Hello blog...

I have missed you!
My happy place....the one place I haven't been able to get to lately!

Kate is home!!! YEAH!!!
She is doing so well with the surgery, she is in less pain then she has been in
for a good 5 years. It is amazing how the smile is back on her face, the laughter
is back and I feel like Kate is back! Pain is an awful thing to live with day in and
day out. It really can make you a different person. So Glad to see this working!
She is walking with her walker still, but the range of motion is really improving
daily. She does her exercises every day. GO Kate GO!

We have lost a wonderful young man...and that is the sad news. Eric Stillings,
our 22 year old nephew took his own life last Thursday morning. We are so very
sad about this. He was a special guy, we had some great times with him. Christmas 07'
he spent many days with us playing guitar hero with Josh and hanging out.
Eric was a little loss in life, and needed to find his way. I hate the fact that he choose the
path he did and left this world. I hope that this loss will help those he left behind find better
paths. I hope families will heal and relationships will be restored. No one should die this young, but it is an awful feeling to feel this is the only way to be at peace.

We need to be more caring and sensitive to one another. This age of "me" generation, we tend to forget about the other people in our lives. We forget to take the time to be a friend. Everyone is so busy going in their own direction. Everyone has expectations of how you should be. Make sure you are doing what makes you happy!! Make sure you talk things out to someone, find someone that will listen....don't hold things in!!! So many emotions running thru me right now. It is so true that when someone passes you have so much to say to them. Say it to them NOW!! Don't wait. It will really be too late then.

It has opened some new doors that I was not quite ready to open with Josh. Not only dealing with death, but dealing with someone being so sad they take their own life. I am so glad that Josh has no idea how someone could be that sad. He only remembers laughing and having fun with Eric, that is a great memory. I did have a great opportunity to talk to Josh about no matter how sad or upset he is , he can always talk to me or Kate. We are taking Josh to the memorial service next week, he wants to go and be there with us. I asked him why he wanted to go...and he replied " I liked him" , it was that simple to him. We talked about how people will be sad, but it is also a celebration of Eric's life too. In which he responded.. "But there won't be clapping will there?" He has been to one memorial service before for a family friend, so he knows what to expect. He is an amazing boy.

Football season, being a coach for the first time, managing the concessions, running my online store and getting ready for our August retreat for S.A.V.E. are just a few of the other things keeping me from my happy spot. But I know it is here and I will visit it more and more as the days settle around here. Thanks to anyone still reading or checking in, Wednesday giveaways will be back in September!! If you have a minute in your day give a thought or a prayer to Eric's family and friends to have the strength and courage to get thru this tragedy.

Eric we will miss you.

Sometimes you need a little chuckle...

Got this in my email box today from a friend. Have to admit it made me chuckle a little.

Totally exhausted, feel like my feet don't even touch the ground in the morning and I am off running. Did get me some spanking new sneakers today, need to look spiffy for my new coaching position this year!!
I am the FIRST ever woman coach for the football organization, it is about time I would say!!
I will be leading our special teams, which is exciting because this is the first year we get to have special teams. Also the offensive coach has told me he would like to start Josh as QB this year. Josh is really excited about that and wants to really do well! I have been really talking to him about leadership and having to be loud on his counts. Should be a good confidence booster for him. So off to the hospital to see Kate, she did Steps today, 5 of them!!! Wahooooooo! I am so very proud of her and how hard she is working and smiling everyday. They have her scheduled to be released on Friday if everything keeps going well. Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers!! zooooooooooooooommmmmmmm!

10 years .....

ago today I got to marry my best friend.

We might not have been at a romantic restaurant, or had some great alone time, but we still celebrated being together.

We had Lee's Hoagies in a hospital room, Kate, Josh and myself. We were still together, and Kate is really working thru this joint replacement with flying colors. She walked half the way back to her room today from therapy....she knows that there is some wonderful stuff on the other side of all this and she can't wait to be able to walk pain free!! Keep good thoughts coming, hopefully she will be home in a week!!

Thanks everyone for your words of wisdom, support and humor. I really have a smorgasbord of great friends, and every time when I need them, they are there. Just when someone is trying to bring me down, I have alot of hands there to lift me up. Sometimes you just need to know that the net is there.

So I did alot of thinking last night, since sleep wasn't winning....and I know that I would miss what I am doing too much. I know that I will probably never become a millionaire doing what I do, but I know there is alot more reasons I do it. So I did some writing and planning over the last hours and have some new focus, new ideas and new approaches to making things happen.

I need to learn to shed some baggage in my life, I need to just let go of some stuff and remind myself more each day all the good there is. I KNOW all this, it is just making it my own. It is good to have next week to unclutter things, and get some things in order. I love hitting bottom only to find out it is rubber and bouncing back is not so hard!!

And sometimes you just have to close your eyes and PUNT!

So here is to another 10 great years with my Best friend, I hope everyone celebrates the ones they love and that love them today.....those are who matter!

Well.....

Today Josh and I went to visit Kate and she seems in high spirits.
I know she is in alot of pain, and she is trying to work through it.
I know she will.
Josh and I miss her, it is hard to not have 1/3 of your family at home.
I don't sleep so well when she isn't home.
Josh sleeps just fine!
Can't wait till Kate isn't in pain anymore because of her knees, it has been
a long road with the pain.
Today she walked 7 feet on her own! Not even 24 hours after surgery.

All this alone time gives me alot of time to think, it is very quiet here.
Thinking is not always a good thing.
Evaluating things, thinking if I am going in a direction I want to continue.
Knowing life is good no matter how much it hurts in some areas some days.

Questioning if I want to continue in the Scrapbooking Industry.
Do I want to pursue new things.
Is all the work worth it.
Wondering if I would miss it.

I know I am exhausted right now, knowing I should not make any major decisions.
I won't. But will continue to think about everything.

Loving spending alot of time with Josh, even through the "Have to be the Mom" moments.
Love watching him "get it" when we have talks about life , present and future.
He told me he wants to go to Layafette College today, he has really enjoyed Football camp this week, I think we might be going to some home games this year, it is a beautiful campus....and nice and close to home.

Hope to get some rest soon.

Football season is coming!
I am excited to be coaching this year.
It will be great to work with the boys.
I can't wait to get on the field.

Life is good, thru it all, Life is good.
Hope to be back to blogging again soon, I am so glad to have this space to give it all up to.

July 7-16

ok so this is how life moves.

Time flies.

Vacation to ...

Wrestling camp with 4 friends all week. Remember I am used to having 1 boy!

Wrestling tournament

Football Camp

Running a busy online store

40 days out from the August Retreat

Kate's surgery today

ETA....Kate is out of surgery with two new knees!!! She is looking good and resting. Tomorrow she gets to take them for thier first test run. It was a little stressful of a day, but glad she is ok.

So what gets left off the list....my blog, my happy place. I have missed this ole spot. But I will be back, with so much to share. So that is where it is at. Thank you to all that have reached out to me over the past couple weeks, I got the sweetest email the other day from a dear, dear friend and she just will never know how much that meant to me, sometimes you forget that there are people that truly care about you.

So until next week when I will have a few minutes to sit down and visit all those things buzzing around in my head....

Home!

I want this for Dinner tonight!
Yep we are home.

Exhausted!

I got a nasty head cold in Seattle and it is kicking my ass now!

Really should take a picture of the luggage still sitting in the Dining room.

So if an airline charges you $25.00 for your bag of luggage, don't you think

they should remember to put it on the plane, and not leave it in Phoenix??

I miss Alaska!

Only gained 2 pounds, extra boxing tomorrow.

Wanted to take our head waitress home with us, she was da bomb!

Ok off to take 5 boys to wrestling camp each day this week.

Hope this head cold goes away really quick!!

Still absorbing the past 2 weeks, I hope my words can do it justice.

Happy 4th!

He looked so handsome, but fell asleep at dinner, this was the beginning of him getting sick. Poor little guy, but he did look so cute!
This is our view from the Space Needle, WOW that is high up there! Mom even made the trip up with us.
This was our dog sled ride, it was amazing seeing these dogs work. I wasn't so sure how I felt about dogs working this hard, but I have to say, these dogs want to run, want to pull. They get so very excited, it is really amazing to see.
Josh conquering the rock wall on the ship. Very cool!

My Picture of the day from Seattle!! Just loved this shot!

So we are about to watch fireworks from our hotel. We have a perfect view from what we are told. We have one more day we will spend in Seattle tomorrow and then we leave to start our flights home in the late afternoon. We are going to pack in a few things in the morning and visit Pike's Market also. We are going to take a water taxi across the bay tomorrow too. I haven't done that since I was in Hong Kong.

This vacation, has been so much, so much I can't even put into words yet. The pictures don't even tell the story. I hope to scrapbook this, I know this trip will always be in my heart, and I would LOVE to do this again. There are so many things to see here, you could never do it just once. Alaska will be one of those places for me.

Oh Canada!

We are in Canada cruising down some water, it is another beautiful day! Just wanted to check in quick and let you know that this BEAR did not get us, altho we were that close!!! This was on one of our excursions in Icy Strait Point. We took a tram into the rain forest, the trip $53.00 the experience PRICELESS!! There were people that payed hundreds of dollars to go bear watching that didn't get to see what we saw! I have emails from them to send them these pictures, because they had to look thru binoculars to see thier bears. There is a cub also in these pictures, I will share later. Oh yeah and that is me on the ZIP LINE! WAHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! That was just an amazing experience as well. Just truly and amazing trip, and something I will never forget. Josh did get sick on day 5 the night we were cruising to Ketchican and I spent that day in the cabin with him, he still wasn't himself yesterday, we did get out to swim in the pool for a little bit, but back in the cabin. Today he is much better, we have been hanging out playing bingo, billiards and miniature golf. That is a trip on the 13th deck of a cruising Ship!!!

So tomorrow early we dock in Canada and start our trek to Seattle. We are missing our puppies something awlful and it has been amazing, but home will be a welcome site too!!!

Hope everyone has a great 4th!!