(slap on the knee)...'coffee?'

If you understand the meaning of this post's title, then you know who I'm talking about! ;)

Today (and everyday since she's been gone) we are remembering my grandma, Elma Jane VanderZwaag who died 4 years ago. She is the most amazing woman I will have EVER known. She had a bunch of kids, grandkids, great-grandkids, and many friends who loved her so much. And all of us miss her so much still. She had the biggest heart! She was the kind of lady that sent money to any organization that asked for it. I always thought this was funny: she sent some Native American organization money because she didn't have the heart to just throw junk mail away! And she could never turn away the Schwan ice-cream man! She was the most loving, gracious, wise, funny, and godly woman.... I could just go on and on.

Four years ago, grandma had been having pain in her stomach. She had gone to the doctor and he set up a biopsy. I remember her being down-in-the-dumps then already as if she knew something wasn't right. I was at her house and asked if there was anything I could do for her, and she asked if I would vaccuum because she thought there'd be a lot of company in the next few days. At this point, I think she'd already been told that she had cancer. She went in and got the biopsy done and we all prayed for the best. I had told her to call me with the news. She called one night and told me that the cancer was in her liver and the doctors gave her 6 months to live. Everyone was shocked and heartbroken, including grandma. The next morning, I went to grandma's house at around 10 or so and she was still in bed. I sat with her... she looked so depressed and yet so cute in her little pink nighty. She got a phone call and all I heard her say was, 'Oh Edith....' and I could hear Edith crying on the other line. It was so heartwrenching. Throughout the next week, each of grandma's 7 sons took their turn staying with her during the night. She went downhill so fast and got hospice almost immediately. I stayed with my dad one night and in the morning my mom came to relieve us so we could go to work and when she woke us up she told us to listen. The radio had come on and the song 'Softly and Tenderly' was playing. These are some of the words to the song:

"Softly and tenderly, Jesus is calling.
Calling for you and for me.
Earnestly, tenderly Jesus is calling.
Calling, oh sinner, come home.
Come home, come home.
Ye who are weary come home."

It was the most beautiful version I had ever heard of that song and I've never been able to find it back. From the time grandma learned of her cancer to the time that she died, her house was full of people ALL the time. I remember I would be coming home from Jordan's house at 11 pm and would swing by to see if anyone was there, and there'd be 10 or 15 cars there yet. And though I've never seen so many of my uncles and grown cousins openly weep, it was still just so PEACEFUL. With grandma, you always felt like you were in the presence of an angel but when she was dying, there was an even stronger Presence in that house.

The Thursday before she died, my sister and I said our goodbyes to grandma. It was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do but one of the most rewarding, too. I'm so thankful that I got to tell grandma how I felt about her. I said something to her about seeing my grandpa again (after 7 years) and she smiled and said, 'imagine that'. That night, Jordan and I went to see her and he hugged her and told her that he was going to marry me and take good care of me and she nodded. (When we got home, Jordan proposed.)

The next day, my cousin got married and they stopped by after the reception. Grandma was so sad to have missed it. At one point during this time, we thought that grandma was dying on Saturday afternoon. All the kids and grandkids rushed to her house and we surrounded her, holding hands and singing to her. My uncle read scripture and she would try to smile at times, but she was mostly relaxed and peaceful. She continued to hold onto life.

There was also another great-grandkid born in this time and the day before grandma died, she got to hold him. She had been so weak and her mouth (and everything for that matter) was starting to shut-down and deform. But she smiled when she held the baby. The next morning, when each of her sons had gotten their chance to take care of her through the night, she died. It's almost as if she had held on to her will to live so that she didn't miss seeing Jenny in her wedding dress or holding little Josiah.

The funeral was memorable and my uncle Bob had a really great eulogy (I think that's what they call it?). At the end of the funeral, all of the grandkids were ushered out and while everyone was still seated, we each took a turn ringing the church bells for the number of years she was alive. That was incredible for some reason. When each of us was done ringing it, my cousin Mike (the oldest) rang for the remainder of her years and that was so sweet. While the grandkids were surrounding the bell rope, the spouses were just outside the church doors and I have this permanent imagine in my head of them scattered and disarrayed but all staring up at the bell reverently. And when we followed in a line to the cemetary, we passed Bill's house and he stood from his lawn chair, that's always sitting in the garage for him to watch traffic, and he saluted. At the cemetary, we sang 'Abide With Me' which was sweet and perfect.

My grandma was so proud of her family and after going through this time with them all, I am proud too. She was a great woman and was as close to perfect as you can get. I will always aspire to be just like her.

Grandma - we love you still and miss you. I think of you often when I think of the countless hours we spent playing Upwords, your amazing and legendary chocolate-chip cookies, paddle-pops, your special lemonade, daffodils, the way you would laugh (and often your laugh was accompanied by a big slap on the knee), your love for animals (and how they always got really fat- probably from eating buttered bread!), and (this is just stupid) there's a certain type of lipstick I have that smells just like grandma's lipstick that she used to put on us when we were little! I cannot wait to see your big smile again and hear your boisterous laugh and, if you still have those dentures, you know I'm going to ask you to do your special in-and-out-really-fast-flash of them!! I'll see you soon.

elston wedding

Last night, we had our last wedding of the year to go to: Nate and Vanessa's. It was an outdoor wedding and reception and Vanessa did a beautiful job with it all. We had a great time. Natalie was the flower girl so I'll be posting a lot of pictures of her in all her glory! We got to the wedding site and got Natalie ready. I put on her white dress and her shoes and wouldn't ya know, lil'-ol'-sentimental-me got a wee bit emotional thinking that 20 or so years from now, I'll probably be helping Natalie get dressed for her own wedding (hopefully she won't still be in diapers!) We practiced walking down the aisle many times before the ceremony and she did ok except for she didn't really want to acknowledge the ringbearer. We tried to get some pictures of Natalie with the bride and groom but she didn't want anything to do with that either. She was really shy with everything at first but she warmed up a lot as the night went on. All in all, she did really well. When it came time for her to walk down the aisle for the real thing, I let go of her and Grant's hands at the beginning of the aisle and she sat down and started to get mad. And I definately didn't want her to throw one of her fits, so I walked down with her. I really was hoping that it wouldn't come to that but it was such a relaxed ceremony that it wasn't a big deal. Natalie did awesome with being quiet during the ceremony (big sigh of relief there!) So here are some pictures of the night.





...warming up to each other over a bag of chips.

I liked how this picture of Jordan turned out with the sunrays shining down on him. It reminds me of the first time I ever saw him and I heard angelic voices sweetly singing, 'ahhhhh' ....just kidding :)

You can just feel the love that Nate and Vanessa have for each other when you are around them. They have been together for 8 years already! I'm sure that they will have a fun and adventurous marriage together and we pray that God will give them many years together. Congrats, you two!

the diet

I'm officially on my first diet. I've never actually participated in a dieting program, I've only ever tried on my own to watch what I eat and to exercise. But that has never worked because I have no self-control when it comes to food (or sweets, more specifically). So I'm trying weight watchers and I'm really going to try to stick with it. I thought if I make myself post about my progress once a week, maybe then I would hold myself more accountable. We're going to Vegas in a few weeks and that's about how long I'd like to try weight watchers. I'm hoping it will be the lifestyle change for me that it's supposed to turn into. We'll see. So my next post will come on either Saturday or Sunday. I'm going to post about how many points I went over or under total in the week, pounds lost or gained, and how often I exercised for the week. The last time I made a goal to lose weight, I stayed disciplined and it worked. But I stopped and went back to my bad habits of eating bad and not exercising and I pretty much reversed all of my progress. Ugh! I really want to lose a little and tone up and I know I can do it if I really try. So here goes....

a post about poop

This was sort of a long weekend for me. Jordan went to Detroit with the guys for a few Tigers' games. He left Friday morning and the minute we (Natalie and I) shut the door, Natalie was crabby and mad. I think I gave her more spankings (that's right, we're spankers) in that day than I have this whole summer! My patience has really been tested this weekend and I think I'm usually a patient person. So what's the testing for?! I don't know if Natalie was acting up just because of Jordan being gone or if the terrible twos are now in effect. My mom noticed that she was being testy, too, so I don't think it was just me. Natalie was much better today (Sunday) up until she decided to take her poopy diaper off.... I was on the phone with Sara and doing some laundry when Natalie walked up to me with her pants and her diaper off and poop all over her butt. I went to her bedroom where she had been playing and there I found 2 terds and...

Ruby.

With a handful.

And a mouthful.

Of...

POOP!

I was yelling into the phone (sorry Sara!), trying to clean out Ruby's mouth, and keep Natalie from touching her butt. So disgusting!! I sent Natalie to the bathroom to wait for me (thankfully she obeyed) and she was yelling to Ruby "No, no Ruby, Nay-Nay poop is yucky!" as if Ruby was naughty one. Jordan will be coming home sometime in the middle of the night and I'm hoping he returns with my sanity that he left with.

from drab to fab :)

I don't know why but this year I have been obsessed with garage sales and thrift stores (even more so than usual). This is something I picked up at Bibles for Mexico for $2.



It was an old, ugly, lightbulb fixture - maybe something you'd hang over a bathroom sink. I had an idea of what I wanted to do with it and it turned out just as I hoped it would. This is the final product:


I spray painted it black, stamped the fancy design on it, and added the crystals and candles (all of which, I might add, were already in my possession!) I put it in my massage room because I thought it would add more to the ambiance I am trying to create in there.

Last week, my 'girlfriends' and I went to IKEA. I love it there and made a list a few weeks prior to going of what I needed. It never fails- I get there and buy all this stuff that I really don't need but forget the stuff I really do need. Hence, the very detailed list. And I'm proud to say that I stuck to it (minus a few {cheap} essentials)! Included in my list were a few various items to give our bedroom a makeover. Of all the rooms in our house, our bedroom is the only one that I haven't changed since we've owned the house. Which we've only owned it for 4 years but I'm just finally starting to get the hang of this decorating thing. And for the past few years, Jordan and I haven't been happy with our room. Hence, the makeover. I should have taken a before picture because it was pretty hideous but didn't think of it in time. So here are the after pictures:




I'm really happy with it's transformation. Before, we had these (dresden dream) blue walls and a blue and brown floral, black comforter (don't ask me what I was thinking when I bought it. In my defense - I was pregnant). For quite a while, our dresser was white with a white mirror above it. So I painted the dresser and the mirror black. I found a second oval mirror and also painted it black. It still needed something else so from IKEA, I bought the shelf underneath the mirrors and a couple of candles. I also got the comforter , the big pink pillow, and the curtains from IKEA. I repainted the walls with this slate gray color that I already had in the house, and I collected other knick knacks to add to the shelf. It's funny, when I took off the switch plates to paint behind them, I noticed that under our blue color was the color of the room before we got our hands on it and it was the EXACT same color as the gray I was putting on! Isn't that crazy? And I remember that we thought the room was too dark when we bought it. Although, there was still dark oak trim and I think now the gray walls with the white trim complement each other so well. And we had these black frames that I put scrapbook paper in and covered with lace curtains I was no longer using. Another freebie!! So total cost of our 'master' bedroom makeover? Seventy Five Dollars!!

Comforter: $35
Mirror #1: $0
Mirror #2: $8
Window: $0
Decorative Frames: $0
Curtains: $5
Shelf: $15
Pink Pillow: $10
Two pink/red Candles: $2
Finally being content with our bedroom: Priceless

I'm not sure that the frames next to the bed are going to stay or go. What do you think? I always think that every wall should have something on it, but sometimes that's not necessarily the case. All in all, I'm pretty happy with our new room - and especially the fact that with a little bargain shopping, we could make it over for so cheap.

And as of last week, we are enjoying some of the 'fruits of our labor' from our garden. I LOVE having a garden at last!!

pictures...

I could probably write a lot more about this past weekend but it's easier to just post the pictures. On Friday, Jordan and I just hung out with our girls and had a quiet night at home. We knew that this month would be flying by with how busy our weekends are.

On Saturday, we had 4 different parties/events that we were invited to but we could only make it to 2: Andrew and Melissa's housewarming party and a boat cruise with the Havemans that Jeremy and Crystal bid on at a church auction. We had such a great time!



On Sunday, we went to a pool that our friend was housesitting at. It felt so good to lay out by a pool and swim. Natalie loved it, Ruby wasn't so sure but the water was a bit cool. Normally we'd be hanging out at Jordan's uncle and aunt's pool but they just moved and don't have a pool this summer....so we've been having withdrawals!

I love this one of Ruby! Too bad I couldn't get it to rotate.

Yesterday, Ruby started crawling a little. She's been scooting all over the place but she's finally getting the idea of how to crawl on her knees. She's so stinkin' cute!

This weekend, Jordan and I are going on a date!! We are going to go out to dinner and see the new 'Harry Potter' movie. I am so excited. I think the last time we had a date night was shortly after Ruby was born. And that was only for dinner. Originally, we were going to go to Chicago on Saturday to the Science and Industry museum to see the 'Harry Potter' exhibit but I think we're going to go another weekend instead when it will hopefully be less busy. And I'd like to space it out a little with getting babysitters. I'm way too attached to my girls! Have a good weekend everybody!

nonsense

It's really late as I write this. Jordan is on his way home from a Tigers game and I'm attempting to stay awake until I know he's safely returned home. And to unlock the door for him because I'm always so paranoid of robbers and murderers and vampires! Vampires, you say? Yes, I have just started reading the 'Twilight' series. I have gotten halfway through the first book in just a few hours. It's really holding my attention. I just finished reading the 'Half-Blood Prince', the 6th of the Harry Potter series. One of my favorites, that one. And I wanted to read it in time for the movie that's coming out next week. But back to 'Twilight'. As grabbing as it is, I cannot keep my eyes open anymore. So I thought I'd blog instead. But now that I'm typing, I realize I don't really have anything to say. I can just see myself babbling for a while and re-reading what I write and deciding not to publish it. But if you're reading this now, I probably didn't re-read it and published it without thought. So.... what can I write about.....

Natalie puked on the 5th of July. We were just about to eat (grandpa was starting to pray) and she just throws up. She hasn't since and there had been no signs that she was feeling sick beforehand or after the fact. So hopefully she's fine. So far, the twos haven't been so terrible. The only 'problem' we really have with her right now is that she somehow manages to climb into our tall bed in the middle of the night without us realizing it. But, as bad a habit as it is, we kind of like it. Usually, we wake up to find her feet in our faces. She insists throughout the night to sleep the opposite way of us. But we still enjoy her company. I know it's a bad habit but it's not like she'll be doing it when she's ten. We'll break it someday :)

Ruby said 'mama' on Sunday and has said it a couple of times since. That's exciting for me! She is so close to crawling also. She can get on all fours and scoot backwards. She's still just as happy as a baby can possibly be. Always all smiles! I think she had a good 4th of July holiday weekend. It was really laid back and we didn't do a whole lot this year but we had a relaxing weekend. On the 4th, we journied to our friend, Brad's house with many other friends and had our 2nd annual whiffle ball tournament and a bunch of food and fellowship. Good times as always with our friends.

Wish I could leave you with some pics of the 4th but I didn't really take any worth sharing! Oh well, my eyelids are beginning to shut down on me anyways.


...and Jordan just got home as I was typing that last paragraph (perfect timing!)