House in Bath, IL

Hey everyone!

Several weeks ago, Jason and I were going to visit his aunt and uncle's house, and off in the distance, I could see part of this house and it looked really cool. Jason said it is rumored to be haunted, but he'd never seen it. So, I talked him into driving near it last weekend. I thought it looked cool, so I took some pictures of it. Apparently they have a trail behind the house that you can go to as well. It's not paved, but you can tell people have driven back there. I wanted to go on the little trail to see where the path led, but we had Shawn with us...so I just got out and took a few pictures of the house instead.

Shawn

Hey everyone!

Very long story short, when we had the kids last weekend, we were also able to keep Shawn for a week. He doesn't start school until Monday, Aug 31st. He will be in Head Start. We're not for sure when we have to take him back. I'm hoping we can take him to school on his first day, but I'm trying not to get my hopes up because my luck, it won't happen.

He's been almost a completely different kid without his brother and sister around. We've had Luke a few times just by himself, but this is the first time that we've had Shawn by himself.

Jas and Luke started school last Wednesday. They didn't really have much to say about the first few days of school, other than it was "good" when we asked. lol

Shawn has been requesting pancakes for breakfast. He asked for pancakes on Monday and I decided to make him a Mickey Mouse pancake...and he loved it. He said he'd never had a MM pancake before. We made a face with peanut butter and then he stuck grapes on the peanut butter. Then he added his syrup. lol







Yesterday morning, I was getting out of the shower when I heard him singing. He was just around the corner, lying on the floor and playing with his firetruck. My camera just happened to be where I could reach it, so I taped him. And I'll let you see the rest. Jason and I were cracking up!

I'm not sure if this is a real song or if he just made it up, but he says it's called, "You Never Knew."



Until next time,

Cole xoxoxo

Wedding Update

Hey everyone! Well, I promised that I'd update everyone on wedding details. Our best man is going to be Jason's brother, Christopher, and he is a BM3 (hope I got that right) in the U.S. Navy. With that being said, it's difficult to find a time that he will be home to have the wedding. Since we're tired of waiting, we found out that Christopher and his wife Alisha will be home next in either March or April, and that's when we're going to have the wedding. We will know approximately two months in advance on the exact time that they will be home, so when we find that out, we will let everyone know of course.

As previously stated, Jason's brother Christopher, will be the best man and Eve will be my maid of honor. Even though we have decided on the rest of the wedding party, we have not asked anyone else yet, so I won't reveal the rest of the party until then. It's going to be very kid-oriented, though.

My mom's friend, Ann, is going to be making the bouquets for me and the girls. I haven't decided my color yet, but since it's going to be in the spring, I've narrowed it down to pale colors of pink, purple, and yellow. I'm contemplating using all three colors, actually. Kind of paying tribute to my parents wedding because my mom asked all of her bridesmaids to wear pale colored dresses. But I'm not for sure...I may just do one color. I have gotten a request several months ago that my boys wanted to wear bow ties, so we're working on that one. I promised them they could wear them. lol

The wedding WILL BE IN MO. Mom and dad are looking around at some parks that might work...for inside and outside, just in case. With it being Spring, the weather could be rainy and cold. There's still a lot of things we're discussing and working out, but we're on our way.

Just wanted to let everyone know on the progress and on some of the details! I'm getting so excited!!!!!!!!!!!!

Until next time,

Cole xoxoxo :)

I'M CERTIFIED!!!!!!!!

Hey everyone!!!!


I am now OFFICIALLY a CERTIFIED Pharmacy Technician! I am soooo excited! For those of you that don't know, I have had to take the certification test three times. Within your first year of Walgreens, they require all of their technicians to be certified. I've been with the company a year and (almost) six months. My manager was able to pull some strings so that I was able to stay working back in the pharmacy (they're supposed to kick you out if you don't pass within your first year of employment), so I was very thankful for that. Walgreens pays the first two times of taking the test, after that, it's the technicians responsibility. So, I had to pay this time. Everybody at my work was very supportive and helped me out.

I had my test at 8:00 this morning at Pearson Vue testing center in Springfield, IL. It's a two hour test with 90 multiple choice questions. Both times that I took it before, I was 8 points away from passing. You find out immediately after your test if you pass or fail, but you don't detailed results until a few weeks later in the mail. The so called "detailed" results aren't very helpful though. They don't tell you what you missed or anything like that. It only tells you how you scored in the three different sections that they score on. You must get a 650 to pass and each time, I had a 642. :( But this time, I passed. I will find out what my score was in a few weeks! I'll update later. I don't even care how much I passed it by, I'm just so excited that I passed. I've worked really hard on this.

Oh and I also get an immediate $1.00 raise for passing. :)

Just wanted to share the good news!

Cole xoxox

Henson Robinson Zoo

Hey everyone!


It's Monday, August 3rd and I'm kind of late of posting about our trip to the zoo. Better late than never though, right? Last weekend, my mom, dad, and Travi came up to visit us and we all went to Henson Robinson zoo in Springfield, IL.

They brought my blazer up with them and then we all went to IHOP for breakfast in Springfield. I hadn't been there in a while and I don't think Jason or the kids had ever been there. The gentlemen that took our name and the # of our party was talking to us and Shawn says to him, "Hi! My name's Shawn!" The man thought he was friendly, so he said, "Well hi Shawn, are you ready to eat?" And then when it was time for us to be seated, he said, "Okay Shawn, here we go!"

After we ate, we went out to the zoo. I'd never been to the zoo, so I had no idea how big or small it was. It was small in relative to the St. Louis zoo, but it was still a cute zoo. The kids got to feed the goats and the ducks and we got to see monkeys, birds, a snake...you know, the usual. We also something called a Chinese Munk Jack. Kind of strange. They resemble deer. I've got pictures.

I got a lot of great pictures and I'll post the better ones. I had fun editing some of them also.

P.S. Some of the pics I tried uploading were too large...so there's not that many here, sorry.

The zoo didn't take as much time as we thought, so we took the kids to a park nearby and let them play for a little while. The kids went down by the lake (Lake Springfield) and threw rocks. They had a little dock and I took Jas and my dad took all the boys. We decided to head back to the house for a little bit before we had dinner because we weren't really hungry enough for dinner yet. So, we came back to the house and chilled for a little bit, talked, and looked at my blazer. Then we went to The Depot for dinner. Or as our kids call it, "The one with the X." They call it that because underneath the sign for The Depot it has railroad tracks, which looks like an X. lol

After dinner, my parents and Travi packed back up and went home. We all had a lot of fun, I think. Gonna upload some pics here soon.


Until next time,

Cole xoxoxox :)

Cook Out and Swimming

Hey everyone!


I hope this finds you well. Just wanted to post some pics and write a bit. It's been a week or two since I've updated anything. Well, I was on vacation last week, then I had a 6-day work week (which was a really crappy week at work) and then I had two days off. I've had more of a vacation in the past two days than I did on my actual vacation. lol

We got a call on Saturday to see if we wanted to pick up the kids. It's a week early, but we get to keep them until this Sunday. Jasmine has a doctor's appointment on Wednesday, so we're taking her home tomorrow night and she is supposed to be coming back on Friday.

My parents are coming up this weekend (Saturday) to go to the zoo with us. I'm really excited. We're going to the zoo in Springfield, IL. We're going to IHOP (International House of Pancakes) for breakfast, then the zoo and then somewhere for supper.

We were invited to a cook out at Jason's dad and step mom's house yesterday, so we took the kids to Havana with us and had a cookout. It was such a nice relaxing day. We all had a lot of fun. We took the kids to the park for a little bit while we were waiting for the food to get done. I did have my camera, but I was so tired that I didn't take pictures. And now I really wish I had. :( After I ate, I got really tired, like I always do after I eat and I just wanted to relax and visit with everyone.

Today we went to Jason's uncle and aunt's house in a town called Bath, IL. (Swimming in bath. lol) They've invited us to come out and swim whenever we want, and we took the kids over there. The water was really cold because the sun hasn't stayed out for very long. It's been partly cloudy most of the day. I stayed in the pool for probably five minutes or less. LOL It was that cold and I'm a baby when it comes to cold water. Jason stayed in there for a little while and played with the kids though. We didn't let them stay in very long because we were afraid that they'd get sick because of the water being really cold.

Their neighbor had six lab puppies and Jason's younger girl cousins brought two pups over at a time so we could see them. They had two black ones, two that were a light brown, one a little bit darker and a chocolate lab. Jas really wanted one of the lighter brown ones and Jason, Luke and I really wanted the chocolate lab. I've got some pictures to upload of the puppies. They were really cute!

Oh and Luke learned how to tie his shoes today! Yay! I'll try to post the video from YouTube. I've already uploaded it, so I don't think it will take very long. :)

It's back to work tomorrow. Then the zoo on Saturday! :) And I have the weekend off. Always good.

Until next time,

Cole

Vaction Bible School

Hey everyone!


Grandma Stella invited our kids to VBS last week. They were all pretty excited about it and wanted to go. It was Monday-Friday, they didn't have it on Saturday and then Sunday night they had a little program they put on. It was at a little Baptist church called Bethel in Bath, IL. I went with the kids last Wednesday night because I was off of work.

Shawn was in a separate class from his brother and sister. Each class (I think there were four different classes) got to make crafts, play games, learn about Jesus and sing songs. Every night, they had some sort of theme. One night they had crazy hat night, wear your clothes inside out or backwards, etc. The night that I went with the kids, they were supposed to wear clothing that had either a sports team they like, or some sort of logo, or someone they like on their shirt. Shawn wore his Hulk shirt, Luke wore his Superman shirt and Jasmine wore her/mine Taylor Swift shirt.

The kids decided they wanted to dress up for their program and I have some pictures of how they looked. They were cute. Except, the shirt and tie that Luke had on got dirty when we had dinner, so he had to change his shirt and he wasn't able to wear the tie with that shirt. Oh well. He still looked cute.

After their program, they led us downstairs so we could see the classrooms and gather all of the crafts the kids did. They also had cookies and drinks for everyone. After that, we had to take the kids home. :(

Lady Antebellum was AWESOME!

Hey everyone!

I got off of work at 5:30, changed (in Walgreens' bathroom lol) and we headed straight to New Berlin for the show. We grabbed something to eat and got in line because it was starting to get long. We only had to stand in line about a half of an hour before they opened the gates. We had never been to this venue before, so we didn't know how the seating was going to be. Once we walked in, we could either go up to the bleachers or the standing room. So, of course we took off for the standing room! We were about five rows back when we first started standing there, but by the time the concert actually started, we were like second row! It was awesome. There was a lady and a guy in front of us (both of them were taller than Jason and I) but that was it. I could actually see pretty well, too. We were just about as close as we could get.

The opening act, Still Kickin' was pretty good, I thought, but Jason didn't care for them much. They started about 8:00 and Lady A started about 9:00. They only did one song as an encore, which we were hoping for more than that, but oh well. The band was throwing out guitar picks and Jason almost caught one, but not quite. However, one of the guys in the band threw his sweat towel that he was using off the stage, and Jason actually caught it! LOL At the end of the concert, they announced that they'd be signing autographs and they wanted to meet their fans, so they pointed to where they'd be after the show. Once Jason and I found where they were, we waited in line. We didn't have to wait very long either. I didn't have anything for them to sign besides my sweat towel....so I had them sign that. LOL I did get a concert t-shirt, but I bought that after I waited in line to get my autograph. So, we both got to shake hands with all of the Lady Antebellum members and they signed my sweat towel. One of the guys seemed to think that it was pretty funny that Jason caught it. lol

So we had a lot of fun and then we had to come home. :( lol I would love to go see them again if they come next year. One of the radio guys said that they've never had as many people come out for the Thursday night concert as this year. Lady A seemed to be having a good time too. Getting ready to upload some of the better pics. I took like 70'ish pics the other night, but I'm just going to post some of the better ones.

Opening band (Still Kickin') and pics of the crowd:

Lady Antebellum (Charles Kelley, Hillary Scott, Dave Haywood):

Lightening bugs, baseball, and other misc stuff

Hey everyone!

I'm trying to catch up on all of this stuff! It's Friday night and I wanted to write another blog to talk a little more about what we've been up to. Last week, we had Luke staying with us for a while. His cousin Matt plays on the Virginia baseball team for the summer league. I got off of work at 5:30 that night and Luke wanted to know if we could take him to the park. So, I took him to the park, and after about five minutes, he had to go to the bathroom. So we walked over to the bathrooms and he saw the baseball games going on and wanted to stop and watch. Matt's team was up next, so we sat and watched another game. Surprisingly, I was able to explain enough what they were doing on the field that he understood. lol He was very impatient waiting for Matt's team to play. We left around 7:30 because we hadn't had dinner yet. Here are a few pics I took of the game. I want to take the kids to see another one before their season is over because it was fun.

Baseball pics:
(I took more pics, but for some reason, the site I use to upload pics as slideshows won't let me upload any others besides these two...?)

Tonight, we went outside to feed the kitty and Shawn saw some lightening bugs. So, I said, "Do you want to catch some?" Of course the answer was yes, so I came inside and got us a jar to catch some lightening bugs in. Jasmine ended up taking the jar because Shawn brought this net thing from his aunts with him and he wanted to use that to catch some lightening bugs. We all had fun. Even that cat was chasing them. LOL He was so cute to watch. I took a bunch of short videos, but I'm just going to post the few pics I took. We poked a hole in the jar Jas was using and I told them that we would let these bugs free and we could get some more tomorrow night when it starts getting dark outside.

Lightening bugs:

Here's just a couple of misc. pics that didn't really fit into any other category. I have some pics (on Myspace and Facebook) of Luke riding his bike a few weeks ago, but they're on a different SD card, so I'll get to those later.

~Ladybug~

Hey everyone...

For those of you that don't know, mom had to put Ladybug down a few days ago. :( I've just now been able to write about it because I'm still upset about it. The last time I saw her was when we came to MO for my birthday the weekend of the 21st. But I did give her a hug (and Cody) before I left because mom had said that they were both getting older and going downhill.

I was telling Jason the story of how we got Lady in the first place. I think it was summertime, and my mom and I were going to see a movie. I think we were in the kitchen and I looked outside and saw a pup and her momma wandering in the yard. Of course mom and I thought she was so cute, and I wanted to keep her, but mom said no at first. Then she told me that we'd talk about it if she was still there whenever we came back for our movie. And sure enough, she was. Her momma kept bringing her into the yard and trying to leave her, as if to say, "Here is your new home." I even told mom, "Please! I'll buy her food and I'll pay her vet bills and everything!" And you know how that goes. Mom ended taking care of her most of the time.

I remember we used to tell her to "sit pretty Lady bug!" and she'd raise her body and her two front paws up and bark. As she got older and bigger, it was harder for her to sit up straight though because she's tip over. lol I also remember that I entered her into a dog contest at my elementary school at Rockport and she won the Longest Tail award for the dogs in her size. Ugh...trying to keep from crying again. I did too much of that the other day.

Anyway...mom said she got a few pictures of her and Cody before she put her down. Cody is really lost. We used to joke that Lady and Cody were like husband and wife. They were always together and Cody would try to take care of her, even though he was younger. Now Cody is all by himself as far as fellow K-9's go. Tigger and Smokey are still there though. Mom says that him and Tigger are sort of friends. lol I will try to post a few pictures whenever I get them. I figure she'll have my dad email them to me at some point.

**********On a happier note**********

Another Lady... Lady Antebellum is coming to the Sangamon County Fair next Thursday and Jason and I are going to see them! I'm sooo excited! The tickets are really cheap and it gets you into the fair and the concert that night. I get off of work at 5:30 and the concert doesn't start until 8, so we're going to go. I can't wait! I've been wanting to go to a concert for a while, but everybody I want to see is either playing too far away or the tickets are more than what I want to pay for them. lol I hope I can take my camera in. I probably won't get any good pics of Lady-A, but I'm sure I'll still end up taking pictures because my camera is always with me! In case you're going, "Okay, Lady WHO???" Lady Antebellum is a country trio made up of Hilary Scott (Linda Davis' daughter), Charles Kelley, and Dave Haywood. They're singles are: Love Don't Live Here Anymore, Looking For a Goodtime and I Run to You. I'm really looking forward to this! :)

I had to end on a happy note since the first half of this blog was depressing.

Love,

Cole xoxoxo

Virginia Carnival and early Father's Day

Hello everyone!


This little town of Virginia, IL that we're in (1800 people) had their annual BBQ this past weekend. Mom, Dad and Travi came up to go to the carnival with us. We had all the kids this past weekend also. I worked until 3:30 on Saturday and then mom and dad came to our house. We left for the carnival...which is just right up the road, so we walked. Our kitty (because we don't have a name for him) started following us up there! Jason picked him up and put him back on the porch and everytime Jason would start walking towards us again, he'd just come right back following us. Finally he stopped. It was kind of funny though. lol

We got something to eat first and then we started riding some rides. After each ride, all the kids were like, "We wanna ride it again! Can we ride it again?" I took some pictures that I'll get around to posting. I've got this one picture of Jason and my dad holding all of the stuffed animals that kids won in their arms and pockets. lol It's kind of funny. I told Jason that he ought to go win me a stuffed animal. So, him and my dad went to play a game that Travi and I played at the carnival. You have to use this squirt gun thing and fill up the water balloon and make it pop before the other person. So, they did that and Jason won and he got me a little stuffed husky dog. It's cute. My mom said, "Like you NEED anymore stuffed animals!" Then she started talking about all of the stuffed animals that my brothers had won me at carnivals and the several barrells of stuffed animals I have at their house. I was like, "Mom, you're not helping my case any!" lol

Here's my husky dog:




Carnival pics:

I think we all had a lot of fun. My dad emailed me and he said that even though my mom and I kept making comments about him and Jason looking thrilled to be there, that he really did have fun and enjoy it. After we were all done with the carnival, we came back to the house for a little bit. I had dad and Jason go outside so I could get stuff ready for Father's Day. Since this was the closest to Father's Day that I would see my dad, I figured I might as well do it this past weekend. I just did Jason's too, since we may not get the kids the weekend that Father's Day falls on. I covered both just in case. For my dad, I just bought a little fancy bowl (it was actually an ice cream bowl, but you can't tell) and bought some cashews and put them in the bowl and then wrapped it with gold tissue paper. Because my dad is as good as gold. Get it? lol I also got him a card. I was going to write him a poem too, but I thought my card covered just about anything I would want to say. I'm really picky when it comes to cards, so the one I picked out for him was perfect already. But I did write a little in it too. The kids made him "Papa's day" cards. lol Dad said that when Shawn gave him the card he made, he had this expression on his face that he couldn't really describe, but it's priceless, like maybe he was proud of his card or something. lol

For Jason, I bought a card for him from me and then I had the kids make him cards, because I figured it would be more personal if they made it versus just signing a card that they couldn't read. Luke and I were at Walmart a few weeks ago, and he picked out a Father's Day shirt that says "#1 Dad!" on it and it has Peter Griffen. For those that don't know who that is...he's the dad off of the animated TV show Family Guy. Which is hilarious. I wasn't comparing his parenting skills to Peter Griffen, but I just thought he'd like the shirt. And he really did like it. He was like, "Are you kidding me? It has Peter Griffen on it, of course I like it!" LOL My mom had also put together a goody bag of stuff (you know my mom lol) For Christmas he got this Gift Set that had a lot of Gillette for Men products. He really likes Gillette, so she got him more stuff, which was good, because he was about out of his other stuff.

Father's Day pics:

I have been off of work today and I haven't done much of anything. lol I've lounged around and read today and that's about it. Back to work tomorrow...yay. I hope this finds everyone doing well.

Until next time...

-Cole- xoxox

Updates

Hello everyone!

I thought my blog needed an update. I've been off of work this weekend. :) Yay! Thursday morning, Luke's mom called saying that Luke wanted to come to our house. So, Jason went and picked him up and we've had him since Thursday. He's currently taking a nap. We went up to the video store earlier and he rented a video game for the GameCube. I'm off tomorrow too, but not the whole day. I have to take my certification test for The State Board of Pharmacy tomorrow at 12:30 in Springfield, IL. I'm nervous about it because I've taken it once and I failed it by 8 points. :( But I do feel more confident this time than I did the last time. I really hope I pass it!!! Prayers, please! :)

Luke decided that he wanted to go to Sunday School with Grandma Stella this morning. He said he had a lot of fun and he wants to go back the Sunday. He brought some books home and he was showing us.

Jason's 25th birthday is tomorrow. Luke and I picked out his birthday present and Father's Day present yesterday. We will probably make him a cake tomorrow. I have to work Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday and then I'm off of Friday! Then I work Sat and Sun, but I think I'm off the following Monday. Our town is having a BBQ this Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Mom (and maybe my dad) and Travi will be coming up. We should have the kids, too. They have a carnival, BBQ, games, entertainment and all that usual stuff.

Travi III graduates grade school this coming week! I can't believe it, he'll be going into middle school this coming up school year. Ah! And Daniel graduated Kindergarten! My goodness! lol

My dad just had another appointment with his doctor a few days ago. He is seeing a new doctor now, though. His old doctor misdiagnosed him. Instead of having ulcerative colitis, he has Crohn's Disease. But the pharmacists that I work with told me that they're both very similar and sometimes it's hard to tell which one it is because they're so similar. Dad says he likes this doctor a lot. He thoroughly explains things to him to where he can understand it.

Well, I think that's all for now. I'll probably have pictures to post in about a week. :)

Until next time,

-Cole- xoxox

Engaged for 1 year today!

Hey everyone!

Can you believe it? Jason and I have been engaged for a full year today. It was technically on Mother's Day last year, but last year, Mother's Day was on May 11th. I was off of work today and I wanted to get my hair cut, so I did that today. Then after that we went to Applebees. I had remembered going to Applebees a few years ago after a school dance, but I don't remember what I ordered. Neither one us were that impressed with what we ordered. We took the majority of it home. Oh well. We're just sitting here watching TV right now. Back to work tomorrow. :(


Until next time,

Cole xoxoxo

Almost two years ago...



And now...

Happy Mother's Day!

Hey!

Two posts in one day are a bit rare from me, but I didn't want everything in one post, so I decided to do a separate one for Mother's Day. Just wanted to say Happy Mother's Day to all of the mom's out there.

We did have the kids this weekend, unfortunately we had to take them back early today. I did not have nearly enough time with them, but at least I did have some time. The kids made me a bunch of pictures...they all had mom written on them. They were so cute. And Jasmine made two things at school for Mother's Day and she gave one of them to me. It was a coupon book for different things. If you're a mom, chances are you've gotten one before. lol So I can turn it in for a back message, a night out of doing the dishes, making the bed, etc. They also got me a gift bag full of stuff. I was upset about not getting to spend much time with them today...but Jason made me feel a little bit better...and so did grandma Stella. She bought a carnation flower and put it in a vase and said, "Here, this is for you...thank you for being such a great mommy to my great grandkids." And I had to fight back the tears. It was really sweet.

As I said in my last post, I bought my mom a card and made her the scrapbook. I talked to Glen for a few minutes this morning and he said that mom was showing it off. :) I told her that I wish I had had more time to work on it and she said that since there were more pages in it still, I could take it back close to next Mother's Day and add more stuff to it. That way I can add more stickers and pictures, and even more pages if I need to.

I called my Aunt Joyce to wish her a Happy Mother's Day. Connie answered the phone, so I got to talk to her for a minute or two. I think they were all getting ready to go out to Olive Garden for lunch. I called grandma to wish her a Happy Mother's Day too, along with Eve and I sent a bunch of mom's on Myspace little Mother's Day messages. Kelly wished me a Happy Mother's Day today and I told her I'd have the kids call her before we took them home...but I forgot that she'd still be in church by the time we took them home. So I recorded a short little video of the kids wishing her a Happy Mother's Day and sent it to her.

Thank you to those of you who wished me a Happy Mother's Day today. I won't mention names, but last year, I called someone to wish them a Happy Mother's Day and what I got in return felt like a slap in the face. I was told, "Well I can't say the same for you...you're not a mother." That hurt me more than I let anyone know. I may not have given birth to those kids, but that does not make me any less of a mother. In fact, I'm the only real mother figure those children have in their lives. I hope that you all had a good day with your kids. Mine was too short, but at least I got to see them.

Love,

Cole xoxox




P.S. That multi-colored hat...it says "My mom is 21 and my dad is 24." Jas asked me how old I was, and I didn't realize why she was asking me until she gave me that paper.

Luke's 6th Birthday Party

Hey everyone!

Luke's 6th birthday was Friday, May 8th. We had his birthday party yesterday afternoon. Mom and dad came up and brought Travi and Daniel with them. I was really glad to see all of them. They were on the road around 7:00 and they arrived around 10:00. We visited for about an hour. Mom had Easter baskets for them (we hadn't seen them since my birthday weekend). We had decided to get some KFC chicken for lunch, so my parents and nephews headed to Jacksonville to get the chicken. In the meantime I iced the birthday cake and then we met each other at the park.

I bought a Pillsbury cake mix and it was the golden butter recipe. I've gotten several compliments on how good it was. I haven't tried it yet though...not a big cake person. I bought chocolate icing and it had sprinkles that came with it. Well, Luke told me he wanted vanilla icing and he wanted a cake versus cupcakes because he had chocolate iced cupcakes at school for his birthday. So, mom brought me some vanilla icing and I just used the sprinkles and kept the chocolate icing for something else.



I made mom a scrapbook for Mother's Day. It had a bunch of pictures of her kids and grandkids. The front page (at the top) said "Mom3GP5", which is her screen name. It means mom of 3 and grandparent of 5. I figured since I was making it with pictures of her kids and grandkids, it would be perfect. In the center it had a picture that was taken at my birthday party of my brothers and I. I'm the only one smiling, but I still love the picture. lol The picture had Glen on my left, me in the middle and Travis on my right. So, stemming down from the picture of me and my brothers, I put a picture of Daniel to the left of Glen, my kids underneath and a pic of Travi to the right of Travis. Mom really liked it and I think she was surprised. I also had two pages set aside for the animals. Can't forget them. LOL One page for the dogs and then the other for the cats. I meant to take pictures of it, but I forgot. I had a few pictures that Travis and Eve sent up for me for the scrapbook that I had to put in last minute, so I was rushed and I forgot. It's okay though. I got her a card also.

We all met at the park. They had a pavilion there, but it was really cold under it. It was pretty windy yesterday and the sun kept going in and out, so it made it a little chilly...but all the kids had jackets. It was really nice when the sun was out though. We let them play for about an hour and then we decided to do the cake and presents at home since it was windy. I had to work at 3:30, so we didn't have all that much time. :(

We came back and let him open his presents and eat cake. After that, I wanted some group pictures...then I had to go to work until 10:00. I really enjoyed getting to see my parents and nephews. I miss those little guys. Daniel said a few funny things to me. When he first walked in, he said, "Wow Aunt Nicole... you look bigger since the last time I seen you!" LOL And the other was, he asked me to give him a piggy back ride. I lifted him onto my back, but I couldn't walk with him. And he says to me later on, "How old are you? Like 19?" I said, "No, I'm 21." And he says, "And you couldn't give me a piggy back ride?!?! You should be stronger than that by now!" LOL Then, he came upstairs with me in our bedroom for a few minutes and on our bookshelf, we have some games too. He went downstairs to ask Jason if he had some game and he came back upstairs and told me, "Um...your husband don't know what game I'm talking about...um... you know...James?" And I laughed and I said, "You mean Jason?" And he says, "Oh yeah! I mean Jason...sorry, I'm bad with names sometimes!" haha

Anyway, as always I will post some pictures later. I'm uploading to Myspace now and I'm almost done. Love you all!

Until next time,

Cole xoxox

P.S. Here are some of the group shots I got also: