Lincoln City ~ Day 3 ~ Family Photos

It is so rare that we see our extended family that I wanted to take the opportunity to take some family photos.



There were 6 kids in my Mom's family. My Aunt Linda, who passed away 5 years ago this September, was the youngest.  My Uncle Butch (George) is the oldest.  My mom was 4th.  Uncle Butch looks JUST like my grandfather.  Really, the resemblance at this age is startling.  His only child is Dennis, pictured on the right and his "significant other" (of approximately 25 years...I'm guessing) is Marcia.  We consider her family.

My Uncle was the volunteer of the year for OroValley, AZ last year.  He has volunteered for the police force for years.



Uncle Buch and Marcia (pronounced Marsha).



The Royer family.  My Grandfather's side of the family is French, (from Callais, France).  My Mom is 1/2 French and my Grandfather is responsible for the nose that you see repeated in this photo.  We call it the "Royer nose."  Apparently it's a dominant gene.  It's even more prominent in profile. :)



I love this photo of my Mom. She looks so happy...she really loves her brother and is so happy when they are together.



A great photo of Mom and Mike.



Mike's family.  We were trying to get through these quickly (the children were not excited about this exercise at all and it was COLD) and so sadly, I didn't notice that Michelle was positioned funny in the photo until after we were inside and looking at them on the camera.













I love this photo of Mom and the grandkids.  I had to do some photoediting to get it though because what I didn't notice until later was that one of the Grandkids had to go to the bathroom.  And you could tell in EVERY photo....



Exhibit A of why I could never be a professional phototrapher.

And Kaitlin insisted on holding her imaginary baby.



I love this photo of Mike and Michelle.



At this point, as evidenced by my hair, it had started raining.



So while I'm not crazy about how I look in them, they are still nice to have.



Can you tell that Andrew is all done with pictures?



Sweet Matthew was game for one more.



I didn't get a good family photo as it was raining and by that point the kids were toast.  But it wasn't a problem as we went back and did professional photos at the beginning of this month which turned out great.

I actually have more photos that I wanted to post from this day of our relaxing afternoon and some beach fun.  But they'll have to wait for the next post.

Lincoln City ~ Day 2

I didn't take a lot of pictures (by my standards) at the beach this time.  There were a few days that I took quite a few, but when we were at the house I just spent a lot of time in the moment, enjoying the day.

Dan picked up the camera and snapped this one of me while I was reading one afternoon during "cocktail hour" which ended up being at around 5pm daily.  I was sipping a Lemon drop, reading a book, and enjoying the view and the sunshine.  A little piece of heaven.  It makes me think about how I need to carve out more moments like that.  It is so good for the soul & restorative.



We decided it might be fun to do a late celebration of Mom's birthday at the beach since we'd all be together.  So we had a steak dinner, and I made strawberry shortcake for dessert.  Simple, but fun.  The children ate at another table/kitchen bar nearby so they aren't in the photo.  I think we all loved the dinner arrangements!

Sunglasses were necessary at the table from the sun setting on that side of the house.  No complaints, we'll take sunshine any way we can get it!



We ate very well on our vacation, considering each meal was for 16 people.  We rotated responsibility for dinner so that no one was overly burdened and it worked great.  We have some good cooks in our family and dinner was something to look forward to.  Dan gained 12 lbs on our trip!  (And has since lost it).



Happy Birthday, Mom!!



Nana and her grand kids + Grand niece and nephew.  Noah was happy, he is just going through a bit of a phase with the camera after a not so great experience with school pictures.  It's so unfortunate as he has such a great smile and he was so joyful this trip.  This isn't representative at all of how he was on vacation.



Mom said one of her favorite parts of our trip was her birthday gift, which sadly, I can't share as we are giving Winnie the same thing for her birthday and she reads my blog!  :)  Don't want to ruin the surprise!

I have some great shots of Mom's expression opening the gift.  And would you believe those are all the photos I took on this day?  I think that's a beach non-picture taking record for me!  It was really nice just to soak in my time and relax.  A really great start to the week.

Mother's Day 2013

I love being a Mom.

I always wanted to be a Mom and it's one of my greatest joys in life.  I'm so grateful for the opportunity to mother these sweet children whom I was entrusted with.  Each of them challenges me & blesses me in a different way.  I love each of them uniquely & completely.  God gave me the perfect kids.  They aren't perfect.  But they're perfect for me.  I often just look at them and say a prayer of thanks for them.

~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ .

Our Mother's Day this year was very low key.

 

Dan was away with Matthew for a K2 Live retreat.  I took Andrew and Kaitlin and we went to Richland to do Mom's community garage sale. 

The kids did a lemonade stand and also spent time with Grammie/Grandpa.  So it worked great.  We had Dan's mom & Dad over in the evening for dinner & S'More's and to celebrate mother's day with them.



Winnie always has lots of pretty, potted colorful plantings so we bought her a plant in a colorful pot (that Kaitlin picked out).



 

First S'Mores of the season! The kids loooove to do this.

 

 

They had baths and then went back out to sit by the fire again.

 

Kaitlin and Andrew wanted to sleep on the floor together.  When I went  in to check on them they were so cute.  Love how Andrew is clutching his bunny, Henry.

On Mother's Day morning, Andrew and Kaitlin brought us muffins in bed on napkins.  It was precious.

We gave Nana her cards & a gift....

 



Which was a little flower charm for her bracelet.  Because Nana likes jewelry.  And flowers.  And Nana doesn't really need anything, and so we gave her a bracelet that we could buy charms for a while back so that we'd have gift ideas for her!  We're crafty like that.  She loved it, so it works out great.



Mom surprised me with a Vera Bradley tote and wallet that I loved.

We snapped a couple of quick pictures and then we headed out for breakfast before leaving town.



 

We headed home.  Dan prepared a nice dinner for me, and we just had a quiet day at home.  I think one of the sweetest moments was when I went to read to Matthew on my bed that evening.  He was laying with his head on me while I was reading and I noticed his breathing had changed...he had fallen asleep.

 

Dan walked by as I was sitting and just watching Matthew's sweet face.  I asked him to take a photo.  It was hard to wake him and take him to bed (Dan actually picked him up and carried him)...it isn't often that this happens anymore and it was just a sweet way to end the day.

Easter Traditions

(I can't believe that it is June 1 and I'm posting about EASTER!)

It is our tradition to dye eggs the day before Easter, after the Easter Egg hunt.  On this particular day, my mom was heading to New Orleans with some friends and so I drove them to the airport prior to decorating eggs.  I have to include their photo because they are so cute and funny together.  I have to say, I enjoy hanging out with them too!

 

Patti is in the middle ~ she is a teacher and was part of Mom's original grief group. Gail is on the far right and she works with Mom.  She was invited to join the grief group (they still meet on mondays for dinner) after the first year was over and they continued to meet on their own.

Their personalities are really fun and Dan said they remind him of a group of teenage girls they are just always laughing, telling stories and having fun.  You wouldn't believe some of the adventures they have traveling!  They are all widowed and I am so glad that my mom has friends like these that she enjoys.  She doesn't sit at home feeling lonely.  Though she misses Dad, she is out traveling and having fun and I am really proud of her.  

While the kids were waiting for me to get things ready they played outside with a hammer, nails, wood and yes, I do believe a saw (gasp).  I've come a long way from my early over-protective days of parenting.




And I included a comprehensive safety talk which was comprised of me opening the back door and calling out, "Be Careful!"

After all, things can be sewn back in place, right?



They had a BALL.

Matthew is a builder at heart.  He has been building since he had the motor skills to do it.  It is his passion and clearly where we need to find opportunities for him to explore.  On this day, he built this little stand for his mini figures.....



My little engineer....



Then it was time to decorate eggs!



I love to get in on the fun too.

We did 12 last year and it simply wasn't enough.  So we did 18 this year!  Andrew and Dan love to eat them, so they are gone in no time.



Matthew and his bunny egg that he created with a wax crayon.



We've lost many an egg to Andrew's little hands during this tradition.  But I'm proud to say this year he didn't break a single one!  In fact, I think it was me who broke one!



I love this picture of Kitti.  Crafting is SERIOUS business!  The kids were all so self sufficient this year! And the Bug LOVED this.



Her little hands were covered in dye (who needs to use a spoon when you have hands?!) and I was glad I had little white gloves ready for Easter Sunday.



Long after the boys finished, Kaitlin sat at the table quietly embellishing the eggs.  She loves to craft and was busy for quite a while.  After all, if a little is good, more is better! 



Examining her next empty canvas.



Tada!

Our next tradition are Resurrection rolls.  I love how this brings the resurrection story to life for the kids.  A marshmallow dipped in butter, sugar/cinnamon is wrapped inside of a crescent roll.  (Just as Jesus' body was prepared with spices and placed in a tomb). 





The wrapping part can be a little hard.



Some looked more like squashed balls, but it's all about the process.



The most important part is getting the sides sealed so marshmallow doesn't ooze all over.

After they are baked, and bitten into ~ the marshmallow is gone!!

He is risen!

Meanwhile, Dan made an A-M-A-Z-I-N-G stuffed cabbage.



It was sooooo good.  This was right before it went on the grill.  It has chicken italian sausage, bacon, cheese, sauted red onion and homemade BBQ sauce.



That night, as I was getting ready for Easter.  Matthew folded some cute little origami bunny napkins.  We tried to do it with the cloth ones, but couldn't get it to work.  He did manage it with these.

 

He is an origami master of sorts.  :)  It's fun to include the kids with the holiday preparations.  They went to bed VERY excited for Easter the next day!