pretty calm when I told them they had to wait for Pappy and Grammy to arrive before they could open gifts. They were just shocked that they could eat cookies for breakfast, which is what we gave them while they waited! They loved their gifts and Kate said everything was "just what she wanted!" Ellie just wanted everything out of the box, NOW! Thankfully, Pappy brought his knife and helped to free the babies and the barbies and the potatoe heads. The girls got to play with their toys all day and then we went to my parents for dinner around 4 p.m. and started the gift-opening fun all over again! We had a relaxing, peaceful, happy Christmas.

Oh...forgot to mention that my fabulous husband bought me an Edward doll. I couldn't stop laughing when I opened it. I'm so glad Edward could join us for Christmas...and I'm glad that I'm married to a guy who can laugh at my crazy crush)!

God Gave Him Wings

On a cold, winter day, Steve and I went to a farm with our friends to pick up their puppy. We weren't really planning to pick one out for ourselves, but we were drawn to a litter of squishy, rolly polly puppies, and one in particular - our Bentley. He wasn't a tiny puppy by any means - Steve called him the "Arnold Swartzenegger" of the litter. We did the "Hold the Puppy on His Back Test" (to see if he squirmed or was calm) and Bentley proved to be a keeper. We had to wait a week before we could pick him up (and even then he was only 6 weeks old), but on a Saturday in February we brought home our Brutus of a puppy. It was a rough beginning between Bentley and I. On the way home he threw up on my new suede coat. Definitely not a good sign. And then he cried at night and was sad and I didn't know how to help him and so I tried to give him away. Serioiusly....I wanted someone else to take him. Thankfully, Steve stuck to his guns and insisted that he stay, and I soon fell in love with this quickly growing black ball of fur.

Bentley came into our lives just when we needed him the most. We had been trying to have a baby for 18 months. We were just about to start fertility treatments and I needed someone to nurture (and someone to sit beside me on the bed while I cried). Bentley fit the bill. We took him to Puppy Kindergarten and then several other obedience classes. We taught him tricks and took him for walks, and bought him toys. He was our baby and he taught us how to be parents.

The dog had his quirks, for sure. When I was home alone with him, he would bark at every noise until Steve walked in the door. Steve thinks he was just protecting me. I think he was trying to send me to the psych ward. He went crazy every time the doorbell rang, he wagged his tail so hard that it banged against the walls and bled, and he was constantly hungry - looking at us with those sad brown eyes, hoping for the crusts of a PB&J or a spare french fry.

But all in all, our Bentley was a wonderful addition to the family. I remember being so nervous about how he would react when we had Kate. I shouldn't have worried. He just welcomed her into the family, not realizing how she would change the dynamics of our family or his life...poor guy!

Our sweet Bentley loved his football and wanted someone to throw it for him constantly. He loved being outside with Steve when he was building the swingset or mowing the grass. He loved sitting under Ellie's highchair and cleaning up everything she threw overboard. He loved to get a new toy and would run around like crazy because he was so happy about it. He loved peanut butter and eggs and he hated veggies (just like me).

Mostly, I think Bentley loved us. He wanted to be with us - no matter where we were in the house. He slept by our bed. He sat under our feet while we watched TV. He laid under the table while we had dinner. He greeted us when we walked in the door. He hung out under my desk when I worked from home. He ran outside, did his business, and came right back to the door to see us. Sometimes I would forget that I left him outside and I'd look for him an hour later and there he was...just staring in the patio door wondering when he could come hang out with us again. We didn't have a fence and he could have run, but he sat by the door and waited for us...because he loved us.

And we loved him, too. He made us laugh (One time, he ran down the steps and jumped on my lap and started drinking right out of the glass of water I had in my hand. Another time, he tried to join me on the treadmill). He helped us through a difficult time. He was a special part of our family.

Today, Bentley went to Heaven, and we have been crying all day. Our hearts are broken, and we will miss him so, so much. When I told Kate, she asked me if God gave Bentley his wings today. That made me smile. I can picture our Bentley flying around Heaven (with an orange football in his mouth).

Thank you, Bent, for loving us and for being a part of our crazy family. I hope you know that we loved you, too, and that we will always miss you!

The girls liked to cover Bentley with blankets and pretend he was a Baby Doll. He was a pretty good sport about it.

The Way to My Heart...

Is definitely through my stomach! Steve made these for breakfast on a lazy Sunday morning. Yum! But I do have to say...the Cinnamon Melts at McDonalds are better. If you haven't tried them, get ye to a Micky D's ASAP! They are gooey and sweet and delicious!

On another note...Ellie might have the H1N1 virus. The doctor gave her tamiflu on Thursday, which makes her stomach hurt and gives us lots of messy, disgusting diapers to change. How'd you like that...from gooey yummy sticky buns to messy disgusting diapers, all in one blog post. Ha! So we've been watching a lot of Dora. It's All Dora, All the Time here at our house. Ellie woke up at 4 a.m. saying "Ratch Rora" and pointing to the stairs. At 4 in the morning. Seriously...she has become one with the coach over the past few days. I just hope she feels better soon.

In other news, I had six families interested in having their family pictures taken. I was so excited! I took one on Friday and I'm taking another this afternoon and one more next week. I always get so nervous before I take pictures for people and I just pray that they don't feel like they're wasting their time. My goal is to get at least 2-5 good pictures per family. Shouldn't be hard, considering I take about 50-80 pictures per family! I still haven't figured out how to move from okay photographer to WOW...like the ones on the sidebar of this blog, but I'm working on it. I can't wait to post some pictures...I'll plan to do that soon!

Happy Sunday!

A Dream Come True...

Five years ago, Steve and I drove through our small town, watching all the little trick-or-treaters out our car window. It is a moment I will never forget. Neither one of us said anything. I silently wiped away the tears that were streaming down my face, and Steve held my hand a little tighter than normal. I had just had my second miscarriage that August and we had officially been trying to have a baby for over two years at that point. Even though there was no known reason why we couldn't get pregnant (or stay pregnant), our doctor had suggested just weeks before that we try Invitro (IVF). Anyone who has ever struggled with infertility knows how difficult it is to believe that you actually need to do IVF. It feels like a last resort...the end of the line. We were overwhelmed and scared. And watching those sweet little trick-or-treaters skip and twirl and run down the street just reminded us of what we didn't have...what we feared we may never have. And I can't tell you how desperately we wanted to walk down those streets with a little princess or batman, firefighter or fairy. I wanted it so much. I remember pleading with God that night, begging for the chance to trick-or-treat with my own sweet children someday.

This week, on a beautiful fall evening exactly five years after that sad night, I watched again, as two sweet little girls skipped and twirled and ran down the street, their wings flapping in the breeze. But this time, they were my girls - the children I had prayed for and pleaded God to send me. I know that five years ago when I was crying and sad, God already saw this day...this perfect day. He already knew how happy I would be. He already knew the blessings that were in store for Steve and I. And they are truly the most amazing blessings.


I have a lot more photos to share, but these are just two of my favorites. They seem kind of "dream like" and they remind me of my dreams from five years ago. But to be honest, even in my dreams I never thought I would be so happy to be their mother!

Recipe for Fun Family Portraits...

I finally found the recipe for a fun family portrait session:

1 best friend with a nice camera and some photography classes under her belt
1 old wicker couch that's been sitting in the basement for years
2 strong guys to carry the couch
1 11-year-old boy to make funny faces
1 hour without rain
2 cookies to bribe children to sit still

Stir it all together and this is what you get...


We had so much fun, I think we'll do it again soon (I'm sure Sheila is cringing as she reads this, but I'm kind of thinking of this as the dress rehearsal - next time I'll get it right). Really, next time I'll try to match Kate's socks to her shirt (seriously...pink socks with a red coat?), remove the ugly cushion from the wicker loveseat, reassess the location of the tree in the background, go easy on the black coats (don't we look like we're at a funeral?), and save the cookies for later in the photo session (have you ever tried taking a cookie from a happy 22-month-old.. yeah, not a good idea).

I must say, though, that Sheila is truly a full-service photographer. She showed up early, got the girls dressed, did their hair, and brought her husband and son to serve as "assistants." And all of that for FREE! It was definitely a fun time...thanks a million McFly!