Boys....

yes, I'm still all in one piece...you doubted?

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!

Pictures...

Here's some pictures of our garage sale day to go with the last post. Rather random, not terribly exciting.
Kara & Kaela

Going GREEN! :D


With their cousin Katie

We're going to miss this!!

Yesterday and today we had company! Austrailia visitors, here in the US traveling around.

They met our 3 older girls some years ago before they were married.

We had a very wonderful time visiting! Come again any time!!

Our kids this morning before they left.

Such a lovely family, and it was SO special to meet them & have them visit!

Words

• I've missed my blogging/journaling outlet
• It's the end of May already. School is out, it's Memorial day.
• Today I sent Kara off with my mom to spend a week at convention preps with Jana.
• Our convention starts in 2 1/2 weeks
• Tomorrow we are having visitors from Australia!
• Tomorrow I have to: Get Meshayla a photo ID, Take her to GI to the Dentist to finish up a root canal, finish up any last minute shopping for her.
• Wednesday, pack her suitcase & we'll go out to Sidney.
• Thursday we'll take her to Denver for her flight to visit Laura in Finland/Sweden for 2 months!
• Today is my nepthew Timothy's 11 birthday! Happy Birthday Tim!
• 11 years ago this month my youngest sister moved back to NE from AZ, she was all ready to go, but didn't want to leave till she got to meet her new nephew, & he did arrive in time!

Hmmm, My to do list is unfortunately still in my head instead of on paper. I think I'm rebelling about writing it down, it seems pretty overwhelming

• Dejavu'

Last week on Friday I helped my sister get ready for a garage sale. Since she got married a month ago, they've been trying to do the consolidation thing...2 households into one. In this case NOT an easy chore. On Saturday both my sisters and I left the garage sale in the hands of the guys and ran into town for a quick break & some cold drinks. As the 3 of us girls were checking out, the clerk looked at us, and then asked my younger sister and I if we were twins. I said yes, my middle sis said, no we're tripletts, and then we busted out laughing. I'm sure the poor clerk was confused. It's an on-going funny, and of course since we don't see the resemblence as much as everyone else, we think it's kind of crazy. As we were walking out of the store, my middle sis said to me: "Well, you always wanted to have twins, and never got them, but now you've grown up to be one!" Wish I could write a book on all the twin funnies we've gotten over the last 11 years since she's moved here.

As we were leaving town, my younger sis just looked at us all together, and said "Haven't we been here before"? Whew. Could write a book on that one too.

11 years ago this month, she moved here from AZ. It's a little too personal of a story to tell all, but she arrived with 5 young children & a moving van full of all her household possessions from a city home to a country run down farm house. From a huge 5 bedroom 3 bathroom spacious house to a small 3 bedroom 2 bathroom house with a basement that was unusable because of flooding. Many of the things she had would not even fit into the house. She threw away, gave away, & stored away so much. Over the years she, with help from us girls and her brother in laws, re-modeled her house, and made it into a lovely home where we've spent many enjoyable hours.

It was kind of hard on us all to do it all again, in reverse, thinking of all the happy hours we've spent working, shopping for, & maintaining her place. The memories that we've made out there. Two weddings on the place. Change is always a bit hard for me, and I have a problem giving things up. The up-side this time is that she's not moving away, but is still here, just in another place. The up-side is that she now has someone to walk along the journey with her. We're looking forward to many more memories and happy times. "The best is yet ahead".

20 and 21 of 52...

Well, it's taken me nearly all day (inbetween everything else) to get this post done. At least I'm picking up internet inside today, so I can sit at the table instead of on the front steps. Also I got my mouse from my desktop on here, so I work better with it. Got a flash drive to transfer some pictures from my desktop to my laptop....so you'd think I was all set now, huh! We'll see. I definitly prefer working on my desktop, I know that for sure!! My helpers planting my flower beds. (Meshayla, Kara & Kaela)

Morgen, Kara & Kaela

Is there anything prettier than lilacs at Mothers day time? I LOVE them!

My 4 youngest girls, the ones still at home.

My boys...pretty soon #3 will be taller than me too!

My youngest 5 at home plus two older brothers here in town.

Mothers day dinner. The guys grilled steaks (picture on former post) Leon and the boys had really intended to make the rest of the dinner for me too, however somehow Sat. got here, the groceries hadn't gotten bought, & Leon got called into work that afternoon/eve. What's a mom to do anyway? I went and bought the groceries & put together a couple things the night before, Leon stopped at the store & bought a cheesecake & Sunday he and the kids did do MOST of the work getting dinner on the table. Plus all the cleaning up. It was a delicious meal!

My sister in law & Mother in law. We invited them to have lunch with us.
Gma J and her grandkids from this house.

This is our basement family room where I put my BIG table. I already have a 2nd fridge, my freezer & a counter down there, now I'm in the process of getting another set of cabinets w/sink along another wall. When I add a stove down there too, I'll have it made! It will work so wonderful for our big family dinners, potlucks & to use for a canning kitchen to keep the mess seperate from my main floor kitchen!

Un-Plugged...

Not by choice, mind you :D
Unfortunally I'm without internet due to problems with our location, and no signals from the tower. It's spring, the trees have all leafed out. We were borderline anyway I guess, but it worked fine in the winter. So, hopefully I'll have something else soon, and in the meantime I'll use someone else's computer when I have the chance.
I'll have to make up my 52 weeks photo later.
Now..... is anyone reading this anyway? (hint, hint.....)

Mothers day

Saturday I took my mom to the nursery, and bought her a new tree for her yard, if you remember the pictures last year around this time, she lost 3 of them in her yard, & it's looked pretty bare!
Later that afternoon I went back & bought me flowers & spent quite a while getting (part of them) planted. Still more to go.
Sunday we had Leon's mom & sister over for lunch, and the guys grilled steaks & they & the girls helped make lunch. That evening I got the lovely 2009 longaberger "mothers day" basket.
Phone calls from all my girls "away from home"--Jeanne, Jana, Laura & Dalayna on Saturday & Sunday helped make my day special!

For some reason I'm not having any luck getting blogger to load anymore pictures. It just keeps going & going & finally tells me "failed". Ugg
I'll just post this for now. Hopefully It will start working again before Thursday. (at least!!)