MiniBullyMom's Musings

...about updating my blog!

You would think that life would slow down during the summer and the hockey offseason. I don't know how I juggle it all during hockey season. I've about decided that it's because I get lazy during the off season and as such don't get as much accomplished.

We spend last weekend at the ocean and visited Westport for Pirate Days. We did a little geocaching, beachcombing and kite flying. I took some new photos of Washaway Beach . We took a family photo at Grayland Beach on a giant stump that washed up onto the shore and had fun just hanging out with our friends. It turned out to be a great weekend weather wise and this coming holiday weekend is supposed to be another great weekend. Weather should be in the high 70's/low 80's which will be perfect for camping and enjoying fireworks.

Since my last posting we have acquired a 5 month old, female German Shepard. We named her Hemi and she is cute as can be. I had my doubts about a "big" dog but she has actually done very well adapting. No fights between the dogs/cats and no "accidents" in the house. Which is pretty impressive considering she was a "farm dog" the first 5 months of her life. The upside 0f her becoming part of our family is that I no longer have backyard "poop patrol". After 17 years of being the main member of that patrol (the guys mulch it with the mower instead of picking it up) I was tired of doing it. So they agreed and we picked her up two days later. I will admit that she must of known that I was the one she had to butter up to when we went to see her the first time. She pretty much ignored everyone else except me that afternoon.

The kids are getting ready to gear up for hockey season. We traditionally take the month of May off and then in June they start Skills&Drills and add some Drop-in sessions in July so that by August they are ready and in shape. This year they both decided to take May and June off from hockey. They are excited because for the first time in four years they are looking forward to having the same coach as last year.

I just realized that it's been almost a month since I last blogged. My friend Kim has been making comments here and there about how she was looking for a message letting her know that I had blogged but I didn't realize how long it's actually been. Needless to say it's been a whirlwind of a month and May just seemed to be a real short month. So I'll give a quick recap of what's happened around the Burress House this month.
I decided to do some followup emailing for my family reunion scrapbook project the first week of the month. I had sent out a second batch of group sheets for family members to correct/update so their scrapbook page could be as current as possible. Some photos started coming back in and I've noticed that either I get no answer at all or a quick answer, photos and updated info.
Then my mom, brother, sister and niece made a quick trip down to Banks, Oregon to visit my aunt who had been diagnosed with Tissue Cancer. She had been experiencing flu-like symptoms for several months and having an extremely hard time just moving around. Six weeks ago she found out it was cancer, had three to six months to live at the most and treatment might give her a month or so more but no guarantee of it and she would probably be sicker as a result.
So we spent a day with her and I was lucky enough to see two cousins that I had not seen in over 15 years. We stopped at the Factory Outlet Stores in Centralia on our way down and did about an hours worth of power shopping at Bath & Body Works, Nike Clearance Store and the Vanity Fair/Lee Outlet. I bought work pants for Mike, my sister bought tennis shoes for friends down in CA, Rachael and Michael bought some aromatherapy "Pillow Spray" that smelt like lavender that's supposed to help you relax and go to sleep.
Then we spent a day getting Christina's graduation annuncements done. (I still have 50 left to make tonight). We have decided to have a party/open house/luau on the Friday after graduation. The dollar store proved to be a treasure trove of luau decorations and even had "Graduation Party" stuff with a Hawaiian theme. Christina's Cap & Gown arrived mid-month so it's becoming "real" to us that she is almost a "full fledged adult" and could actually get married/move out if she was so inclined....but I doubt that will happen because she recently informed me that she plans on living at home until she is 41.....I think NOT!!!! Now we have begun "Graduation Gift" negotiations.
I think part of the reason that the month has "flown by" is because Memorial Day weekend was earlier than normal. We went to Millersylvania for three days of camping with the Kelly's. Sam and I took the kids geocaching. Turns out the boys had dabbled in Geocaching while at Camp Goodtimes. We set out to find two caches (one of which was a two parter) found the first half of one then found out from some fellow geocachers we ran into on the trail that the second half was missing. Found "The Big Tree" cache, dropped off a Travel Bug at "It's Miller Time" and we planted a new cache. I still need to go upload the coordinates for the "KB Toy Box" at www.geocaching.com and update my log book to reflect dropping off the Travel Bug.
Last week I got news that my Aunt's cancer was more involved than originally diagnosed and that three months was on the "extremely optimistic side". While camping over Memorial Day weekend my mom had to call me and let me know that my Aunt passed away.
So this week turned into another busy week. I went back to work on Tuesday then left for Oregon with my niece and son on Tuesday night. Attended her memorial service on Wednesday then took an extra day to visit with cousins and my uncle who had flown in from Utah. It was a nice visit and all agreed that we needed to make an effort to get together and reconnect more often under happier circumstances. I took the opportunity to update everyone's family info in my genealogy program and was even able to have some family members identified in old family photos.

Hummie has decided to kick of National Scrapbooking Day (May 2nd) with a Cool Guy Scrapping Contest where you scrap about the men in your life/family. The contest will run over the next seven weeks with the winner being announced on Fathers Day. Her guys (she is the only female in the family) are going to be the judges.

Leave it to Hummie to dangle a contest in front of me that I just can't resist. She is kicking it off on Saturday and you can get all the info on it HERE at Hummiesworld.

She was thinking ahead and has even created a thread for "guy kits" so we have sources! Deb (Scrappin Cop) has a great kit you can get for free on her blog. I've posted a couple images from the kit so you can see them.

So...if you have a guy in your life who is into tools (what guy isn't) or who is a construction worker this may be the kit for you. Now I'm going to have to figure out if I can somehow coordinate doing a couple layouts for this contest and complete my other scrapping project in time.

Mathilde stopped by my blog last night so I naturally went to her blog to go leave some love and check it out. Even with my non-French speaking skills I was able to figure out that she had the most beautiful free kit available!!! Go check it out at her blog!! Its a huge collab kit from Soval, Joey, Penny57, Scoubidoo and Cjournet13. If you follow the link to this kit there is also an opportunity for 4 more free kits designed by Joey!!

I completed the first page of my Smith Family Scrapbook project. This is the first "album" I will have completed that has a recurring theme. I have done pages here and there for my family but never have I tackled a project of this magnitude. I am going to be creating one page for each family that covers five to six generations of our family. This is giving me an opportunity to update our family history and share it with the entire family. Lucky for me our family has consistently held family reunions bi-annually for the past 26 years so we have a contact list that is pretty extensive and current. The finished book will be auctioned off during our family reunion this summer. Every year there is one "Big Item" and this will be that item this year. Money from our auction gives the reunion committee for the next reunion some seed money to make deposits for venues and other administrative costs like printing and stamps. Each family will get a copy of their page before the reunion.

We have had absolutely beautiful weather the past four days low 70's and sunny!!!
I've started working on a Scrapbook for the Smith Family Reunion this summer. After creating family group sheets so I could update everyone's info I realized that the project was going to be bigger than expected and actually had to create a spreadsheet. This way I can track who I sent group sheets to, who's updated and returned them, if I've uploaded their info in the program, have I received photos, started the page, completed the page and if I have printed it. Once the entire book is completed (by June) it will be auctioned off at our Family Reunion. We hold a silent and verbal auction right before the Saturday night family business meeting. The money raised at the auction goes to the Reunion Fund which helps cover reunion costs and create seed money for the next one.

Hockey season is finally winding down in our house this weekend. We are hosting this weekend's tournament (Daffodil Invitational) and we finished the first two of our four games yesterday. We lost 0-2 to the Eugene Jr. Generals last night. Eugene scored both of their goals in the last 5 minutes of the game. The kids came out excited about how close the score was and talking about what a great game it was. There was actually no complaining about the refs or the other teams sportsmanship. Which is amazing for Midget (8-12 grade) players considering that they are competing against teams that are house level, midget "All-Star" teams whereas we are just a house team made up of Bantams and Midgets who lovesplaying hockey. The kids are already looking forward to next season because for the first time in four years they have a coach who is committed to staying, they will only lose one player to "aging out" and our three Bantams who "played up" are going to be Midget aged next year. The kids are already setting up what nights each month they all want to "drop-in" on as a team over the summer.