Terrific News Tuesday

So, how do you like to share good news? Do you like to just blurt it out all at once? Do you like to tease people and feed them little bits and pieces as you work your way to "the main event"? I like to be clever and string people along until they just can't stand it any longer, but normally I'm the one that can't stand it and I just yell it at the top of my lungs, kind of like this....

I AM GOING TO BE A GRANDMA!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, it's true. I am going to be a Grandma. My daughter Tresa and her husband Chris are expecting their first child and our first grandchild in September. I can't even begin to tell you how excited we all are.


It has been SOOOO hard not to tell you, but Tresa wanted to wait a little bit. She was at the doctor yesterday for her second check up and everything is looking good. Little baby was so active that the doctor called him/her a jumping bean. He/she also had hiccups and even put his/her little arms up over his/her head! Doesn't that just blow your mind when the little chipper isn't even two inches long yet?

Every Thursday Tresa sends us all an e-mail she receives from a baby website. It tells us what the baby is doing and how big it is and what is developing. It's just so amazing to read. In the beginning they compare the size of the baby to a common food...like a kidney bean or a prune. It does help you to visualize the size, but made it difficult to eat kidney beans one week. This week the baby is the size of a fig....so when we text or e-mail about the baby, we call him/her "the fig".

We had a bit of a scare last Monday when some guy driving way too fast during the morning rush hour tried to cross all of the lanes of traffic after getting on the expressway and slammed into the back of Tresa's car. She got an ambulance ride, an exam and an ultra sound and thank goodness everything was okay. We were so worried. She was on bed rest for a couple of days as a precaution.

Tresa being pregnant has brought back so many wonderful memories for me. I loved being pregnant...all three times. It was the most magical of times. What a wonderful year this is going to be.....we are so blessed.

Tresa asked us what we would like to be called. I have never really thought about that. If you are a grandma....what do your grandchildren call you?

How Does This Happen?

I was in the bathroom Tuesday morning putting on my make up. I had the radio on in my workshop and the news came on. I heard a familiar name mentioned....followed by....arrested for armed robbery!

The name they mentioned was a kid that my boys went to school with. They weren't friends with him, but he lived one street over from us for a while. Michael played soccer with his older brother. This boy was a year older than Matt, my youngest and he was always the tough guy. He was a bit of a bully....but armed robbery? Are you kidding me?

His mom was one of the nicest people you would ever want to meet! I grew up with her and her sister. I didn't know his dad or his dad's family very well, but they seemed like nice people. We all went to the same high school.

We were just talking at work about this very thing on Monday. I always wonder what happens along the way, to make kids turn out the way they do. These kids all go to the same schools. They all play together. Some play sports together and even hang out together. Yes, many of them experiment with alcohol and drugs...there are very few perfect kids out there as much as many parents would like to believe. Even the smart kids from stable homes do things they shouldn't be doing...but what happens that some of them outgrow that immaturity and bad decision making and others just don't?

I don't know what has happened to him or his family since the kids were in school, but my heart aches for them all.

Do you ever wonder "why" when you hear about stuff like this? They all start out beautiful and innocent. How does one become successful and another one becomes a felon? What path did their lives take that lead them to make that kind of decision? If something had been different in their life....would they be different? It makes me sad.

CHEE HOO!!!

When we got to Telluride, I noticed that Matt was wearing one of those plastic bracelets. I wear a blue one that says, "Believe" in honor of my Chicago Cubs and life in general. I wore a yellow "Live Strong" Lance Armstrong bracelet until it finally fell apart. The one Matt had on was red, green and yellow.

I asked him if I could see it and what it was for. On the outside it said, "Be the Best You!" and "Chee Hoo!!!" On the inside it said, "Make a difference".

Matt's best friend, Chris is also a grade school teacher. Like most teachers, he is always looking for ways to encourage and inspire his little learners. He made up the "Chee Hoo" to serve as their own little celebratory, happy cheer, like my "Woo Hoo" or "Yippee" or "Hip Hip Hooray". He had the bracelets made up and gave them out to the kids in his class.

Sometimes when he wants the kid's attention, he will yell, "CHEE" and the kids will yell back, "HOO!"

Somewhere along the line, they decided that it would be cool to get "CHEE HOO" to catch on outside of the classroom....so being the kid that I am....I offered to help them.

With my promise to spread "CHEE HOO" across the nation, I received my awesome, "CHEE HOO" bracelet!!

It was kind of funny because on the 4th we were sitting on Matt's front porch watching the fireworks and we kept hearing neighbors yelling, "CHEE HOO!!"

So my much used, "WOO HOO" has been shelved and replaced with, "CHEE HOO" in an attempt to spread the cheer and happiness for the children of Telluride!

CHEE HOO!!!

Happy Day

Happy Mother's Day to all. I hope it is a wonderful day for everyone! My little boy also turns 26 years old today. That is just so hard for me to believe! I have always said that if Matti had been my first...he would have been my only. :) It isn't that he was a terrible child...just a bit more challenging than the other two.

Irv was so excited when Matt was born, because after two blue eyed blonds, Matti had dark hair and brown eyes like his dad. The dark hair didn't last, but oh those pretty eyes.

Matt has always been smart and adventurous. There were no little boys in our neighborhood his age, so he always tried to tag along with Michael and his friends who were all three years older. A week before he turned four, he told us to take the training wheels off his bike because he couldn't keep up with the big kids when they rode on the dirt trails that ran through the empty lots in our neighborhood. We took them off and after a few really hard falls and a lot of angry tears, off he went as happy as could be!

We use to call Matti, Hector the Collector. He was the boy with the full pockets...and you never knew what you might find in them. He couldn't pass up anything he considered "cool", and it was all cool to Matt.

Matt loved soccer and baseball. He even tried some wrestling and played some basketball. It was fun to watch him doing tricks on his roller blades, and he just couldn't get enough of the great outdoors.

We had a four foot deep above ground pool and he loved it from the first time we put him in it. He would slap on a pair of goggles and jump in, swim to the bottom and bring up anything that had been tossed in.

Matti got his first stitches when he was little in a very delicate male area....he slid on his butt down a hill and met up with a stick that was firmly planted in the ground. The next stitches were in his forehead when he flipped over the handlebars of his bike and landed on his face. Have you ever seen how much a facial cut bleeds? Yikes!

He broke his wrist clean through at soccer practice one year. I was sitting in the car reading and the kids came running to get me. When I got to the field, the coach still had him laying on his belly on the field. The coach raised up Matti's sleeve very gently and there was his wrist at a 45 degree angle, only the angle wasn't at his wrist...it was a couple of inches above it. It was SOOOO gross!!

Matti's love for action and adventure has left him bruised, battered and scarred, but what fun he has and how happy he is!
High school was a little intense. It wasn't that he did anything different than my other two did...he just managed to always get caught! Isn't that right Matti? Short hair, long hair, bleached hair, dread locked hair, pierced ears, eyebrow, lip, tattoos...we've seen it all, but the boy inside never changed.

Matt is very opinionated, just like his mom. He has a difficult time allowing other people to have their own opinion when discussing something he is passionate about. He is right and they are wrong. He is learning though as I have learned...to allow each person to have their opinion...even if their opinion is WRONG!! HAHA!
Matt is an amazing teacher according to the parents of his students. His love of all people and of nature warms my heart. He is caring and compassionate and makes me so very proud. He takes such pride in everything he does and tries to make the world a better place for all. He is passionate about life.

His siblings call him a "tree hugger". He rides his bike to work every day rather than drive his car. He sent me what he called a "lame" card, but the selection was minimal in ones that weren't wrapped in plastic.

One of his very best friends is his beautiful border collie Luna. She accompanies him everywhere he goes, and that includes hiking, camping, rock climbing and snowboarding!

I know you are off climbing that 350 foot "rock" today Matti, but Happy 26th Birthday Baby Boy! I love and miss you so much!

Oh Baby, Baby, Baby

People look at me like I am crazy when I say I loved being pregnant, but it's true....I really did. It was just such an amazing feeling to know that there was a little life growing inside of me. I loved how it felt when they moved, when they had hiccups and when they would stretch out their little hand or foot or their little butt. I would be pregnant again in a second...if I wasn't already 57 years old!!

I had good pregnancies for the most part. I gained 35 pounds with Tresa, 40 with Michael and 45 with Matt...maybe it's good that I didn't have a fourth baby! Never had morning sickness...I refused! Lots a cravings for ice cream...or at least that's what I told Irv they were so he would go get me some!

Tresa was born when I was 22 years old. I was so ready. I had been around little kids my entire life. I loved kids. Tresa was little Miss Perfect. She was a happy, healthy little girl that we toted everywhere with us. If we went to friend's houses to play cards, she would bring her little blanket and when she got tired she would plunk down within sight of us and go to sleep. As a toddler she slept 12 hours a night and took a couple of good naps every day. She talked really early and had this very grown-up little voice that caused people's heads to turn in the store when she started talking. Tresa was the perfect little baby, but she sure didn't prepare me for what was next.

That was Michael! Oh the trouble that little guy gave me. I went into labor at 6 months and again at 7 months with him and ended up in the hospital overnight so they could stop labor. It's a darn good thing they did too. Michael was born with Hirschsprung's Disease. He had no nerve cells in his colon and to make it simple to comprehend...he couldn't poop! One emergency surgery, one colostomy, and two other surgeries and he was as good as new....well actually there is a heck of lot more to it than that and he has given me permission to write about it which I will do another time. It was the most frightening thing that has ever happened to me, and made me realize just how lucky we are when we have a healthy baby. With a sick baby that refuses to sleep in a bed, you turn into a zombie, even though it is mostly your fault for never letting the baby cry. You do get to know all of the late night tv shows and you walk around in a haze a lot, but I would do it again in an instant. He was a neat little kid!

Then came Matt.....hmmmmmmm....what can I say about Matt? The pregnancy was uneventful, and we and the entire hospital staff celebrated when he pooped for the first time! That meant no Hirschsprung's Disease for him. Matt was born able to run and ride a bike! Well that's an exaggeration, but he did ride a two wheeler without training wheels the week before he turned four. He told us to take the training wheels off because he couldn't keep up with Michael and his friends when they road through the trails between some of the houses with them on. We took them off, and after a number of crashes....he was gone and we never saw him again.! Another exaggeration of course. Matt was a terror on wheels. We only made a couple of trips to the ER for stitches and broken bones, but I always said that if he had been my first...he would have been my only.

For those of you that have kids, I'm sure you can relate. For those of you that don't but plan to...I hope I haven't frightened you.

Journals and Photo Albums for Kids

I am one of those people that believes in letting your children try a lot of different "things" when they are young....so that in doing so...they will find their hidden talents. Tresa played the clarinet, she was in the marching band, she played softball and she swam. Michael and Matt tried every sport imaginable.

I encouraged reading from a very young age. We belonged to a variety of book clubs. In fact, I have boxes of kid's books just waiting for the day I have grandchildren coming to visit so I can read to them! My daughter was a fluent reader before she entered school. The boys.....they could take it or leave it at that time. They were too busy trying to juggle a soccer ball or hit a home run.

Since I was always doing some kind of crafts, we always had art supplies in the house. The kids always made me "special" things. I have some of the most elaborate Christmas decorations you would ever want to see. There is nothing better than a special gift made by little hands.

My kids are all grown up now, but many of the things they were exposed to as children are still very important in their lives today. Matt still plays soccer and softball, and gets his workout hiking and rock climbing. Tresa loves to run, works out and does yoga. Michael played soccer through college, and has recently taken up running. Matt does most of the photography for our shop, still draws and loves to write poetry. Tresa has been thinking about taking some art classes. She and Michael are both very good writers. All three kids still love to read.

Knowing how important it is to expose kids to art at a young age is what inspired me to create some children's journals and photo albums. You just never know where that next little talented artist or photographer might be hiding.

The journals I made have blank pages and heavy cardstock covers. There is a cute picture on the front of each journal and some of them are decorated with buttons and brads. The journals are held together with eyelets and ribbon, and each one comes with a pencil, an eraser and a sharpener. The journal and all the "goodies" come in a handmade cloth drawstring bag.

The photo albums are made from a purchased album. I recovered the album with cardstock and decorated it as well. Each album comes with a disposable camera for some great picture taking. The album and camera also come with a handmade cloth draw string bag.

My kids would have loved these when they were little. I can just picture them toting their little bags all over with them.

I have additional kid's journals and photo albums available in my etsy shop. I also have two beautiful lined journals for the non-kids that love to write!