It's her again

Yesterday, Ella woke up from the afternoon nap first and she was being so cute and happy.

She stays busy cleaning my floors and testing which furniture will hold up to her trying to tip stuff over on herself.  (yes, that's a bruise on the right side of her forehead, in all this learning to crawl business she hasn't figured out yet that doorways and walls don't move)

(Currently she's taking a cat nap and I'm looking at her over the video monitor and wishing I could take a picture. She sleeps with her bum straight up in the air. It's too cute.)

Uh, oh...she's coming to get me!

Yipee! I finally finished the alphabet pillow.

Table

Some people wanted to see a picture of our table. It came with 6 chairs and a leaf, obviously I don't have all the chairs around the table or the leaf in, if I did that we wouldn't have room to sit at the table. ☺ Now I need to find a tablecloth so we don't ruin it in the first month. You can't really tell by the photo, but it's more of a mahogany color and not black.

I'm working on new pictures of the new beast that I'm driving around, but I was going to wait until we got our new rims. (part of our deal in buying the van was that the dealer was going to put new alloy wheels on it for us)  However, the dealer is doing it's best to uphold the slimy reputation car sales people have by backing out on their end.......anyway, I'll post pictures soon.

In other good news, we sold our other van over the weekend. Our ad hadn't even been posted for 24 hrs before it was sold,  that was nice and it's a relief to not have to worry about it anymore.

Ummm, other than that I don't think I have anything else to talk about. heh. ☺

Memories and a cool story...

Since my grandma passed away a few weeks ago, it of course brings up a lot of memories and you want to remember all the good things about that person. Grandma wasn't perfect and that was probably what drew more people to her because she was human but she was always trying so hard to be a better person and I'm grateful for that legacy. Out of all the grand-kids (all 60 of us or however many there are. ☺) Grandma and I probably butt heads the most, but I was stubborn and not living up to expectations so that was to be expected, we went on to have a great relationship though. ;o) Now that I'm older I can fully appreciate how blessed I was to grow up in a place with all of my grandparents within walking distance and active participants in my daily life. Every afternoon at 3:00 was snack-time at "Grandma Conrad's" and all of us cousins and our friends would go over there and hang out in the afternoons eating, coloring, playing the piano, reading, or just visiting.  Think about it now, that's truly a special thing to be able to have in your childhood.

 I titled my post on Grandma's graveside as "Final Goodbye" and that's because really, I said "my goodbye" when I was a senior in high school a few months before we put Grandma in the nursing home (1999). Grandpa had gone somewhere for the day so us grand kids that were around would check on Grandma on our way to and from school and during breaks. I stopped at their house to see what she was doing on my way home from school and Grandma said some really awful horrible things, of which I'm thankful I don't remember. I went home in tears thinking that Grandma hated me and wondered if that's how she felt about me all those years, but then after some time I finally realized that it wasn't "her" saying all those things and so then I cried again knowing that Grandma would never be herself again.

My Grandpa and Grandpa on their wedding day. (1943)

My uncle Tim posted this story on Facebook and I thought it was really neat so I wanted to share.

I guess this story is out and many of you have asked that I post it so you can review these events. You may all take the following message anyway you like, but I believe my mother reached out to me from heaven to let me know she's still looking out for me. You cannot believe how this message impacted me. Goosebumps are still pricking the back of my neck. What follows are some messages I received from a man on Facebook.




Nick Nicholson February 21 at 1:52am



I have found a bible in a Salt Lake City rental car lost and found closet, given to Tim Conrad from his parents on his birthday in 1974, with a prologue written from them. It includes his date of birth. If this sounds like it might be yours, let me know your birthdate and I'll confirm and get it to you.


-Nick






Tim Conrad February 21 at 2:40pm



Nick,

I lost a bible years ago, I'm not sure if it's the one, but my birthday is June 12, 1955

Thanks,


Tim



Nick Nicholson February 21 at 3:19pm
Hi Tim -
This is profound.


160 Tim Conrad’s on Facebook, I'm just now half way through posting to them; I can only post 3 per hour, else Facebook sees the duplicative post as a web bot and tries to lock my account... Nevertheless, you are the one!

More profound is the story of this bible. Between 1973 and 1976, I managed American International Rent A Car in Salt Lake City. Upon my departure, I was given a box of Lost & Found items that were never claimed. I recall at the time trying to reconcile your name (on the front of the bible) with rental contract names, but couldn't find a match... anyway, the box went into my storage unit, and then another when I moved to Colorado in the 80s. I took the box out of storage last week and had an unbelievably powerful and compelling urge to use the technologies that have evolved since packing that box away, in order to find you...



I have an esoteric spiritual connection to source and believed that the energy driving me to find you last week was associated with Valentine’s Day… now that I read your Facebook “wall,” I see that 2/14/2010 was more than just a typical Valentine’s Day in your life. For the loss of your Mother, I am profoundly sorry and can only hope that the story of this Bible, and the angelic impetus, karmic energies and divine inspiration for its final return, will have a higher connection for you than is otherwise worldly possible.



Please let me know where to send it.



To authenticate, here is the inscription:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~






“-With Joy shall ye draw water out of the Wells of Salvation”


Isaiah 12:3



This Bible is an inexhaustible source of the heavenly water; - draw from it often –



To Tim Conrad on his birthday – June 12, 1974



From Dad and Mom

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Truly profound.


-Nick



To give full clarification about this event. Mom and Dad purchased me a very expensive NIV Study Bible for my Birthday in 1974. In 1975 we went on a trip to SLC to perform "Worthy is the Lamb" a cantata written by James and Lois. We were put up in some of the church member's homes. I was given a ride to the house by one of the congregation. When I got home from the trip a realized I was missing my bible. I called the people I stayed with as well as the church we performed in to find it but to no avail. I figured the bible had been stolen. I had no idea the car I got a ride in was a rental.



Anyway, that was 35 years ago. I was so upset about losing that bible, but after a couple of years I gave up hope of ever seeing it again. It's hard to believe that this timing is coincidence

Messy Girl

The other day I'm doing my thing around the house, Aidan and I were polishing off a bag of peanut M&M's, I come back in the living room to check on the kids and found Ella looking like this.

After freaking out for a minute and making sure I got all the peanut particles out of her mouth (thank goodness for those sharp teeth!), I grabbed the camera

This happened before with a brownie that had almonds in it.

I haven't figured out if Aidan is being nice and sharing

or if Ella is just being an opportunist and picking up his leftovers.

 She was totally bummed that I took away what little was left of that M&M.

She likes her food!

Yes, I'm a dork...

I have another blog. I created the new one to talk about the house remodel, decorating, crafty things, furniture I want to refinish, someday gardening, etc... I probably will and do talk about it over here too, but I can go more into depth over there. ☺
http://othernuttystuff.blogspot.com/

More importantly, I wrote a post over there about my blog books, so for those that were interested in that, go check it out.

Now, a video of my children just cause they are cute.

The Munchkins

I think Aidan is starting to enjoy Ella more now that she can move around and chase him.

He brings her toys and food.....yeah

food, like brownies (with almonds!) and M&M's. (a story for tomorrow)

Although she does try to steal his toys away from him now and he's not so fond of that.

I've been putting them down at the same time for their afternoon nap and I will check on Ella through our video monitor and I see Aidan putting toys and books in her crib. Nice.

He also sings to her which is oh so helpful of him when trying to put her to sleep.

They are tons of fun though, if not somewhat exhausting. ☺

Eight Months!

She's on the MOVE!

Now that she's crawling (or something sort of resembling crawling) it's really hard to get her to sit still.

Her hair is looking particularly awesome too.

She's kind of goofball too.

I was sitting there throwing toys to her so I could get her to sit still long enough to get a couple of photos.

She's got 5 teeth now and working on the 6th tooth. As I said, she's definitely getting around and she's my little vacuum looking for treats (edible or not), she knows that underneath Aidan's chair is the best place for finding the good stuff.