A Day of Memories. . .

Alright so it started back in September of 1997. We met on a blind date. That blind date was amazing! I didn't think so at the time, I thought Big Daddy was the typical guy trying to impress me. He apparently did impress me because I called him next and asked him to go to devotional with me on Tuesday. He said he normally watched the devotional in the theater arts building and so that's where we went. We saw each other everyday from that point on.

On October 19th, Big Daddy proposed. Surprised me and I surprised him too letting him know I needing to think about it. I said yes the same day, later in the evening. I already knew I wanted to marry him. We were engaged and started planning our wedding date and all the other fun stuff that goes along with getting married. We rented our first apartment by putting a deposit in on it in February and holding it by paying "most" of the rent on it every month for the landlord to hold it for us since we loved it compared to everything else out there. I'm telling you our friends all hung out at our place because it was roomy and didn't have pigeons living in it with us. Oh, and, the bathroom was not IN the kitchen.

Big Daddy had a goal not to kiss until he could kiss his wife. So, not really fond of this idea, I tried with all my might to sway him away from his goal. I really did try! But, he when he has a goal he is trying to attain, he reaches it. So, that's right we didn't kiss until. . .

May 15, 1998 over the altar.


On our wedding day, we walked over to Wendy's, we weren't hungry - just thirsty from all the kissing we had to do to make up for lost time, and we both ordered BIGGIE Pink Lemonades. So, in honor of our wedding day, we always have gone to Wendy's and gotten pink lemonades to celebrate. A couple of years ago, Wendy's stopped carrying their pink lemonade. So, now we make our own. So today, I made pink lemonade. I didn't have enough to make TWO BIGGIE pink lemonades so I made one pink and one blue raspberry lemonade. That's our two glasses we typically use. D-for Dad and M-Mom. Big Daddy even called today and asked if we could make a date for some lemonade. I love that man!
So, here we are today. . . a portion of our journey together completed and lots of years ahead of us. This is our first anniversary apart. Lucky 13! Seeing how we have been in the military for almost 10 years, we do consider ourselves lucky.

I'm so happy with the choice I made those many years ago to marry Big Daddy. He brings a smile to my face, still makes my heart flutter and holding his hand is still one of my FAVORITE things to do!

Sweetheart, Happy Anniversary! I love you!

Spring Family Pics

Big Daddy & Little Mama

Kissing! Love Miss Priss' face. Climbing trees makes taking pics more fun!

Family. . . isn't it about time.

A big BIG thanks to Dee Miller for being our photographer!

Just One Good One. . .

Nana Banana was nice enough to offer to take a family portrait for us in front of the tree on Christmas Eve. It's always fun to do family pictures. We say off the wall comments just to make us smile. One of our favorites is "Daddy wears pantyhose." (don't worry Big Daddy would never do that) Another way to get us going is to do a little fanny pinching and squeezing.

One of the first shots. Notice Miss Priss is spinning around to find out WHO touched her. Cowgirl is protecting her backside. Big Daddy is checking to see if his aim is right and Little Mama is protecting her backside too.

Now it's Drama Queen's turn to mix it up and do a famous dance move trying to squirm away from fanny pinches. Miss Priss is protecting her assets. Diva is making sure she can be seen while Cowgirl obviously has her hand covering her hiney.

Great smiles in this one. Cowgirl caught her attacker! Miss Priss is tired of smiling and protecting her hind-end. Drama Queen's face is saying, "Enough Already!"

Finally, a good shot. . . for the most part!

Couldn't skip putting one if of just the girls. They are all so beautiful and full of energy. Such a delight to have kids at Christmas time.

We Made Them Look!

Don't you just love Miss Priss's slumped shoulders??

Fun Day at the "Pumpkin Patch"

I've asked in the past - why do we do this? And, we smile?! I think secretly everyone knows I like them.

Obligatory picture before we went in. You know, you may never find your way out!

Our choice in maps. We took the SUPER EASY one so the kids could answer correctly. Again, secretly I was afraid of the maze, I'm not so good with directions when all I have to rely on is the sun or moon.

Picture of the girls IN the maze. Doesn't Miss Priss look thrilled? They were troopers and stayed together quite well. We did get "lost" a few times. We made it though.

Drama Queen trying her hand at the corn cannon. I didn't whip out the camera until she was the only one left to shoot. If you hit the target you got a small bag of kettle corn. Little Mama hit the target and boy was that kettle corn yummy. We wanted to get more but you had to stand in a terribly long line, place your order and then wait 30-45 minutes for more kettle corn. The poor young men and women running that booth simply couldn't keep up with all the demand. It was probably the BEST kettle corn I've had since the street markets in California.

Miss Priss's fall portrait. Yes, it was humid and hot and windy. Miss Priss was trying to smile and this was the best she could do. Right after this picture she started complaining her lips were hurting. Poor thing her lips were chapped.

Drama Queen sittin' pretty with a fall pumpkin.

All my gorgeous girls!

Drama Queen Fall Portrait

All my beautiful girls again.

Cowgirl's Fall Portrait - I love the smile on this girls face! Her whole body is smiling! Can you see it too?

The girls loved the "Cow-ch."

Diva's Fall Portrait

So, one of the biggest things we were looking forward to was the pumpkin patch. Little Mama had called in advance and spoken to someone at the farm about the pumpkin patch. She assured me that the kids would love it and get to wander around a select their choice of pumpkin. When we arrived at the field, there was little selection. We did not get a single pumpkin. We got back on the hay wagon to ride back to the main maze and saw something wonderful. More pumpkins! You see - this is apparently how pumpkins "grow" in our part of the country.

The pumpkins "grow" in these special containers. Do you see how bare the field was? Some wonderful farm hands help to distribute the "fresh grown" pumpkins for you enjoyment.

Gentle boys! These are "fresh grown."

The girls all followed the tractor around like deer follow a feed truck on the hunting ranches. It was pretty funny!

Drama Queen had found an itty bitty baby pumpkin.

Miss Priss selected her small pumpkin and was found with the chapstick out a lot. Good thing I'm a smart mama and keep one in my pocket all the time.

Drama Queen with her selection.

Diva and I saw lots of people carrying around two pumpkins at a time just like this. Didn't they know they looked ri-donk-u-lous? We think this picture is funny!

Cowgirl and her prized pumpkin.

Drama Queen on the hayride.

This is one of the pictures I took on Saturday that I really liked.

We had a blast and will probably return next year too. However, we are still searching for a REAL pumpkin patch.

Big Daddy's Adventures

At times, Big Daddy has to travel for work. Don't worry, I told them to act sad for this picture. When he does travel, he packs this giant bag. Each of the girls gave it an honest try to see if they could carry it. It made for some great laughs right before Bid Daddy had to leave.Drama Queen pulling with all her might! She's a tough one, got it to budge just enough to knock her over.

Pretty much Drama Queen looked just like her big sister, Diva, does in this one.

Cowgirl gave all she had and didn't get it to move an inch.

Miss priss tried and basically knocked the bag over so I staged this photo. The bag is bigger than her and for sure weighs at least double what she does.

So, how many of Big Daddy's girls does it take to lift this giant bag???

All 4!

I love Cowgirls face, looks like she's the only one trying.

This is our countdown chart. One globe per day of travel. It's in the hall where everyone can see it all the time. The girls can say and kiss their Big Daddy goodnight every evening on their way to bed.

This time, he's gonna have fun and keeps telling everyone his work is sending him on a cruise for his birthday. We sure are gonna miss him.

This Didn't Work

Why are there timers on cameras? When Bapa was visiting this last week, we went out to do some pictures. This is the result of the 10 second timer on my camera. I love my tripod, it's great! The timer part, we'll have to work on that. Imagine what we would have gotten if I used the 3 second timer! More posts about this past week will follow.