March 31

Maybe today is the reason I couldn't sleep last night?  Its not like I forget what today is, how could I. Nine years.  It's hard to believe that I have survived this long without being able to talk to you whenever I want or get a hug whenever I want.  You are with me always, through the bluebonnets I see in the spring or your recipes I make. And lets not forget the dreams.  I love when you visit me in my dreams.  Always with a message, even when you're mad at me.  You can still put the fear of God in me.  ha!  I never want to disappoint you.  I hope you are proud of what I have accomplished, especially as a single mother.  I miss you every single day and I love you so very much Momma.  Nine years too many.  Love and hugs always, Michaela Anne.

Easter, Monday Blues & Maybe The Longest Post Ever

Happy Belated Easter!!

I am dragging this morning.  My eyes are not functioning well at all and I'm moving at an extremely slow pace.  I think the Monday following Easter should be a holiday as well.  Lol!  The kids were moving pretty slow too.  I think we'll all be in bed as soon as we get home this evening.  Fine by me.

Friday, my best girl and I were up early so after ONE cup of coffee, I jumped in the shower and got ready so we could go get ourselves the mani/pedis I had been promising my girl.  After we were done, it was still a little too chilly out for me, so I changed into my favorite destruction jeans, tee and blardigan.  I kept my flops on because I didn't want to cover up my brand new pedicure....

The kids and I then met up with my sister and her son for lunch at La Casona.  Afterwards, us girls did a little shopping in LJ.  Bella spent some money she had at Bath & Body Works on new hand sanitizer.  Big surprise. Sister and I treated ourselves to a new pair of capris from Buckle.  I also picked up a new shirt for the boy which you will see in a bit.  I found some new sandals at The Rack Room and ALLOWED my sister to take advantage of the BOGO sale.  She scored some sandals for the bargain price of $7.50.  Happy Easter sis!  

We then headed to Target to get a few things for Easter Bunny and then made our way back home where I convinced Chris to dye eggs with Bella while I went grocery shopping.  I needed to get a few more things from the E.B. so going solo was better this trip.   After that, I put my family basket together for Saturday and we all went to bed to get some shut eye.

#familybasket #isntitpurdy

Saturday was Vyvial Easter in El Campo at my cousin's house.  Oh it was filled with so much food, fun, laughs and great times.  As usual, we had an egg hunt for the kids.  My gosh there were sooooo many eggs this year.  I think each kid got 50 eggs each!

Gettin' ready to run, but first some confetti eggs!!  Brady had just smacked Bella with an egg here...

 

Sweet girl...

 And she's off.... 

 Checking out the rewards of a good hunt....

I got smacked several times.  LOVE those nephews of mine....

I asked my cousin to take a picture of me and Christopher...

Check out that hand with the egg in the bottom right hand corner coming in for the kill

That's Brandon...the little sneak...

 Followed by my brother....

Oh...Christopher is wearing the shirt I picked up at Buckle. 

So handsome, even with confetti all over him.  

Later in the day, my cousin gave us the annual garden/yard tour of her home.  We have done this every year she's had Easter at her home. Diane has so many different plants, flowers and bushes and works her butt off the weeks leading up to her family invading her home to make it all look nice.  I have always gone home with a cutting or two from her flower beds however, I didn't make it out of there this time with anything.  Guess that means I need to go back!!  Sharing some pictures with y'all that I stole borrowed from cousin Veronica on FB...

That's Diane (homeowner) in the orange shirt giving us the spill.  

We stopped to say hello to Chef Patrick (our cousin & Diane's brother) who was monitoring the chicken noodle soup pot.  Please note the size of that pot.  We mean business when it comes to our chicken noodle soup.  Y'all, it could be 90 degrees outside on Easter but we will always have chicken noodle soup for supper.  Always.

Diane gives a very enthusiastic tour and you are allowed to ask questions.  

Can't remember what Dina was asking here...

We lost our photographer shortly after this shot or maybe she didn't post any other pictures for me to steal borrow.

I do want to show you this one she took during the egg hunt.  

Pretty girls and cousins forever..

Dina, Missy, Diane, Cindy

The rest of the day was filled with more eating, visiting, chicken noodle soup and 4 games of Wahoo.  Have you ever played this game?  I had not, but my cousins roped me into playing with them and once I caught on, it was fun.  My nephew William (and Godson) made their board.   Going to try and convince him to make his Godmother one :).  I think the kids would enjoy this game too.  

We left El Campo late that night arriving home at almost 1 a.m. and plum tuckered out.  We all went to bed but had to be up early (I did anyway) to boil eggs and potatoes for the potato salad I was taking to Daddy's for lunch later.  Oh how I didn't want to get up Sunday morning to cut up tators but I did.  We had a nice lunch at Daddy's and an egg hunt for 3 of the kids. We all bailed out early since everyone had to get back to school and work today.  I did manage to get a sweet picture with my babies though...

Love these two so stinkin' much....

Hope y'all had a great Easter weekend!!

The Garden Is In

Yes ma'am, we got it in yesterday evening.  I still need more green bean and flower seeds but everything else is in.  I have three new additions to the garden this year...onions, green bell peppers and cantaloupe.  I've never tried them before but giving it a whirl this year. We also have tomatoes (big ones & cherries), potatoes, squash, zucchini, cucumbers, green beans and jalapenos.

For the flowers we have sunflowers, zinnias, purple coneflowers, hollyhocks and poppies.  Hopefully the bees will be plentiful this year and the garden will be bountiful.

I am also hoping the dreams I've had regarding the garden are premonitions, if you will.  The dreams are behind me planting bell peppers this year.  In one dream, I had a huge bell pepper "tree" on the side of the house where I grew up with tons of peppers hanging down.  Weird I know, especially since they don't grow in the form of a tree but I'm thinking positive and taking it as a sign to plant them this year.  I also had another dream that Momma was in.  Just a note here, when she is in my dreams, there is always a message.  In this one, she is cooking supper.  Daddy brings in a ton of green beans from the garden.  She tells him she'll cook those too.  She was in the process of frying up some squash and zucchini already.  Hoping its a sign my garden will do well this year.

Thinking positive....

Not much else going on this way. Gearing up for Easter this weekend with family.  You know how I'm looking forward to that. 

Randoms

Happy Tuesday y'all!  I'm trying my best to put on a happy face because its Tuesday and not Monday but its proving to be difficult.  When my alarm when off this morning, I was thinking it was already Wednesday so I was doing a mini happy dance in my head because Thursday is really our Friday since we have a holiday this week.  That happy dance quickly went away when I was in the shower and realized it was actually Tuesday.  Curses!  Oh what disappointment.

On a brighter side, check out my ring....

Actually, it was one of Momma's rings.  Its very springy so I've been wearing it this week.  Do you know I remember when we picked this ring out for her.  I don't remember if it was for Mother's Day or her birthday but I do remember going with Daddy to find her something. We chose this one because it was different with all the colors and because she didn't have anything like it.  Good memory.  

I was feeling pretty good about my outfit today, especially since my little priss pot helped pick out my necklace, so I decided to take a pic.  I do want to know why my pics always look ridiculous but when I see the EXACT same picture on others, it looks good?  

 

A few weeks ago when the little priss pot and I went shopping for sandals, we popped into Buckle to check out some capris for me.  Well, the sales lady found some clothes for the priss pot to try on.  She also brought me a cute little top to try.  I was in the middle of texting a girlfriend so we took this pic to show her.  

#twopeasinapod

#arentwecute

I didn't get anything for myself but I splurged big time and got the priss pot the outfit in this picture.  

#dontjudge

#youonlyliveonce

#shesspoiledandiknowit

Also a few weeks ago, I received this from the ex boyfriend....

We are talking.  I don't know what will come of all this talk, if anything.  We shall see. Stay tuned.

Sunday Evening Thoughts

I'm relaxing this evening in the living room after cooking supper. I was watching the Hallmark channel but decided to see what else was on. Rocky III, heck yeah!! Does anyone else stop and watch Rocky when you happen upon it? I do. I have watched Rocky II a hundred times but I always, always tear up (sometimes a full on cry) at the end when he says "yo Adrian, I did it". That part is shown at the beginning of Rocky III as well...

Went to Needville Friday night to get ready for the city wide garage sale at my cousin's house. I didn't have much this go round which was evident by the whopping $38 I made. #dontbejealous

The weather didn't affect our customers. It was cold and windy by they still came out in swarms to find their treasures. Overall, we made just over $2000. That was between seven families in our group. My cousin Dina swears this was the last one.  She said that back in Septemebrr as well. We shall see what happens. 

Saturday confirmed two things. I miss my momma something awful. Next week will be 9 years since she's been gone. That is crazy. I love being around momma's sisters because it's like having her around but this time, I really missed her.  I am going to also admit that I am very jealous that some of my cousins have the opportunity to spend more time with the Aunts then I do. I absolutely hate that we've reached that point that we don't get together as often as we used to. I miss it. We will see everyone Saturday for Vyvial Easter and I can't wait. Being close to your relatives is a blessing and a curse. A curse because as you get older, your family grows and gets busy, life takes over and it gets harder to see each other. A blessing because even when you can't see each other as often as you life, they are always there for you in a heartbeat. 

I was all for another cold spell but I can do without the wind. Tony showed up at lunch today to plant the garden. I turned him away. I surely did! I told him it was too cold to plant a garden. If we weren't fighting the wind, I think I would have been fine, maybe. He made a couple passes with the tiller and headed home. The kids and I loaded up and went to Lowes to get seeds, plants, mulch and topsoil for the flowerbeds. 

We'll shoot for planting Tuesday evening. It's supposed to be warmer and not as windy. #fingerscrossed 

Super excited that I'm only working 4 days this week. Good Friday holiday this week. I promised Bella we would take my $38 from the garage sale and put it towards mani/pedis on Friday when we're off so we'll have pretty fingers and toes for Easter. She loved that idea. Momma is in desperate need of a pedicure too 😉 

And since it's the first day of Spring, I'll leave you with these...have a great week! 

Friday Is Here

Not much to report in these here parts.  The rain has subsided and the sun has come out.  Thinking it will be a little too wet to do anything in the yard this weekend so tomorrow the girl and I may venture out to find some sandals.  I'll see if the boy wants to join us but I'm betting if the weather is nice again, he will want to put that kayak of his in the water.  Just a hunch I have.  ;)

As you know, I was off Wednesday with the babies but came back to work yesterday to no computer.  It up and died on me so I got my new one installed sooner rather than later.  Its faster and better but still some kinks to work out.  And I need a few programs installed that I use on a regular basis.  It was kind of a crazy day yesterday with that going on and it being board meeting day. Yay me!  But we made it through and Friday has arrived!! Y'all know how I love me a Friday any day of the week.

Some really good news this week...my tax return hit the bank!!  Momma is paying some things off and putting some money away.  Feels good.

On the down side, I read some negative comments on FB last night.  My own fault because I went looking at someone's profile and there they were.  No names mentioned specifically but you know who they are directed.  These are people that are my age and older that should know better, but they don't.  Its really sad, but it also upset me and took a while to calm myself and fall asleep last night.  I know I have done nothing wrong but it still hurts because there are people out there who have been poisoned with stories and lies all to make someone else feel better about themselves and to gain "friends".  I'm better off I know but it still bothers me.  As my friend Callie and I said this morning, being a good person, the bigger person and taking the high road can suck because most of the time, you are the target of nastiness.

I saw this last night...

So that's what I'm going to do, stay focused on the positive.  

Y'all have a great weekend!

  

Rain

I'm laying in bed watching today's episode of The Young & The Restless listening to the rain outside. It's thundering but not bad. This is the kind of rain I love. I love to go to sleep to rain like this. I sleep really good too. 

Ever since the hail storm last year in April, Bella doesn't care for thundering. It worries her. I reassure her but she still gets spooked. I get lots of snuggles from her in times like these. 

I took a vacation day today to spend the day with the kids while they were on spring break this week. Chris ended up going to friends house to spend the night. He's been such a trooper being home with his little sister all week, it didn't bother me to let him go. Bella and played games, colored and then baked some chocolate chip cookies. 

She helped momma measure everything and watched to make sure all the goodness was mixing up well. 

Finished product....

My little nugget snuck her peace sign in on me when I snapped this picture. Silly girl. She had a few cookies to make sure they turned out good. They did! 

It's been a good lazy pajamas kind is day with my girl and I loved it, rain and all. 

Thursday Laugh

I came across this on FB earlier and had to share it.  I've seen it before but it made me laugh again today.  I so needed the laugh and decided I had to share it with y'all.  I guess you could consider this my throwback Thursday!

Oh Gladys, you're a hoot!!

My favorite line from this....
"Listen, I'll be honest with ya....I love Jesus but I drink a little"

Ain't that the truth though?  Well...okay, it is for me!  LOL!!

Y'all have a good one :)