Brothers and Sister

So, the kiddos spent the weekend with my mom this last weekend, and as a fun craft she made tye dye shirts with them. They came out very very cute, and after they were all done my mom took this pic. It is so hard to get all three of them together where they arn't either upset, screaming, or trying to run away, so a pic like this is priceless. Thanks mom!! :-)

Whats New Here?

Well, not much actually. Alex is taking swimming lessons for the next few weeks. He had his first one this past sunday and did very well. He was really shy and a little scared at first, but after a little while he warmed up to the teacher and really tried hard to do what the teacher was asking him to do. As a treat afterward I took him to 7-11 and got him a slurpee and some gummy bears, which he greatly enjoyed. Other than that, there is little else going on around. I guess I just wanted to post to let everyone know we are still alive. LOL. Of course the calm will soon end as Collin's b-day is coming up in August (as well as mine, but we won't say anything about that. :-P ).

Oh, I did want to pass along a recommendation. If anyone one out there is interested in natural and alternative medicine and hollistic living, I just recently found a pretty cool website/blog called http://www.healthyfellow.com/. It is updated pretty regularly with information about everything from medical treatments, to hair and skin care, to nutrition and all sorts of other interesting topics. In general there is just a lot of stuff about keeping your mind and body healthy, and I have really enjoyed reading through the posts. Just thought I would pass that along, if anyone was curious about that kind of stuff. :-)

And well, next time I post hopefully it will be more exciting. LOL. :-)

Can we say busy!!!?

Ok, so this is backwards,but for some reason it always puts the pics before what I write, no matter where I put the cursur, so just read below first. LOL.


A pic taken by my Grandma Ballard. Mackenzie was covered in cake, but she was one happy girl!

My whole family that was there. From left to right, me, my cousin Olivia, Grandma Ballard (my dad's mom), Uncle Curtis, Aunt Donna (my dad's sister), Sarah (My new sis in law!), my Brother Tom, my mom, my uncle (mom's brother), my step-mom Rhonda, and my dad.

A pic of me and Timm and Sarah and Tom. Timm looks good in this pic (though that may be because he was actually just smiling and not making a funny face or doing something stupid, LOL, love you honey!). I on the otherhand look fat, I think I am slouching in the pic or something cause I swear I really did look a lot better that day. Plus, I started out the day in Stilleto heals that looked great, but they don't work too well in grass, so they were ditched....Anyway, enough complaining about myself.

Ok, so yes, I am still alive. We have just been incredibly busy I feel like I have been running ragged the last few weeks. We have been preparing our house and yard for my brother's wedding, which was on the 4th. We dug new flowerbeds, mulched our brains out, built a new deck after tearing the old one down, and weeded/mowed/and trimmed everything a million times. :-) But in the end it was all completely worth it. The ceremony was on saturday and it was beautiful. I was blessed enough that my brother asked me to officiate the wedding, why you ask?? Well, I think it started as a joke "hey, YOU could so the wedding!" Ha ha, laughs all around. Well then it got me thinking, I wonder if I could? So I went online, and within a few short minutes I was ordained and sent all my paperwork into the State of West Virginia with $25, and a week later I had a license to perform marriages in WV!! So, I ended up doing it. It really was fantastic, everyone had a great time. We got to see family we haven't seen in a long time, hang out with old friends, had a ton of great food, and set off fireworks.

I think what was the most wonderful part for me though was that my brother is one of the most important people in my life. It almost chokes me up thinking about how much he really means to me. Since I was a little kid he has been my best friend, and besides my husband, he is my best friend. He is the kindest, sweetest, most loyal man, with a crazy sense of humor and a dork after my own heart. So, to see him so truely happy made me so happy I almost started crying during the ceremony. All I can say is that I wish him all the luck in the world, a marriage is a difficult thing and the road can be bumpy, but if you keep your partner close to your heart and in your mind at all times and you work through it together, it can be the most life altering thing (other than having children). I love you Bro!!