Welcome 2011!

My absolutely LEAST favorite holiday is New Year's! I think it is because another year is over and I start thinking about where we are and where we are headed. I have never liked the unkown and it seems like every new year is full of "unknown". Plus, when I think about what I do "know", it doesn't make me that happy either--I'm going to be 33. My uncle Wally died in a car accident shortly after turning 33 and I remember thinking that he had lived a pretty full, good life...now that I'm here, I realize that the 16 year old I was when I stood at his casket had no clue how little he really had lived. I also know that my kids will turn 10, 9, 6, 4, and 2, respectively this year and that really makes me sad. I have learned how to do a lot of things over the last "almost" 33 years, but I have yet to figure out how to slow down time!

We did have a nice New Year holiday. It was different this year, but still a lot of fun. We went to Toledo for the first time in a while. In fact, my mom's side of the family had never even met Drake! This is a shame because he is a mini-Reeves in a baby suite! :) We spent New Year's Eve swimming at the hotel which the kids thought was way cool, and then we went to my Aunt Kim's house for the New Year celebration. It was so great to see cousins and Aunts and Uncles and get caught up. It is amazing that you can go almost a year without seeing these people (in some cases, even longer) yet, when we all get together, I immediately revert to that 7 year old girl in Grandma's high heels, having a beauty contest with my cousins while Grandpa sings, "A Pretty Face...is like a melody!"

It was so neat to watch my kids with my cousins' kids. My kids don't get to interact in big family situations like that very often and I could tell they really enjoyed themselves. They were relieved to see that I had brought the bubble wrap with us so we could still jump on it at midnight, and I think some of our family members enjoyed this part too!

On New Year's Day, we swam again at the hotel and then got ready for my cousin, Jonathan's, wedding. We had to be out of the hotel by noon and the wedding didn't start until 2, so there we were, all dressed up for a wedding with nowhere to go. So...we took the obvious choice...we went to the Bass Pro Shop! Hello! That's right...how do you like me now???? I spent my first few hours of 2011 walking around a huge store filled with more "stuffed" animals than I ever cared to see in my lifetime, in a little black dress and heels. I swear just about every person we saw (men, women, and children included) had chewing tobacco in their mouth, and apparantly "Camo" is the new black! You can put camo on anything! Did you say anything? Yes--anything!!!! I must admit, it was very difficult to fight the urge to redecorate our entire house while there! At one point, mom and dad put this horrendous black bear salt and pepper shaker in the cart. That is when I decided to carry Drake and let someone else push the cart.

We finally got to go to the wedding which was beautiful. The priest was a little direct with his sermon on marriage and how God intended it. Not that I didn't agree with most of what he said, I just know that a lot of people there probably had other thoughts... In fact, after the service, he saw Shawn and I walking out of the church with our 5 kids and he stopped and asked how we were related to the bride and groom and if these were all of our kids. We get this reaction a lot from priests and little old Catholic people--apparantly, we are like the poster-family for Catholocism!

After the wedding, we had a two hour break until the reception. At a stop light, Dad and Mom pulled up next to our van and asked where we wanted to go to kill time. My first suggestion was to find a Cabella's store to make my day totally complete, but we decided that we better just find the reception hall since we weren't exactly sure where we were going. After a 45 minute tour of the lovely Northwest Ohio landscape, we realized we were a little lost. At this point, Shawn and I start arguing about where we are going, Delaney starts to cry that we are going to miss the cake and that is the best part, and the kids all start to argue. Dax, was pretty quiet and I just assumed he was sleeping, until a quiet moment about 5 minutes later when Dax suddenly exclaimed, "This is a sticky situation!" Shawn and I both started to laugh at how cute it was that he would say that about us being lost, until we turned around to see that he wasn't being cute, he was being literal! He had taken the gum out of his mouth and it was all smooshed and stringy between his hands!

We finally made it to the reception, got Dax cleaned up, and enjoyed the great food, and fun dancing. The bride, Amanda, and her father did a dance together that was super cute. They danced to "Butterfly Kisses" which is what my dad and I danced to when I got married. I was going to ask my dad why we didn't do a "routine", but then I remembered that I got married in the middle of the Notre Dame/Michigan football game and luckily, the DJ planned the Father/Daughter dance during halftime! :)

Watching my cousin at his wedding and reception was bittersweet. He is what I have always considered the youngest of the "original" group of cousins and he always had the cutest little baby face, and now he is all grown up and ready to start his own family. Luckily, I was quickly snapped out of my reverie as I watched my family dancing on the dance floor and Drew leaned over and said, "Mom, are we really related to these people?" I just smiled at him. Oh, Drew--if you only knew!

Best of luck in the future, Jonathan and Amanda--can't wait to meet your kids some day! :)