Christmas Past

David and Will, relaxing after some gift opening!!
Superman a.k.a. Charlie J.
Mel and Pipes in their matching outfits from Uncle Andy's family. Andrew

Levi lookin' cute by our tree...
A December walk down at the Canal...lovely
Christmas morning...Mel, Will and Levi E. and his stash

Duncan and E. - weapon geeks

Well, Beck is in need of a post...so I will take time out of my scrappin'/shopping frenzy to put a little blast from the past up on here for your viewing "pleasure". ha ha.

These pix are sadly out of order...but they are all from Christmastime of 2006. Andy and his boys will be flying in on Christmas Eve to be with us for 5 days. My mom has been out in Cali. with him since last Friday and is flying home today...we have missed you Momma!! Can't wait to see you!

I am looking forward to some down time this weekend before Christmas...i have so many gifts I need to finish up..calendars, coasters, wrapping, purchasing...Bah Humbug!! no, it's really fun and we need to embrace the holiday. That mantra belongs to Beck and I. I think moms feel the pressure and sting of the frenzy a bit more and I guess as moms, that's ok. Shield the blow. Takin' one for the team. yup. ok...movin' on.

I'm officially 35 now. My sister got me a really cool sister necklace, a heart and a key...I LOVE it, Beck...thank you so much, to your family!! and to you. I have yet to use my Starbucky's card...maybe we could do coffee (you could do hot choco, of course)...Thank you for the delish dinner...it helped stifle the blow of Mom and Tom being out of town on my b-day and David working to keep us caught up thru the holiday week. I am so stinkin' blessed to be your sister. I love you more than you will ever, ever know! I LOVE YOU!!

Yesterday, I got together with my BFF's and they made me a really neat bracelet for my b-day...I will have to take a pic and post it but it has all of our birthstone jewels on it, and a CROSS right in the middle...the way it should be. Jesus Christ at the center!! a good, daily reminder!! Thank you, girls!! I am loving each one of you so much!! I am blessed with a good circle of chicklets...what would a girl do without her "girls"???

Ok, well, I gotta shower because Mel has her Piano teacher's Christmas party today...I will try to get pix of that, though she will be flying solo at this event. Pal Charmaine lives across the street from said piano teacher so I may go visit over there..though I have so much shopping yet to do...ahhhhhhh. Hope you all are embracing this Christmas season!! Choose JOY. CHOOSE JOY!! God Bless You today!! Adios!!

Yet another walk down memory lane...

one can see where my daughter gets her open-mouthed grin...hmmmm.
A younger days collage...love the big 80's hair!!
I'm the little chicklet in the blue Little House on the Prairie outfit circa 1976
You are probably wondering why I'm walking down memory lane again...tomorrow, December 18, 2007, I am turning 35. Can you believe that? I just can't believe that I am that OLLLLLLLLLD!! now, I know it's really not that old but I can remember being 16 or so and thinking people that were 23 were gettin' up there...but 35?? c'mon. I just can't grasp that! I still feel and act as if I'm 16.
all right then...the top pic is obviously from the summer of '73. I love that Molly makes this same face...but then again, I think most babies do. her face is much rounder than mine was..I guess I've always had the long, angular face. Pic #2 is a little smattering of family photos...I think you can tell who I am...In the older pix, I'm the one with the big, straight up hair or short bob-ish hair...Becky never liked to have her hair too short and she is the same to this day. The bottom pic is a classic. I don't have many pix of myself with my dad's dad. We got to ride in his Model A (is this correct, Dad?) car in the Bicentennial parade of 1976 (duh) and weren't we just so cute waving our little flags. Grandpa Gaines was so cool...he passed away when I was 9 so I don't have many memories of him but he was so handsome. I will have to post some pix of him on here...whatta looker.
Anyways, think of me on Tuesday, I'm sure my back will start hurting (more than it already does), my hair will turn just a bit more gray, and my eyesight will finally fuzz up. Pray for this ol' gal.
I will try to post on here later on...I've got SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO much to do to get ready for Christmas, which is, ya know, about a week from now...ahhhhhhh.

Here I am...where are YOU?

Well, hey there, folks!! I'm not sure what the method to this madness is, quite actually...but Becky, being the victim of the past few posts, asked that I put a few photos of myself on here. Quite honestly, there are just not that many of me over the years. I have gone thru some pretty funky stages in my life...downright frumpy ones especially. And while I'm not that much better now, I do have moments and glimmers of put-togetheredness. I went thru the "jumper" phase, ya know those awful dresses with shirts underneath, plaid or embroidered, quilted, blech..I had lots of those. I went thru the cut off sweat phase, where I would just change up the t-shirt that i wore with my "fancies" (as B. and I called them). This top pic is more recently. Mel took it in the summer of 2006. crazy, crazy. The second pic is from 1993, when David and I were very newly married and the hardness of life hadn't set in yet. We were so young and naive then. #3 is from my 21st birthday, less than a month after my wedding...I can't get over how young I look. Check out our little basement apartment, we didn't even have a ceiling, it was just the floor above...I'm bumming myself out tonight. I was on the cusp of life, those 5 kids were just waiting to spring forth from my womb. And look how old I am now(almost 35, ack)...#4 is at one of my wedding dress fittings. I wish I felt as honored back then as I do now, to have worn G'ma's dress, to have my sis and mom with me pretty much all the time. Young and stupid! O to be young again. kinda. not really.
All of this to say, Life is Beautiful. You have a choice to make it wonderful or to make it awful. Some people in my life are making bad choices. At the expense of others. Life is a gift...Choose JOY!! CHOOSE JOY! joy doesn't mean you will always be "happy" or "in love, gushy, happy, warm"...it means you have made a commitment. Refiner's fire. you come out more beautiful in the end.
Ok, well, chew on that. I could so totally go on here but I'm getting all verklempt. I'm so thankful to the Lord Jesus Christ for the trials AND joys He has brought me (and my family of 7) through. Praise the Lord for faithfulness, His and ours. Praise the Lord for His mercy, for it endures forever. Good night.