It's time to get caught up!

Blogs can be a good thing or they can make me crazy! I started this to use like a journal about our family and I have not been very faithful in keeping it up but it is a new year tomorrow and I promise to do better.  Here's a little catch up to get us on target. Our family in review since we became grandparents!

It all started about 4 years ago when our daughter called to tell us they were expecting our first grandchild.  She was born half way around the world so we had to make a trip to see them.  (I will share photos in a future post about travels)  Let me tell you, my grandchildren are so smart and cute!  I bet yours are too!
Here is #1 and she will be 4 years old in 2010! 

She brought so much joy to us!  We had finally made it - you know...  the grandparents club!
Her arrival was just too special to describe.  Since we had just been there as a family to visit, Meg and I went to help with the new baby. (PaPa had to stay behind but he was going to see her in just a few months!)




She was such a cute baby and she was just too far away from us. We stayed in touch with webcams and they made a trip home when she was just a few months old.  Here are a few photos documenting our trip to see her as well as her first trip home.

There were a lot of FIRSTS to come such as...

Her first Fall/Halloween

Our little strawberry!

First Santa visit - not so bad??

Visit to the beach - neither of them loves the beach but looks like they had fun anyway!Here's a start - with more to come later...

Like Mommy, Like daughter!

Have you ever thought what makes kids like they are?  I sure have! In many ways I think Megan is a lot like me.  We loved playing dolls when we were little and we could hardly wait to be mommys ourselves!  That was what she said she wanted to be when she grew up - a Mommy!  Not a doctor or nurse or real estate agent - but a Mommy!

Well, low and behold - I am a real estate agent and she has been too for the past 7 or 8 years and she does really well for someone who just helps her friends and family! But her dream came true when she found out she was pregnant in 2006 after being married almost 7 years but she lost the baby soon after and that was really a blow for all of us.  It was not long after that when she called to tell us she was expecting again.  We were thrilled and even though it was a very difficult pregnancy, we got our little Sienna.  Well, she is very much like her mommy and loves to play with dolls!  She was an exciting addition to our family.  We already had our first granddaughter and I will tell you all about her in an upcoming post.

In 2008, Megan found out that she was going to have another baby and we were excited for her.  Soon after, through ultrasound we found out that it would be another girl.  Wow, Megan was living her childhood dream!  She was a mommy times 2!  Nola arrived in June of 2009 and what fun was about to begin!  Sienna took to her like she was one of her dolls!  She could not keep her hands off of her!  Well, it looks like she is going to be just like her mommy because she takes such good care of her little sister!  She even plays mommy 24 hours a day!

  

If you look closely you can see that Nola has a little doll tucked under her right hand - compliments of Sienna!  Of course she would think Nola needed a baby too!

Like Mommy - Like daughter!

Getting behind updating my blog!

Wow, has it been 5 weeks since I updated this blog? Well, a lot has been going on! We have a new granddaughter! and her name is Nola. She was born June 6 and she weighed 9 lbs 12.5 oz - whew! but everyone is doing great and big sister Sienna is so good with her. Since I got back from helping with the new baby, I have been trying to get caught up at work and now we have a rent house vacant and we are busy cleaning it up and installing new granite countertops and carpet so we can get it rented again. Next week I head out to Virginia to help Angela drive back to Oklahoma for a visit. I know I need new pictures uploaded for you to see so I will put up a couple now and work on more later. Thanks for being so patient with me. Till later....

Hampton VA and Washington DC

What great fun we had in Hampton VA visiting Angela and her family. We stayed a few days while Dennis, Kevin and Drew tiled their backsplash in the kitchen and the floor in the utility. I should have gotten pictures of their handiwork to display!! We had a great visit and got to go eat at Harpoon Larry's - a great seafood place ( really it is a dive but great food!).

While we were there, the guy that

demos the F22 planes at the air shows

was practici

ng at Langley and

we got to go out

on the flight line and watch him practice for the Paris Air show coming up. It was a highlight of our trip!

After our visit in Hampton, we

boarded the Amtrak train to DC. That was fun and and we arrived at Union Station in DC and had lunch there before heading to our hotel that was just a short 2 block walk from the Nation's Capitol! We could see it from the front door of our hotel. It was a great location for seeing all the sights.

We got pretty good at the metro also! Drew and I visited about as many sights as we could pack into our sho

rt stay while Dennis was in meetings for the National Association of Realtors. Once back home, we were ready for Megan to have her baby in Austin so we could head down there but as you can see, we are still waiting for the call! More pictures in next post!

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cruising

break time

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Apps for fun as well as work!

This is a repeat from my work blog but had to share it on my personal blog as well!

OK - I have really had a lot of fun searching for apps for my iphone and some of them are absolutely the best and others are just OK. There are some that are very helpful in my everyday work and others that just waste my time! Lately I have downloaded several fun ones that I plan on letting my granddaughter play with when we go to see her. Last time I was there I had downloaded a piano keyboard and I was a hit! She loved to use my phone to punch out some really cute tunes! Since then, I have searched for others that I thought she would have fun with and I have come up with Tappy Tunes and Ocarina, two more musical apps. Then there is Scribble Lite and Bubblewrap that are just fun to doodle with! I know, I know - you are thinking that I play around a lot with this phone but it really has some awesome useful apps that are great for everyone! We have a trip planned to DC for business and I found an app called DC Guide and it will look up sites or restaurants and then it will find where you are and tell you exactly how to get to where you are going! Can't get much easier than that - I thought. Well, I found the Google app for my iphone yesterday and I really think it is the best one yet! You open the app and then you just speak into your phone and it finds on the web just about anything your little heart desires! Unbelievable! I applaud these app writers. What will they come up with next? More to come.... I will keep you posted as to my favorite apps!

Easter weekend in Austin

Megan, Sienna and Spencer! Easter 2009

Here is a picture of Spencer's family with us on Easter Sunday for lunch at Megan's house. It was fun time being with them. We love them so much! and we are thankful that Megan and Spencer have them so close.

The other picture of us laughing is funny! and for the life of me - I can't remember us taking it! Getting old is the pits!

How fun is this? She thought she was so cute and you know what - she was right! It was a great weekend but cool by Austin standards! She never really did figure out hunting for Easter eggs! In fact, she was just walking right by one and this little boy (whom we did not even know) reached over and picked it up but when he saw it was pink - he immediately put it in her bag!!! We scored more candy!

Row Row Your Boat

Here is our big girl Alannah singing and I think Ty really likes it when she sings! What do you think? How do they grow up so fast? Just yesterday we had no grandchildren and now we have 3 with one on the way! Life is good! God is good! They are just little stairsteps too! Alannah is 3, Ty is 1 and Sienna is 2 with baby sister due in about 5 weeks!

Such a little Mommy

  This little girl is going to be such a big help to her mommy in about 8 weeks! when her little Sis comes home.  She reminds us of her mommy when she was just about this age too!  We brought her little Sis home and she was sooo much help!  We can hardly wait to see them interact together.  We are sure it will bring back such good memories!

Here's our little Easter Bunny straight from Austin, TX! We were just there this past week and had a really fun time playing with Sienna! She will be 2 in April and we just can't believe it! While we were there, we played a lot, read books and sang songs! We plan on going back to Austin soon - maybe even for Easter weekend! Also, while in Austin, we ate at a fun place called "5 guys hamburgers" and then we went to a place call "Hey Cupcake" for dessert! I think you can guess what we had! They even inject the cupcake with whip cream if you ask them!

We always have fun in Austin - they have such great places to eat! One of our favorites is Shady Grove! We did not go there this time because it was South by Southwest weekend and we figured that it would be an terrible wait time to eat outside since it was so pretty and everyone in the world would be downtown!

We will post pictures of our other grandkids soon. If you want, you can go to my facebook now and see really funny pictures of Ty eating in his highchair while he was asleep! So funny!