my sweets

They really do love eachother! they are both at such a fun age.

The funeral

So last Thursday we flew to Texas to my paw paws funeral. I knew that this was going to to be a hard trip, but I knew it was one that had to happen. A year ago my paw paw told Mike and I that we could have his house and farm if we wanted it. This was a house I grew up at and SOOO many of the great memories I have from my childhood stems from that house. We have talked about it and thought about it, and have never made a concrete decision. It is a smaller town than the one we live in, the people there are very country (not a bad thing, but might not be a good thing either), small churches, FARMING! Farming sounds AMAZING, but it is such hard work. It is humid and there are bugs everywhere. Owen got his first fire ant bites, and we are still scratching mosquito bites. Plus my dad was holding Scarlett and a 4 foot snake slithered by. Oddly, these are all things I can get used to. A life on a farm would be a great experience for our kids. We could homeschool, they would grow up around the hardest working people in the world, good, wholesome people. They would grow up being respectful humans. I just don't know if it is the life for us. It would be a COMPLETELY different lifestyle!
When we got to his house, it was so overgrown with vegetation, it scared me! It was not what I had remembered from a few years ago. His house was empty, his gardens were not recognizable, it needed more work than I think we could do. SAD! We went into the house, and I broke down. My dad and I cried. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be. We decided to come back after the funeral the next day so I could get what I wanted out of the house.
The day of the funeral was hotter than hell. It was the kind of heat and humidity that made your clothes cling to your sticky skin. The service was amazing. There was a 16 minute sideshow of his life. I cried through the whole thing. One of my paw paws old friends got up and told stories about him, and we all laughed and cried. At the end of his talk he said two things that I will remember forever. He looked at all of my family and said, "James would have wanted nothing more than to see you all walk with God, and if you are not, please turn your lives around." I felt like it was my paw paw talking to us. The second thing he said was that there was a saying that he always remembered my paw paw saying, and it was one of the best sayings ever. He said,"It's a mighty fine world we live in, and it's really hard to beat, you get a thorn with every rose, but aint the roses sweet." I sat there thinking that I remember him saying this a lot. The last part of the service a man from the VFW stood up and presented a flag to my uncle, and saluted my paw paw's box of ashes. It was an amazing end. It made me sob uncontrollably, but I think I needed to.
After the service we went back to his house and I walked around his property and took tons of pictures. I went inside and took more pictures, and gathered some stuff that I wanted. There was a box in one of the rooms, with a bunch of stuff I had sent him in the nursing home. I was looking through it and found a copy of the letter he had written me when I was born. I read it, even though I know it word for word. He ended his letter with, "it's a mighty fine world we live in, and it's really hard to beat, you get a thorn with every rose, but aint the roses sweet." He had said it to me a million times, because that is how many times I had read that letter!
We took his ashes and my maw maws ashes and mixed them together. We took them out to the garden and buried half of them in the garden. It was the only time no one cried. It is what they would have wanted and I think it made us all happy that we could do that for them. It was a wonderful and sad day, all at the same time. I feel like I got incredible closure from going. What great people my maw maw and paw paw were. They will be missed.

Albuquerque!

My mom and I made a trip to Albuquerque to take the kids to the childrens science museum. We spent half of the day there and had to pry them out of the building to leave. I was pretty impressed myself. It had a lot of hands on things for kids my kids ages.

This is the face Scarlett gives me when she wants me to stop taking pictures and tell Owen to share.

The kids thought it was the greatest place on earth. They can't wait to go back.

Owen Loved the trains, and I loved watching his "concentrating" face.

Scarlett loved the art section!

Home again, home again, jiggity jig

We have been in Texas for the last 5 days. I have so much to blog about, but I will have to start with why we were there. We went to my paw paw's memorial service. Me, Mike and the kids flew to Texas to be there for the service. We left Thursday morning at the crack of dawn and drove to El Paso (because we live in the sticks, we have to drive two hours to the closest airport) to catch the plane. We had to lave extra early to get to the airport an hour and a half before the plane took off, because of Scarlett's peanut allergy. They told us to get there early so we would get to be seated with group A. We got there in time and got seated with group B. Group B sits in the back of the plane apparently. They do not allow preboarding so we literally got the last row in the plane. No PREBOARDING! If airline company's had any since at all, they would keep the front rows open for passengers with young children or elderly people. Do they not get that when little children are on planes, they will start to cry loudly if they are the last ones to get off the plane?! Also, kids poop in their diapers, and wouldn't they want the stinky kids off the plane faster.
In mid flight, the flight attendants passed out pretzels and drinks. A couple people started asking for peanuts, and one lovely flight attendant pointed in our direction and said, "we have a peanut allergy person on board so we are not serving nuts." I wanted to stand up and say, "yep, that would be us, and if any of you have a problem with it, SHAME ON YOU!" People were mad that it was a "nut" less flight. Really, people cant wait one hour to have some nuts?! AMAZING!
One the way home, we were sitting in the airport terminal, and we heard and announcement, "Would the family of Scarlett Grace Remund please report to Gate 7 counter" Her we go, call attention to her again! We walked up to the ticket counter and a lady asked us what grade allergy she had and gave us a ticket to preboard before anyone else. We were seated in the front row of the plane, and no one pointed out that she had a peanut allergy. Everything is better in South Texas!

Stuff?!?!?

Why do people measure their worth by the "things" they have? Some days I want to sell everything, rent an apartment, and be free of all the "stuff". Where we live, people like their stuff a lot. I don't like to be told I need "this", or I need "that". I have everything I need. I actually have WAY more than I need. And conversations like that just irritate me. We all have way more that we need. This country suffered last year and is still suffering because people "needed" the best and most expensive. More depression, more anger, more devastation, and of course, more stuff. I think the key to happiness is to get rid of ALL stuff and focus on the people in your life. A Simple life is a happy life.
I can't wait to live in a city where I can walk or ride a bike to a grocery store. Where I can home school my kids if I want to, go out in public with no make up on, we can drive one car, and have fifty kids if we want to, and if the people I am around don't like it, I can find a new group of friends. I am feeling so trapped right now. haha can you tell? Anyone want to buy a house? I think I am going to put ours on the market SOON.

More paw paw

I think blogging about this is kind of therapeutic. Not everyone has close relationships with their grandparents, but I have been so blessed to have mine be a HUGE part of my life. I feel pretty empty right now. My grandmother died in 2001 (I think) and that was hard. One of the hardest parts about her death was seeing my paw paw miss her. He wanted to be with her. He loved God, and knew that he would be with her again someday, and today he finally got his wish. I bet they are in heaven catching up right now. Talking about grand kids, great grand kids and weddings and who knows what else. Even though this is so sad for me, that I will never get to hug him again, I am happy because he is in heaven.
I am so incredibly lucky to have had grandparents like him and my maw maw. I will never forget his slobbery kisses that I would wipe off. Every time I clip my kids toenails, I think of him. He would always clip my toenails and it tickled SOOOOOO bad! I will always remember him catching lizards for me and my brother. We would go to church with him and my maw maw when we would go visit them, and he would let me sit in his lap. I usually fell asleep in his lap because they went to the most boring church in the world. One time I fell asleep in his lap and I remember closing my eyes and dreaming that I was falling, and I jumped and my shoe flew up in the air.
He was the greatest gardener EVER. We loved going to visit them in the summer and help him garden. Gardening memories are memories I will never forget. Mike was telling me this morning, that he will never forget the first time he met my paw paw. My paw paw got in his face and told him to treat me right, right after he showed him all of his guns.
This morning when my dad called me, it was a call I knew was coming. I knew why he was calling, and I was as prepared as I could be. It is still hard to take, but I am going to hold on to the great memories of him, and know that he is in a much better place. And he is singing hymns with the angels.

Paw Paw

My paw paw is in heaven. He is with my Maw maw and I know they are happier than ever right now. I am so sad that he is gone, but I am so happy that he is not in a hospital bed anymore. He is and will always be a man I look up to. He was great! I will miss him a ton!

The tree house

Mike has been building a tree house for the kids. Here is the beginning stages, and I will post more soon.

This is what I stumbled upon the other day

Bobby

Bobby, our pet came by again, and I was determined to get some good pictures of him. Mike wanted to name him bobby, and I think the name sucks, but I will go with it. Here are some pictures of him.

thoughts

When we decided to sell our business, we had many reasons for doing it. MANY reasons! We did not really think about what Mike would do, because we really did not care what he did as long as we did not have to be business owners. We wanted him to have a job where he could stay home during the day, and work at night. The job that was available at the time that we sold the business was a tile job, so he took it.
Since we have become parents, we have NEVER wanted the kids in daycare. Every week when I had to get them ready for daycare, I was depressed. I thought of ways to get them out of going to daycare regularly. I think they were at a decent daycare, but I am a picky mom who thinks she knows better than anyone else how to raise her kids. Mike and I love our kids more than anyone else could, and I wanted them to be with us as much as possible.
In December we decided that it would be best if Mike got a second job to help pay off cars and other things. We thought we could be debt free in a year. Also, we wanted a steady income, and construction is not always steady. Oh, and he call every electrical company in town, and no one was hiring until the summer. He got a job delivering pizza. I have to admit that I was not thrilled about this job, because I was a little concerned with how people would treat him. I was thrilled that I had a husband that would do anything to get his family ahead. Of course every time he had to tell someone he was delivering pizza, they looked at him with an uncomfortable look, and said, "oh that's nice". No one thought it was "nice" people just assumed we were struggling financially. What people did not understand was that it was the first time in our married life that we were not struggling. When we had the business, we went to be most nights stressed out of our minds about how we were going to pay all of our bills.
Everything was going so good for us, and we were so happy. Then the tile job ended, and all he had was delivering pizza. He was searching for another construction job, and then I realized that we were paying the bills with just my job and his pizza job. The thought occurred to us that if he kept his pizza job only, we would have everything we have wanted. The kids would not need to be in daycare at all, and we would be financially set. For two months now we have been happier than ever. It is summer now, and he could go out and get an electrical job anywhere, but he is not going to do it. We don't need it. We are happy. I am more proud to be married to Mike than ever! He is an amazing example of a man.
I have learned more this year than ever. Life is soooo not about what you have. It is about the relationships you have. We have taken on a whole new perspective, and I love it! I guess this post is for all the people that have judged him for his job. And also to make people think about judging someone before they know the whole story. We have really learned who our true friends are this year, and I could not be happier about it.