I have decided to help get me kicked started again with my weight loss and I have joined Jen over at One Mom's World in her Spring Operation Weight Off For Moms.


I have been overweight, it seems like most of my life. I have had periods where I have been in good shape but I feel like I have mostly been overweight. Since having my two children, I have gotten really overweight and have not taken it off. I am now trying to get myself back in shape so that I can enjoy my life with them. I want to be able to participate in all the fun summer activities without being so self concious.


I am determined to make this happen! I do not want to post my weight, but I am shooting to lose at least 50 pounds. I have weighed myself today and might post my weight at a later date but just can't do it today. I will take a picture and may also post at a later date. I wish I could be braver, but I am not there yet!


Good luck to all and let the games and encouragement begin!!!!!

Divine Mercy Sunday

Today is Divine Mercy Sunday and the conclusion of the Divine Mercy Novena. These past ten days have been very fruitful for me. It has been a week of quiet revelations that has brought me closer to my Lord. I pray that it has been the same for others.

We will go as a family to a special Divine Mercy Sunday mass at 3:00pm today. I hope it will be a beautiful service that will inspire my husband and children as well as myself! Jesus, I trust it Thee!

My Faithful Friend

This is my faithful friend, Chelsea. She has been my constant companion for fourteen years. She was my child before I had any. She was my friend and protector when I became single, and was out on my own again. She was there through the tears and through the happy times that followed.
She patiently waited when I met my husband and was gone more. She patiently waited when I was busy with my new babies. She was always just content to lay by my side and wait for the attention she knew would eventually come. She has never demanded anything from me. All she has ever wanted was just some of my time and attention.
On more than one occasion I have left her somewhere that was out of the ordinary. One of these times was at my father's house. My sister was going to take one of her children for a walk so she decided to take Chelsea with her. Chelsea went along for a few blocks, but suddenly realized that she was not where I left her. She stopped, turned around and took off running. My poor sister was so afraid that something would happen to her that she was yelling for her to stop and had to turn the stroller around and tried to catch up to her. When she made it back to the house, Chelsea was sitting at the door, just waiting; waiting for her master to come back and get her. This is not the only time she has done something like this. From the first day I got her, she was my dog; over time she became my child, my friend and my faithful companion.
It was fate that I was at the Vet that day and a man was there with a puppy who had been dumped at his house. His dogs didn't want her around so he was looking for a home for her. She was the sweetest looking little puppy so even though I all ready had two dogs, I took her home and have loved her ever since. She has always been smart and loyal and I do not know what I am going to do when she is no longer here with me. I will not think about that now, I will only love her and cherish her as long as I can.

Flowers in the Yard.

Just some pretty little flowers that are growing out in the yard. They caught my attention so I thought I would try to take real flower portraits of them. This is as good as it gets.
This one isn't bad, a little blurry. This one I thought turned out pretty good. It actually looks prettier in the picture then in the yard.

This is a dainty little flower that always looks so pretty.

Oh no, where did that come from! I guess I better stop blogging and start working out in the yard. The weeds are starting to look like flowers to me!

It did photograph well though, don't you think?

How things change!

When I was young, things were sure different then they are now. I lived in a quiet little neighborhood that was made up of families with children about my age. I must have had at least 5 or 6 kids that I could play with. I also had a brother a year older and a younger sister; the Grasshopper, three years younger than me. They too had several kids around their ages to play with.

I remember in the evenings we would play hide-n-go seek until after dark. We played dodge ball and football in the street after school as well as an occasional game of baseball or woofle ball. We rode bikes, went to each other's houses, and ran through sprinklers and all the fun things of youth.

But one thing we never did, at least at our house, was draw with chalk all over the sidewalks. We could do it at other houses, but not at ours! My father, who is a wonderful father and grandfater, is Dutch and a meticulous gardener. He always had our yard looking great. He would even plant rye grass so we could have green grass in the Winter! He just always liked things to look neat and tidy. So, he did not like the sidewalks covered in chalk, it was just one of those things that bothered him; sort of like finger nails on the chalk board. He was a wonderful father and let us get away with lots of things he just didn't want chalk all over the sidewalk.

So of course, it was much to my dismay and surprise, when I returned from the Divine Mercy Novena on Easter Sunday that I would arrive to this:

And this:

And this:

And this:

And this:

There was not one stretch of sidewalk in front of the house that was not covered with writing, drawings, hop scotches and the likes. Two of the culprits were still in the act! The funniest thing is that the father that raised me, aka "Papa" was sitting in the front yard with the fathers of these children and watched it happen! He had no problem with them doing this it at all! What happened in the few years (ha ha) since my youth that has brought about this change? Maybe it is called becoming a Grandparent twelve times, soon to be thirteen, that mellowed him.

I will say that he had my nephew wash the sidewalk off the next morning, so all was new again!

The Last of the Easter Pictures!

Here are a few more pictures from Easter that I just couldn't let go unpublished! Fantom the Wonder Dog who kept going back to the shade because it was a beautiful warm day!

Such determination! She was not going to let that little grasshopper get the best of her!

Oh if I could only do hair like the Grasshopper can! That hairdo is after playing hard all day and it still looks 1000 times better than what I can do!

One of way too many deserts at Grandma's house!

The table decorations at Grandma's house. Aren't they cute? Her and Aunt Weez made them!

That is one good looking plate! I think she only ate the deviled egg!

Big Jim, Little Jim and Aunt Weez hanging out!

Aunt Weez, Steve, Uncle Rick and my DH. Man his hair is getting a little thin in the back!

Mr. Katviper, because he said I better not!

Way to much loot for one little Boy!

Grandma, Katviper and Connie making fun of the boys who can't find the eggs!

My little one crawling under the chair to get to the egg under the table!

Taking a spin around the Easter festivities!

That should just about do it for Easter this year! We had a great time with everyone and thanks to Blogging I have pictures to prove it! It was a glorious Day of celebrating!

Hunt at Papa's House

After having lunch and a successful egg hunt at Grandma's house, we headed to Papa's house. When we got there we were met by an anxious group of egg hunters who had been patiently waiting for us. All the eggs had been stuffed, and were waiting to be hid. It was another long wait for these cute little Grasshopper Girls; who are now famous blog girls!

Once we got started, there was a lot more competition at this house! There was fierce competition to find one of the Money Eggs. Little Miss was off to a good start, but no money yet.

They searched all through Papa's miniature gardens. The guys had done a good job at hiding them in all categories; easy, medium and hard. That oldest Grasshopper was like an egg magnet. She was filling up that basket fast! And check out that tall hunter in the back ground who is able to snag them out of the swingset pipe!

My son was doing his best to talk the middle Grasshopper out of her money egg. I don't think he was successful.

Little Miss is starting to run out of steam. Egg hunting is hard work and that bucket was starting to get heavy.

Once they were done, all the egg hunting grandchildren got together for a picture. Even Fantom the Wonder Dog got in the action, because she is after all one of the granddogs.

My son didn't have to negotiate a money egg after all! He actually was able to snag two of them. Since the rule was only one money egg per person, he gave the one with the least amount of money to his little sister. What a guy!

The girls were excited to start checking out what was in all those eggs. Look at all of them! Hopefully the Easter Bunny put new toothbrushes and dental floss in their Easter baskets.

Speaking of the Easter Bunny, this one hung out all day with us.

And I had to end with this adorable picture. My daughter loves this picture of her and one of her favorite girl cousins! What beautiful girls they are!

We are so blessed to have most of our family here locally with us. Only my oldest brother and his family live out of state. We miss them being with us, especially on holidays. It was a very blessed day and we enjoyed it very much. But I was so glad that we all had the next day off so we could recover! Hallelujah!

Wordless Wednesday - Grasshopper Sisters

Happy WW! For other Wordless Wednesday posts go to 5minutesformom.com

Easter at Grandma's

After Mass we traveled to Grandma's House for her annual Easter Bonanza. Grandma always hosts Easter for my DH's side of the family. We always have great food and lots and lots of egg hunting. The kids also love all of Grandma's many many Easter Bunnies; not as many as her Santas, but it is getting close!

The kids almost had all the Easter Egg hunting to themselves this year. They were the only two "little ones" so they got lots and lots of eggs with little competition, except for themselves. Here my son is showing off his "two egg grab, behind the back, and threw the legs move." He got to show off his techniques because he didn't have to hurry!















My daughter is leisurely picking eggs from the flower pots as she enjoys a chat with the Rabbit Family. She became their friends so they gave up all the hiding spots for the eggs! She thanked them kindly and told them she would be back to share the spoils!

Oh No! They both spotted the orange egg just laying on the ground. This was probably the only time that there was any sort of competition!



My son then found this one among the old watering cans. The bag on top is another gift for one of the older kids. This family hides eggs and gifts! Each one will have a name on it so you don't pick one that isn't yours!

The kids favorite thing was probably the Crayola Color Wonder Sets. My son got a Cars one and my daughter got a Disney Princess one. These kept them entertained for quite awhile and kept ink off their clothes and hands. What a great idea those were.

We weren't quite sure why our daughter decided to hang out under the table. Maybe it was to get some shade from the beautiful day that we had. It was unseasonably warm but we all enjoyed the day and each other.

It was another great Easter at Grandma's House!

Happy Anniversay!

Happy 14th Anniversary Uncle Bob! We all would like to wish our favorite Uncle Bob Happy Anniversary! It is the 14th Anniversary of his 39th Birthday! He is a wonderful Uncle and an all around great guy.
We wish you many many more anniversaries in health and happiness!

Easter Morning

Easter morning started bright and early. We planned on going to 8:30 am Mass because we had two different Grandparents to go to. And of course, Little Missy is always the first one to wake up!

After checking out what the Easter Bunny brought her, she went and woke up her poor brother. Little Mister likes to sleep in but when he heard the Easter Bunny had been here, he got out of bed as quickly as a sleepy head can.

He was excited about his Peeps. I don't understand why he wanted Peeps. I can only guess it is because Grandma Barbara would give him the ones she got from the food give-away. Whatever the reason, he was happy!

We took pictures of them in their Easter Outfits before church. I wanted to make sure I got them before they had a chance to get all dirty and messed up. It was off to church to celebrate the Resurrection of Our Lord! Of course we had to make sure we left early or otherwise we would not get a seat. Luckily we did, and we were able to sit as a family with Papa, Uncle Bob and my sister's family. It was a great beginning to a crazy day!

Easter Sunday

He is Risen! Alleluia! Alleluia!