Halloween Thru The Years

Bah, humbug.

Oops.

Wrong holiday.

I mean, Happy Halloween!!!!

Halloween...one of my most favorite days of the year...the day when you can dress up as anything you want to be, take on a different persona, and get candy from strangers.

Awesome!

Trick-or-treating as a child was always a delight...walking on the sidewalks with my friends, lugging along a pillowcase that would get increasingly heavy as the evening wore on, and counting down the minutes until the much-anticpated "Loot Inspection" once I got home.

Loved the chocolate. Hated the peanut butter thingies in the orange and black wrappers.

But seriously hated the plastic spiders or the pencils that the dentists in the neighborhood would pass out. Ack.

And seriously hated having to share the loot with my parents...but totally seeing the benefit of that once I became a parent myself. Hee.

Here are some Halloween photos over the years at our house...Enjoy!


Me...circa 1966, at the age of 4...a Wicked Witch....



Brad, as a 1-year old race car driver, in 1990...




Brad, as a 2-year old clown, in 1991...




Brad, as a 3-year old pirate, in 1992....




Me and the boys in 1994...




In 1995, Brad was a knight and Taylor was a cat...Taylor was still young enough I could force "cute" on him....




By 1996, the boys wanted "Scary" and wanted nothing to do with "cute." Sigh.




By 2000, the boys were joined by their little sister, who was a decidedly cute Tigger....


And here we are, 11 years after that last picture was taken.

Oldest son is now a senior in college, far from home.

Younger son is 18 and will be working tonight at his job...no dressing up for him anymore.

And my daughter is spending the evening across the lake, at her girlfriends' houses, where she'll trick-or-treat one last time. But not with us. Sigh.

Life goes on. Kids get older.

And yet the kid that's still inside me will always enjoy Halloween.

Be safe tonight, however you choose to celebrate.

Peace.

Busting A Gut Over My Sister's Gut

My sister and I have a somewhat new tradition of trying to get together every month for dinner, where we can nibble and nosh on such appetizers as jobs, kids and families.

However, with my sister's rectal cancer diagnosis a few months back, our dinner-time conversations lately have focused more on chemo, ostomy supplies and side effects. Fun stuff, I'm tellin' you, and I can only imagine what people around us must be thinking if they could only overhear our talks.

Last night, while sitting at our local 54th Street Bar & Grill, we were discussing some pretty intimate stuff at a decibel level of 125, as the restaurant was very loud and very crowded. Sis is open to questions about how things all "work" in her body - or how they don't work, depending on what part we're discussing - and she decided to give me a graphic anatomy lesson.

Grabbing the straw wrapper (educational supplies are somewhat limited in a 54th Street Bar & Grill, after all), she proceeded to lay out her colon, as well as her rectum...and in case I wasn't overloaded with too much information by this point, she tore off a little, teeny, tiny bit of straw wrapper and used it for her ostomy bag:



She then grabbed her black straw and used it as her pointer, because all good teachers must have a pointer, don't ya' know, and so there, in a crowded and crazy and noisy bar, I learned everything I ever wanted to know about how her body eliminates waste through the ostomy bag.

Fascinating stuff, I'm tellin' ya...and when I realized what we were doing, I couldn't help but get the giggles...and before we knew it, we were both sitting there, busting our "guts" (sorry - couldn't resist an anatomical pun at this point!) with laughter at the absurdity of our situation.

I think we laughed until we cried.

Sometimes, the best medicine isn't a bunch of chemotherapy drugs dripping through a port...but a good old-fashioned dinner with your sister, busting a gut over her gut.

Peace.

Beatles vs Turkeys

Living at the lake the last two years has given our family all kinds of "lake-living" education...

...lake roads are really, really curvy....

...there are lots and lots and lots of leaves to rake... (guess what we've been doing all weekend??!!)

...spiders and spider-webs are permanent squatters of boats, docks and decks....

...and the local wildlife remind us all of the time that THEY are the true permanent residents, and us human-folk are just "borrowing" their territory...

I was reminded of this last fact as I was driving home from the grocery store, and I came across this sight in front of me:



Somehow, I couldn't help but be reminded of these famous "animals":



Although, I will be the first to admit that a rafter of turkeys gobbling in excited agitation as they scurry across the road doesn't quite sound like the Beatles.

Peace.

Extreme Homemaker: Joplin

"MOVE!" "THAT!" "BUS!!!"

Know that phrase?

If you've ever sat down and watched an episode of Extreme Makeover Home Edition, than you've heard the ebullient host, Ty Pennington, scream those words through his ever-present megaphone, prior to a well-deserving family getting a home of their dreams.

Pretty cool stuff.

Even more cool is that my Hubby got an opportunity to be one of the lucky volunteers today, working on those dream homes.

Extreme Makeover has been in Joplin, Missouri this week...doing an unprecedented "Seven Homes in Seven Days" build for their upcoming 200th Anniversary episode. (Set to air probably in January or February)

On May 22nd of this year, Joplin was the scene of the most destructive tornado in U.S. history - a monster storm that killed over 160 people, leaving thousands of homes and businesses destroyed. I spent almost 3 weeks in Joplin immediately afterwards, with the American Red Cross, providing food and other supplies to the people affected.

A few months ago, both Hubby and I applied online at www.joinextreme.com/joplin to be selected as volunteers to work on the build...seven homes...in seven days...for seven different families.

What a once-in-a-lifetime experience that would be, we thought....

A couple of weeks ago, I found out that we had both been selected...Hubby had been chosen for the October 22nd shift from 2:00 - 8:00 pm...while I had been selected to build a house at a later date...in Maine.

WHAH??

Yup.

Maine. Or possibly Massachusetts.

Either way, it was a long way from Joplin, and a long way from Kansas City.

I'm not sure how that mix-up occurred, but oh, well. Probably best that I not be hammering out construction so soon after the gallbladder surgery....right? That's what I'm telling myself, anyway, as I worked through my disappointment at the mix-up.

So, Hubby set off today for his unique volunteer experience...and he called a bit ago, on his way home, bubbling with enthusiasm and excitement on all that he had been a part of today.

Very well organized, he said. Lots of volunteers - hundreds, if not thousands. From all over the country.

All seven houses are in a row...on the same block...but all with different themes.

And yes, he DID get to see Ty Pennington - several times, in fact - as Ty walked around the job site...but he never got to hear Ty screaming into the megaphone.

We can't wait to watch this episode and "meet" the families who'll be moving into these special homes...and knowing all of the love that went into them from all of the volunteers....

Now...if only I can get myself to Maine...or Massachusetts...and work on the house that I got selected for....

Right.

Peace.

Telephone Line

There's a famous quote by Mark Twain that says, "The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated."

I'm feeling a particularly close kinship right now with Mr. Twain, as I have heard of a rather exaggerated rumor regarding myself that I must squelch.

A few weeks ago, I had to leave my Red Cross work in New Jersey early, so that I could come back home to Kansas City and have gallbladder surgery. A nasty business, to be sure, but all is well in Post-Gallbladder World, I am happy to report.

Over the course of my recovery, I received numerous "Get Well" cards in the mail...from friends, church members, and fellow Red Cross volunteers.

One card, though, in particular, caught my eye:



This card was signed by numerous volunteers who I had been working alongside in New Jersey after Hurricane Irene...and their personal messages were...well...puzzling.

One says, "Sorry to hear of your loss."

Um...okay....you're sorry for the loss of my gallbladder???

That's kinda' weird. But....okay.

Another message says, "Prayers for you and your family."

Wow. I lose my gallbladder, and my family needs prayers?

Okay...I guess they kinda' do need prayers, having to deal with me post-surgery. I could give the devil fits when I'm being whiny and needy and not feeling well.

And then I saw this message:

"We are so sorry about your fire."

Mystery solved. Kinda'.

It appears that these volunteers didn't hear correctly on why I left New Jersey early. They didn't hear that it was "gallbladder." They heard "house fire."

They thought my house had burnt down.

If it weren't so tragic, it would almost be funny. I mean, I feel awful that all of these people think that I lost my house...but how the heck did the message get so turned around??!!

Remember that game we played as little kids...Telephone Line...? Where we would sit in a circle...and one person would whisper a message in someone's ear...and then that person would whisper it to the next person...and so on, and so on...and it was always funny to hear how outrageously wrong & mangled the original message was by the very end?

This was Telephone Line in real life...and now, how to go about correcting all of these people so they don't think I lost my house??

Just a little old gallbladder.

Big difference, huh?

Peace.