I'mmmmm back! I wasn't too worried about not blogging. I don't write about as much exciting stuff as my husband and Josh do, so I am sure you all went on about life just fine without reading my blog! As my friend Wayne told me - I have the Mommy Blog.

A lot has gone on in the last few weeks. I can not simply remember it all. I know I have been ouchy at my family and friends. I am tired and I need a vacation. A real vacation. Not stay home and do stuff around the house. I would like to go away but I don't know when that will happen. At least when I am away I don't have to cook, clean, do laundry, etc. all those mom things every women knows what I am talking about!

Some fun things this week - what a great weather week it has been. In the 70's during the day and high 50's at night. I have slept the best in the last 3 nights that I have in weeks. Last night we had a nice dinner - steak on the grill. They hit the spot. After supper we went to Franke Park and flew Piper's new kite. She thought it was great. She was pretty interested mostly in walking around to explore the area where we were. The kite was cool - but didn't keep her interested for long. I let her hold the string and OF COURSE she let go - so Daddy (being the good daddy he is) goes chasing after the kite! This is one thing I really wanted to do this summer so I am glad we were actually able to fit it in!

Monday night - it was so cute. Steve put a blanket in the front yard and him and Piper were laying on it looking in the sky for airplane. She was patting the blanket telling me to lay down beside her. Another one of those moments you can't get back so we all just laid there and looked for airplanes. I loved it.

Sunday was Daddy's Day. We had a house full. I made chicken kabobs, rice and family brought pasta salad, potato salad, cucumbers & onions and dessert. The big kids, Piper, Adam and Norah went swimming in the afternoon. Piper loves the pool..... we are in trouble. Norah still wasn't too sure of it yet. In the morning the kids gave Steve his gifts. Piper was so funny with her bag of stuff and then of course all she wanted was all his colored bags. Ashley was wonderful and put Piper's name on the card that she had bought Steve and she even let her color on the one side of the card. It was cute. Riley picked out his own card for Steve. He was pretty proud of the card. I read the card later and I didn't really get what was so funny - but it was funny to Riley so it was meaningful to Steve then. Steve is an excellent dad. Some days I wish I had his patience and compassion that he has for our children. As my brother called me John Jr. on Sunday I guess I realized I need to take a chill pill!

Steve and I are both upset over the passing of Tim Russert. Ever since I have kids I get real emotional at EVERYTHING! I just don't deal well with stuff at all and especially when it involves a kid at all. (like Tim's college age son) I just can't imagine his son entering his real adult life when you become friends with your parents and not having a parent there to share it with. I would be a mess. I hope my children never have to go thru that and that we are there for their adult life things.

My boss is back to work and seems to be getting along good. I am thankful he is doing well - both selfishly and more for him. He is young and has kids and grandkids ( and we know how I don't do well with that - see previous paragraph) I am looking forward to not doing some of the stuff I was having to do - so that is the selfish part!

We have our new fence. I LOVE IT! It looks so nice. The pool has the new liner and isn't leaking. The back yard is starting to look real nice. This weekend I want to put some more mulch down and finish the one flower garden. I keep thinking next year we won't have to put as much work into the back yard as this year so more fun stuff can be done.

I felt for awhile we bit off more than we could chew with our projects. We were having lots of "problems" in general - fridge wasn't working right, this broke - that broke, etc,. etc., I just had too much on my plate! But now things are winding down and starting to be more like our normal life - I am starting to feel like myself again..... until we start the deck..... the next project.