She's 16-

She's Beautiful-

and she's mine.  (well, ours-on loan anyway)

Meshayla turned 16 back in September.  Sixteenth birthdays seem like quite a milestone, and it's always fun to do something special.
Our convention is in September, and also I was leaving on my trip in September and Morgen and Meshayla were both going to stay with their older sister  in Sidney while I was gone and somehow we needed to squeeze a birthday celebration into the month too.  When I found out that all the kids were going to be able to come to York this year along with the advantage of it being a holiday on Monday after, we started making plans for a surprise party for Meshayla on Sunday night.
I might add that it's very hard to pull a surprise off in this family--too many people, SOMETHING or SOMEONE always slips up.

Well, this is true except when you intend for everyone to know something and assume that they do, then SOMEONE DIDN'T find out when they were suppose to.  (Note--don't ever assume)

Anyway, amazingly no one let it slip, and we pulled off the surprise party.  Amazing.  As was the cake that Lynisha made and brought with her, leaving it here at the house on their way to York.

Meshayla and her "twin-cousin" Rebecca have celebrated their birthdays together since they were 3 years old.  This year Rebecca is living in AZ, and so she wasn't here on their birthdays.
When she came back on her school break the girls got to spend some time together, and took a whole bunch of pictures of the two of them (with help from Morgen.)

Here's a few of my favorites they took.

To celebrate their birthday together, my sis and I took the girls on a girls day out to shop & eat before Rebecca went back to AZ

Happy happy 16th year to both of you!

  ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

38 weeks (along)!!

Hmm, 38 weeks, sounds like I'm expecting a baby or something. YES! Actually I am; A grandbaby girl, due in 2 weeks! WOW! THAT IS ONLY 2 WEEKS!! Yes, I'm getting very excited, and you can know what to expect for my "mom's in the picture" in the very near future!
This will be the first baby for our oldest daughter! Our 4th grandchild. Two more months and we'll also welcome grandbaby #5.
Things are gearing up here, so much going on and to do for the rest of the year. 2 babies, 2 baby showers, 2 trips to ND, a wedding to get ready for Dec 31 plus countless "normal everyday life" things to do and think about.

September brings another birthday in our family, plus two of her cousins. Meshayla and Rebecca are two days apart, Rebecca Sept 11 and Meshayla the 13th. Our closest "twin-cousins" They were both born at 7:06 in the morning. Their cousin Landon is a year younger than them, born on Sept 21. The girls have had their birthday parties together every year since they were 4, the year my sister moved back here from Arizona.
This year because of all of our crazy schedules we combined Landon's birthday party with the girls, and also added Jackson's birthday too. Poor lil' guy...his was actually the end of July and my sisters family schedule was even more crazy than ours, because they didn't have a chance to have a party for him before this!
We did the party up good, they each got their own cake, and the older boys got to have a "sleep"-over in the barn at my sis's country house. The girls had their sleeplessness in the house and by the time it was all over, I think my sis signed a BIG SIGH OF RELIEF!! 5 young teen boys, and 2 teen girl cousins, plenty of mountain dew & monster drinks plus snacks doesn't make for much sleep on anyone's part!

Now for the pictures....
It's Party time!!



.
Meshayla & me.


Becca & Shay--our 15 yr olds!

My sis, Luanne, Rebecca, Meshayla & me

Jackson K, (8) Rebecca L, & Meshayla (15)& Landon K (14)









It's our family ritual to let the birthday child pick where to go out to eat for their birthday. This year Meshayla's pick was Skeeter Barnes. Good choice Meshayla-- free dessert too! Of course the camera had to go along, and guess what? she didn't even protest the pictures!

I have others, but I think I will add them in a slide show on this post in the next couple days, so if you want to see more, stop back by. Time to let this be all for now!

31 and 32 of 52 weeks

The end of July we celebrated my Grandpa's 95 birthday. He is in a nursing home and has Alheizmers. Sometimes it was a bit confusing & overwhelming for him, but mostly he seemed to enjoy it. He dosen't remember our names, and only remembers some faces, but if we tell him we're "his kids", then it's all great!
Grandpa & Grandma had 5 boys. These two are the only ones left. They both got married around the time or after I did, so their kids, my only cousins are my kids's ages. I thought it was fun to see this picture of us together, I think we definitely look related! Grandpa has 4 other grandchildren, including my brother.

***************
Meshayla's home! Last week on Thursday we went to Denver to pick her up at the airport. The 3 younger kids got to come too. They were so excited to see her, and I *think* Meshayla was quite happy to see them too!






Here's mom and dad with our girl back after 2 months! (I have NO clue why my mouth is open in both of these pictures!)
After we finally got out of the airport (minus luggage....) we went to Sidney to our daughters, then Friday we went camping at Ogallala for the weekend. Next week coming up.....beach play and jet-skiing!!

22 of 52 and Meshayla's trip begins

Our daughter Laura has been in Finland/Sweden for two years now this summer, and she's been very anxious for some of her family to come see her. Large families, small incomes and crazy work schedules are not very conducive to travel like that. About a month ago several conversations, and some spur of the moment decisions, it was planned, tickets bought and passport applied for so that Meshayla could fly to visit Laura for 2 months this summer!
My Mom has traveled alot, and my 3 older girls some. Me, very little so making these arrangements and what it all entailed really isn't up my alley! Thankfully I had lots of help from Lynisha & Laura to get arrangements made.

Meshayla ended up with an unexpected Root canal the week before she left, finishing up just 2 days before she flew. Thankfully there was no problems with that. Yay for youth! We left home on Wed. this week to go out to Sidney where we left my younger kids with their older sister, and Thursday morning left early for Denver for the airport. Lynisha left her kids with someone too, so it was just Relyssa, Meshayla, Lynisha and I. We had plans to go wedding dress shopping after seeing Meshayla off.

At the airport they would only give us one guest pass to go to the gate, so that left Nish & Lyss on the other end of the airport to pass time while I went with Meshayla.
I had checked about assistance for her, but unfortunately the airlines she was flying with did not have a contract with the airlines she was connecting with in Newark NJ. Getting her assistance in Denver to Newark was quite pointless since I was going to the gate with her to see her on the plane anyway. I was not worried about her once she was on the plane, flying even tho oversees, and her sister would be there meeting her on the other end, but the changing planes, going to a different terminal & checking in with a different airlines in Newark, plus a 4 hour layover before the plane left was giving me fits of nerves! Since she didn't have anyone at that point to meet her there & hand her over to an assistant, then that option wasn't going to work either.
She refused to acknowledge being nervous over going thru there alone, whether she really was or not, but I'm quite sure I about drove my daughters crazy with MY nervous state over it!

We "solved" the problem the best we could by giving her a cell phone to take, printing maps of the Newark airport, (for both her to take, and me to keep) and highlighting where she needed to go, along with going over everything a billion times :D
A friend had sent her a small laptop to take along, so we spent our time waiting on her flight out of Denver on the computer, phone, and walking the moving sidewalks, along with eating 3$ ice cream cones. Ouch!

The plane was about 3 hours late, which made for a very long wait, more time for my nerves to get worked up. The sign kept moving ahead the flight time, and it's probably a good thing that I wasn't realizing a 2 hr. time difference in NJ that was going to make meeting the connecting flight tighter! Anyway, finally boarding time, and I stood there watching her go thru the line, snapping a few pictures, went up to give her one last hug as she was giving the agent her boarding pass, and the agent turned me to mush & tears when he asked if I would like him to take a picture of Meshayla and I before she got on the plane! WOW! He apologized to the other passengers, said they had plenty of time, and took our picture! I was so impressed with his kindness!

In the meantime in Sweden, Laura was tracking Meshayla's/the plane's progress, and was talking to me on the phone, could tell me exactly when they actually took off, as I couldn't see, and when she was flying over our home town!! Amazing! (well, she SHOULD have been sleeping...!)
When Meshayla arrived in Newark, we had agreed that she would call me, and I was so happy to get that call! Now for getting her thru the airport to the next terminal, checked in with another airlines & boarded. She had her map, I had mine, and the phone connection kept us both reasonably calm. I reminded her to look for signs, & could hear her as she asked directions several times. Everything went quite smoothly, but I could detect a few nerves on her end. We discovered that really she did not have any extra time at all, as they were already boarding her plane by the time she was in the right place. I'm glad I didn't know that ahead of time! We hung up the phone after she was boarded, and Laura called her a couple minutes later, as she was watching the tracker, and wanted to make sure she was on! Then Laura called me too. She finally went back to bed then.

The other girls and I were wedding dress shopping in Denver, and didn't get back to Sidney till Midnight. Laura called me at 5:20 a.m. to say that Shayla had arrived, & Laura was with her. I gratefully thanked her, sent Love & hugs to them both, & went back to sleep. They went off to have fun. Today was a very long tiring day, I'm exhausted! 3 hours back home, and I am very stiff & sore and very very tired. Even after a nap, bed/sleep is going to feel very wonderful tonight!
My summer has officially began!

Alice in Wonderland Musical Production

The middle school swing choir put on Alice in Wonderland. This is Meshayla's first time on-stage experience. They did a great job!

Sidewalk Artist

Maybe I should let her paint on my walls...what do you think?

The Essay

I Forgot I was going to do this yesterday. This week has been filled with cleaning & painting, and now trying to get things back in order before the kids come home tomorrow, but next week I need to put my "vacation" :) pictures up, so I'd better get this done today!
(If you don't know what I'm talking about, this post follows Thursdays post below)

"Why America's Veterans Should Be Honored"

Veteran: One grown old in experience, especially in military life. Honoring: Held in high regard or respect.
However in reality, veterans and honoring is more than those black and white definitions. Why our veterans should be honored is not a question we should have to ponder on too excessively.

It has been said "Freedom is never free." Men and women in uniform have proudly stood for our country, only to be knocked down again. They've experienced what it's like to be captured and tortured to the point of insanity. We know this because of the pain that never ceases to haunt their eyes. It's a pain that's still healing. Our veterans have been driven against resistance to continue in battle as their comrades were agonizingly engulfed by death in various forms. They feel the suffering, the anguish, when in a matter of seconds a soldier that endured so many traumas already is reduced to nothingness. Those of us that aren't fighting may think; "Oh, it's just another pile of ashes to sweep up." The veterans paid the price for our freedom by placing their lives on the line. To be willing to sacrifice themselves when we are not.

Dick Cheney said that, "It is easy to take liberty for granted when you haven't had it taken from you." We haven't had our freedoms stripped and taken from us like some unfortunate victims in other countries, unable to speak or walk freely. Many of our veterans have gone through that tragic period, when their liberty was torn apart, catapulted to the ground and shattered, leaving only minuscule fragments, as if it never existed in the first place.

"In war, there are no unwounded soldiers." (Jose' Narosky) It doesn't matter how long those veterans live, they will never forget the trial and tribulations, where horror and fear were every day acquaintances. It's the pain that binds them together. We are not the ones that made a commitment to defend this country whether it meant standing steadfast and strong when bombs pelt from the sky like raindrops, or not. Our veterans have fought, and continue to fight for this beloved country; for us, to keep it from crumbling, to keep our hearts beating as one. The least we can do is honor them, to respect and to pray for them. To help them conquer the difficulties caused by the struggles for our homeland's freedom.

*Meshayla J.
age 14/8th grade
October, 2008

12 of 52

Back in October, Meshayla wrote and entered a writing contest for "Patriot's Pen Competition sponsered by the VFW. She loves to write, so her biggest problem in writing the essay was that it was a 400 word limit. She loves "descriptive" words, and when she asked me to help her cut it down to 400 from her rough draft, it was very painful!
Last month I got a phone call-"This is (___) from the VFW, and we are calling to find out how many of you will be attending the dinner for the contest winners. ?????!!!! I had no idea what she was talking about, as my daughter totally blew it off after the teacher told her she was one of the winners and she had forgotten to tell me! I think I was more excited than she was!
Anyway so last week we went to the dinner and got to hear the winners read their essays. In this particular contest, there was 167 entrys, and Meshayla's essay was 5th place. She won $20
I was very proud of her, not only for being one of the winners, but she did an excellent job of reading the essay in front of the crowd.
*EDIT* I'll post the essay tomorrow for anyone who wants to read it.--

Meshayla's artwork

Cake -- part 2 and another party

Well, we survived another birthday party! I think I've mentioned before that since both my sister's & I live in close proximity, along with a married with children niece, we have LOTS of birthdays to celebrate! It's often hard to find a date that works for (give up on ALL) settle on the majority of us. That's the reason these birthdays get stretched out, and kind of run into each other! (As you can see by my list up above, I have a nephew with a birthday tomorrow...) We had settled on Sun. eve supper (tomorrow) but then our workers announced they will have Sun. Gosple meetings, starting tomorrow eve. Scratch that plan. Re-schedule for tonight.
We had a great time. Luanne & I did a taco salad supper, easy to make a huge batch of. and not much work. Add watermellon & grapes, along with cake & ice cream, a warm late summer evening with our family & friends, what more could you want?
Oh, so you really just wanted to see pictures of the cake eh?

Well, for my first attempt I think it turned out pretty well. Made some mistakes, nothing serious, learned some things, TO do, and NOT to do, far from "perfect" but the girls liked it and it tasted good, so that's all that really mattered, right? That I got lots of compliments was a bonus, although maybe everyone was just being nice!
It really was fun, I think I'm hooked. Can't wait to do the next one!! Oh yes, I also canned 3 batches of grape jelly today, and although I ended up leaving for the party with a few dirty dishes & the remains of the gum-paste misc. on my counter, I managed to keep my kitchen reasonably clean during the process. YEA!! Now that really is an accomplishment :*) Unfortunately my hands didn't fare so well, they are several shades & blotchy with red frosting dye!

Here's a couple more of the "twins" birthday party pictures. Yes, they both got "chucks" for their birthday!