Dylan's 13th Birthday

It is hard to believe Dylan is now 13 years old. His birthday was June 10th. I have been so busy with work and school, now's the first chance I've gotten to post about his big day. This year Dylan wanted a cookie cake. I ordered a double layer because I didn't want to miss out on the icing. Mrs. Field's knows how to make cookies. The cake was delicious. I didn't realize how big it was going to be, but we had James' mom, dad and cousins Linda and Dank to help us eat it.James' parents were in town for Dylan's birthday and watching his baseball game. James' cousins, Linda and Dank also came to watch him play. We were a very loud group. Everyone kept turning around and staring at the people who talked funny. LOL
For Dylan's birthday dinner, he chose to eat at Bandanna's. Notice the huge smile on James' face. This is his favorite restaurant, so he was happy Dylan chose it.

James' parents enjoyed our neighborhood yard sale. His dad bought items and tried to turn around and sell them again for profit. Didn't work out quite like he'd planned.


I took James' mom & cousin Linda to old Saint Charles. We visited all the shops and found the most amazing spice and mixes shop. The key lime pie cheese ball was delicious and caused us to spend way too much money. LOL

It was a great weekend celebrating Dylan's birthday, watching baseball and visiting with family.

Spring 2011

Well, last Sunday I spent all day creating my birthday present. It's the picture of the shutterfly album below. It holds eight years worth of memories. One thing I hate about the digital era is not having print outs of my pictures to put in photo albums. I have several albums of pictures ranging from my childhood to when we first moved to Florida. A couple of years ago I tried creating a couple of pages on a digital scrapbook & printing them off. The pictures were so dark! But while I was on my new favorite obsession, ancestry.com, I saw an advertisement for photo books from shutterfly. I had so much fun going through all the pictures and reliving the memories. While watching a video of my great grandmother's 100th birthday, as I looked for pictures to add, tears were pouring every time I heard her speak. Memories are great in your head, but there's just a little something extra special about looking through a picture album. It's set to arrive on Monday. I can't wait!





We have been super busy this spring. I'm currently half-way through my training to become a surgical technologist. Classes are time consuming, but I love my program. This spring I've been in a class where we do mock surgeries every week. I've participated in a breast biopsy, carpal tunnel release, lap chole, appendectomy and some others. While at SLU anatomy lab I was able to dissect a kidney and explain their function to a bunch of highschoolers. In August I start going out for clinicals in the hospitals. I can't wait!


A lot of my "free time" is spent at the baseball field this spring. Dylan is in his third season of baseball. After two years of being slaughtered EVERY game, it's nice to be on an undefeated team. I'm actually paying attention to the games this year! Of course, I do still talk to any girl sitting next to me, but I'm actually keeping track of runs and outs. Who am I? Maybe all along I just needed some wins to get me into baseball. Watching Dylan out there makes me have flashbacks of watching James play in college. He plays the same position and let's face it, he looks just like James. Dylan's usually one of the top scorers on the team & he's great at center field. He's hoping to play on the high school baseball team. One more year to prove he's got it for varsity!

Last night Austin's eighth grade class had a dance. On Thursday he told me about; nothing like last minute decisions! I encouraged him to go and even ask one of the neighbor girls to go as friends. Well, he decided to go, but didn't want to ask anyone. We went to our trusty Target to buy him a nice shirt & tie. The kid has outgrow EVERYTHING lately! Now we're shopping in the men's department! Came home with a nice shirt & tie. Thank God James got home that night to teach him how to tie it. Poor kid would of had to go find a neighbor dad to teach him how to tie a tie because I have no clue. Before he left for the dance I said, "Don't just stand in the corner. Ask girls to dance. You'll have more fun." At 10 pm I went to pick him up at school. He got into the car and was exhausted from dancing. I'm so glad he actually danced! My little boy is growing up. Before we know it he'll be driving, dating, going off to college... Can we freeze time, please.

Photo Book

Click here to view this photo book larger

December 2009

For Austin's 13th birthday we went to Cancun, Mexico. We had so much fun, but we didn't carry the camera & video camera around with us that much. I had lots of little videos from time in our room & a visit to Tulum. Finally, a year later, I've put them all together in a movie to remember our time there. My movie making skills are basic at best.

It's so funny to see how young Austin & Dylan were then compared to now. Austin's voice is much deeper now & he's a lot taller than me now too. I'm glad we have these videos to remember this time in our lives.

Just one month late, here's the video of Austin & Dylan's winter band concert.

It's hard to believe Dylan is 12 years old. I know I say it every year, but it's true. It makes me so sad to think of him growing older and one day moving out. Only six more years until college.

We started off Dylan's birthday by letting him unwrap his presents at 12:01 AM!!! Then we whipped him soundly (12 licks) and sent him off to bed. I awoke later (10 AM) to find him in the family room with his big rebounder already put together. We bought him a rebounder so that he could practice playing catch even with James out of town. Those of you who know me well, know that I don't play catch. I'm so afraid the ball will hit me that I end up closing my eyes which inevitably makes me get hit by the ball.

That night we took Dylan to Red Robin for dinner. After dinner, the neighbors came over to eat cake & ice cream. We also had fun playing Guesstures and Twister. The next day the boys had fun playing in the pool. Austin & Dylan had just recently watched the movie, "Fired Up". It's about two boys who join a cheerleading squad to get girls. Well, after watching all the cheerleading pyramids the boys were dying to try it out in the pool. It was hilarious to watch & they had a blast doing it.

If only I could read his mind.

Notice Buster licking Ryon's leg. I think he's trying to distract him!

A picture of the cutest dog ever!

Mother's Day 2010

Dylan is so sweet. For Mother's Day he made me breakfast. He made chocolate waffles. It was a receipe he found in a cookbook at the school library. They turned out great. It was like eating brownies for breakfast. What girl wouldn't love that?!