memories

While the new year is upon us and we are filled with hope and excitement about all the possibilities '09 possesses, today my heart is filled with sadness. A year ago today my cousin Meredith passed away unexpectedly. She is survived by my aunt and uncle and her two brothers, Chris and Mike. I pray today that they will be able to find peace and that will be consumed with God's love, that their sadness will be replaced with joy and the memories of their loving daughter and that they can find strength in His promises.

As I laid awake these past few nights, I had time to think about all the memories I had of Meredith. She was four years older than me and I adored her. Although my list of memories falls short in many ways I'm sure, these are just some of the things that stand out in my mind:

Doritos, penguins, Duran-Duran, coke slurpees made with snow, walking to 7-11 to buy sweat tarts, playing Box Car children, Xila (the name we gave to the huge snow pile outside our grandparents house), eating my very first "veggie" sub from Subway with Mer (who was a vegetarian) and choosing from that moment on to adopt a "no red meat" diet myself, sparkling water, teaching me how to apply eyeliner, playing my Ouija board in our grandparents room at Christmas, playing Bloody Mary and Light as a Feather Stiff as a Board, looking forward to her hand-me-downs, Kowloon Chinese Restaurant, the letters she would write me and her beautiful handwriting, incense burning in her room, earrings made from chandeliers, singing and playing the piano, orange tic-tacs and gummy bears, and black olives strategically placed on each of our fingers.

As I recalled these things I found my eyes filled with tears, yet I was laughing at the same time. I miss Mer but am so thankful to have these memories.

Happy New Year....

Here's hoping that your new year is off to a better start than ours:






why is it that the "naughty one" is smiling in this mug shot?


disclaimer: none of the parties shown above was actually arrested or served any time in the local pen for any crime or misconduct.

'twas the night...

'Twas the night before Disney
and all through the house,
not a creature was stirring...
(okay, so we were all stirring until about 9).

Our suitcases were packed
for Florida's warm air
in hopes that we, The VanderWoudes,
soon would be there

Koby and Kyan were nestled
all snug in their beds
while visions of Mickey, Donald, Goofy and Minnie
danced and sang in their heads

With Kevin cocooned in his blankets
which is really quite a sight,
we had just settled down in bed
to sleep for the night.

In the blink of an eye
there arose such a sound,
our alarm clock was buzzing,
no children yet around.

And then, all the sudden
we heard through the door,
the sounds of their giggling
and feet racing on the floor.

So we dressed and ate
faster than ever before
and as quick as we could
headed out of the door.

We jumped in the Pacifica,
such excitement we all felt
"Off to Lansing!" Kev shouted
as we buckled our belts.

And soon what to our wondering
eyes did appear?
An airplane waiting and ready
to get this gang out of here.

50 days later
and now finally on our way
"To Disney! To Mickey's!"
they all heard us say.

a first for ky

Ky drew a picture of a person for the first time yesterday and it was pretty impressive, complete with hair, eyes, nose, mouth, arms and even legs. While my intention was to save the photo, he managed to continue to draw on the paper until the image was unrecognizable. So, today I asked him to try again while he was working on some art in the basement. Check it out...

can you spot the two dashes for eyes, the small dot nose, the mouth, legs and arms?



Genius?? I would say so.

special person lunch

Today was "Special Persons" lunch at Koby's school. Ky and I joined Koby for a Thanksgiving lunch complete with all the fixins. We sat with a boy who is in the other kindergarten class named Griffin, whom Koby has made friends with. Every time Griffin sees Koby he says, "Hi Koby-Jack cheese!" Prior to naming our children I thought I had gone through every possible rhyming word etc. for each name in so that our children would not end up scared for life. I completely missed the colby-jack cheese thing! (I also never thought of cheyenne pepper, which I was made painfully aware of after Ky's birth when Papa Briggs kept referring to him as "Pepper"...aagh....) Anyhow, here are a few snapshots from our lunch:

Jack (a good friend from Kob's class), Griffin, Ky and Koby



Koby noticed the boys giving bunny ears in the previous pic and wanted to get one of himself doing it to Griffin....boys.....

a veterans day thank you

Today we want to say thank you to all the men and women who have served and fought for our country. In our family, we have had grandfathers, uncles and a brother serve in World War 2, Vietnam and in Iraq. We are thankful that each of them returned home after their deployment. However, we are aware that many have so selflessly given his/her own life, so that we can have the freedoms we do. We are so grateful for and humbled by those who have chosen to fight for our country. Today we hang our flag to remember all the sacrifices that have been made on our behalf. Thank you veterans!

"Trick or treat. Smell my feet....

give me something good to eat. (STOP!) This is as far as we have taught Koby and Ky to sing this little Halloween chant. The other night as we tucked Koby into bed he added....If you don't, I don't care. I'll pull down your underwear!" HMMMMM....this is indeed worldly influences taking hold of childhood innocence! When asked where he learned that part of the song, he replied, "At school" (but of course!!!!!)

So last night we did some trick or treating, no feet smelling or underwear pulling (thank goodness!). This year Koby's chosen costume....Captain Rex from Star Wars Clone Wars.



Ky chose to be Murray Wiggle (from the Disney show "The Wiggles") Murray is the Wiggle in the red shirt who plays the guitar. Ky is completely obsessed with the Wiggles right now. We watch their movies and sing their songs, day and night, night and day.


Together these two made quite a pair (pair of what has yet to be determined)



It was such a beautiful night too. We headed over to a mega-neighborhood to gather some goodies. The boys trick-or-treated for about one and a half hours without complaining. Ky would stop after just about every house and pull out the candy he was just given and show us all. He is a candy-aholic (is this really such a thing?) so last night was heavenly for him. Here are some pics of the stash they
collected: