Madilyn at PaPa and MeMe's house.

We thoroughly enjoyed our time spent with our precious GRANDdaughter Saturday evening and Sunday. She will be 1 year old in September and the time has gone by so quickly. She has such a sweet personality and she loves to give kisses. She is trying to walk and gets brave at times letting go of whatever she might be holding on to at the time.

A lot of the toys that she is playing with were toys that I have kept that were Jerrod's, Trista's and Brandon's.

PaPa loved getting all her hugs and kisses while MeMe was taking pictures.
She always wakes up in a good mood ready for breakfast. She is wearing part of it on her clothes. She needed to sneeze right after I had given her a bite of fruit.
She went to church with us and loved singing during the Praise and Worship but I had to take her to the nursery since she wanted to keep singing while Pastor was preaching. She is waving bye-bye and is saying quite a few words. She is definately a baby on the move. You can tell how much she loves her Mommy & Daddy when they walked in the door to pick her up. Thank you Ashley and Brandon for sharing this precious angel with us. We truly love our time spent with her. ;)

It's been awhile!!!

I know it has been quite some time since I posted anything on my blog but I have been working at PVR doing housekeeping and giving mom a break for the month of July. People have NO idea what has to be done to keep the restrooms (12 toilets, 3 urinals,4 showers 12 sinks), 5 cabins, etc clean. Some people just don't know how to clean up after themselves and I feel sorry for their parents and or spouses if they leave the same kinds of messes in the bathrooms at home. Who ever heard of sticking their wet clothes covered in grass in the dryer without washing them first??? And if there is a toilet brush in the stall where you just made a mess please use it and clean up after yourself. I think it is called "common courtesy." What happened to mother's teaching their daughters to wrap their sanitary pads, etc in toilet tissue before putting them in the trash can??? Much less leaving them just laying on the back of the stool, not wrapped in toilet paper and NOT even put in the trash can. OK, enough complaining. I just want my Mom to know how much I appreciate all of the HARD work that she does for our wonderful PVR. I love you Mom. ;)



This is a LARGE toad that Brandon and Ashley found in their back yard. Trista almost cried when she saw this picture. She is horrified of frogs, little frogs, so she couldn't believe this picture when Ashley sent it to her. She said, "That thing needs to be in an exhibit at the zoo." I am not afraid of frogs but I will not pick one up. Brandon and Ashley didn't pick this one up either, it was a little girl in the neighborhood that rescued it from their backyard and put it back in the pond that is almost directly behind their house. I told them that it will probably come back to visit. It had made a hole for itself right under their bedroom window. They also found a snakeskin in their new flower bed. Ashley's comment was, "Well that just lets me know that there is a bigger one out there somewhere." Doesn't sound like my girl's are going to be country girls.

I will post new pics of my GRANDbabies on my next post.

Umholtz Family Reunion

This is a picture of all but one of my Mom's brothers and sisters. We missed you Uncle Jimmy and Aunt Sandy.Uncle Leon and his family. We missed you Debbie and also Uncle Leon's grandsons.
This is my beautiful Aunt Dorothy with one of Uncle Harold's sons, Jimmy. We missed all of the Miller Family, we love you all!Uncle Johnny and family. We missed you Farrell and family and Josh and family.This is Aunt Cindy and family. We missed you Laura and family and Ricky and family.This is Uncle Harold and family. We missed you Susie and family.This is Aggie's family. Madilyn is hiding behind PaPa Freeman's head. It is really hard to get the babies all looking at the cameras at the same time. We missed you Braden, Billy and family (4), Robert and Family(15), Jimmy and family (4). Too many names to mention all separately. The numbers next to the names is how many was missing from each family. Uncle Tommy and family.My picture of Uncle Earl and Aunt Alice had someones head in the middle of it so I will have to get a better picture from someone, so if you are that someone with a good picture please send it to me. We missed Zondra and family and Ariana and family. Would love to see all of you. Uncle Earl is in this picture standing behind the table behind Aunt Dorothy. This is my cousin Brenda and Barbie.This family loves to eat. I want to thank Aunt Cindy and her children for ALL of their hard work getting this family reunion organized and for providing the meat and all the paper plates and etc. The rest of us brought the side dishes and deserts. We had a wonderful time of fellowship and it was wonderful seeing everyone and all of the new family members that have come into the family since our last reunion. Hopefully it will only be 2 more years until the next one, not 8 years. I really miss my Uncle Ron who has gone to be with Jesus since our last reunion. I did get to spend a week camping with him, Aunt Dorothy, Mary and her children after our last reunion. He was a very special person to me and my family. I LOVE AND MISS YOU, UNCLE RON!

Jacob's Graduation Pre-K 2009

This morning Jacob graduated from ECC, the Early Childhood Center, Pre-K class of 2009. One of our past school Superintendants, Mr. Paden gave the commencement speech and it was wonderful.

A very good family friend, Ruth Atchley was given the "Grandmother Volunteer of the Year" award. Ruth taught Jerrod, Trista and Brandon in our Children's Church for many, many years and she now volunteers at the Early Childhood Center.

We also got the wonderful news this week that Jacob's transfer was accepted so he will be attending Kindergarten at Pratt next year. So MeMe will know if he gets in trouble. We will probably both have to go through some adjustments next year. I just hope that one of the most wonderful Kindergarten teachers in the school system will still be at Pratt next year, which by the way is the daughter of Ruth Atchley, the Grandmother Volunteer award winner. She loves teaching and has a true compassion for children, just like her Mother does.

Congratulations Jacob!

Roaring River Has Just Begun 2009

Like father like son, except Jacob doesn't look as into it as Jeremy. Don't you just love Jacob's little fishing vest? Even if he doesn't fish he wants a fishing permit to hang on the back of his vest. We bought him a hat our first trip to Roaring River this year but he won't wear it because it doesn't have a big hook on the bill of the hat like PaPa's. So we will be purchasing one on our next trip which will hopefully be at the end of this week, Memorial Day weekend. If I didn't have to work 3 days after Memorial Day I would be staying for a couple of weeks. Darn snow days that we have to make up. ;(

Jacob talked his Daddy into helping him look for crappie heads (crawdads). They did finally find one as you can see. I would have rather had the crawdad in my trailer instead of the lizard they found. I looked in his little bug keeper that we keep in the trailer for lightning bugs and there was a lizard in it. Might I say it could have gotten out since the lid does not lock shut, so I talked him into letting it go.

There is a park in the resort for the kids to play at. Kylee and Katie are a BIG help with Lauren. They take her to the park and keep her entertained. They always try to do things that Lauren can do with them. I am glad that they have a good time when they are together.


Trista and Jacob went fishing with Jeremy so she decided to take some scenic pictures of Jacob. I really don't care for the one of him looking over the edge of the cliff. The one of him by the waterfall is good but they came back to the trailer and Jacob had nothing but his wet underwear on. Well, guess what!!! Jacob fell into the freezing cold water and thank God he grabbed a tree root and held on until his Mom could grab him. I am just glad I wasn't there when it happened. Trista is always telling me to keep my eye on him when we are around the water. I'm just glad that it happened when he was with her and not with MeMe. We have a wonderful time together with family and friends when we go to Roaring River. It is such a relaxing place to be.

Madilyn

Isn't she beautiful!!! This picture was taken when she first got to MeMe and PaPa's house and she had just woke up from a short nap in the car. It took her a little while to break away from Brandon. She is definately a "DADDY'S GIRL." Brandon is a good Daddy. He takes care of Braden and Madilyn during the week while Ashley is at work from 7pm until 7am. He calls her his chunky monkey.

Lauren quickly discovered that she isn't going to be able to hold her and feed her the bottle like she use to. So we decided to get out the toys and they had a great time playing together.

She is definately a baby on the move now. She is crawling around everywhere and pulls up so it probably won't be long until she is walking around everywhere, then it will be hard to keep up with her. Aunt Trista was able to get one picture with her.
Before Brandon & Madilyn left I gave her a bath in the kitchen sink. I just figured that the smaller the tub the better!!! She loves her bath time. I think you can tell by her beautiful smile. MeMe loves giving her babies their bath, soaking them in baby lotion, putting their pj's on them, and then I just want to rock them to sleep. She was almost asleep before Brandon got her in the car. She was a tired little angel after playing with Jacob and Lauren. I just wish I could see her every day. She is growing up so fast. We love you Madilyn.

BRADEN'S BIRTHDAY PARTY

Today we celebrated Braden turning 5 years old. As you can tell it was a bowling birthday party and it was a little hectic with 4 and 5 year olds. They had a blast but Braden and Jacob would get a little upset if they didn't knock all of the pins down. They are both very competitive and like to win all of the time! Go figure since both of their dad's, Brandon and Jeremy are also competitive.

I am not sure about the poses in these pictures, but aren't they cute! ;D

Jacob would lean in what ever direction he wanted his ball to go and that still didn't help it.

I can't end this blog without showing a few pics of Braden's little sister and our precious angel Madilyn. She is also growing up so fast. It is hard to believe that she is 6 months old now. Isn't she a cutie!!!!

This is the first picture taken of me and Madilyn together since she was born. MeMe is usually the photographer. MeMe and PaPa love you both very much.

Spring Break 2009

We left friday morning at 4:00, Robert called at 3:00 to see if we were up getting ready. I told him that we would be ready even though I had not gotten to sleep until 1:30 after getting things together and doing my hair which takes about 45 minutes just to dry it. I loaded Jacob up in his pj's, pillow and blanket. I did get dressed but also had a pillow and blanket for MeMe. He woke up when we got to Roaring River ready to trout fish. I had to explain to him that we had to set up the trailer first and get the heater turned on because it was COLD outside. Once he got out of the truck he decided that he would go to MeMe and PaPa Fweeman's (Freeman's) trailer where it was warm. After getting the trailer set up and the heater turned on I got him dressed and headed to the fish hatchery to feed the fish. This is something that we do every day besides going to the fish store to see if there are any new toys that he might not already have.
As you will notice in most of the pics Jacob's left eye is closed because he said that the sun was in his eyes and he could only open one. Later that day we took him to the playground area where a bunch of mom's had brought their children, blankets, and picnic baskets so Jacob had lots of kids to play with.

He wanted to show us how strong he was and that he could go all the way across the monkey bars. He wanted MeMe to try it but I told him that I wasn't strong enough so he proceeded to tell me that I need to start lifting weights to make me stronger.

After the first trip of going to the creek with RJ, Zac, Kylee & Katie and Jacob coming back to the trailer with his only pair of tennis shoes wet I decided to go to Wal Mart and get him some wading boots and oh boy he thought they were cool and immediately wanted to go and try them out in the creek, so off we go Jacob, MeMe and PaPa. He said that he wanted to look for taddle poles (tadpoles) and crappie heads (crawldads). As you can tell in the pics he was very careful about turning over each and every rock.