Let it Snow!!

Tiffany built her first snowman tonight. I helped without a coat, so if I'm ill, my fault!

She actually built two. As we waited to pick up the boys from work we built a snowman in front of the Mail Room Service Center. (That was free advertising!) No pics of that one.

Saturday 10:41pm

Thats really all I needed to say, is the time.

I'm having a girls night at my house. It is going well, I have not laughed this much in a long time.
Emily is playing wii soccer and see make some vary cute nosies. I just had to share. I will have to fill you all in when the weekend is over. (I don't think I will be getting much sleep.)

Busy Saturday

Saturday was a busy day. I started off early with little sleep. I had to be at Walmart for some good sales. Ya know like paper towels and dog food. The lines were huge so it took me the better part of the morning to get that done.

Then we went to see Tommy's Hockey team in action at 10:00am. The game had just started when we arrived so we had not missed much. Tommy's team lost 5 to 3, but it was a great game.
Austin was fun to sit with. He tells me he is having a baby, it's in his mommy's belly right now. (Just to let you all know, in case you missed that.)

Then to the show. It was Joe and Dawn, Amy and Dennis and Mike and I, off to see Fireproof.
It was a good movie. Not sure any of the men wanted to be there, but when it was all said and done I think all of us learned something about ourselves. We should all try The Love Dare even if we have a strong marriage.

After running late at the show, we needed to pick up the kids. Which were all at my house (Taylor, Chris, Tiffany, Lauren, Emily, Tommy, Austin, Jessica and Steve showed up at some point.). I made it clear to my great group before we went to the show, that the little ones did not need to hear or see bad things.
Well they all bombed at that one. Tommy tells me Steve came over and kicked Taylor's butt in a wrestling match. Emily tells me that Chris says bad words.
They all had fun, but I don't know if any of my friends trust my house as the childcare place.

Well off to dinner.

We all went to Genjis. The Bojo's left second and were the last to arrive. Come to find out with the movie running late we have put Emily late for a dance team practice. So her and Dennis will not be able to stay and eat. POOR EMILY!
Dennis was on Day one of the Love Dare so he did not say anything negative, and just took Emily to practice. What a good guy!
Mike, Tiffany and I had never been to Genjis before so it was a fun experience for use. Our cook played a prank on Tiffany, he sprayed her with fake soy sauce. She jumped so high, it was great to see her laugh.

It was nice to get out with such a great group.
Sorry no pictures I'm slacking.

Halloween 2008

Is Tiffany in Emily's picture space.
What a good looking group of kids.
Bat dog!!!!!!
Napoleon and Pedro
My little cowgirl and her hourse.
Napoleon and his girl!!
Jessica and Cortnie

First Snow

I called Mike Monday October 27th to say it was snowing.
He took a couple pictures to show me that it was hail.

I still say it counts as the first snow of the year.

The END!!

Softball every Sunday is the only time I can look forward to seeing my friends all together with there spouses. We get together other times, but I know every Sunday it's a sure thing.
Now the season has come to an end.

We did not play our best on the field, but we looked good.

I can't wait for the next season!!

Kristine's Wedding

The day starts with Tiffany being sick. We decide that she should see a doctor and it was early in the day so we were sure there would be time to get to the wedding on time. Oh wait, I forgot to say it is Taylor's last homecoming, and he would be leaving for that at 2:30. So we also needed to pick up his flowers, get him some money and so on.

Can anyone tell that my day is not starting off on the right foot?
Tiffany and I got home at 1:10. On the way home I picked up the flowers and Mike and Taylor went to get his money.
The wedding is in Munger at 2:00, I'm not dressed, no makeup and my hair is not done either. We did some fast running around and yell at each other to make sure we had everything we needed and that Taylor had everything he needed. It's now 1:40 and we were off. As we are pulling out of the driveway Mike and I both realize we have no idea where we are going. We call Amy and she is no help as she does not know either. We give Dawn a jingle and she gave us great directions and we made it to the wedding in time to say hello to everyone and the wedding began.
The wedding was beautiful!
During the wedding Taylor sends us a text message saying "What arm does the corsage go on left or right?"
I lean to Dawn and ask "What arm does the corsage go on left or right?"
She says "I'm not sure."
I lean forward and ask Sue "What arm does the corsage go on left or right?"
After a moment of looking at her own arms she says "Left"
Mike sends a text back to Taylor tell him which arm.
Moments later we all have our arms up blessing the marriage, when Dawn notices a corsage on a ladies arm and says "LEFT!".
A couple minutes later Mike receives another text message from Taylor asking " Does my boutonnière go on my coat or on my shirt?"
Mike responds his coat and all should be well.
During all of this we have bee's buzzing around our heads, cell phones buzzing in our pockets, and a wedding taking place.

I'm going to let the pictures tell the rest of the day. (I'm getting stressed just retelling it!)

EXPO

It was a hard day at work. Gabbie and I are attending an expo in Caro. I'm mostly emailing Julie, and Gabbie is working hard to attract new students.
We are having a lot of fun. Gabbie talked me into getting my cholesterol checked, which means I had to get a poke. OUCH!

This was a great opportunity for us to get our name out. It is surprising how many people that are so close and don't even know about our school.

I hope everyone else had a fun day at work.

Summer has passed

We had such a great summer. It went by so fast. My internet has not been working so I have had all kinds of things piling up in my poor little head. I thought I would just add a slide show of summers greatest moments.

I'M BACK!)

I'm still here!!

Hello everyone. It seem like it has been forever since I have been on the blogs. We are having trouble with the wireless part of our modem, so the computers up stairs are the only ones that are on-line. (I don't go into the man cave!)

Things have been going well. The children have both made it to mid-marking period with good grades. I think this will be the last year I have to worry about that. Tiffany does so well and is upset when she is not doing well. (So with her I'm all set.) As for Taylor, it is a struggle for him to turn in a paper that they do in class, and then he does not care about his grades at all. Just passing is ok with him.

Softball is going good as well, we have a great group of friends playing. We have so much fun, just being together, which makes it fun win or lose.

My three kids are back at another season of hockey.
Taylor's team is doing ok. At this age its more about individuals rather then team, so it makes it hard on the goalies.
Steven's team is scary to watch. Steven has such a nice face and no face mask when he plays. I get so nervous when the sticks, pucks and fists are flying around.
Tiffany's team looks good, it will not be the same as last year, but it will be fun. We have the same wonderful coach this year and Taylor is still helping coach. It is so nice to see two of my children working so hard together. Her first game is not until Saturday so we will see how it goes.

Steven has got a new addition to is family, I'm a grandmother of a cute little black lab. It is a female and her name is Jayda. I try to doggy sit after work everyday, so she is not in a cage all day. My dogs also like to have a little one around. So now, none of my children need to have children!)

I will try to do a better catch up blog with some pictures, when I get brave enough to go up into the man cave.

Hope all is going well.

Good laugh!

This will only be posted for a short time.
I still can not stop laughing, thank you Lisa

Sorry if you missed a great laugh. If you
didn't get to see it and you are curious, let me
know.
Have a great weekend!

Golf outing, Wives Versus Husbands

Wives By Jill Muylle
We almost had our New York girls together again.
Lupe hurt her knee so there were only three.

Let me start off by tell everyone I had a golf dream the night before the scramble that I had killed someone with a golf ball that I hit. Not sure who it was as they looked like a person on the Wii game system.
When we got to the Papesh home I tell everyone about my dream. We have a few laughs and move on.

We started off slow, the Papesh family was up and almost ready. Joe was in the front yard weed whacking with his 7 iron and Dawn was inside getting ready for the sitter. We're off and as fast as we left, we are heading back. Dawn forgot something and we had to return, off again.

We arrive at the golf course and try to confuse people with our three person teams, but Julie came to the rescue to help out. We stopped in for donuts and coffee, then went to look for our golf carts. Joe appears and tells us that our golf cart is sponsored by the funeral home.
Now how ironic is that, I dream of killing a person and then we have the funeral home for a sponsor.

Our start was not so bad, we got an eight on a par 5. We did get par twice and boogie once. We saw the men on the course a few times, but from a distance. So we were not able to talk to them about how they were doing. However we were able to see someone swing three time before hitting the ball on his forth swing (We won't mention any names ,Dennis!). So we knew we were not the only ones on the course having trouble. About the third hole in, Dawn moves behind me and says shhhh, as she loosens Amy's golf bag. It took some time but sure enough clunk clunk off it falls. Amy can't hear it so I have to say "Oh what is that? Your bag fell off the cart" It got some laughs, but then it was on! Amy awaits for Dawn to get in her cart, then drives Dawn's cart aways by pushing it with her cart. The bag loosening went back and forth, I'm not sure who's turn it is to prank, but I'm sure it will be a good one!
Then we come to a hole that our friend Lisa is working at. Lisa asked if we wanted a pointer?
She says "Everyone is using their irons on this hole."
When Amy flips her driver over and looks at it confused and says "This is iron!"
Lisa turns and says "Enough said, use that one!"
It was a great moment you had to be there to see the look on Lisa's face!
Now we have finished golfing and it is time for lunch.
As we are walking up Lisa Wright stops Amy and says "Look what I found in the woods!" As she hands Amy a golf ball that has Bojo written on it. We start laughing because Amy did not have a ball like this, so there is only one other Bojo that it could belong to. I would like to add that Amy may have hit some trees but she did not loose any balls in the woods!!

We didn't think we had done so bad, until they announce the winners and losers. When they announced they say the score and then the name of the winner. However for the last place losers in the Womens division they says "For lack of embarrassment, last place goes to Dawn Papesh's team!" I go up to ask how bad we really did, it seems we were 36 over par. I believe we were the best losers ever!! We take home a case of toilet paper.
All in all we had a great time!
Now I'm going to let Mike tell you about the Husbands.

Husbands By Mike Muylle

Dennis and Amy arrive to pick up Jill and I bright and early. We all head to the Papesh's bright eyed and bushy tailed.

Let's back track to Thursday for a minute. Dawn, Amy, Jill, Joe and myself went to Kokomo's to shag a few golf balls to get our swings down. Since I'm discussing the husbands, I will stick only to us. Joe steps up behind the driving box. I glance over and it appears Joe is a decent golfer. Nice bag, nice clubs... looking pretty fly he is. I stand there thinking to myself "Good deal, at least Joe will be able to hold us above water on Saturday". I intently watch Joe to get a god idea of what was to come. After his first couple swings I went from thinking he could hold us above water to we may sink very fast. By the end, after almost hitting Dawn a few times, things weren't looking to bad... but we are hitting in a dome... so it is hard to get a good feel.

Now back to Saturday morning. We pull in, and Joe is in his front yard taking swings at practice balls warming up. We pile out of the Bojo van to watch. WHIFF... WHIFF... WHIFF. Well, lets say, the balls were not hurt. It's early, these are just warm up swings.... I am sure it won't be this rough when we get on the course. As we wait for Dawn to give final instructions to the sitter, Joe grabs his golf bag. He proceeds to grab a shirt, lays it on the bag. He then states out loud that he needs a hat. He turns, selects not one, but 2 hats and puts them into the bag. He tells Dennis and I that he should be good to go as he has his extra shirt and a couple hats in case one gets wet.... What the hell??? This is a golf outing not a damn Formal dinner! I can just imagine that he also has a pair of new undershorts, tightie whities i am sure, and socks in his bag that we did not see. Dennis leans over to me and says "What a woman."

While awaiting the shotgun start most everyone grabs some donuts and coffee. Dennis is having tremendous difficulty keeping the beverage in its cup. Whether he is talking or walking he is spilling it. Joe is throwing jabs in about Dennis' handling of his java. After spilling it in the cart, Dennis gets a refill and puts a lid on it. Joe strolls up, coffee in hand, and proceeds to point down at Dennis and pours his coffee all over. These 2 have not even touched an Alcohol beverage yet and yet can not control the flow of liquids.

As I said earlier, Joe "looked like he could play golf". He strolls up to his bag after strapping it on to the cart and pulls out a brand new glove. He did not have one on Thursday. Now I am starting to get it. Joe is putting fear into the other golfers by "looking" like he knows what he is doing on the links. This wasn't as evident until later in the morning when I notice Joe pulls out a gadget that holds quite a few ball markers and golf tees. To myself I am chuckling... at least he looks good. Then he drops the hammer. I believe I had asked Dennis about how far we were from the green when he says "I do not know, ask Joe to pull out his scope and scope it". You have got to be kidding me, Joe even has a damn range finder too!! Is there anything else he can have to make him look like he is an actual golfer!!!

Shortly after starting, Dennis pulls out his cooler he brought. No, it is not a cooler for beverages, but a cooler for his Stoggies. He picks out a cigar and grabs his butane lighter. This lighter could have powered my grill at home. After a few flicks, there is no flame. Dennis grumbles. I comment that it must be a bummer that his lighter won't work. Dennis assures me there is no need to worry, that he always carries a spare. At the next hole, he pulls out the spare, which is a twin to the first one, and lights up. A few holes later, he feels the need for a second. He digs in the side of the cooler pulls out the spare and "flick, flick, flick" no flame. I start to laugh and tell him that it must be a real bummer to have the spare not work also. Dennis assures me again to not worry, he carries fuel also. Again at the next hole, he pulls out lighter fluid that he carries just for this type of emergency. Now that is what I call a die hard cigar smoker.

I do not want to bore you with hole to hole coverage, but I can sum it up pretty well. Just about every hole went like this. Joe hits the ball on about a 20 degree angle right. Not a slice mind you, he just hits it right. Now, a few swings and misses might have happened before he hit it, but when he did... yup, to the right. Dennis was a bit more unpredictable. Sometimes it would slice right, sometimes it would hook left, sometimes it would not move, sometimes sod would fly.... but the ball would not.

On one of the holes there was a couple ladies selling 50/50 tickets at the tee box. Joe offered to go first. After asking these ladies how rough our wives looked when they came through earlier and chuckling about it, he steps up between the white markers, places his ball on his tee and prepares to drive the ball. Joe winds up and put both ass cheeks into this swing, for what Dennis and I think was to "look the part". He follows through on the ball, barely hitting it. His front foot slides behind him on the upswing and he damn near face plants in the box. Dennis and I bust a gut laughing.

The back nine beer girl was surely thinking these 2 would need to be cut off early as Dennis runs head on full speed into Joe's cart, with her just one fairway over. Dennis throws on the charm and blames the wet grass for not being able to stop and Joe plays the innocent victim in this accident. A few beer stops later, Ashley the beer girl stops as we are chipping on to the green. She says she will stick around until we are done on the hole. Dennis and I start throwing jabs at Joe who was chipping first. As what happened when he felt like showing up for softball, Joe swings and misses!! Again we are laughing as Joe is failing to impress the young lady. He thinks quick and asks her if she would like to hit this for him. HAH, Joe getting someone else to do his job. She obliges. She steps up and makes a comment about having to hit over the "beach", the hip term for sand trap. She swings but tops the ball and it goes about a foot. Joe hops all over it and starts to give her a hard time. Ashley calmly looks at the laughing Joe and states to him "Well, at least I can HIT the ball!". HAHAHA, Dennis and I again as Joe gets put into his place.

There was one hole in which Joe needed to hit out of the rough. Off to his immediate right was the group of women ahead of us awaiting to tee off at the next hole. Joe, knowing every shot he has hit has gone in that direction, grasps his club with 2 hands, puts his head down and says "God, please, just let me hit this ball straight". The big guy upstairs was listening as we all witnessed a small miracle as Joe hit his ONLY straight ball all day!

After the many shots we put on different holes greens, other holes tee boxes and in woods it was done. We donated our share of money to the various games we could do throughout the course. We just kept reminding ourselves it was for the kids. None of us got anything for it but the enjoyment of watching each other play. I thought we did alright. I was pretty sure we did not finish in last place. The guys got done about a half hour before the girls and just in time to get our food and fill our need for food. After lunch they went through the prize winners... and losers. Sigh, we tied for last place and won (?) the tiebreaker... Joe, Dennis and I got to split 60 rolls of toilet paper........

You will see us on the course next year and look out we will all be in good form!

RELAX

Off to Traverse City to relax. Tiffany and I thought we would get away for a couple of days and go to my parents house.

We arrived about 3:00pm on Friday. We decided to go to the Music Fest in Traverse City. The people in town were a little wild. At one point I thought I was back in New York. There were people in strange clothes, from pig suites to underwear. There was even a bubble blower in the street. After some great music and good food to bed we go.

While in bed at 3ish in the morning the dog starts to bark. Clearly try to tell us about something, we just wanted her to stop barking. she continued to let us know for a while longer that something was no good outside. (to be continued....)

Saturday we got up early so we could go to the Farmers Market and garage sales. Before we left we loaded a cooler and walked out by the garage (that my parents are building).
Then the rest of the story....
Their lays a dead rabbit that a bobcat must have caught at about 3ish in the morning. Poor thing, after a small funeral we hope the poor rabbit is resting in peace.

At the sale we found some great deals. I bought this cute tepee for work, and a floating cooler for enjoyment.

On one of the roads we went down there was the coolest street sign. No one would believe me if I told you about so I took a picture.

Now that we had a floating cooler it had to be tested, so we went tubing. What a trip!

There is always something with the Brethauer's. We took two cars so we would have one car where we got in the river and we would park one car at the end where we would get out of the river. Low and behold there was a snag in that great idea. Dad locked his keys and wallet in the car at the beginning of our trip and his van was the one at the end. At least we were able to get in the van so we would not have to carry the tubs, however we did have to walk back to the start so we could get the keys.

After tubbing it was just a day to chill out, a few yard games, barbecue, ice cream and a nice walk so Tiffany could ride her scooter. I love these kinds of days, fun filled but not exhausting.

Sunday rolled around fast, it seemed like we just arrived and it is time to go home.

We ended up going to Aden a little city out side of Travers City for and Art fair type thing, that was over before we arrived. So we did a little shopping in there little shops. I found the collest flip flop ever (Twice)! The first coolest ever were called Switch Flops and the second pair were call Hotflops. (Check out the links and guest witch pair of sportsflops Tiff ordered.)
Then to finish our small road trip, we stop at some little parks just to see if they were worth retuning to in the future and then to Tiff's favorite restaurant (bd's Mongolian Barbeque).
The Dog liked the Bessy River the Best and looks forward to returning soon.

After such a great weekend of no stress, I returned home to a dryer that will not turn on.
So I started my week with the thing I like to do best, fix something with my husband. When it comes to working together Mike and I are always like oil and water. No matter how much you work it, it just does not come together. However after lot of hatefulness I have a working dryer!

Calgone take me away!

Putting on a good front!

Life is not treating me so swell lately.
It seems when I’m stressed one thing after the other falls a part.
I won’t bore you with all of the details, but I will share a few.

1. I have been having this pain in my hip for few weeks now. I have been taking a lot of medication to help. It seems all this medication is having some side effects. I come home everyday from work and sleep.

2. Do to all my sleeping, house work is building up and I’m just behind in everything.

3. I decided to ask for help. I like to blog and really want to blog about everything. So I ask Mike to help me with the Forth party write up. (No help!)
(Now I’m really behind.)
I now had to blog about the party, the building, softball, and a family gathering. (Just this is enough to stress me out!)

4. So I ask my sister Donna to help me out with the blog. (She comes through) She planned on coming over after I got out of work. So I decided to remove the pictures from my camera and upload them onto photo bucket, so we could make a slide show. Seems during this process I deleted all of the softball pictures. (More stress) I had some great pictures.

5. I had a Doctors appointment today to see what is going on the my sometimes painful, sometimes sleeping leg and hip. I came home and had a little time before I had to leave and fell asleep, missed my appointment. Now I can’t get in until next Thursday!

So here is one of my big solutions blog is going to get the shaft, with a boring write up. I’m going to stay up late, clean my house and then chill out on the couch.

I’m so upset about the softball pics I could cry.

Softball up date:

Sod farm fell apart Sunday and lost our first Game. Season is over.

We plan to play Fall Ball. I’m looking for a new Fall Sponsor!! Wish me luck with that!

Steven’s softball team has lost every game this season. Sunday they really needed to lose there first game. The whole team had plans, most of the team was going to the Kid Rock concert, one had a baby shower, Steve was still helping out with the last touches on the building project.
They WON the first game by forfeit.
The Kid Rock group decided to leave a little late to play game two. (I think they really planned on losing, after all they had never won) I was needed for this game, and it went well.
WE WON.
Now for game three and a possible Championship.
For this game we would be missing some players. We ask my Hubby, and three girls from Heritage to help. Low and behold we took home the trophy.
What a great time!
Sorry NO pictures:(

As for my family gathering. This was with the Beebe side (My Mother’s side.). My cousin Steven is in town from California. He and his wife own a producing company, which keeps them busy and we don’t get to see the vary often. However after a long day of softball we were late and I’m sure missed all the fun. It was still fun to catch up with the Family.

Talk about stress my Steven didn’t go with us, he was sick for to much sun. So he stayed home and watched my parents dog.
Mom and Dad should have left about 5:00 or so to get to my uncle house on time. However my sister’s truck had a dead battery and was blocking in there van. Needless to say we all got to my Uncle’s house about 7ish.


Storm on the way to family gathering!

Steven and his wife Brianna

Spitting duck!

Left to right:
Dad, Mom Uncle Raymond, & Aunt Shirley

Glad to get through one more busy weekend!

House work here I come!!!!

Saturday through Jill's Camera and Donna's Verse

On June 6th there came a great wind
that knocked down trees and giant limbs.
Mandy and George stayed out of the way
but sadly, they lost their garage that day.

Jody called in the troops to clear the debris,
got a big dumpster for an even bigger fee.
Terry brought a doozer, we thought things would go fine,
but we wouldn’t be that lucky due to a bad hydraulic line.
So we tackled the job with shovels, hammers, and an ax,
while Jan did extreme yardwork despite our pleas for her to relax.

On Saturday, July 19th the rebuilding began.
Dad showed up that morning with ladders tied on the van.
Mom brought matching aprons so they could build in style.
They had the walls together in a surprisingly short while.

Even Audrey drove some nails into a 4x4,
while Harry, Jeff, and Terry tried to see who could get hammered more!
Steve was a work-horse, he was such a sight to see -
until he leaned on the fiber board and broke it with his knee.

Jody used a lot of muscle, Dad used a saw
Mildred used us all without even lifting a paw.
Donna used a sharpie and Aunt Jill and Elden used a chair
Jan used her mad-skills to keep the kids out of our hair.

Harry and Steve held up a wall until the rest of the crew was ready,
Dad and Terry hammered in temporary boards to keep the whole frame steady.
Jody called in a pizza order and she let everyone have a rest,
Jessica sat around shyly because that’s what she does best.

They got back to work, the tiny trusses are lifted
Which way is up? The neighbors must think we’re gifted!
Harry claimed a level that used to belong to dad.
Dad decided to get even instead of getting mad.

The ladder held up Georgie while he hung roofing sheath,
The house might have fallen down if it wasn’t held up by Steve.
Mom, Dad and Harry cut and rolled out the tar paper
While Roy and Jeff totally destroyed the hammer-stapler.

The clouds rolled in, here comes the wind, time to call it a day.
Jody, Jill, and Donna put the lumber and tools away.
One thing about our family - you never go hungry or thirsty,
so the boys filled up on Busch Lite and everyone else on KFC.
We really all come together when there is a job to be done,
and the togetherness is entertaining, maybe even fun.

Fourth of July Party @ the Muylle's

Every year for the last 7 years the Muylle side of the Family has a forth of July party.
It is a lot of fun there is fishing, swimming, boating, food, family, friends and fun. While almost friends, Mike and I don't invite any of our friends, however we should it is great.

Here is Mike, George, Amanda and Addison watching the commotion in the water.

I don't get many of these pictures any more!! Steve and Taylor playing a game!

Here is Tiffany and Karly showing off there mad boating skills.

We popped a hole in the trampoline so the group is helping fix it ,so they can get back out in the water.

They all made it out! From Left to Right :

Two boys we don't know, Courtney, Steve, Jessica, Tiffany, Mitchell resting, and last of all Taylor slowly getting on!

After a long day in the water everyone must lay down for cheese ball fight!
Finally the Fireworks begin, what a great show this year, every year it gets bigger and better. I think they lasted almost 40 minutes. (I will one day add video to you tube!)

Softball

Sunday we had our last softball game before the playoff tournament.
We were short several players, so we had my son Steve and his girl friend Jessica come and help us out.

Come to find out the other team did not have enough players either and had to forfeit the game. Nice easy win for the Sod Farm!

Thought I would post the schedule for next weekend for those that were not at the game.





By the way, does anyone know how I got everything underlined? How do I remove it? (Boy am I having issues!!)

Great weekend!

OK, for the Chicks with Sticks game, I was named MVP for the white team. As a gift they gave me 4 passes to the Saginaw Fireworks. They were awesome!! We were able to park on the Island, eat dinner and have the best view of the fireworks (for no cost at all). For those of you who do not get to see them here is a little view.

We also got a couple great new toys. One toy being a game that you play by tossing 2" washers into a box. Inside the box is a cup. 3 points if you make it in the cup, 1 if you get it in the box. I will not bore you with all the details, just wanted to give you a quick synopsis. The other toy is a 7" water trampoline to be used at my in-laws. I just thought I would share a few pics of the toys.
One amazing picture was the first one that as taken. Mike was taking a picture of Taylor and I with the new toy on the lake, while Tiffany and Uncle J were playing on land with the other new toy. Somehow he got both toys in one picture. No, that is not a halo over Tay's head, that is one of the washers that were being tossed that was captured!

He seems to think it is a great shot! I seem to think my @$$ is looking large!!

On the Hunt!!!

I'm on vacation and things did not go as planned, we are unable to go to Traverse City.

So Tiffany and I decided to gather my sister Donna and her three children to go on a GEO cach.
If your unfamiliar with GEO caching, it is like a treasure hunt using your GPS.

Usually you find a box of some sort filled with little trinkets . You take something and then leave something . To our surprise we would not be taking or leaving anything today. Every GEO hunt we went on they were so tiny we could only sign the log and sometimes this was a challenge. Here are some samples of our troubles today.



Now Tiffany has be challenged, we must find all these little stinkers!!!

Welcome, Elden Ray !!!

What a great night!
Yesterday Tiffany and I headed up to Hurley Medical Center about 6ish!
My sister was having contraction every 2 minutes, and was comfortable. The contractions were progressing but she was not dilating. She had her last dose of medication a 10:00pm, so they were ready to move things a long. She was given some pitocin and they just kept increasing the amount they gave her. About 2am she was starting to get uncomfortable and was given an Epidural. About 3:15 we were all stretching our legs and getting Jan some candy form the vending machine, when we stepped back in the room they said here comes the baby. Tiffany & I stepped out and Mom and Jody stayed in. I told Tiffany she could push for a long time, there maybe a long wait yet. We decided to just to walking passed the room and the door was open a little and we heard Elden start to cry @ 3:25. They let Tiffany into the room, she was able to meet the baby when he was less then 2 minutes old. The baby came so fast that some of the group missed the whole thing, as they had not returned for getting snacks!


We are waiting

and waiting!

OK, here he comes!!!

Does Aunt Jan still want her candy?

He is perfect!!

Double Header

It's a great day for 2 softball games!

We are the only team in our division who is still undefeated. Time will soon tell if that will still be true at the end of the day.

Our first game started off decently. We traded runs throughout the game. We were not playing our best ball. We seemed to like just throwing the ball around the diamond while being just generous enough to let them score. We had a few bright moments. Amy made a fantastic running catch in Left Center. Paul and Stacie had a guy in a pickle at third. Paul was chasing him back to third when the runner dove for the base and Paul dove after him. It reminded me of when my kids were younger and watched wrestling. Paul landed on top of the guy with a flying elbow almost certainly grinding him into the base path. OUT!!!! the umpire says! Although Paul got up slowly, he knew he made a darn nice play. Too bad it went all for not, as in the top of the 7th we handed them the game. We were up 7-5, 2 on, 2 out. We then played catch with the grass, the fence and the umpire. We fell apart. 4 runs later we are down 9-7. Our first real breakdown of the season. We couldn't put anything together in the bottom of the inning. A loss.

We had an hour between games and pulled up a few coolers to cool off. We were not a team that was too happy with the way we played. After catching everyone up on the New York trip we got ready for game 2.

As we were watching the other team warm up, we notice that ( I will try to be as nice as I can), we might have to do a "cup" check on this other team. We seriously could only visibly pick out 3 men on that team. We started looking for boobies, sports bras and any other noticeable female attributes. Lets just say, the women on this team swung from both sides of the plate.

Now I know you think I may be being harsh, but there was 2 incidents that played out this tune. The first was when their team was coming up to bat. Paul was running the scorebook and the name they gave as the first at bat was Sara. Paul yells " WHOA WHOA, Sara is the first batter!!. The batter turns and says " I AM Sara. The umpire, then trying to cover for Paul says " OK, but is it Sara H. or Sara A." Uhmm, there was only one Sara on the team!The second happened when the umpire asked their catcher who was playing in the outfield ( he was trying to determine the boy, girl, boy, girl positioning). Now after they determined the names, it still did not help the umpire so he politely said that he could not tell who was who. Their catcher replied " Heh, I have trouble telling who is who too!"

We played pretty well. Angie made a great closed eye catch in right field, Nate had another in the park homerun and Dennis laid the biggest belly smacker crossing home plate for and in the park homer. For those that were at our first practice but not at the game, it looked like Paul's flop at home, only past home plate and a 4.4 on the Richter Scale! Not quite as graceful as Superman when he lands, but a helluva lot funnier. Love ya DENNIS! We thought we were going to have to give the Red Cross a call for a blood transfusion as Dennis was leaking quite well. 2 huge scrapes on his knees, 1 nice one on his shin and yet another on his elbow. It was bleeding well enough that the umpire had to ask him to cover it up or he would not be aloud to play. The man came prepared as a bandage went on the knee, his shin sleeve was hiked up over a knee and his white towel turned a dark red as he cleaned up as best as he could.

On another note I was playing catcher as I seem to have that down pat. A batter comes up, hits a slow roller out front. I bust out from behind the plate. I see Mike coming up, I pick up the ball, the runner is running to first, AAARGHHHH too many things going through my head, should I throw it to first, or toss it to Mike and have him throw it, should I , should Mike, should I should Mike....... I Let the ball FLY!!!!! and the damn thing ends up behind me. Now, lets be honest, I threw it for NEGATIVE yards. After realizing, what the heck I just did, I hear Mike L yell from Right Center "WHAT ARE YOU THROWING? A YO-YO!!!!!" Now yes, I am a tad embarrassed, I walk back to the plate so we can get back to pitching, when i notice the umpire is snickering. I turn and say "It was not that funny", When he replies " Oh **snicker** Yes it was".

We played much better in the field and pulled out a 5-0 win. It made it a little easier to swallow after our performance in the first game.

I need to give a huge shout out to Amy B as she had by far her best day out in the field today. She was making plays left and right. Didn't matter if it was a fly ball or a grounder. She was hustling all over, almost getting to a fly ball that went into right field. If she would have been 5'9" instead of 5' she woulda had it! hehe

With a4-1 record, we can not complain too much. Or can we?

New York (day two)

Tuesday we wanted to be at the Today Show at 7:00am. Lets just say sore feet, four lady's, NOT HAPPENING!
So this is the day we are going to do our travels on the subway. While walking to the Subway we encountered some New York sidewalks.

This is puke for you slow people!!! And the birds are having breakfast.

This is our first ride on the great Subway!

We get our subway passes and head to the Today Show. Some how we ended coming out of the
Subway right at Rockefeller Center,

right where the staff of the Today show come out. It was really awesome. We had a great time there Joe's blog sums it up!!!

From there we went to the Statue of Liberty. This was also really neat. It is big and Green!

This is where we stopped to eat lunch and some man helped Dawn spill her lunch on the floor. We also ran into Amanda, Lauren and her mother.

Our next stop was Ground Zero.
This was an emotionally draining stop for me. I could not stop thinking that I was most likely at one point going to be standing on the very ground someone lost their life. As we entered St. Paul's our trip went from chatting and laughter to immediate silence. This is the church right next to the Towers that was not damaged from the their collapse. It is also where all of the workers went for rest and food during the clean up and where the memorials were made for all of those that were lost.

This is St. Paul's behind the trees. These trees are what saved the church from damage. The construction in front of the church is the area known as Ground Zero. One of the Towers was located right in front of the church yard.
After leaving the Church we went to the tribute visitor center and tour. On this tour there was a former Firefighter that told his story of how his life has been changed forever from the events of September 11th. As his team arrived at the center he had to encounter some very horrifying things before the tower fell and through him over 600 feet.
I was just overwhelmed by the story this man told.

I was so glad we saved this for our last day, I think it would have been hard to enjoy myself after hearing of such a tragic time.

After we left the tour we still needed to shop for souvenirs and go to a Broadway show. So we needed to keep moving.
We shopped in Chinatown at a van, a closet and over a garbage can. (NO it is not a typo.) After I lost 10 pounds from sweating do to anxiety, I'm able to look back and say it was funny. There are so many people selling things illegally right next to the police, I can't even believe it! Shopping took a little longer then we had anticipated so we had to hustle back to our Hotel to change for the show.
Leaving our Hotel a little late we headed to the Subway. As we are waiting for the train to get there Dawn encounters a RAT! It was great. I wanted a picture so bad. I decided to cross the yellow line and try to take a picture, when a Police Officer came and tried to tell me my life should be more important then a rat. I told him I got a picture of the puke so I really need a picture of the rat. His reply was "I have lived my whole life in New York, taking puke and rats for granted. Now please stay on the other side of the line and close your bag, your in New York!" I didn't get the rat picture my batteries died right as I took the picture.

We arrived with 5 minutes before show time. I must say, I think everyone needs to go to a Broadway Show it was AMAZING!!! We stayed after to see the stars leave and got the signatures of all the stars but one.

After the show we did some last minute shopping and got a bite to eat. We were all so tired and started to get a little silly. Amy almost kicked a Waiter and we still don't know why they call Steak cut onion rings "steak cut"! Were they cut with a steak knife???

That is my wonderful trip to New York!!!