90 Years AND Counting!

This past weekend my family on my Mom's side gathered to celebrate my Ma-Maw's 90th birthday at Red Top Mountain State Park on the lake.

Ma-Maw is 90 going on 50, she's healthy as a horse and rides her stationary bike 5 miles EVERY day... and to beat that, it's on her back porch in this horrible heat.  Go Ma-Maw!

Amazing how one woman can make this many people, and this isn't everyone.

Ma-Maw, Lexi and me ofcourse!

My Ma-Maw and my Mom

If only she were as sweet the whole time as she was in this picture.

(I know I have other children, but they were busy swimming the entire time)

My cousin and her sweet baby, I just had to add this...

Meet Amanda...

Amanda, our new addition.  I finally got my hands on their wedding pictures.

Welcome to our family

Cat Food Bully...

How could this innocent look mean anything is up?  So sweet and cute.

Until she realized the cat food bowl was sitting under the bench

Flood Funny...

This picture was taken by one of my husband's customers.  Thankfully we didn't receive anything close to this at our home.  Just floating dead moles in the backyard, it took my cat a few days before he decided to tote them away.

I'm very sorry to whomever's home this was, but you have to admit, their sign is VERY clever and funny at the same time.  It's sad to think that someone would try to profit from another's tragedy.  Looting is ridiculous and wrong in ANY situation.  Only way that I could even come close to agreeing with it would be in a world wide disaster where your children were going hungry and you needed food.  That's about it.  I'd do anything for my kids, I'd probably do anything for anybody's kids.

Innocence

As 8th grade ends there is a right of passage, Spring Formal.

She's growing up.  Wearing short dresses and heels.

Repairing Old Photos

I've been trying my hand at repairing old family photos for my "wall"  I didn't want to OVER photoshop them, I want to keep the old look, but some were wrinkled or missing edges and had been written on.

Let's Talk About Our Family Heritage...

I have this brilliant idea or maybe in the end, a not so brilliant idea of hanging pictures in a fashion or style on a large wall depicting our family tree.  I probably won't be able to go back more than Scott's and my Great-Grandparents, or use 5x7's or something to be able to fit the frames on the wall without looking too cluttered.

I LOVE knowing about my family.  Even when I was a little girl, which I still am *cough*, I would sit and listen to my family tell stories about their life growing up in Kentucky and about the coal mines.  And my Dad's side of the family were farmers, to hear their stories about working in the cotton fields.  Funny how you find out all this "secret" information that nobody talks about.

This is my Maternal Grandmother with her first four children, I'm sure my Mom was born by then but was absent in the picture because she spent the first few years of her life in the Shriners Hospital In Lexington, KY.  I can only hope that I will be as beautiful as my Ma-Maw.  Wonderful Lady.

My Great-Grandfather & Great- Grandmother, my Grandpa's Mom & Dad.

Left: Great-Grandmother, my Grandmother's Mom  Right: My Grandfather

Left: My Grandmother, beautiful!  Right: One of my Great Uncles, I like this picture and it's colors.

My Mother

My Grandfather on the right, working in the KY coal mines

Wouldn't these pictures look great in some antique frames on the wall?

New Addition...

We have a new addition, thank goodness the addition isn't due to pregnancy. Example, me.  Welcome to my new daughter-in law.  Saying that makes me sound SO old.  But really folks, I'm still a baby. Wink, wink.

Alex's Photo Shoot...

The world as Alex sees it...

Notice the beautiful lines... such imagination. :)

There's like 400 more of these.  I found a steal of a deal at a local liquidation outlet.  A Vtech camera for kids for $2.50 and Alex went wild with it.

Beautiful Weather...

Nothing Much...

Loving The Digital Scrapbooking...

Oh, it only took me about 3 hours to complete this simple template.  Haahaaa.  I'm slow.  Seriously though, PhotoShop is harder than I thought, but I am trekking through with tutorials by my side.  Probably the best ones yet that I have found are Funky PlayGround Designs or FPD there are alot of great digital scrapbooking tutorials here.  And for your blog, I've found that Shabby Blogs and Cutest Blog On The Block have great how to's as well as freebies for your blog.

Happy 1st Birthday Lexi

Where has the time gone?

Happy Birthday my sweet girl!  Those first few weeks, mostly months were rough.  But we made it together.

Smarter Than Your Average Bear...

Alex and Lexi love to play with the doodle pad.  Here they are showing off their smarts.

 

Alex has just amazed me.  He's 4 and there are so many things he can spell by himself.  He's basically taught himself to read just by memorizing words on signs and things.  There are eight kids and he can spell all their names as well as his own.  Granted, some of the letters are shaped alittle strange like his x and e's.  But he's a smart little sucker.  He already knows all his color words.  He even knows how to drive, he's a horrible backseat driver.  "Mom, why are you slowing down?" or "That's not the way"

We are currently working on adding and subtracting.  He can do it if I talk him through, but write it down and he thinks I'm drawing crosses.  Haha.  He also informed me that he prays at his school and that we need to pray too.  Too cute!

Many Faces Of Amber....

How many pictures can you take of yourself? I mean really! Amber got a new camera so while she was at school today I decided to upload her pictures to the computer for her... it took FOREVER and ever and ever and ever......................................................... there were 168 pictures that she took of herself over the course of two days.

Oh the fun I can have with this! I decided to do a collage, ofcourse this is nowhere near the pictures she took. Then I decided to make a video with some really dorky music. Ahhhh.... I see blackmail in her future! Bad Momma, Bad!

Trip Down Memory Lane...

Thinking about Lexi turning one in two months made me emotional... I started sifting through our photos and it brought back so many memories for me, especially when the older kids were little. When you have different age groups growing up together you tend to forget the cute little things that the older ones did, or that could just be because I have too many kids.

I ran across this cute Easter picture of Matt & Amber. Adorable! Matt was 4 and Amber was 2.


Matt's first birthday... I still think he was way too gorgeous to have been a boy.

Alex's first Santa picture... he doesn't look too happy about it.

I didn't meet these sweet kids until Alyssa was 5 and Megan was 7 and Allen 14. This is Megan's 4th birthday. Look how much everyone has grown!

Daddy and his sweet girls.

Our first Christmas as a family... can't believed I paid $5 for this stinky picture of a bored Santa. This was in 2004. Amber is 9 here, Megan 7, Bethany 6 and Alyssa 5.

Bethany with a much smilier (if that's even a word) Santa. Beth was 8.

Then I ran across this one, Megan and Alyssa. I'm not sure how old they were here, the imprint on the back says 2000. I look at Alyssa and I think about the resemblence of her and Alex.

Our first vacation with Alex and Lexi... she hardly had any hair!

Me and my hunk! 2004

When I married the love of my life... November 2004

Matt 11, Amber 9 and Beth 5. A little getaway with my kids that I drug Scott along. Close to when we first met.

Alex's 2nd birthday.

Alex 20 months.