Happy New Year!

Love how my new

Susan Branch

calendar looks in my kitchen.

Happy New Year!

Welcome 2013

The Lights Are On But Nobody Is Home

This is what our block looked like before 

they started building the

apartments across the street from our cottage.

You can see where we live. We have the two tall trees.

Picture of the building at night, trying to finish.

If you have been following 

the progress of the new apartments

 being built across the street from us,

it's come to an end.

It has been a long process.

They broke ground last January 

and now it's a year later.

Whew!

They are done!

Can't wait to see who moves in first.

To recap here are a few pictures to show you the progress.

Oh, LOOK!

Those two on the porch are

 our first neighbors!

The End!

It Was A Merry Christmas

Christmas morning


End of the day, sound asleep.


Hope you enjoyed your Christmas as much as Lulu did!

Kimmy sent me these pictures of our granddaughter.

Priceless!

Girl or Boy????

Kimmy (our daughter) had an ultra sound yesterday,

to find out the gender of their baby.

Kimmy asked the technician to call me with the results.

Mark and Kimmy didn't want to know until

 they opened "the" box.

Last week I sent them, 

a blue outfit in one box

and

a pink outfit in the other box.

Tom's job was to decorate the boxes.

Todd, Stephanie and Trey joined Tom and I today,

in the special celebration, 

to announce who will be joining us.

  Two boxes...   

decorated with care.

One full of Pink things.

The other full of Blue things.

Todd, Stephanie, Tom and Trey

We gathered around the computer and Skyped.

 I told them to open box A

It's a  BOY!!

I couldn't be happier!

Blessed!!

 (five times over)

Just a Bit of Christmas

Here at the Cottage,

we kept things 

simple.

Merry Christmas

Leaving Boise and a Big Part of My Heart

It was hard to leave 

all those sweet faces.

We will be back and soon!

Long ride home but it gave us time to 

recover and plan our next trip.

COOL!

Oh yea, that's snow.

~*~*~*~

Now, this part of the post is a funny story.

(At least it was for us.)

Todd (son) and Stephanie gave me this GPS 

for my birthday. 

We practiced using it all the way down and back home.

We now are very proficient.

I like to give names to things, like rooms in our home, my car, etc.

Well, I named my GPS, Daisy.

When we were looking for a place to stop, rest or 

eat, we would pulled it up on Daisy.

Daisy would take us to the front door of any 

and everything we were looking for.

No more wondering where to go or going the wrong way.

No more stopping to ask for directions or guessing.

Tom calls this a marriage saver!

So he renamed the GPS,

 Miss Johnson,

the Marriage Counselor.

 Tom wants to give out GPS's as wedding gifts.

~sigh~

Celebrating My Birthday in Boise

Lulu (5 1/2 yrs),
has been decorating my 

birthday cake for several years.

Here's Lulu when she was 3 years old,
working on my birthday cake.

Once again, she did a fabulous job!

It was Lulu's idea to use the single candle for the ONE

because they ran out of the block, number one.

She also picked out all the decorations.

It's been a log standing tradition to have

 birthday cake, ice cream and presents 

for breakfast. 

This day was no exception.

 For my birthday dinner, we went to Chic-fil-A.

It was my first time there. 

Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus were on hand for pictures.

Some of my favorite  pictures:

Ila May in her car seat.

Special moment between the two of us.

Lulu on Mrs. Claus's lap.
(Not a big fan of Santa)

Levi ran to sit on Santa's lap.

Our little girl,
 who is due with her 4th child,
 in May.

First Road Trip to Boise

~Lucy On My Lap~

Tom and I took our first "Road Trip" to Boise.

It's about a 10 hour drive,

 depending on which way you go.

One way it's shorter but
has a lot of snow that covers the mountain passes.

The other way is longer.
 It has several mountain passes without a lot of snow.
Our car now has studded tires,
new window wipers and anti-freeze.

We are going to see Kimmy, Mark,
Lulu, Levi and Ila May!!

Car packed with our Christmas packages.

Car packed with my homemade goodies

 and famous banana bread.

Car packed with familiar kid toys and books.

Car packed with our dog, Lucy.

Car packed with two, really excited grandparents.

Beautiful drive.

Lots of straight a-ways that go on and on.

We decided to spend the night in Pendleton, Oregon.

We (me) didn't want to drive the curvy roads of

the Oregon mountain passes, after dark.

So, we did a little Christmas shopping 

at the Pendleton Woolen Mill

 Lucy enjoyed the night all wrapped up on the big bed.

This sign got me really happy!

The excitement was starting to build.

 

We were welcomed with our own personal signs.

They didn't want us to miss the turn.

How cute is this!

~First Sighting~

After this picture, I needed to give out hugs and kisses.

So no pictures of the 

best welcome I've ever had!

~Their front door~

We felt so special
with a greeting like this!

(more to come)