Archive for the ‘Family’ Category

It seems like every day my Dad ends up having a really bad headache.  I know this was going on back when he was working (he retired 8 year ago.. I can’t believe it’s been 8 years already!) and we thought maybe it was just stress from work.  But since it continued after he retired we knew that wasn’t the case.  He went to the doctor and they did do a scan (don’t remember if it was a cat scan or MRI) and thankfully they didn’t see any cancer and the doctor said that he has arthritis in his neck which is causing the headaches. 

That’s where I wish there was something I could do to get rid of it for him so he could go headache free for while.  I found a psoriatic arthritis treatment, but first off I don’t know if that’s the kind of arthritis he has.  (Honestly I didn’t know there were certain kinds)  Plus after reading the warnings on it I’m thinking maybe he would be better to have the headaches.  Of course who am I to say since I’m not living with them every day.

Guess I’ll just keep searching and praying I can find something all natural that will help him.

After Paul’s last doctors appointment I’ve had to change the way I buy certain foods.  Per his doctor, Paul needs to be eating more fiber, so when buying breads, pasta, crackers.. etc I have to make sure the Dietary Fiber % is higher than the Total Carbohydrate %.

The last time I had shopped for Pasta I had only found one that had a higher % for the Dietary Fiber and it didn’t taste terrible, but I also wasn’t totally in love with it either.

Then a couple weeks ago Mom Central along with Ronzoni Smart Taste ended up having a blog tour which I was lucky to participate in and was thrilled after I watched the Supermom Video that the spaghetti I was going to be trying was not only high in fiber, but an excellent source of calcium!  (It is a cute video if you want to watch it)

So when I received my package in the mail I couldn’t wait to give the Ronzoni Smart Taste a try.   Was it going to taste like cardboard, or was it going to taste like every other spaghetti?

I’m happy to say it ended up tasting like all the other spaghetti we’ve ever made!  Actually most of the time I have left overs for the following day, but this time I didn’t.   So that tells me even my sometimes picky eaters even enjoyed it even though it’s 3x’s the fiber and calcium equal to an 8 oz glass of milk!!  What a great way to sneak more fiber and calcium into a diet than with smart taste pasta!

If you would like to try some Ronzoni Smart Taste pasta, just visit their website and click on their promotions & coupons and you can sign up to get a coupon for $1 off 2 boxes!

I just want to say thank you to Mom Central & Ronzoni for giving me the opportunity to try their Smart Taste Spaghetti.  Had I of not tried it, I probably would of stuck to the same ol’ pasta because I know my family liked that kind.  Now I know which brand of pasta I can get that’s high in fiber for my family and tastes great!

“I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour campaign by Mom Central on behalf of Ronzoni Pasta and received a sample of Ronzoni Smart Taste Pasta to facilitate my review and a $20 thank-you gift certificate.”

Has it seriously been a week since I updated my blog?  Shame on me!!  Now I have to think about what we did this past week.  Monday the kids and I went to the library to pick out some new books andmovies.  I had a friend recommendthe Left Behind series written by Tim LaHaye so I checked out book number one.  Looking at it I thought do I really want to read this?  I’m not much of a book reader and this book was quick thick.   That afternoon the kids & I were reading our own books and let me say, this book sucked me in on the first page.  I ended up staying up till 3:30am reading!  Needless to say the next morning I was quite tired.  I did end up finishing the book just this afternoon and will be starting on the 2nd book tonight.

Tuesday night my friend’s daughter called (she is Katie’s age) and wondered if we wanted to come over and play.  So the kids & I quick picked up the living room and off we went.  (I knew we would be getting home late and wanted to make sure everything was picked up so they could go straight to bed)  Like usual we had a fun time over there.  Katie & O (that’s what I’ll call her) played in their swimming pool while Kevin had fun playing with their train set and I had fun being able to have adult conversation!   It’s just nice to be able to have fun/relaxing nights like that.

Wednesday, Paul andI ended up taking the kids to the Grand Rapids Public Museum.  That was the first time we took the kids there and we all had a good time.  Of course Daddy takes a little to long looking at stuff (he thinks he needs to read EVERYTHING) so the kids & I went ahead and I just had fun pointing out things and seeing their minds at work.  The fun part of the day was all of us being able to ride their carousal.   Paul didn’t dare get on it thinking he might brake something, but as soon as I got on he knew it would be ok.  It was cute.. Kevin & I took some horses in front of Paul andKatie so I turned around and there was Paul and Katie holding hands the whole time.  Talk about priceless!  I’ll have to download the pictures so I can show you!  The other fun thing was we had stopped in the printing store (they have a street of what it looked like back in the day with stores that are filled with stuff back then) there was a volunteer working and printing book marks.  He was explaining the whole process of what they had to do back then, Paul was asking him questions when all of a sudden he asked the volunteer if he had taught at Hudsonville High School.   He said yes, when Paul said I thought so.. you were my teacher!  What a small world!  They have fun talking about old times and probably could of talked longer had the kids not of wanted to go check out the other “stores”.

Then last night Kevin got to start back up with his Karate.  They had the last 2 weeks off due to the instructors being gone on vacation.  I had to admit it was kind of nice not having to take him twice a week to class, but once we were back in class you should of seen Kevin.  He was so slap happy, smiling and giggling all the time.  When I asked him about it on the way home he said he was just so happy to be back there.  Everyone seemed happy to be back! 

Today I ended up running up to Meijers to get some stuff for tomorrow (we have our annual family reunion up at Big Star Lake) and I ended up finding out that Meijers started putting most of their toys on clearance!  It must be they are starting to make room for all the new toys for Christmas!  So, since there was a whole aisle that was 50% off I decided now would be a good time to get some Christmas shopping done since the kids were home with Paul!  Needless to say I know Kevin will be really excited this year.  Of course I’m not sure if what I bought will be for Christmas or his birthday which is in November.  I was able to find a couple things for Katie, but most of the stuff I saw for her was only 25% off so I thought I would wait a little longer for those things.

So that’s what I’ve been up to this week.  What have you been up to?  Anything fun?

I know most people are shying away from them, but my parents are actually looking into buying one as it’s getting harder to get in and out of their car and would like something that sits up a little higher.   The ones they are thinking about looking at are the Buick Rendezvous or the Toyota Highlander.  Do you happen to have one of these vehicles?  If so, do you like it?  Or do you have a different SUV that you love and gets good gas millage??  If so I would love to hear what the pro’s/con’s are on the Rendezvous, Highlander or why you like the SUV you have.

I found out that in a couple weeks my sister-in-law and family will be heading out to Yosemite National Park!  When ever I hear of someone going out west on a family vacation I can’t help but think of the movie Vacation with Chevy Chase and all the problems they had. 

It always seemed like when went went on vacation we would always have issues too!  Our issues always seemed to be with something happening to our vehicles.  All I know it was probably a good thing we didn’t have an RV because it’s probably easier to find a car towing company versus a rv towing company.  I guess when my sister-in-law heads out west they will be camping it with a tent. 

Here’s wishing them a safe trip out west and back home!  May they not have to visit a bunch of car repair shops like we did when I was little.

I can’t believe how different my parents bathroom now looks with a new door. First it was new counters, sink, bathroom faucets, toilet, counter-top and floors from last year and now this year they put in new doors and it just feels like I am someplace different. I didn’t think a door could make such a difference, but it sure did! It makes me want to start re-doing some of the stuff here now.

Have you done any upgrades to your house lately?  If so, what did you do?

My cousin signed up on Nick Jr for their Super Fan Contest and is in dire need of some votes so she can win a bedroom make over for the kids!

So I thought in case you didn’t know what to do for a couple minutes today (and until the contest ends) and wanted to cast a vote for a great cousin of mine (SAHM to 3 boys) then just follow this link…..

http://www.nickjr.com/home/super-fan-contest.jhtml

Hers is the one where one kid is a doctor and the other 2 are animals.

Her words on the side say.. My child is a Diego Super Fan. He loves to watch Diego, wear Diego clothes, read Diego books, and play with Diego toys. In this picture he is checking on his “animal brothers”: baby bear and giant puppy.

If you do go off to vote… THANK YOU SO MUCH and if you need for me to vote for you on something, just let me know!

WOW! It’s been that long since I’ve blogged about anything! OOPS! I’m sure most of you (at least my family members that I haven’t called) are wondering how our vacation is going. Things are going pretty good!

Last Tuesday (Has it already been a week since we left!) we left after Kevin got out of school and drove down to Goshen to visit my Aunt Margo. Usually we take a different way, but this year I thought lets take this way so we could visit her. Now I know why as there was a big pile up on the expressway we usually take and we would of been stuck in that big mess.

After visiting with my Aunt for awhile we hit the LONG road for our next destination.. Macon Georgia so we could visit the Museum of Aviation. Kevin fought like crazy on going to sleep as he didn’t want to miss a thing. Katie did too, but thankfully they did sleep for a couple hours so I could get a little sleep. We finally arrived at the Museum, but Kevin wasn’t to interested. I think it was because he got spoiled at Kalamazoo’s Air Zoo. That too is a air museum, but it also has some rides for the kids to ride on and he was in the ride mode as our next destination was Disney!

We arrived in the Orlando area Wednesday night and spent the night in the hotel and then arrived at our villa rental on Thursday!   I was very surprised on how nice it was as the pictures did not do it any justice.  Since we did arrive before noon we decided day 1 of Disney was in order and off we went!

Disney Day 1 ~  The first thing we did was we took Katie over to the barber shop in the Magic Kingdom.  In case you don’t know.. there is a barber shop there and they will cut kids hair for $14 and adults for $17!  If it’s a childs first haircut (and it was Katie’s) then they give them Mickey Ears with the back that says First Haircut and also a certificate noting the first haircut as well (as well as wrapping the hair in tissue for you).  Then she ended up putting her hair up in a pony tail and added “pixie dust”!  (She even put some in Kevin’s hair too!)   The crowd level wasn’t bad at all as we didn’t have that many long waits.  The longest was Peter Pan and I think we waited about 40 minutes otherwise it was 10-20 minute waits if that even!

Disney Day 2 ~ We ended up going to Animal Kingdom this day as Paul’s parents were going to be coming up and staying with us for a couple nights and since the park closes at 5pm we thought that way we wouldn’t be missing anything.  We got there after the park opened and the crowds weren’t that bad either.  We didn’t have that long of a wait for the Safari ride or It’s a bugs life.  Other than that we really didn’t do many other rides.  We did see a lot of characters there and the kids got their pictures with them.   (Rafiki, Pocahontas, Jiminy Cricket, Mickey & Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Bear from Brother Bear)  We did learn one thing… our kids both love riding rides so we decided from now on we will just be doing the Magic Kingdom.

Disney Day 3 ~ Paul’s folks were staying with us and went to Disney with us as well!  Since they were there, Paul and I took advantage of it and while they took the kids on the Putt Putt cars, Paul and I went on Space Mountain!  Since it was early morning we were able to ride it twice before the line started forming.  The 2nd time riding it Paul got to ride in the front car and he said that was amazing!  The crowds were a lot busier on this day as it was a Saturday and the weather finally was warmer!  We ended up staying the whole day and watched the spectromagic parade and fireworks.

We then took a day off to go back to Magic Kingdom yesterday!  We couldn’t of done things any better yesterday except of gotten there when the gates opened.  We still got there early where we were just about able to walk onto the rides.  Then around lunch time we headed home for the afternoon.  When we went back we got to ride in the front of the monorail with the driver!  It’s just so much fun to ride up front because you can see everything.  By the times we got to Magic Kingdom people were already leaving and we once again didn’t have to wait that long for the rides we were looking to ride.  Instead of watching the night time parade we ended up riding more rides and what was really cool was we had just got on the Astro Orbiter when the fireworks started so it was cool to be flying in the rockets watching the fireworks!

Today was another day to veg around the house, but then tonight we ended up goign to the Cinderella Gala Feast at the Grand Floridian.  Can I just say I can’t wait to get home to download my video I took of the kids dancing with Cinderella, Kevin getting a kiss from Cinderella and then Kevin dancing with Drizella.  At least you will have something to look forward to now right??

I can’t believe it’s been a year ago today that my Grandpa passed away due to cancer.  How much my life has changed in that year’s time. 

I just wish both him & my Grandma were still around so we could of went over to their house and Kevin could of told them about his first day of school and Paul could of told Grandpa about getting ready for Deer hunting since Grandpa always loved talking about that.    We love you & miss you Grandpa!

Even though we really didn’t have anything planned for the weekend the kids & I had a fun time.  Paul ended up working some Overtime on Saturday so the kids & I went in search of the perfect garage sale.  Needless to say we didn’t find it as we only found 4 books,  (Kevin’s buy for the day) but we still had a fun time.  We also stopped by my parents so Kevin could show off his new Superman lunch box!  Then after that we went in search of some more garage sales and found a couple, but they didn’t have any good treasures for us so we headed to Wedgewood Park in Grandville where the kids have fun playing on the playground and check out the creek so Momma could get some pictures.

Then on Sunday we went to church (which is always fun) and then headed over to my parents for a get together with a few family members as my Cousin who is in the milatary at Fort Hood (New York) was in town and that way we could see him. It felt great to see him again and found out it sounds like he will be getting deployed before Thanksgiving, but he isn’t 100% sure where yet. Either Afganastan or Iraq… either way we should be able to see him 1 more time before he leaves!

Katie with her favorite soldier!

All of us that were there. Next time hopefully we will be able to get everyone together! This was a last minute thing and most of the family members were out of town for the holiday weekend. (Yahoo for timers on cameras so everyone could be in it!)

Just the cousins