Mom's 60th Birthday - Nov 2, 2008

This is Mom's best picture for her bday. Because we surprised her she didn't have time to plan ahead & get her hair cut before we came. So she had it done the day after we left. Doesn't she look beautiful? She looks great for 60! Happy Bday Mom!

So my Mom turned 60 & we kids surprised her by showing up at her home on Halloween.

I want to be sure & post these to my blog so when I print all this for our family journal I will have a record of this. Mom's candles are in a pan of Apple Crisp. Yummy! Mom has never liked birthday cakes. Always something other than cake to celebrate her bday.

On her actual bday, our last day together that weekend, we took individual pictures with our bday Mom. It's been a long time since I've had a picture taken with my beautiful mother.

We went to this wonderful restaurant called Salty's at Redondo beach in Des Moines, WA. I surfed the internet & talked to Wenatchee people looking for recommendations. This was a keeper for sure. Would love to go there again. We wanted a seafood restaurant for Mom as she loves it. She can eat anything seafood (clams, oysters, shrimp, lobster). You name it she likes it. She said she really liked Saltys. We all had the same style three course meal. Some of us had steak and the others Salmon. We all ate way too much food but it was delicious. The Coconut Tiger Prawns the others had for appetizers looked really interesting. They said they were good.

When we first got to Saltys we went outside to take this picture. It was raining as we drove there. The clouds were black behind us & we thought this might be our only chance for an outside picture. It worked out perfectly. The rain stopped while we took the picture. I love this picture. If you could see the original the sky is amazing. But what's really amazing is how wonderful my family is. I'm so happy we could get together again & celebrate Mom's bday. Don't I have the most beautiful family?

This was the gift we presented to Mom while we were out to dinner. A book about our Mom. We each contributed photos of us individually with our Mom. We also wrote about memories of her. We each have our own page in the book. She loved it. It made her cry. Mom never cries so we thought it would be ok to give it to her at the restaurant. Turns out Ryan was right. He told us not to do it then, but us girls vetoed his decision and we did it anyway. In the end it all worked out fine. Mom had to wait until she got back home before she could really read it. We kids had a great time putting together our photos and memories. It was a great experience. Now this book will become part of her legacy. She was gracious enough to buy us kids copies of the book so we could have one too. The grandkids loved reading about their Ma-Kay & their parents memories of growing up with her. It will mean even more the older they get.

You can see that we have our desserts in front of us on the table. Dessert was fantastic. Some of us had this cake/mousse/thing with raspberry sauce & a couple of us had creme brulee. The later was incredible, the best I've ever had. A great finish to a fantastic meal.

Mom's dessert. Not a great picture of Mom. Doesn't do her justice. During dessert she had lots of pictures being taken including one from the restaurant. They were real great.

One of the many things we did during the quick weekend together was play Uno. I haven't played a game with my siblings since we were little. So it'd been about 20+ yrs. The funny thing about this picture is Ryan having to consult the game rules. Everyone but me plays card games a lot with their families & they all play a little differently based on the ages of their children. So since we are adults we really had to play by the "real" rules of the game. It was hilarious. You had to be there. Fun times. Ryan also tried to teach us how to play "Hearts". I still don't get it. I even went online recently to play online & see if I could get a better handle on it. Still don't get it! I'm the oldest sibling & the slowest when it comes to card games. Oh well.

We showed up on Mom's doorstep, rang the doorbell & said "trick or treat" in really weird voices. We said it over and over and over again. We knew if we said anything else she'd know it was us. I was laughing so hard under my sheet I didn't say anything. Ryan was saying enough for all of us. I thought the "Ghost of 1973" sign would give it away. But Mom was so surprised to even have trick or treaters that she claims she didn't see the sign. It's hard to explain her reaction. She left us all standing outside while she went to get some candy. Then we pushed Alysa inside & followed her in. That kind of freaked her out. The reason we did that is because JJ told us that's what kids do in Panguitch. If you leave your door open they just come in and sit down. Isn't that funny. We're not real sure Mom was surprised? She said she was??? Mother's intuition & Staci having not called Mom for her daily dose of motherly advice we think gave it away. We'll never know for sure. That's ok. We wanted to surprise her, we think we did & we'll leave it that way.

After we took the sheets off & exchanged hugs we put our sheets back on to pose for pictures. Mom with her five silly ghosts.

Alysa & JJ in the car next to Ryan, the ghost. We had a great car ride from SeaTac to Lacey. Fun times!

Staci was filming how silly we were in the car. I was driving. Ryan was the only one in his costume, at this point. We were laughing & Ryan was making silly jestures to cars passing us. It was Halloween after all so not that strange to have a ghost in our car. Staci how did the film turn out? We knew there were recording problems, but...?

We probably had more fun driving from the store there in Lacey to Mom & Dad's front door than we should have. I should have been pulled over for my driving. I went through the gate at Mom & Dad's at about 50 mph. I was afraid the gate was gonna close. Too funny for those of us in the car. These are great memories! We are so blessed to get a long so well & have so much fun when we are together.

Marnie's First 5K

So this posting is for my good friend, Lisa. She's the one that got me running. She's such an inspiration. Her first run was the half marathon in 2007 that I walked with my other good friend, Sheli & she ran it. She is still running. You go girl. I've been telling Lisa for months that I would post these & I've finally done it. So this first picture is the funniest one, where it looks like I'm gonna hurl. I was explaining to Lisa earlier that as my sister, Jennifer & I crossed the finished line I thought I was doing fine until she said "so how do you keep from throwing up?" This was my expression. And my sister-in-law captured it on camera to my surprise. I am happy to say that I didn't get sick even though the picture tells otherwise.

Hopefully my sister never says that again at the end of a race. Also, I learned not to sprint the last quarter mile at the end. Who's idea was that JJ? I think she started it & I couldn't let her win, of course. It's pretty funny to remember this experience months later.

So here's "MY FAMILY" that I'm still so proud of. We set a goal. We accomplished it. I can't wait to do it again & also again as a family. I understand that there's a 5K coming up the week of Thanksgiving here in Wenatchee. I haven't exercised much since this 5K in August. I've been a real slacker. I have committed to my good friend, Lisa, that I will run the 1/2 marathon next year in October 2009 in Leavenworth. So I've got to do lots of runs prior to, in order to work up to it. I do need to also acknowledge my brother, Ryan, who has continued to keep running since this occasion & also continues to inspire us all. To all those exercising, keeping healthy & possibly running, keep it up! We all inspire each other. "WE ARE FAMILY". That was our families song. I think of it often.

Austin & 6th Grade Camp

Back on the first week of October Austin & I got to attend 6th Grade Camp together. It was held at Tall Timbers a christian church campsite near Lake Wenatchee. It was beautiful there as you can see from these pictures. The weather held quite nicely. We got wet but not too bad. I was there once before when Whitney was in 6th grade so I knew what to expect only this time it was a little different being there with my son. We had a great time. Hope you enjoy the pictures.

This man (in the white shirt & hat) was real interesting. He spoke to the kids about trees and his job when he worked for Fish & Wildlife. He had a piece of petrified wood that was like 700 years old. It was real neat. He taught the kids to stay in school, work hard and stay out of trouble. He showed the kids how he could climb a tree several hundred feet up. Then he would pick the seeds out of the cones and use them to plant more. They loved to watch him do this even though he only climbed about 50 feet up. The boys loved it. He had some great stories to tell & the boys found it very interesting to think they could do this working for Fish & Wildlife.

This woman taught the kids about salmon & we saw several right there near the bank of the river. The cycle of salmon and how they swim all the way down stream to the ocean & then back again to the exact same spot is amazing. How do they know where they are going when they are swimming up stream? It's incredible to think about. This is something these kids have been taught for years. The school system here teaches them about salmon beginning in third grade. It's real interesting & they love it. It's not the extreme "save the salmon" talks don't misunderstand.

Here's Austin with his "group" at the dinner table. There is a cook here in this lodge & she has it really well organized. There's no messing with this lunch/dinner lady. The kids are kind of scared of her so they eat what she has prepared & follow her instructions to the "t". Dinner this night was homemade mac & cheese with pepperoni in it, Jello squares, scones & no dessert. Good thing since they knew we'd be eating lots of junk food later in our cabins. Breakfast the next morning was real good. Steel cut oatmeal that had been baked with add ins to liking, i.e. brown sugar, raisins, coconut, milk, pecans, etc. Real filling & very tasty.

Here are 4 of my 10 girls I was in charge of. Aren't they cutie pies! Good thing they aren't all 16. They are still sweet innocent fun loving girls. I think I was picking food out of my teeth there in the back of the picture. Oblivious to a picture being taking. So the funny part of this is that I guess Austin's teacher Mr. Birks knows me well. I was the only adult with these 10 girls. All the other groups were about 6-7 in size & had two adult women for each group. All the mom's and dad's thought it was amazing I could handle that many girls all by myself. Never mind the fact they were so well behaved except one mentally challenged girl in the group. But we all got along great. I fed them lots of sugar, we stayed up way past curfew & played games. I got thank you cards telling me how much fun they all had. I am so thankful for all the experience I've had in Young Womens. That's why it was so easy for me to take care of 10 by myself & I told anyone that who cared enough to ask how it was going. Mr. Birks at 12:30 am had to come to our cabin & tell us lights out. He laughed when he saw silly string everywhere & the girls having so much fun & I was still sane. He hated to have to tell us to go to bed. We had a full days schedule ahead of us though. So much fun!

Last picture. Mr. Buhler(sp?) Papa you probably know him? He grew up in Wenatchee. Now teaches school in Oregon. He juggled, lots of fun, silly, scarey things & last of all he ate fire. Then he taught one of the teachers how to do it too. Great fun. The kids also did skits. Somewhere there's a great picture of Austin doing his skit & laughing hysterically at something only he thought was funny. His laughter & smile is always so contagious. When I track down the picture I will share. I think Austin will always remember this fun experience. I know I still remember my 5th grade camp experience. Fun times I think I will always remember too. Glad I could do this with my kids.