Jonah & Addy

Tonight we had my cousin Adam, and his wife (and my good friend) Ashley over for dinner with their sweet kids. Jonah is almost two and Addyson is two months old. We had a nice visit. Jackson is very good with Jonah. After dinner we played the Wii...and had a lot of laughs.

I have been playing with my camera again lately...Taking and editing pictures when I can. I still know nothing about any kind of photography techniques, but I got a couple of cute pictures of our little company tonight.

Sweet Baby Addy...

Cute Jonah....

We have a lot of fun with Jonah right now. He has the sweetest little personality.

Happy Birthday...VIP Style

This year I was a little late planning Jackson's birthday party. We tried to have it at Bounce U this year, but I couldn't get it all coordinated in time. About a week and a half before his birthday, I went home feeling sad about not being able to make all the Bounce U details work. I sat down with Jackson and said, "Buddy, I am sorry I didn't start planning sooner. How about if we just have some kids over at our house? We can bring out the speakers and the microphone and you can plug in your iPod?" I was really trying to make it sound "cool." Jackson's reply..."Can we have a VIP area?"

WHAT? How does he know about VIP areas? We've never been anywhere VIP.

And that's how we came up with the VIP Party.

We created a VIP Lounge in our front room. Jackson and Lou put together a playlist of Jackson's favorite songs. We set up the microphone and roped off the section...for VIP's ONLY. It looks like Simon got in without a VIP pass.

We set up a chocolate fountain with a large variety of items to dip (or not). Cheese puffs, marshmellows, graham crackers, chips, gummy worms, oreos, etc.

Everybody loved it...including Uncle Bobby...I asked the boys to dip the craziest thing in the chocolate...chocolate covered Ruffles...Yuck!All the boys wanted to sit by Jackson...

Our friend Tiff made the cake! We loved it.Uh-oh! Is Grandma Bevy in the VIP section without a pass?

I'm sneaking in to get a drink...Present time...

Jonah had a fun time playing with the big boys...

It's time to play the Wii...VIP Style.
We love you Jackson! Happy Birthday.

Update: Life in the Standifer Home

I don't have a good excuse for my lack of posts...I feel terrible for letting so much go by undocumented. I thought instead of try to post one post at a time and try to fill in what I haven't posted I would just do one big update.

Jackson is having a great year...He played indoor soccer this winter and really enjoyed it. We got into it too, and I know Lou was sad to see the league end. But baseball season has already started and Jackson has started practicing with his team, the Angels. I haven't made it to a practice yet, but Lou tells me that Jackson has already excelled at a few of the different positions.

Jackson is doing great in school. He has joined the chess club and has been recommened to participate in Exceptionally Capable Learners (ECL) program. This is basically the GATE program for 1st through 3rd grade students. (Brittany, doesn't this make you proud?). He stays after school on Thursday's for ECL and on Wednesday's for Chess club. Truthfully, he's one busy kid these days between those two things and his baseball. He is doing well though so we keep encouraging it.

Lou's speech and debate season is winding down. It usually does towards the spring. He is still coaching after school and he has a few tournaments coming up, but he has a lot fewer weekend commitments during this time of year. We are planning a yard sale in April to help his team raise money...We are asking the kids to bring in items to be sold at the yard sale and all proceeds will go to the team.

Lou is enjoying music again and singing for a new band, Soul Kitchen. I am feeling lucky because they practice in our home right now so I get to hear them each week. They are already so so good. I just can't wait for them to have their first gig.

Lou recently bought a recumbent bicycle and is slowing getting back on the bike after a long hiatis. I am proud of him for getting back into it...He loves being on the bike so much. His back has recovered slowly, but we say all he time how much better he's gotten. He really has.

I just finished my first year with Chris. Last March I started working for Chris as the controller for all three of his companies, 1430 ESPN Radio/790 ESPN the Deuce/HiS Magazine (that's really only one company), A Plus Signs, & Mega-Prints. It has been the busiest job I have ever had, but truthfully...I LOVE it! One day a week I am over at the station and the rest of the week I am in my office at the sign companies. I really like everyone that I work with...especially Chris and Stacy...they have a sweet family.

I am still doing a few sets of books on the side, but I am lucky that my schedule is flexible and I am able to find the time to juggle it all.

This probably belongs on my fertility blog, but I haven't kept that up either...I started seeing a grief counselor not too long ago and I can honestly say it is the best thing I have ever done. I won't get into all of the specifics (at least not here), but I feel so much happier than I have in a long time. I'll leave it at that.

One reason I have not blogged through the holidays is because, even though we have had some sweet, good things happen to us, we've also been dealing with some extremely sad news. My grandma was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in early December. As soon as she started treatment for it her health declined rapidly. Sadly, she passed away yesterday morning. I feel lucky that I have been so close to her, and that we had a sweet holiday season with her. Even though it was so difficult to see her in such pain, some of my most tender moments were shared with her during the last few months.

I'm moving slowly this morning. My heart hurts today, and truthfully, I'd love to crawl back into bed and sleep all day, but I know I need to get moving. On we go...

Where's Simon

Simon LOVES to lay in clothes...Clean clothes (especially right out of the dryer) or dirty clothes. He doesn't really care. Lately we've been losing him around our house and we seem to always find him in the laundry. This is where he likes to be these days...

Happy New Year...2010!

We spent the evening at home...just the three of us. We had sushi (take out) and played Wii all night.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

We had a nice time decorating our house for Christmas. We actually put the tree up pretty early, but we didn't do too much shopping until almost Christmas this year. We had trouble getting into it after all that has gone on in our family. We didn't send out our Christmas cards or letter this year. I wasn't being a Scrooge, but truthfully it was a little too much to have to think back on and write about. We're hoping for a much better 2010.

Once we got into the Christmas spirit we had a fun time getting ready for Christmas and really enjoyed the season. Jackson and I made a fabulous Gingerbread house. We had a lot of fun decorating it and I was atually kind of sad to see it go after Christmas.

We were so thrilled to have Jackson for Christmas Eve and Christmas day this year. We usually only have him Christmas day since his mom's family has a big Christmas Eve celebration, but this year we were happy to receive a phone call from Jackson at about 8:00pm on Christmas Eve asking to spend the night with us. We picked him up and hurried home, and prepared for Santa to visit in just a few hours.

Jackson had the brilliant idea to make a reindeer feeding station in our back yard. We mixed up everything we could think of that reindeers would love to eat: cabbage, carrots, oats (oatmeal) and a little lettuce.

We made Rudolph his own special dish and we made a big tin for all of the other reindeer. We set everything up on our back patio. While we were setting everything out we heard some jingle bells and a "Ho Ho Ho!" coming from the trees. We were worried that Santa was already making his rounds in Clovis, but discovered that it was a false alarm.

We got on the Santa Tracker online and saw that Santa was actually in Canda and we knew we still had a little more time to get things prepared. Jackson left Santa some cookies and milk and wrote him a note and placed it right in front of the fireplace.

The next morning when we woke up we found that Santa had come and the reindeer ate all of their food. They left a little bit of a mess, but we didn't mind cleaning it up. Santa left a note for Jackson and thanked him for the cookies...they were all gone...He must have loved them. Jackson's stocking was filled with lots of goodies and our sweet little boy was concerned that our (mine and Lou's) stockings were empty. We explained that Santa would have way too much to do if he brought stuff for all the mom's and dad's too.

After a little while Grandma Bev came over with donuts and milk for breakfast. We opened a lot of our presents with her. Jackson was very happy that Daddy and I bought him a Wii for Christmas. He had been asking for one for a while. One day he said< "Do you have $199.99?" I said, "Yes." And he said, "That's enough for a Wii." I told him that if we got the Wii he probably wouldn't get a whole lot of other presents since it cost so much and he seemed to be okay with that. He got plenty of presents...more than he knew what to do with really and so when he opened the Wii he was one excited kid!

He got the dual sided Light Saber too. He asked for this almost everytime we were in Target. This one was hard to wrap and apparently he figured out what it was because when he opened it he said, "I knew it!"

Jackson bought me a beautiful ring...

And he bought Grandma Bev a cute little Willow Tree boy...

Later on in the day Grandma Lupe, Uncle Tom, Billy & Dawn, Aunt Brittany, Uncle Bobby, and Grandma Donna came over for Christmas dinner and more present opening.

I cooked Christmas dinner with Bev and Lou's help. Everything turned out real nice and we had plenty of left overs. We had a great Christmas this year. We were sad to put all of our decorations away, but we did. Lou and Jackson go back to school and work this next week. Life is moving quickly and we are heading into the New Year with hope of a better year in the Standifer house.

Hope everyone is well! Happy New Year!

Visitor at the Standifer house

My dad came to visit us a couple of weeks ago. It was a quick, but nice visit. We got to show him around our favorite parts of town...Casa Corona, Yodigity, Swim America, and Target. He loved our new house and really enjoyed our new neighborhood. We took a few pictures in our back yard. We tried to get the dogs to cooperate, but they weren't feeling like being photographed.

Dad, we are so happy that you finally made it down for a quick trip. We know it's a long way for you and you never have enough time to stay too long, but we sure have fun having you here. Jackson was so glad to have you try Yodigity and we've been looking for our picture up on the wall in there, but we haven't seen it yet.

Thanks for everything. We love you! Come back again soon.

Happy Halloween

Well, I know this post is terribly late...I don't know what happened to me. I felt kind of lazy lately. We had quite a big Halloween...or maybe I should say long Halloween. It started back mid-October...We went to Zoo-Boo again this year. Thanks to Adrienne we were able to get some tickets and make it once again to the annual Zoo-Boo at our local zoo. All the kids dress up and there are games and booths set up to go trick-or-treating at, and there is music and magic shows and all kinds of fun stuff. Anyway, we always have a lot of fun and this year was no different. We absolutely loved it.

Here is Jackson getting ready to go...He dressed up as a Ninja this year. At Zoo-Boo...waiting in line for some kind of carnival game. Can't forget to check out the animals...Going thru the hay-maze...This was fun. He did it a couple of times. So a few days after Zoo-Boo we went to the pumpkin patch. I couldn't remember ever going to a pumpkin patch (I'm sure I probably went as a kid)...It was a lot of fun. We didn't take any pictures there, but we did pick out some darn good pumpkins.

We carved them a few nights before Halloween. Daddy did most of the carving...Jackson told him to make fangs on this pumpkin.
We carved two great looking pumpkins...Jackson made a cape for one of them (it was a piece of felt glued on the back of the pumpkin). After carving we decorated some little pumpkins. We had a lot of fun with this and will probably do this again. I still have not gotten rid of them...They look so cute. Jackson was very good at this and seems to be quite creative. He comes up with some great ideas. Here is Jackson's pumpkin....
Here is Lou's pumpkin.....And here is mine....Once Halloween night came around...It was time for trick-or-treating...Here is Jackson in his best Ninja pose. Ready to go out... He got quite a bit of candy. He told us when he was ready to stop trick-or-treating and we headed for home. Of course Jackson has been wearing this Ninja costume as much as possible. When ever he watches 3 Ninja's or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles he wants it on and we find him in his room practicing his moves. It's quite cute.