WOW!!!

While watching the news the other day Josh and I saw a clip piece on the big news stories from that last decade.  9-11, Katrina, and Obama topped the list of life changing events.  With tears in my eyes I asked Josh where 10 years had gone.   The last decade was a big one for Josh and I.  Our lives are not even remotely where they were in 1999!  Our biggest fear were computers crashing and the power going out when the clock struck midnight.  Little did we know!!!

Ten years ago we had been married for 3 years, Caleb wasn’t even a year old and I had all of my grandparents.  The last 10 years have held so many heart breaks for me.  In this past decade I lost my 2 grandpas and my Mamaw.  I lost my triplets to miscarriage, we lost Josh’s grandma, our first house and Josh had open heart surgery, just to name a few!

But amongst the lost we have had wonderful, great, awesome, life changing events too.  The birth of Brayden and Andrew.  The revile of God answering our prayers in our time of need.  Josh recovering  from his heart surgery in record time and doing better then we ever expected!  The addition of so many wonderful  people in our lives, like Margie and Beth.  And the reconnection with Manda, has been such a blessing!

We are nowhere close to where we were 10 years ago, but we are so much stronger in self and in faith then where we were a decade ago.  And I can’t wait to see what this next decade and God has in store for us.

Happy 2010!!!

Orville Glennie Dickens and Grace May Able Dickens 1917 (give or take a year)

I have been searching and searching for this picture since I read about {this} contest over @ 5 Minutes for Mom.  I dug in to the back of my closet and found a box of pictures last night and finally found it.  With out further ado my sleeping angel Caleb!

He was only 2 in this picture and he honestly fell asleep like this!  He was watching cartoons laying on the couch.  He was goofing off one minute and sound asleep the next.  If you look in his hand you will see his “tab”.  I am not sure if I have ever mentioned anything about the “tab” here on the blog before.  You know some kids have passies (like Brayden did) and some kids have blankets (aka; silky, as Andrew calls his), Caleb had (and sometimes I still see him hiding one in his hand) had his “tab”.  What is a “tab” you ask?  It is the tag from clothing.  The one with the size and washing info one it.  It all started with him rubbing his Luvs diaper.  Luvs used to be slick on the outside, not cloth like like they are now.  He loves that feeling.  One day my mom noticed that is why he didn’t want his diapers traded in for big boy underwear.  After some trial and error we found that these tags would work for him.  He then promptly gave up the diapers and started using the potty.

This picture make me smile every time I think about it and I am glad that this contest helped make me find it.   I switched to digital when Brayden was under one and all of Andrew’s picture are digital.  Their pictures are easy to find on my computer files.  But many of Caleb’s pictures are prints.  I need to take the time to scan them in so I can find them easily too.  Someday…

And to be fair to my other two sleeping angels here are my favorites of them.

This was taken of Brayden after his 1st Birthday party. (Notice the party hat.)

He was exhausted after all of the excitement!

This one of Andrew I just took a few weeks ago.

Look at how kicked back he is!

What a better way to spend a crisp Fall Saturday afternoon!

I did a quick Google search for pick your own apples in our area and found that an apple farm that my family used to go to when I was a kid, had apple picking.  As a child they didn’t have picking your own, but Barry and I loved to go a watch them pressing apples to make cider.  My family, (Dad, Mom, Barry, Papaw & Mamaw Spurlock and I) would make the 40 minute drive to the “apple barn” at least twice in the fall.  We would also stop and get ice-cream and shop at a little Dollar Store when Barry and I always got a little toy of some sort. These are some of my fondest childhood memories.  I was so excited to take the boys there and share with them and Josh a little part of my childhood.   We picked a bushel of apples and bought two gallons of cider and a jar of Pear Butter.  I was disappointed to see that the old fashioned apple press was no longer in view to the customers.  But the cider tasted just as wonderful as it did when I was young.

When we got home I enlisted the help of my Mom and Aunt Kathy and we made two pans of Apple Dumplings.  YUMM-O!!!  Here is the super easy recipe.  It has a surprising ingredient but I promise that you will not be able to tell.

• 2 Sticks of butter
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 2 teaspoons Cinnamon
• 2 cans (8 per can) crescent rolls
• 12 oz Mt. Dew
• 16 slices of apples

Wrap each slice of apple with one crescent roll.  Lay them in 9×13 pan.  Melt butter, sugar and cinnamon in small sauce pan.  Pour melted ingredients over the apples and crescent rolls.  Pour Mt. Dew over all ingredients.  Bake for 35-40 min. @ 350.

I still have over 1/2 bushel of apples left. I can’t wait to make some more apple creations, so stay tuned!

Other then picking apples, we went shopping to get Caleb a new pair of shoes, went to church, and played cards with my mom, Kathy, and Mamaw.  It was a wonderful week-end!!!  :o)

The basement has been scrubbed and bleached, and the house no longer smells like a week old dirty diaper. As I said in a previous post, we had been storing my grandparents table down in the basement. After rescuing it from sewage water, I started thinking about it and I wanted to see if it would fit in the kitchen. I was afraid that the table was to big to use here at the new house, as we didn’t have a dining room, just the eat in kitchen. I decided to use a little drop leaf table, that was a thrift store find, along with the chairs to my grandparents set when we first moved here. It looked good in the kitchen and worked well for awhile, but since we have been here Andrew has transitioned from the highchair to the booster set. With adding one more plate at the table we have been rather cramped. And besides I really missed my table…

This table has been in my life for as long as I can remember. As far as I know my grandparents bought it and used it for awhile. They moved into a smaller home and swapped tables with my parents. So we had the table for awhile. Then at some point and time they moved and they got the table back. At the time the table really meant nothing. It was just there, for Pete’s sake it IS just a table, right?

But after setting the table back in my kitchen today, I rubbed my hand across the tables top and tears stung my eyes. So many of my memories revolve around this table, quite literately, since it was the table that my family would gather around. Countless family meals were ate at this table. Many birthday candles were blown out at this table. So many Holiday feast were spread out on this table. Handmade quilts were laid across this table to be pieced together by Mom and Mamaw. My cousin Emily, brother Barry and I played on and even under this table. Numerous games of Scrabble, Rook, and Phase 10 was played at this table with my family. And as Josh reminded me this afternoon, I went into labor, with Caleb, while setting at this table.

My grandparents moved one last time before they passed away. The kitchen was very small and they once again couldn’t fit the table into their space. So they gave the table to Josh and I. We were thrilled since we had a big dining room and a very small table at the time. We used the table for 7 years at the house until we moved this past spring.

I am so glad that I have the table sitting up in my home again. I am so happy that Josh, the boys, and I can continue to add to the memories I have of this table. No, it isn’t an antique, it isn’t a fine handmade oak piece. But it is PRICELESS to me!!!

7 years ago at this time my life had been pretty consistent. I hadn’t had a lot of unhappiness in my life. Josh and I had been married for just about three years and Caleb was a wonderful addition to our family. And on the 4th of May we joined my Grandma Spurlock in celebrating her 65th birthday. I remember that day like it was just yesterday. The weather was warm. Caleb was playing in the cool, green grass in my Mom and Dad’s yard. We had a family meal and instead of cake my Mom had made a strawberry desert for my Grandma. It was one of the last joyful, happy days I had during the whole year of 2000.

Me and my family had no idea of the roller coaster ride our lives were about to take. And I had no way of knowing that my life was going to change forever. On the 6th of May my brother called me with the dreadful news. My Grandpa Smith had passed away in his sleep, due to a massive heart attack. My Papaw was gone. We made the necessary plans and packed up the van and made the long trip to SC to gather with family and bury my Papaw.

Upon coming home I drifted through the next few days, the pain still so strong. One evening, I was at my parents house along with my Grandma and Grandpa Spurlock, we spent the evening looking at photo albums and talking about “the past”. We ending the night with my Grandma buying Caleb his first Ice Cream cone. {This was one of those few joyful days I was referring to above} The next morning, May 25th, I got the phone call from my Mom. She was at the hospital with my Grandma Spurlock, she was very sick and Life Flight was coming to transport her to Toledo. My Mamaw had a massive brain aneurysm. She laid in a hospital bed for a week on life support until she contracted phenomena and passed away.

My life was now in constant pain and hurt. How could this happen??? I had lost two Grandparents in just three weeks. I was numb, and I thanked God everyday for Caleb. He was my reason to keep going. Not only was I hurting and sad over the loss, I was hurting watching my Mom and Dad grieve over their loss. My Mom lost her Daddy and my Dad lost his Mommy. My Grandparents lost their spouses of close to 50 years. Our family was broken!

Two weeks passed and my phone rang once again. This time my Grandpa Spurlock was in the hospital and he was being transported via Life Flight to Toledo due to Congestive Heart Failure. While there he had been given over 40 minuets of life saving CPR. He struggled for days in the hospital until they decided to send him home and bring in Hospice. I lost my Papaw on a hot August night. With in 9 short weeks I lost three Grandparents. By this point in time I was beyond numb. I remember crying tears but not really feeling ANYTHING. I had nothing left to feel, I had cried for so many weeks, I had given all I had.

Now amongst the sickness and deaths that year my Mom had surgery that kept her down for 4 weeks, my Dad’s MS worsened and he spent close to a week in the hospital, my baby brother went off to collage and I suffered through my miscarriage.

Seven years has since passed since that roller coaster ride. Most of the time I can push the pain back and move on with my life. Cause lets face it, life does go on! But some days, like today while remembering my Mamaw’s birthday, it still hurts like it just happened yesterday.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAMAW, YOU ARE SO MISSED!!!This is a picture that was taken at Josh and I’s wedding on July 4th 1997.
We have since lost everyone in this picture except for my Grandma Smith.
(Grandma & Grandpa Spurlock, Grandma & Grandpa Smith, Shana, Josh, Great-Grandma Motter and Grandma Wiseman)

Mary “Sue” Wiseman
October 23, 1933 - November 23, 2005

A year ago today the world lost a wonderful person. She meant so much to so many people. She was truly one of those people this world has to few of, she was a Mother, Grandmother, Great Grandmother. She was a good friend, a hard worker and a joy to be around. I can’t put in to words what she meant to everyone but I can tell you what she meant to me.

It is going to be hard to find a starting point, so lets start from the beginning. She was the woman that raised my husband, she was the one that filled Josh with all that he is. She was his Grandmother and the best Mom to him anyone could be. The sacrifices she give for Josh and her family were immeasurable.

I loved to talk with Sue. We could talk forever on the phone. I can still hear her say ‘It’s just me, I’m only gonna keep you a minute…’ Well, it very rarely was just a minute….LOL!!! I loved to spend time with her. Before Josh and I were even married we would go to concerts together. She took me to see Alan Jackson at UT one time. We got there and in line to go in and she couldn’t find one of the tickets. She dug and dug in her purse, with no luck. So luckily they had a handful of tickets left and she bought one more. Now mind you they were $50.00 seats. And once we got out to the car after the concert, Sue reached in for the keys and pulled out the lost ticket…lol….She had had it the whole time. But we decided that Alan Jackson was worth every penny spent.

The support and help she lent us was invaluable while Josh was laid off for six months and our Caleb was born 4 weeks early and had a NICU stay. She spend all night with Josh in Toledo Hospital the first night that they took him. All the while her mother was very sick back home. Caleb was born on Sunday night, and she would make trips to the NICU and to the Nursing Home. One Wednesday night after Josh and I just spent the day in the NICU, we stopped by to see Grandma Motter and Sue. Sue looked so tired that night.  We had no sooner got home until the phone rang. Grandma Motter had passed on. That week we buried Grandma Motter and brought home our now, healthy baby boy. Sue was so strong. What a strong person she was.

In 2000 I lost three grandparents with in three months time. I really took the loss of my Grandma Spurlock hard. While talking and crying one day with Sue, I told her ‘my Grandma Spurlock is gone and my Grandma Smith is so far away in SC“. I felt so much pain right then. I will never forget her words to me. “Shana, I will be your grandma, I love you“. From that day on, Sue was my Grandma, not just an in-law!!!

Later that same year I became pregnant with triplets. Wow!!! Three baby’s not even trying…lol…and we still had one in diapers. The news was overwhelming, but still a blessing. Until a few weeks later, I miscarried them. Sue was always the one who understood my loss the most. That year and every year after she would give to me an ornament with three angels on it. She never forgot my pain. And I believe she felt it right along with me.

So many wonderful memories I have of her, to many to list them all. But today, a year from her death, and Thanksgiving 2006, I have to say one of the greatest things I am thankful for today, is having had her in my life for the time I did.

We miss you Grandma!!!