Summer vacation 2015

We had a fabulous vacation this past week (me and the kids). Jamey joined us at the cabin on the weekends and my friend, Dani, and her kids joined us at the cabin the last four days. We went to Como Town, went to my aunt's pool for swimming with all the cousins, Ben had his last two soccer games (and scored two goals in one of them!!), and we got our Mastercraft ski boat back in the water for the first time since before the kids were born. We had a blast!!

Cousins

We spent a couple hours today with my cousin's and their kids. At the end, we took this first picture of all the kids. As I was getting ready to post it, I realized it's almost identical to the one below, taken six years ago. Flip around the girl holding Maddie and the one next to them and you've even got them in perfect order. Too funny!

Mother's Day 2015:

February 2009:

Easter 2014

Our way-too-fun day!

Yesterday was a banner day in the fun department for the Webster family. We had two extremely tired kiddos when we got home at 9:30 p.m. last night and all day today! In the morning we went to my aunt and uncle's house in Stillwater for a pool party with our cousins. There were 8 kids there, all under age 8. Ben & Maddie were the youngest, but boy did they love following their older cousins around and learning from them.

From 2013-07-13_Wolffs

I especially love this cute picture of Emily and Maddie:

From 2013-07-13_Wolffs

From 2013-07-13_Wolffs

From 2013-07-13_Wolffs

From 2013-07-13_Wolffs

Then in the afternoon we drove to the southern part of Dakota County for a wedding reception for Shelby. The whole Beissel clan was there and we had a great time catching up with them. Since my Dad died, we haven't seen them much, unfortunately. That family sure knows how to party! My friend Dani and her family came up from La Crosse and my brother, David, came from Rochester. The kids had tons of fun playing on the trampoline, dancing and playing with glow sticks and anything else they could find. We tried to get a little "family" photo with our friends, but didn't seem to manage to get everybody to look at the camera at the same time!

From 2013-07-13_Beissel

Love this photo of Lois and Dani!

From 2013-07-13_Beissel

And this one of Maddie and her uncle David

From 2013-07-13_Beissel

And, of course, Lindsey always looks way better than everybody else...

From 2013-07-13_Beissel

And there was also a short birthday party for Marge, who will be turning 80 this coming week (although you'd never know it looking at her)

From 2013-07-13_Beissel

Personal foray back to 1940

The release of the 1940 census records on April 2nd prompted me to dig into my family history a bit. After all, my parents were both born in 1940 -- just a couple months after the census takers would've knocked on my grandparents' doors. I wondered what life was like for my two, very pregnant, grandmothers. I knew one family was poor, the other quite well off, but the census records showed me just how different their lives were.

I published a story in today's paper about my little adventure back in time.

Here's the Census form where I found part of the Sylwester family (see the first line). My grandfather and great-grandfather were on the page before:

From 1940 Census

And some pics...

My grandfather, Erv Wolff holding my mother in summer 1940:

From 1940 Census

My father in the middle, with his older sister (left) and an unidentified cousin, probably in about 1942 or 1943, I'm guessing:

From 1940 Census

Miss you, Dad

Today marks three years since my Dad died. Of course each day and each year get a bit better, but it's never truly better. I've missed him (and my Mom) a whole lot more this past year because of the babies. I'm so sad that not only will Ben & Maddie never know their grandparents, but that my parents never got to see and hold their grandchildren. But I like to think they are here with me, and although I don't believe in reincarnation, there are days I think my Dad has come back in the form of my son, Ben. Just take a look:

From Dad

From Dad

My brother

I talked to my brother, David, today and he had lots of interesting things to say. First and foremost was that the restaurant he has run in Rochester for the past five or so years has closed. They lost their liquor license in May due to gang problems and they've been running it on a shoestring ever since, hoping to find a buyer. They finally gave up, but do have an interested party.

He has been job hunting but it's tough. Restaurants aren't hiring much and when they do, they want someone cheap (in other words, straight out of college).

The other interesting thing he had to say was that he found a box of items from my parents house that he had forgotten about. The box is filled with my clothes from when I was a baby. He said they are still in pretty good condition and he wants to bring them for Maddie. Wouldn't that be so much fun!? If nothing else, I'll dress her in one of the outfits and take a picture just to say she was wearing Momma's clothes. How fun.

Apparently he doesn't have any of his own clothes because we have younger cousins who probably got them as hand-me-downs. And all the cousins are boys. I was the only girl.

Sad day

Today marks 13 years since my Mom died. Hard to believe it's been that long. This past year has been particularly hard for me because I so wish she (and my Dad) were here to share in the joy of my twins. I wanted her advice while I was pregnant and when they were first born, but I can only believe that her advice is coming to me through my instincts -- somehow she already taught me what to do.

The other day when I was putting Maddie to sleep, she looked up at me from her crib and for just a moment she looked just like my Mom.

Of course, Ben is a daily reminder of my father, too.

I'm at the cabin this weekend by myself cleaning the place out. I intended to go out to the cemetery where my parents are buried, but by the time I started thinking about doing it, it started raining pretty hard. I'll go out there tomorrow.

I tackled lots of cupboards and closets here that have been filled with lots of junk -- plus a few valuable things -- that we just never use. So I filled a couple boxes of things we'll try to sell on eBay or craigslist, plus a half dozen or so boxes for charity and a very big pile to go straight to the dump. I can't believe how much junk there was in here!!

It has all collected here since 1984 (when my grandmother died and the cabin was remodeled) and more got added when my Dad sold our family home, and every year we add a few more things. So it was definitely time to purge. I had to make room for baby things!

Plus I'm babyproofing as I go. I moved all the cleaning supplies to upper shelves; made sure matches and tools and things like that are in upper cabinets and simply left a lot of lower-level cabinets empty.

Now it's time for a drink and a movie. Jamey's home on baby duty (calling me every couple of hours for advice!), so I get to relax for the first time in many, many months. I bet I sleep like a rock tonight.

First family outing!

Yesterday Maddie and Ben had their first family get-together -- and their first outing besides trips to the doctor! It was also their 6-week old birthday.

We went to my cousin Doug and Sara's house to celebrate several family birthdays, particularly the two 2-year-olds -- Olympia and Emily -- who were born a day apart. Not all of the family was there, but most of the Twin Cities' based ones were.

The kids -- ages 4 and under -- were fascinated by Ben and Maddie. Each took a turn holding one or the other. Olympia was especially enthralled, helping to feed each one and following us to the changing table when it was time for a new diaper.

Here's a pic of all the kids. It was quite a challenge to get 4 toddlers to all look in the same direction and not have a funny face!

From Feb12

Here's birthday girl Olympia with Maddie..

From Feb12

The other birthday girl Emily with Ben...

From Feb12

And a few more...

From Feb12

From Feb12

From Feb12

From Feb12

You can see more in my web album here....

Wolff family party 2008

This weekend we went to our annual summer "birthday" party with my Wolff family relatives (my mom's family). There are three sections of the family and we're all busy having kids these days. This year there were 6 kids age 3 and under, plus 2 older kids. Needless to say, it was chaos. One of the pictures in this slide pretty well sums it all up! You'll also see we also got some baby presents for the twins! Next year they'll be about 6 or 7 months old when we have this party and they'll certainly add to the chaos.

Mom and Dad

A cousin of mine asked for a digital picture of my parents to include in a digital collage at her upcoming wedding, so it gave me reason to finally scan the last good picture that was taken of my parents together. Until now, I only had a paper copy. This is from 1993, a few months before Mom first got sick. It seems like just yesterday.

 

Merry Christmas!

Last night, we went to my family's in Stillwater for dinner, presents, a birthday celebration for my cousin Tom and a visit from Santa. We had a great time. Check out the pics...

Family party

A little over a week ago, we had my mother's family to our cabin for our annual summer birthday party. When I was a kid, we did this every summer. These weekends are firmly etched as some of the best childhood memories for not only me, but also my cousins. Now, most of my cousins have children of their own and we're trying to re-create that for them.

This picture shows the oldest of the kids. There are two babies who were born last February (they were napping when we snapped this pic).

We spent hours pulling the oldest two girls around the lake on tubes or trying to teach them to waterski (haven't quite got it yet!).

The day went by way too quickly! Can't wait for next year.