End of School Year 2016/2017

This past Friday, June 9th, 2017 marked the last day of school for my girls. Kathleen had her graduation from 5th grade and won a bunch of awards. We are so proud of her and all her hard work this year. Seems like just yesterday I was getting her ready for her first day in Kindergarten, time sure does fly by. Off to middle school and 6th grade this fall!

Hayley finished up the 10th grade and is currently doing the driver's part of her testing this week to get her learner's permit. Been saying lots of prayers, especially with all the other careless driver's on the road out there...I worry... I trust in her very much but as a new driver there is so much to learn.
Again for me the time just flies by so very fast... Kindergarten to 10th felt like I blinked and it was in fast forward....

                                                      Receiving a few of her awards. :-)

                           They had  a nice slide show for the parents to enjoy and reminisce.

 There were goodbyes until the fall.... but I know they will be hanging out this summer together too!

                           Mrs. Hall, her 5th grade homeroom and main subjects teacher. :-)

                               Some of her awards she received. She was so very excited!

                              Mrs. Miller, her math teacher whom she just loved as a teacher!

                           Silliness with snapchat filters from Hayley and her BFF Breanne!

We traveled up to Maryland to spend time with Caitlin and celebrate her high school graduation! These girls have grown up together and her mom and I have been best friends since we were 3 years old! So happy we were able to be a part of it all.

And while we were back in Maryland  we just had to get a snowball that I have missed so very much!! :-) Delicious and the marshmallow just completes it!

                                                                         Blessings,
                                                                               Jill

I Have Been Selected as One of The Top 100 Stay At Home Mom Blogs by Feedspot! :-)

I received such a pleasant surprise in my email yesterday from Anuj, a representative for Feedspot. He told me I was selected by their panel as one of the top 100 Stay at Home Mom blogs on the internet and I feel truly honored. Here is a portion of the email I received, and also a code to add the badge to my blog :-)

If you click on the badge on the right sidebar of my blog, it will take you to a full list of all the top 100 Stay at Home  Mom blogs and how to subscribe to them and more. I came in at # 73 :-) Congratulations to all who have made the list! There are so many wonderful, amazing blogs out there and so many truly wonderful people I have met through the years. I feel so very honored to have been chosen for this recognition. Thank you to all who were  a part of this nomination.

With that being said, I had just been talking with Jerry the other day about how I need to get more of my posts together and up on my site. This very life that we blog about also keeps us quite busy on a regular basis, lol. ;-) But no excuses, this is something I love... the sharing of recipes, crafts, daily life, tips and so much more. I need to get bak to all that! I started this blog in 2010 to document our family's lives and to leave a memory trail behind for my children and their children and so on for generations to come. I want my children, husband and family and friends to know how much I loved them and what they mean to me, even after I am gone. Then it also grew to fabulous friendships, some paid posts, blog conferences and so much more. Going further than I had ever originally planned! I write and take pictures for the enjoyment and the memories... To freely write is such a great privilege and blessing and I am so grateful to be a part of the blogging community. This award is that nudge to me that I need to get back to more frequently posting like I did before. So more will be coming soon, I just really wanted to share this with all of you!!! :-)

For fun I thought I'd share my very first blog post with you, you can read it here  My how much has changed since this very first post! :-) Thank you to all who have been here with me since the beginning and a big welcome to all those just joining in!

Have a wonderful weekend!!!! It's a whirlwind here, but I will have a lot to share! Thank you for stopping by to visit my blog, there is so much more to come!

                                                                      Blessings,
                                                                           Jill

Whirlwind Weekend and Hayley's Sweet 16th Birthday!

This was my view of Jerry for most of the ride over Memorial Day weekend. After the girls got home from school and Jerry home from work, we jumped into the Ford 250 pickup rental and headed to Maryland. My parents rented the truck so we could bring our trailer up and load a few things for their upcoming move to NC. Yes, they have sold their home and everything is moving pretty quickly for a June settlement. More details on that soon!

We had one day (Saturday) to load up things in the truck and trailer and Ashley just had her baby girl Annabelle 2 months ago and she brought her over so we could spend time with her. Ashley is the daughter of a good friend of ours so we consider her our  niece :-)

Hayley's uncle Garry always manages to get crabs for her, for her birthday each year and he dropped them off to my mom's house but couldn't stay.

When you're from Maryland... you'd better know how to eat a crab! LOL. It's surprising to me how many places haven't heard of Old bay seasoning... something we learned in our moves.

Jerry and my sister's husband Brent enjoying what was left of the crabs after the girls were done :-)

Stacy, a friend since childhood from our old neighborhood and also considered family, came over to help us load things up and she brought her great danes back for a little bit, they are so sweet! This is Jax....

                                          And this is Bella, a little more camera shy :-)

                                              Our niece Neve with Ashley and Annabelle :-)

Neve turned 13 on May 23rd and Hayley turned 16 May 29th so we celebrated together while we were there with a big cake :-)

          All loaded up to get ready to head back down the road for a long ride to NC on Sunday!

It was mostly cloudy, gloomy skies with rain on the way back. Jerry grew pretty attached to that new truck, lol and had a hard time letting it go back to the rental place. ;-)

            Arriving back at our home where we will store it for awhile until they move down.

Monday was Hayley's birthday so we had a little celebration with the 4 of us. So hard to believe she is now16!!!

For those of you new to my blog who don't know our story... I was told I'd never be  able to have children,....through a lot of prayers and 7 years of waiting we found out we were expecting Hayley. Jerry had thought he wanted a boy, but when the ultrasound showed a little girl his heart melted and he went out and bought Hayley her first diamond and emerald jewelry set, a ring and earrings to give her on her 16th birthday. We held it for her all these years and I kept it safe through each of our moves. Monday was the day she finally got it and Jerry's eyes filled with tears as she opened it. Both his girls are truly daddy's girls and there's nothing he wouldn't do for them. Someone asked Hayley why it wasn't a car for her birthday and she said this set meant more to her than a car. We love you Hayley with all our hearts! Happy 16 th birthday!!!

We also have the tradition of going to Texas Roadhouse every year for our birthday dinners. Our anniversary is the 28th, a day before Hayley's birthday so we celebrate it all together. She always gets a steak, but this year she had a cold and ordered a burger! We were surprised! But she said she's saving her steak for when she can taste it, lol. Smart girl!

This picture is of a random stranger's VW bus he let us take pictures with. This or a VW beetle are on Hayley's dream car list, so I thought I'd add it for her birthday post :-) One day... I have no doubt she will find hers. This weekend we will be having a few of her friends over to celebrate and in a couple weeks the big celebration will be in Disney World and we are taking her best friend with us. We are also meeting my sister and her family there. They are so super excited, as is Kathleen!

More pretty blooms showing up around the yard... this yucca finally bloomed, in it's early stages Kathleen was convinced it was asparagus ;-) The bottom sure does look that way when it first comes out.

We also have a very old Magnolia tree in our yard that stands quite tall and has beautiful blooms on it this year. We've had a ton of rain, so I'm grabbing the pictures of them as I can while they are blooming.

I will be sharing my garden posts soon, I am having trouble with blogger picking up pictures from my photos on my Mac and I'm not sure why, so trying to get that figured out so I can share them. Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

                                                                          Blessings,
                                                                                Jill