Monday, May 24, 2010

Happy Birthday, Queen!

Thirty-six years ago today Michelle Laurie Donahue was born.  It was the most wonderful and life changing day of my life.  I can not begin to imagine this world without My Michelle in it.
I could not believe she was finally here!


Proud Mama with the most beautiful baby in the world.

First professional picture at three months.
 

She was the best baby in the world.  I took her with me to the beach all the time that first year.  She actually had a tan in her one year old picture!  Our main entertainment in those early days was to go to Debbie and Jeff's house to play games and eat our giant desserts. Michelle would go to sleep in her makeshift bed in Debbie's bedroom with no problems, as long as she had her beloved blanket.


This will always be one of my favorite pictures.



The only way I could get her to pose for this picture was to hold her on my lap.


Here she is at two and a half wearing the first dress I ever made for her.


Very first trip to Disneyland.


First time I could get her to sit on the Easter Bunny's lap.


She always loved a ride from Daddy.

Michelle was such a wonderfully sweet little girl.  When she was still quite young her dad nicknamed her Queen and the name has stuck.  She did well in school and met her best friend in the world when she was 8 years old and her friend's mom was the Girl Scout leader.  Catherine spent so much time with us thru the years it was almost like she and Michelle were sisters.  They still speak almost daily to this day.  So much of Michelle's growing up years were spent with Debbie's boys.  She went to school with them, spent her holidays with them, camped with them and  ultimately double dated with them many times over the years.  They are more like brothers to her than cousins.  She has tons of family for a girl, who is technically an only child. 


Michelle has blessed my life in more ways I could count. We have grown to be the best of friends.  No one gets me the way she does.  We can laugh together over the simplest of things. No one in this world has a laugh that is as contagious as Michelle's.  There is no way you can not join her.  She can ALWAYS find the funny side of almost any situation. When some thing wonderful happens, I can't wait to tell her.  When something awful happens, I know that no one else will understand the way she will.  When God sent this wonderful woman to be my daughter He truly gave me the BEST gift I have ever gotten. Happy birthday Michelle.  May this be your best year ever.  May the Lord bless you in every way possible.  I love you!

Sunday, May 23, 2010

SNOW again!



I could not believe it when I got up this morning and it was snowing outside!  We just bought two big tomato plants yesterday at Costco.  Thank heavens we were too tired to bring them up last night and just left them in the car.  This crazy weather is just one more reminder that we control very little here on earth.  Praise the Lord for that!

All of my roses covered with buds.


View from the deck.

We literally had thunder and lightening for a couple of hours, while it intermittenly snowed and hailed.  Then the sun started to come out, but it kept on snowing.  It was absolutely beautiful!

How Stunning is this?

How could anyone  ever look at this wonder and not KNOW that there is a God?

It looks so weird to see the dogwood tree all green and full of blooms with it snowing out.

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Out of my league....

Today, I worked in Jackie's classroom.  For some reason, the teacher decided to do some exercising with the class after the Pledge of Allegiance this morning.  Considering  the fact that I was standing in front of the room with her at this particular moment, I had no choice about joining in. We started off running in place, at a rather brisk clip.  I am not kidding, when I say I was almost winded. She then went into some elaborate arm contortions and bizarre poses.  We continued the session by staring  at the ground  frozen in peculiar stances and then slowly lifting one leg into an odd position.  (Keep in mind that the woman is close to my age and has the build of a toothpick)  Never once did she even appear mildly distressed.  I considered my performance Oscar worthy.  I could have collapsed to the ground gasping for air, but she was never aware of this fact!  Obviously, I will be addressing this issue ANY moment. 

Jackie just informed me that her teacher LOVES Yoga and that she feels it helps to relax the body................  NowI get it. I guess my body is just not used to being so relaxed!

Monday, May 10, 2010

A fun weekend!

This was a very busy and enjoyable weekend.  Saturday, my in-laws came up to spend the weekend with us.  My father-in-law loves baking, so I had to be sure he was not disappointed.  I had a big plate each of freshly baked oatmeal and chocolate chip cookies on hand.  We visited and ate and watched movies all weekend long. 
Looking up at Great Grandma.


The happy Great-grandparents.


Great-grandma and her little girls.


Four generations.

On Sunday morning we all went to church together and my FIL got a beautiful carnation for each of the three mothers.  After the service they gave each of us a beautiful devotions book.  I flipped thru it and there was a recipe for scones that I decided to try out when we got home.

Pretty and pink for the ladies!

Jackie was insistent that we have tea with our scones.


On Sunday after noon baby Priscilla got her very first taste of baby cereal and it was met with a large crowd watching.  We all got such a kick watching her facial expressions!

Mommy is showing her how wide to open.

So that's what all the hype is about.
What flavor is that?
Mommy is very excited about all of this.
What was in that bite????
At this point it could go either way.
A little encouragement from big Sis.
You can do it Sissy!


Thursday, May 6, 2010

Today.....

Today......... was baby Priscilla's 5 month check-up.   Jackie went along to help with her on the ride home from the doctor.  The one thing Jackie was dreading was of course the shots.  Michelle finally talked her into going by telling her she could go out of the room when she got them.  Jackie said afterwards that she could still hear Sissy in the hall.  It is a sad sound when a sweet little baby is cooing one minute and screaming in terror the next. Not a sound that this Grandma wants to ever hear.   She weighed 16 lbs. 3.3 ozs. and is 24 inches long.  She has officially doubled in weight since she was born!



This is her sad little face getting ready to go to bed......

This picture sums up how she feels........

Today......... was my day to go and work in Jackie's classroom.  They are doing testing, so the teacher had me doing a lot of prep work for the kids to make paper mache globes.  They were not going to start on them until 1:45 and Jackie was going to be leaving school at 1:30 for the baby's doctors appointment.  Any one who knows Jackie knows that making a globe would be a dream project!  I could not bear the tension of her missing out on the experience.   Thinking to myself smugly, that I am a crafty sort of gal, I asked if I could just work on Jackie's at home.  The teacher had a jug of liquid starch, ripped up paper towels and blown up balloons on strings ready for them to work on .  After glancing at the items she had, I figured this would be simple.  Jackie  and I bounced out to the car with a balloon on a string and drove home.  Keep in mind, I have NEVER even remotely done anything that involved paper mache. 

 The nightmare started when there were no jugs of liquid starch to be found.  We compromised with a can of spray starch.  Next, I decided I might need some backup instructions and tips, so  I went on the Internet. I actually  found a "How to make paper mache" video on You Tube.  It was a man and he make it look ridiculously easy.  He was mixing up 2 cups of flour with 2 cups of water and just dipping the strips into the mixture and slapping it on to a 2 litre bottle.  I thought to myself that I could come up with an even better mixture. I mixed up a cup of of spray starch and a cup of water with two cups of flour.  With my strips in hand, I went out on the deck to hang the balloon from it's string and get started.  From this point on, things just kept getting worse.  I quickly discovered that my mixture was so thick it was very difficult to soak a strip of paper towel in it.  When I finally got a strip moistened, it really wouldn't stick onto the balloon.   Suddenly the wind starts blowing, and I have Jackie holding the string, so I can try get something to stick. 
 Blobs of thickened goop are all over my hands, on my clothes,  and all over the towels I had on the ground.  Finally. it started to stick, but the more I got on the more it started sliding  to the bottom of the balloon and clumping.  I have no idea how long we were out there. Towards the end I was literally patching areas with wet strips soaked in spray starch.  By this time, the balloon is soooo heavy I was terrified it would break off of it's little yarn string. I get the balloon down from it's hanging spot and carefully rush down the hall to my bathroom.  Hours pass with me trying to blow dry the globe. Eventually, I call it a night.

It is now three o'clock in the morning. I woke up with a start and I started dwelling on the BALLOON.  After lying in bed trying to get my mind to go blank, so I could  get some much needed sleep, I found myself in the bathroom, kneeling over the soaking wet balloon,which is lying in my bathtub.  A couple of the pieces were lifting, so I ended up going outside to get the spray starch off the deck.  I was chattering, as I had just heard some raccoons on the roof.  It will be a while before I can get back to sleep, so I have decided to try and finish this post.  I must be tireder than I think, as I am making so many mistakes on here...................




My wonder mixture!



The nifty spray starch amidst the giant mess.
One of the goop soaked towels on the ground.
Jackie  trying to decide if there is any hope......
Another view of Grandma's folly.

I had actually thought this would be a fun photo session of Grandma and Jackie working happily together.  It was such an incredibly sticky mess, I couldn't even touch the camera until the end.

Today........I learned, the hard way, that I am not as clever as I thought I was.

Monday, May 3, 2010

35 Year Anniversary

Thirty-five years!  As I look at those words it almost sounds unbelievable!  How very quickly this time has passed.  So very much has changed.  Two very young, naive, incredibly poor, and insanely hopeful people married each other thirty five years ago today.  It is simply a fact to say that we have grown up together.


I can definitely say that ours was NOT a story of "love at first sight".  I attended an all girls high school and Greg attended the all boys high school that we shared our social activities with. During my senior year, the nuns decided that it would be a good idea to have a panel of senior boys come over once a week to sit in on our religion class.  That way we would supposedly get a guy's view on things.  Greg was one of the boys on the panel.  He was cocky and annoying and way too opinionated for my taste. LOL  As the weeks went by, my irritation at his attitudes grew.  I had a steady boyfriend at this time, who was everyone's idea of the perfect guy.  He was Mr. Steady and Reliable (the opposite of who I perceived Greg to be)  During this time period, Debbie (my sister) went to a dance and came home with the news that she had met a new guy.  As we sat there discussing the story in detail, I realized to my horror that it was Greg.  Despite my warnings, she went to prom with him!  Thru a series of events over the next few months Greg and I eventually went to a party together as friends.  When we were actually together in a one on one situation, I came to realize that he wasn't exactly as horrible as I had thought him to be.  The next weekend, after our "date",  he was in a bad motorcycle accident and was taken to the hospital.  My grandmother worked in the admitting department at this hospital and that is how I learned of his fate.  I started visiting him daily. Greg was in the hospital for a couple of weeks, so we spent a lot of time together. Getting to know him in this unique situation let me see the real Greg.  For a year he was in a cast and on crutches.  We dated steadily during this time and I was the designated driver.  The rest as they say is history..........

(Look how tightly we are holding hands....)

The most wonderful thing we have shared together is our daughter.  Michelle has brought a joy to our lives that we could never have imagined.  Watching her grow from a baby to the special woman she has become has  fulfilled and given purpose to our lives.  Now we get to enjoy the blessing of being grandparents together.  The wonder of this experience has been beyond compare......the joys of parenthood with none of the responsibility.

(We were sooooo happy.  This was our first family vacation.)

I don't think it is possible to spend this much time with anyone and be able to say it has all been smooth sailing.  We have weathered many storms.  Sometimes the only thing that kept me hanging on was the knowledge that my best friend in the whole world was in the exact same boat as me.  In some of my darkest hours the sight of the one person in the whole world who knows exactly how I feel, has been enough.
It feels wonderful to have gone thru all of the ups and downs that we have over the years and to know we are happy, still in love and TOGETHER.  I praise God for letting this be the story of my life!





Saturday, May 1, 2010

Time for a new Bible

Jackie has such a thirst for knowledge.  She wants to know all the details about almost anything you can think of.  She has been wanting to know more and more about Bible stories.  Her little Childrens' Bible is just not providing enough info anymore.  She told me she wanted a Bible for bigger kids.  Greg and I found the perfect one for her.   It is the NIV Adventure Bible.


It has lots of extra facts and detailed explanations on the pages to enhance the reading.






 There are a lot of maps in the back.  Jackie is just like her Papa when it comes to studying maps.  They both love to pore over them.


She was so darling when we gave it to her.  She carried it out to the living room so she could sit on the love seat in her favorite reading spot. She was quite pleased to know she had her own real Bible.  Her little body sitting there studying the Word was darlng.


When she was done reading, she carefully put it back in the box.  She reverently carried it into her room and put it on her nightstand.  Her innocence and sweetness are simply beyond measure........
Jackie wanted to give her old Bible to Sissy, so it is waiting on her bookshelf until she is ready.