Happy 90th Birthday, Great-Grandma!!!

What could I ever say to describe this day, to do it justice? What a fun, memorable celebration of our ever-lovin' Mom/Grandma/Great-Grandma!!! It was a day full of happiness and laughter and tears and memories and LOVE.

Here's Grammy with her cake and 90 CANDLES!


And here's her ingenious way of blowing ALL of them out!



Here are some of her Great-Grandkids presenting her with their gift...

...a book entitled "My Grandma is 'Great' because..." filled with their pictures, pictures of them with her, and their favorite things about her.

The kids kept busy...Aunt Sue supplied them with a booklet of "Grammy Games" filled with crossword puzzles and word searches filled with family names and lakehouse fun. Seth told me that he's keeping his forever. :)
Dave's brother, Mark, made a slideshow filled with pictures of her life, starting with her wedding day through all kinds of treasured family moments.

Here's a brief clip, to give you a taste of what Mark did. It was wonderful! Watching all of it, I couldn't help remembering Great-Grandpa's words as he looked around at his children and grandchildren, "Look around, Ma. Look at what we started!"


Here's part of what Great-Grandma and Great-Grandpa started, their son Dennis' family.

We love you, Grammy!

Parties, Parties, Parties!

So, Saturday afternoon, after everyone was packed for the weeked, Dave took the boys to meet our extended family at the waterpark. I took Caroline to a disco bowling party for her sweet friend, Karmyn. Aren't they cute?!

Then, Caroline and I drove to the waterpark to meet our family for Dave's cousin's 40th birthday party and Dave's Grandma's 90th birthday party.

Love this picture! When Dave's cousin, Aaron, lost at a game, he was subjected to the kids' "spanking machine"!

Then on to some fun at the waterpark...

All went well until it was time to go back to the hotel room for bedtime. We had it all worked out...Caroline would sleep with her cousin, Anabel, Henry and Seth slept in another bed, Dave and I in another, and Evan would sleep in a little cot. Unfortunately, the hotel ran out of cots that night. So we made a little bed out of a chair and ottoman where we thought Evan could spend the night. He was all set up with sheets, his favorite blankets, and his music box. Unfortunately, it took until 11:00 to get him to sleep. He slept a couple of hours there, and then joined Dave and I in our double bed. That was not quality sleep to say the least! Poor Dave finally gave up on sleeping there, and finally slept the rest of the night on the chair. And I spent the rest of the night with Evan using me as a pillow, kicking me, and all other things that lead to very little sleep.

Have I mentioned lately that he's three? That's the only thing that I can say in his defense. I do love him. :)

The next day I woke to a headache (cluster? migraine?) that worsened as the day went on, climaxing right before we were to go into the party for Dave's grandma. Fortunately, with some Tylenol, caffeine, and rest, I was able to join the party after a while. I was so happy that I could, because I would have been so sad to miss such a wonderful celebration...

SOME of my Valentines

Wow...so much to catch up on! The kids had their Valentine's Day parties on Friday. The kids were pretty excited about the parties and the Valentine's cards that they got from their classmates, despite the fact that this was the first year that the kids were not allowed to exchange little candies as well. I just thought I should include this picture as well...it seemed fitting in this post to include a little brotherly love. :)

Friday night was also the same night that I started feeling really crummy from a bad cold...going into a big weekend I was pretty worried how I would hold up. So I went to bed, and then just focused on getting our family ready the next day. Dave was a big help, but still, there is generally no rest for sick moms.

Evan Impersonating an Earthquake

Alternate title: C'mon baby, let's do the twist!

When the earthquake happened in Haiti, the kids were concerned that we could have an earthquake here. Never having experienced an earthquake in Illinois, I told the kids that we don't really have earthquakes here.

Then, bammo, a week later, I had to eat my words. At 4 AM, I was in a deep sleep, and was awakened by a big boom and then some loud rumbling sounds. I got a little panicky, and (I know this doesn't make any sense) thought that a burglar was trying to break in. Dave jumped out of bed, and that's when we realized that the whole house was shaking. Dave went to the hallway where he saw Henry and Caroline. Henry was accusing Dave of trying to scare him, saying "Why were you shaking my wall, Dad?" Caroline was pretty scared, and came running to me in bed. Soon after that, the shaking stopped. Henry and Caroline stayed with us in bed for a while, and after we explained that the earthquakes that we do get here are VERY rare, and nothing like they had in Haiti, they were mainly just excited to talk about it with us and their friends in school.

After they settled a bit, we went to tuck them back in their own beds. That's when we saw that Seth was awake and completely unphased. Apparently, he too thought his Dad was just trying to scare them, and was just trying to fall asleep again. Evan slept right through it all.

The next day, Henry was trying to explain to Evan what had happened. The following clip is the result of Henry's teaching. :)

Magnitude 3.8 Quake Wakes Up Chicago Area - Local News | News Articles | National News | US News - FOXNews.com

Magnitude 3.8 Quake Wakes Up Chicago Area - Local News | News Articles | National News | US News - FOXNews.com

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Such excitement in our house...

Last night was BIG. Of course, we had a 3.8 earthquake centered just miles away from our house. However, just a few minutes ago, Caroline, Evan and discovered that our very prolific Platy just had her babies. Yes, this is the same platy that just had babies January 21st. Mom and babies are doing just fine.

Because the babies were born the night of the earthquake, we've decided to name the ones that we've seen so far Shiver and Shake.

(Their siblings, born just 20 (!) days ago are Flippy, Dippy and Pippy. The oldest baby, born from another mother ~27 days ago, is named Zippy.)

Illinois Earthquake?!!!

It's about 4:10, and our family just woke up to an earthquake. Crazy...its on the news now...
Henry came out of his room and accused Dave of trying to scare him by shaking the walls. :) He and Caroline wound up in our bed, too excited to sleep for a while.

Peace

A good day.
Valentines written.
Playdate played.
Barbies accessorized.
Earrings enjoyed.
Kindergarten lessons learned.
Homework done.
Brothers teased.
Books read.
Sweet dreams in progress.

I love this little girl.