My memory...it's a going!

It's amazing how I forget certain things!  Like my PIN (but don't worry, we're not revisiting that really).  In all the posting about Daynah's graduation and graduations in general, I forgot to mention that this year is a milestone year for me in regard to graduations.  I graduated from high school 15 years ago!  It's kind of hard to believe, but it is true.  And do you know how I came to this realization?  I'm sure you really want to know (although, I have to warn you, sometimes it is scary to learn how my mind works).  I was driving in my car, flipping through my button that tells me mileage, miles per gallon, temperature, and oil level.  When I got to the one that says I have almost 103,000 miles on my car, I remembered the conversation I had with my mom this weekend where she informed me that she has about 118,000 miles on her car.  She is looking to buy a new car soon because hers is OLD.  But I couldn't remember how old.  I was convinced it was 13 years, so I started thinking about when she got her car.  And I realized she got it the year I graduated from college (because I got her old car).  And then I did the math.  And I realized that it was 15 years.  And then I said, "Oh my gosh, I graduated from high school 15 years ago!"  And then I got sad for two reasons.  If I think mom's car is OLD, that means I am OLD.  And also because I realized that my car is 10 years younger than hers and has almost the same amount of miles.  And that is how my mind works...sometimes...

Random Pictures

Here are some random pictures of Josh.  Artistic pictures,  if you want to call them that.  Either way, it was just some of the fun I had while my family while they were here.

Here is a picture of Josh and I from Daynah's 8th grade graduation.  It is one of my favorite pictures of us, even if it is a little outdated now.  And even if he has grown a few feet since then.

And if you want the evidence, here it is.  I'd like to say I shrunk, but I would be lying.  Josh did try to make me feel better by telling me that I probably grew a little bit in his almost fourteen years of life.  I couldn't really convince him that I was "fully grown" at the age of 19 when he was born.  But thanks for trying to make me feel better!

Graduation--a week late

I'm a little late posting these pictures, but I've been spending time with the family. I am still in a bit of denial that Daynah has graduated. It seems like just yesterday that I received the call from Dad and Amy that they were pregnant. I still remember it. I was so excited to be a big sister. Here are a few pictures of those times of being a big sister:

And then she grew up!  And I couldn't give her piggy back rides any longer.  And then she kept growing.  And growing.  And growing.  You get the point.  :)  And now she is a high school graduate.  Yikes!  Here is a picture of her class.  My camera didn't take very good pictures, so this is the only one I took.  Can you find Daynah?

Here is a picture of the two of us, with her still in her gown:

Here we are at her party.  Notice I'm a little bit taller?  I was on my tip toes!

And here I am with my two younger (but obviously taller) siblings (and now I am not on my tiptoes):

I didn't get to see much of Josh the week they were here because he was spending time with friends.  But I saw him all day on Sunday.  And I cried when I left that night.  He walked me to my car, to make sure the "burglars" didn't get me, opened my car door for me, and then just stood and chatted with me for a few minutes.   Man, do I miss that kid!

So, Daynah, the graduate.  I am so excited to see what she will make of herself in the next couple of years.  I can look back on that graduation year and think about all the things I didn't know!  But also all the fun memories I made in the next couple of years.  And as I am typing this now, I'm realizing that I would have been on a cruise (my graduation present to myself) right about now.  Like I said, fun times, fun memories.  And it all seems like a lifetime ago.  I hope that Daynah cherishes these times and realizes the memories she can make in the coming years.

Happy Mother's Day, Mom!

Silly or sentimental?  That's always the choice when picking out Mother's Day cards or Birthday cards for Mom.  I never know.  Some years I have done both because I couldn't decide!  We'll just have to see where this post takes me, because I am flying by the seat of my pants today!  Dangerous, I know.  Maybe I should have had a 3 point outline for this post.  First, some pictures from last year's Y-Me walk.  I didn't get up to Chicago this year to participate:

Mom. She's been there through thick and thin for the last 32 years (Heehee...I almost put 33!).  She has seen me silly, angry, sad, lonely, excited, tired, mischievous, sullen, frustrated, confused, happy, ecstatic, talkative, refusing to talk, etc.  You name the feeling, I wear it on my sleeve, especially when my mom is around.  She has seen my eye roll probably more than anyone else...and more than she deserves!  Things that I love about my mom:
1.  She is sold out in this position.  I know she will drop anything for me if I ever ask.
2.  She is a great listener.  She may want to solve my problems, because she is my mom, but she will listen first.
3.  She is always my champion.  She cheers the loudest and is the most excited when things are going well.
There is so much more to this list, but no amount of words could express what she means to me, so I will leave it at that!

Thank you for being you, MOM!  I LOVE YOU!!!

The Elusive PIN Number

I have been waiting anxiously since Monday to get my PIN number in the mail.  Of course, I can send a letter and it amazingly gets to the place I send it (not in Peoria) two days later.  But this PIN number that is coming from a bank that I was standing in on Monday.  Took 5 days.  Not an incredibly long time, but still, come on already.  It's an important piece of information I need to get back into my brain. 
So the big question that I've had all week of still not being able to remember my PIN?  Will I remember it when I see it?  Or was it lost forever in this brain of mine?  The moment of reckoning came today when I got the mail.  Emily was as anxious as I was to see what would happen when I saw it (that might be a slight exaggeration, but she did put down what she was doing to be fully in the moment with me because she is a good roommate).  I opened the envelope, unfolded the paper, looked at the number.  And I'm just not sure.  Definitely not a number that had popped in my head at any point during the week.  But the more I say it to myself today, the more "normal" it feels.

I did laugh at the instructions in the letter:
1. Memorize your PIN.  Then, destroy this form. (Ummm...bank people who will only mail me my PIN number if I forget it in another 6 years...I might just be hanging onto this in a safe place instead of destroying it.
2.  Never write your PIN on your card or carry it with your card in your wallet or purse. (Okay, I get this one, but it still would be convenient to have it in my wallet somewhere, but I won't be doing this, even for convenience sake.)

And there were 4 more instructions, all really starting with a bold word.  I won't bore you with those.  Just your average, don't share it, report a stolen card immediately, shield the terminal keyboard.  Things we all know to do.  But this girl is definitely keeping this piece of paper somewhere (don't worry, I probably won't remember where it is if I need it, but for right now, it makes me feel good to know it is somewhere for reference.)

Just one of the reasons I have the best boss EVER!

We had a retreat today for work.  Which mostly means we eat a bunch of food (breakfast and lunch in about 4 hours' time).  And we throw in something therapeutic so we can call it work related!  In years past Faye has made homemade cinnamon roles that are DE LI CIOUS.  Today was no different, except for this:

Our very own pan of homemade cinnamon rolls to take home with us!  She loves us that much!  I'm refraining from eating one right now because I'm really full from a fabulous lunch, but I kind of just want to dig in!  Thanks, Faye! :)

Big Guns

I couldn't decide whether to title this "Big Guns" or "Playing with the Boys." Either way, I now have the song "Playing with the Boys" from Top Gun in my head. You know the scene where they are playing volleyball on the beach. It's the song playing during that scene.   Anyway, I digress.  Chris bought a Nerf gun while I was in Georgia so that he and John could have Nerf gun fights (John already had a gun).  John LOVED this activity.  Although he was a little leery of Aunt Teresa playing because it was "daddy's gun."  So, at first I just took the pictures.

Look at how happy he is to be chasing Daddy and shooting him!

If you look closely in this picture, just above the chair, you can see an orange bullet heading straight for John.  This is why he is moving away! 

AAAGGGHHHH!  I love that he is wearing a shirt that says "Boys Rule."

Doesn't Daddy look tough?!

Worn out from all this shooting at each other.  Chris was holding the gun while he rested.  No sneak attack on this guy!

John is also pretending to sleep.  Notice the smile.

Hey, John,  I think you have something on your forehead!

And finally I got my hands on one of those guns!  In reality, Nerf fighting is only so-so.  It really means about 5 seconds of shooting and 10 minutes of looking for bullets all around the yard.  And John has an unfair disadvantage.  He has to run to the table to cock his gun each time because he is not quite strong enough to pull it back on his own yet.  So, you have to go slow with shooting your own gun so that he doesn't get hit 6 times before he gets to fire twice!  But he doesn't seem to care, no matter how fast you shoot him.  I especially love this picture, because Chris told him to look mean! :)

All about nephew #2

Because he deserves his own post!  :)  He just doesn't do as many themed things as John, so Michael didn't get as many posts devoted to him as John did.

 This is the only picture that Michael and I were in together with him awake.  He kept screaming "Someone take a picture of me and Aunt Teresa!" but I guess no one was listening!

 This is what he wore to pick me up from the airport! I love how it looks like he is either winking or pooping, depends on your interpretation!

 Pretty blue eyes, just hanging out in his bouncy seat.

 I really wanted John in this feet picture, but the TV wouldn't pause and there is no taking him away from his pirate show when it is on!  So we lost our chance.

 This one kind of looks like he is dancing! :)

Chillin with his toy.

I'm trying not to think about the fact that it has only been two weeks since I have seen him and he probably looks so different already.  We had a talk about not growing, but I don't know if he'll listen to me or not.

You are like the people you live with

At least Emily and I seem to be rubbing off on each other.  Unfortunately, it's only the bad qualities.  When I couldn't remember my pin number for my ATM card yesterday, the first thing I said when I walked in the door was, "Emily, I'm becoming you!" :)  Don't worry.  She laughed.  And asked, "Oh no, what did you do?"  Forgetfulness is just one of my roommates many admirable qualities! Gracefulness is another!  Yesterday, she needed a redo button too.  (FYI--Emily gave me permission to write this post.)  She began to clean and I heard a crash.  She had dropped a light bulb off a shelf and broke it.  Then later, she was mopping the kitchen floor and she bumped the mop bucket and soaked the whole kitchen (a very effective way to clean the kitchen floor).  Then even later, she was eating dinner while we were watching a movie, so as she carried it to her chair, the plate tipped and her food fell on the not so clean carpet (thanks to my procrastination--a trait all my own, didn't need to pick that one up from any roommate).
Today, I went to the bank to get this whole debit card thing figured out.  I decided to first try to get some money out of the ATM to see if I would remember it.  No such luck.  But they led me on a false sense of victory.  Put the card in.  Enter the number.  Go through your whole transaction.  And THEN get denied.  So, I went into the bank.  Long story short.  Still can't remember my pin.  They are mailing it to me. 

And then tonight I was doing laundry.  I put the first load into the dryer.  Watched a few minutes of Bones and on the second commercial break, put my second load in.  As I was putting the soap in, I realized that the motion did not seem familiar to me.  I am 99.999% sure that I did not put soap in my first load of laundry.  Don' worry, it is currently being rewashed as I type this.  I won't stink tomorrow.

Here is what Emily just said to me that really made me laugh: "Teresa, this is just not like you.  It really must be killing you.  But it makes me feel a little bit better."

Where's the redo button?

Not on life.  I would not want to redo my whole life!  But just on today.  It has just been one of those days.  And it's not over yet.  Yippee.  I woke up tired, which I don't understand because I got a decent amount of sleep.  I chose to crawl back into my bed after my shower instead of spending time with the Lord before going to church.  But church was great.  I haven't had a normal attendance (Sunday School and church) week in three weeks, so it felt good to be back.  Lunch with friends.  After lunch I decided to stop and get gas in my car.  Where I proceeded to forget my pin number for my debit card.  That I have had for 6 years.  I still don't know if I remember it.  Do you know that I can remember my bank account number from high school.  The account I closed 10 years ago when I moved to Texas.  55053664. That's it.  4 digit pin number?  Elusive.  Then I got home and of course it is 682 degrees in the apartment.  Slight exaggeration.  But heat makes me crabby.  And then add humidity into that.  Emily is not ready to turn on the air, but it is not her fault, because I am not ready to pay for air.  I just don't like the transition.  It makes me crabby.  Add to that I'm having fun female emotions today anyway.  And then I went grocery shopping and could not use even the credit portion of my debit card, so I had to charge groceries and gas on my credit card that I was just excited yesterday because I thought I was going to be able to go a billing period without having to put anything onto the card.  Stupid memory loss.  So then I had to call the bank to get the hold taken off.  Yep.  It has been a stellar day.  Oh, and I couldn't keep my eyes open while I was reading my book, so I thought I'd go take a nap and maybe wake up on the right side of the bed.  But of course as soon as I closed my eyes I couldn't sleep.  And then I opened the door to leave to go to the grocery store and realized that it looked like it was going to pour down rain. And I knew this is how my luck would go: if I didn't leave, it wouldn't rain; if I did leave, it would rain as soon as I left the store with all of my groceries in tow.  I guess that was one thing in my favor: it rained while I was in the store, so I didn't get wet.
But just so this post isn't completely about me complaining, here is my nephew in all his double chin glory!

A Boy and His Dog

A boy and his dog playing catch:

John took lots of "rests", although he would never call them that.  But this one lasted long enough for ZuZu to chew on her toy at his feet:

Another rest while watching TV.  ZuZu makes a great pillow.  She is the greatest dog ever.  I have pictures of John when he was two just sitting on her while he watched TV.  She can be so patient with him.

John made a fort and even included the red blanket just for ZuZu to lay on in his fort.  Here he is totally pretending to sleep so that I can take the picture.  When he saw I was going to take his picture this was the pose he chose. :)

Bath time?

Playing tug-of-war.  I mentioned in an earlier post that ZuZu is so much more gentle with John.  She tugs her toy hard enough that it is a challenge for him, but doesn't pull him over.  When I play tug-of-war with her, I have to brace myself with all that is in me so she does not pull me over.  And even then she often wins.

Who is going to get it?

The boy who loves his brother

I actually did not get very many pictures of John and Michael together.  But this one I love:

This is actually not even nearly as close as John gets to Michael.  He has a "special" way to talk to Michael that involves getting as close as possible, talking really loudly through clenched teeth, and rubbing his head.  But Michael doesn't seem to care!

And this one I love because John was rocking Michael in his bouncy seat because Michael was a little fussy.  Just part of the day's work when you're the older brother, I guess.

A boy and his rope

This is the rope that John measured as "One hundred fifty sixty thirty!"  He LOVES this rope.  The boy has thousands of dollars worth of toys at his disposal and he would spend hours with this rope just tying it to things and then untying it and tying it to new things.  I am not exaggerating when I say that this rope is as long as the house.  In one of the rare moments that it was not tied to something, I had John walk down the hallway with it.  I was in the living room and he walked all the way into the master bedroom and then into the master bathroom with it.

Just look at the concentration!

Here he is making a "jungle" for Michael.

And then the big boy, AKA my brother, got involved in the rope creativity.  He tied one end of the rope around John and the other end to the dogs toy.  He was trying to get the dog to pull John across the kitchen floor.

The only problem is that ZuZu is super gentle with John.  Knowing the rope was attached to him she was being really careful, so Chris was trying to hide her view of John.  After this picture, Chris tied the rope to the dog's collar and had me call her down the hallway so she would pull John.  I wish I could have gotten a recording of John's laughter!

In this picture you can't actually see the rope, but trust me, it was under the blanket and making our fort extra cool!

We also used the rope to decorate the dog's bed, connect two "boats" (aka couches), entertain the cats, make really long non-venomous snakes (because John took the venomous out of it so it would be nice), and other things that I am forgetting at the moment!  By the end of the week he was very proficient at tying knots, even if he didn't really know what he was doing.  But not always so good at getting the rope untangled.  We had a few frustrating moments over this.  But we learned, "It's okay because sometimes you have to practice!"

A mild panic attack and a false alarm

Last night just before I headed to bed, Emily read to me from Facebook that Chickfila was no longer coming to Peoria!  I had a mild panic attack.  And was very thankful that I ate it three times while I was in Georgia!  But I decided I could not think about it or research it right then.  I needed to go to bed.  But today at work, while I was in the mood to procrastinate, I headed to week.com to see what the fuss was about.  This is what it said yesterday: "There is no word on the status of the proposed Chick-fil-a restaurant.  Our calls to the company's developers were not returned.  However, Chick-fil-a has removed Peoria the list of future restaurant openings on their website."

But today, this update was added as well: "A representative for Chick-fil-a said the company will break ground on the restaurant toward the end of this month. The restaurant is slated to be opened in late September to early October."

So, while it is not coming this spring as anticipated, the insinuation that it was not coming at all is a false alarm.  Now we can all sleep a lot easier!