Grandchildren Cuteness

I am fortunate to get to see two of my grandchildren at least once a week. In fact in two weeks, they will stay with us for most of a week. Since I have a toy shop in a flea market, a lot toys pass through the house, and I try them out on the girls to see what they like. Their newest favorites are a Fisher Price 1995 parking garage and a wooden train!So those will stay with us.

So focused on making the train go!

Hair is still wet from the pool.

Even Papa and Uncle TyTy got involved in building.

Seriously though, I think the layout Winter and I built in the first train picture was much better. You'll have to take my word for it since you can't see it.

I post a lot of pictures of Jessica's girls, River and Winter, but I don't post as many of my step-daughter Ashley's children, Phoenix and Griffin. They are 15 and 12. They are up in Indiana, so I have to swipe their pictures from face book.

Phoenix plays percussion in the high school band.

This was taken on Griffin's 12th birthday in August. He plays trumpet and football. 

Ashley

My son-in-law Mike with Griffin.

Picture overload coming the week they stay with us.

Last Day of Summer Vacation

August 14 was our last day of freedom. And it was also Jessica's 27th birthday. So we watched the girls overnight the 13th and all day the 4th so Hunter could take Jessica on a deep sea fishing trip. River is in a bit of a difficult phase right now--very 2 ish, so we decided to have a backyard pool party day.

Winter ready for bed on the 13th

She decided to help me with revisions.

It was a beautiful day, so we set up the slip and slide. We made a popsicle challenge where they had to slide down and grab the popsicle in their mouths.

We also got a clearanced blow up pool.

We started pulled pork in the crock pot early in the day so it would be ready when Hunter and Jessica got back from fishing.

Then we had a game time.

Winter took a good nap.

River would have nothing to do with resting or even sitting while someone read books to her. She fell asleep right before supper. She was NOT a cheerful child when her dad woke her up a while later!

 Winter is 15 months old and a good eater!

27 candles

It was a good transition to the first day of school.

8th

8th

12th

Step grands:

Griffin 5th, Phoenix, 9th

To Bloomington and Beyond

After Cummins Falls we headed north again. We should have driven farther that night, and the next day would have gone much better, but oh well. Hindsight. We loved the falls and didn't want to leave.

We got a bit late start to Bloomington and ended up at the back of the line for a Karen Kingsbury book signing and event. They'd sold 400 tickets and we were very near the back of those 400 fans. The instructions were to get our book signed and then go watch a 30-minute video. Really they should have started sending people to watch the video first once the line got long. We waited over 2 hours in line, and then it was so late that I skipped watching the video because we needed to move on.

The upside of the long line was that Karen Kingsbury's mom travels with her, but most people don't know who she is. She recognized Jasmine and I and came over to talk with us while we were in line. So I got to catch up on all the news while waiting.

with Anne Kingsbury

with Karen Kingsbury

Only one of Karen's children was with her, the youngest, Austin. He is 6'4" and Jasmine is 4'9". He is a really friendly young man and dutifully posed with all of Karen's fans.

We were supposed to be at my step grandson's football game two hours away from 1-3, but arrived at 5!! The game had gotten rained out half way through, so we didn't actually miss it. We met up at their house. Getting there so late, we didn't have much time with them. But it went really well. Tyler got Griffin into Magic the Gathering cards, and Jasmine and Phoenix messed with drums together. Griffin was really upset when Ty had to leave.\

We took a bunch of photos together. My tripod was buried, so we balanced the camera on a pile of old photo albums.

Phoenix and Jasmine

Griffin and Tyler

Jasmine, Griffin, Tyler

 Phoenix, Jasmine, Griffin, Tyler

Phoenix, Jasmine, Griffin
Me, Mike, Ashley, Tyler

I don't get to see these guys very often, so we are trying to plan something for next summer.

After this we drove on up to my Mom's arriving about four hours later than planned.

Kid Updates

Some new things going on, some thing remain the same. So here we go ...

I don't post much about my step daughter, so I'll start with her. She is married and has two children who are growing up much too quickly. 

These shirts are perfect, because it's their names!

Ashley is a hair stylist, so Phoenix gets to try out a lot of new looks.

 Tyler is good about spending time with the kids. The sad part is that after he's spent time with the twins, they'll turn around and steal from him. That's just life as it is right now. Up days and down days. I think they are actually trying to do the right thing, but some days they just don't care. 

Ty and I work together at the flea market during the weekend. We divided into two stores, but he's right across the hall from me. I have more general toys, and he has more pop culture, 80s action figures and more specialty type toys. I'll try to post pictures of his store soon. He still works at the mall, too.

River and Winter love their Unca TyTy. Unfortunately I don't have photos of them together. They were lost off of my phone.

I get to spend time with Jessica every week because she works evenings. She gets overwhelmed at times, so I try to meet up with her at least twice a week. She has applied at a restaurant much nearer to her house that will be  opening this weekend. I know that many, many people applied, and I don't know if they are done hiring or not.

River is two, and Winter will be one on the 21st. Winter said, "Gigi" yesterday!!!! I haven't heard her talk before. Jessica says that she said "thank you" the day before.

That brings us to Jeff.

Just last week we found out that Jeff got married on December 29. Rick saw a picture on his facebook page and it was tagged as Jeff and Briana Cassel. He messaged her and found out about the marriage. It doesn't appear they had any sort of ceremony or that they even told anyone. He merely posted a photo of them together. But since every one wrote "Happy New Year" rather than "Congratulations," I'm assuming that other than the people he's stationed with, no one else knew.

The second picture was posted the day they got married. She turned 18 in November, and he will be 25 in a couple of weeks. I sent both of them friend requests on facebook, and both accepted, although I don't think Jeff is on much.

Okay, that's half way through my crew, so I will post this for now, and continue it later.