Julie's Top 10 Memories from 2008

Here is my top ten list of memories, good and bad, from 2008.

10.) The Blizzard. It came on Cassidy's second birthday forcing us to reschedule her birthday party. We let her open a few presents that day anyway since it was her birthday and got her some cupcakes.

09.) My mom moved to Lancaster. It has been nice to have her close by to see the kids more often, to have dinner weekly with us, and to watch the kids for date night!

08.) Richard was "downsized" from MacTools. We were very fortunate to have a nice severence package though. He essentially had a teachers summer since he didn't fiind another job until mid August.

07.) Family vacation at OBX. We always enjoy our vacation in the OuterBanks and this year my dad joined us for a few days. it was nice to have my dad join us. I hadn't been on a vacation with my dad since junior high school. The kids enjoyed hunting for crabs with papaw.

06.) The fence painting. Man that took forever. We painted, and by we I mean Richard, the fence white this summer and it looks great but took 2-3 weeks to get done with the heat. The kids and I did help with the inside of the fence.

05.) Put a hold on selling the house. Pretty much everyone knew we were looking to move to South Carolina or North Carolina. We love the beach so much and wanted to be within a few hours drive to the coast. Losing the job pretty much halted that! So then we decided to stick around here and the market goes down the crapper! We will wait it out and try again in 12-18 months, sooner hopefully, depending on the economy. I really, really, really am ready to move.

04.) Spencer started Kindergarten. And it was all day kindergarten at that. I didn't know how I'd make it through all day without my Spencer home with me. The first week was stange and sad. But I'm cool now. And Spencer loves school and has a best friend named Zack.

03.) My mommy and me days. I had a fun time with Cassidy at the Wiggles concert, Spencer at Chuck E Cheese and Brenden at the Jonas Brothers concert. It is nice to have a day alone with each kid separately.

02.) Cassidy is potty trained. Enough said.

01.) The Blackout of 2008. Who can forget that one. We had hurricane force winds that left lots of my neighbors with missing siding, shingles, limbs from trees and entire trees and of course without power for days and some even weeks. We were lucky and only lost power for about 6 hours and had no damage to our house or property. My mom lost her power for 3 days and other parts of Lancaster lived 1 or 2 weeks without power. Schools were closed for 3 days using calamity days that I hope they don't need this winter.

So there you have it. I hope you all have a happy New Year and achieve everything you want to achieve in the new year. I wish you all good health, prosperity and love!

Cassidy is a "big girl" now

No more pullups! Cassidy is officially potty trained. She stays dry at night too. I'll still keep some pull ups around for Brenden's game days and long car trips right now as a "just in case" so she doesn't have an accident at the game or in the car. But she's telling me she has to go or just going on in to the bathroom when she has to go and she's telling me at the store too. I'm so proud of her.

We're almost done with Christmas shopping. We are going out this weekend to get a few more things for the kids. We go to Pam's (Richard's sister) house on Saturday night to celebrate Christmas with her and her family. This is the first year we aren't going to her house on Christmas morning ever. Melinda and Jason are going to Montana to visit Jason's family this year for Christmas. We have a game at 5 and have to go to Pam's right after that. Busy night.

Picture with Santa

Not the greatest quality picture I know. I took my old camera with me since it is small forgetting that the reason I got a new camera is because the old one was not performing so well anymore and pictures were turning out blurry, as seen above! So hopefully the picture that the lady took will be better. I can pick them up today after 4pm. Here's hoping she got a good one. I know she took one of Cassidy sticking her tongue out because she commented that she had to get that one because it was so cute. But while it may be cute, that's not the picture this mom wants! If it's crap, I'll take them to the mall. This was done at WalMart where they were giving you free picutres with Santa. And being the penny pincher that I am, I couldn't pass up a free picture.

Countdown to Christmas

Thanksgiving went well here with my mom and dad both here. We have our Christmas tree up, stockings hung and outside all lit up. I'll have to take a picture of the outside and put it on here. I made the Christmas cards today and sent half of them out and the other half will be going out tomorrow. When my writing started getting sloppy due to a whole lot of writing I thought it was time to stop and finish later. I had the text added to the photo cards but apparently forgot to select add so I ended up writing our names on 30 cards and addressing all the envelopes. So you can see why my hand was numb.

Christmas shopping is underway! We have made a good dent in their lists so far. I can't elaborate on items because a certain 9 year old reads this blog sometimes! (Shout out to Brenden!)

Basketball season has begun. Brenden's first game was last Saturday and they lost. But that's ok because there are a lot of kids on the team who haven't played before. They only lost by 7 points so that's not bad. Brenden said that the coach told him that he and Nico played the best that day so he was happy.

Well, that's all I got. Bye!

one week away

Thanksgiving is one week away. I bought the pies and whipped cream this morning. I'm going to get the rest tomorrow or next week depending on the sales. I've been making everything and hosting Thanksgiving at my house for 5 years now. This year my mom and dad will both be here....at the same time. Wish me luck! No seriously, they get along just fine nowadays. They're both here for birthday parties so it will be no big deal. I love making everything. Maybe in a few years we'll be in a little bit bigger of a house and anyone who wants to come is welcome. Of course then you might need to bring a dish.

I took our family picture again this year. This is the second year I've done it myself and I must toot my own horn and say it looks great! Last years was on everyones Christmas cards and look for this years picture on your Christmas cards as well. I used to send out wallet sizes with everyones cards but Sears started giving fewer pictures in their packages so I decided to start doing it myself. After 10 years of frequent trips to Sears Portrait Studio I've learned lots of poses and love taking them myself. But getting a 2 1/2 year old to smile at the camera that is on a self timer and no one is there for her to smile at is the hardest thing in the world! We put a toy on top of the camera for her to look at and we all said Cheese with her to get her to smile and keep smiling.

Well, everyone have a safe and happy Thanksgiving!

just blogging

Well the sports schedule has begun. Brenden has baketball practices on Tuesday nights at 8 and Thursday's at 5. Strange isn't it. They practice at 2 different schools in the city too. Games will start at the end of the month and go through March. And March is when soccer practice starts for Spencer. In about 2 more years I'll put Cassidy in gymnastics and then I can't even begin to imagine how I'll multitask that if practices fall on the same days for any of them. One of our friends has a kid in soccer and 1 in gymnastics at the same time. And her husband isn't even home in time to help shuttle them to practices. Richard is taking Brenden to the Tuesday practices since it's so late and they don't get home until @9:15. I of course get the Thursday practice since he doesn't even get off until 5. Games are on Saturdays so he'll never miss those. Right now the only activity Cassidy does is toddler storytime on Wednesday mornings at 11 at the library. She loves it. We get to do a craft after the storytime which is good because I'm not crafty so that's the only craft time the poor girl gets. I make ornaments with them at Christmas and hand turkeys at Thanksgiving and coloring eggs at Easter, but that's as crafty as I get. I color with them all the time though if that counts as anything!

School pictures

Here's the boys' school pictures. Spencer is in Kindergarten, and Brenden is in 4th grade.

I'll have trick or treat pics to share when we download the software for my new camera. Brenden was Harry Potter, Spencer was Iron Man and Cassidy was an angel.

I had the stomach flu earlier this week as did Spencer and Brenden. Not fun at all!