Uncle TJ & Aunt Kaya

My brother, Dryden, and my sister, Makayla, have always been very close with my kids. They spend a lot of time over at my house, since they only live about 5 minutes away, and my kids loving having them over to play!


Alyssa (7 months), Makayla (4), Easter 2008.

Dryden (12), Rylan (5 months).

Like Mother, Like Daughter.

My Mom and I have always been VERY close. She really is my best friend. I'm very lucky to have a mother like her, who never gave up on me, and who still doesn't. I appreciate her more than she realizes. We're so much alike. I ordered a sign online last week that reads, "Mirror, mirror on the wall, I am my mother afterall." And that is so true. Now that I'm a mother, I see myself becoming more and more like her everyday. We look alike, talk alike, have the same sense of humour, even our mannerisms are the same. This picture shows that. We're both adjusting our sunglasses the exact same way as Dad snapped this picture from vacation a couple of years ago.



Basically, all this to say, I love you Mom. Happy Mother's Day!!

Rollercoasters.

I was going through some older pictures on my computer this morning, and I came across some from a family vacation I took with my parents a couple of years ago. We went to Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee and they have some AMAZING rollercoasters. Since I was a kid, Dad and I have made it a tradition to go on every rollercoaster we came upon. I've never felt so alive as I do taking a straight down dive for a couple hundred feet. This is one of my favourite pictures of Dad and I..

Fond Memories.

I was thinking today about Puppy (my grandfather). He passed away when I was 13. He was known for his funny, and usually senseless, rhymes, poems, and stories. One in particular that I remember more than the others is this one that he taught me as a kid..

One bright day in the middle of the night,
two dead boys got up to fight.
Back to back they faced each other,
drew their swords and shot each other.
Two deaf policemen, hearing the noise,
got up and shot the two dead boys.
If you don't believe this story is true,
go ask the blind man.
He saw it too.

This was one of many and to this day the family laughs and jokes as we recite the poems he passed down to us. Everyone in the community remembers him fondly, I'm sure he didn't have an enemy in the world. RIP Puppy.

I wanna do it by myself!

Rylan's hit that stage where he doesn't want any help. Especially with eating. The last couple of days he's been refusing to let me feed him anything, which pretty much limited him to finger foods. So, I decided it was time for him to try using a spoon for himself. We were having brocolli and rice casserole. I didn't think he could make too much mess with that. Wrong.

The before.. Hmm, what do I do with that?..


Like this Mommy?



Aha!


Hands are easier =)


Mmm, brocolli!