Romance and Birthdays

I love vacations! Thus the blog name......:) Kim surprised me with a romantic trip to Galveston Moody Gardens just "because". The light show was beautiful. He's still got it!

This is the view from our room.

Then on the way home, we stopped by Pearland for Curtis' 1st Birthday! That was a fast year! He's such a ham! We gave him a red wagon which he loved. The party was a hit for everyone but mostly for Curtis himself. I was surprised when he dug into the cake......but without his hands! Guess he knew about the trough nights the Schwartz family used to celebrate! What fun!!! Kim's brother, Denny, his wife, Jane and daughter Megan all were able to join us for the party. We are so blessed to have them close by.

Jillian.....you did a great job planning and decorating! It was a fabulous 1st birthday! I just don't know how you're going to best this one for his 2nd! We are so proud of you and your job as Mommy. You and Jacob are such fabulous parents. God certainly blessed Curtis with you both.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Merry Christmas to all! Today we celebrate God's greatest gift of all...his son! Rejoice!!!

Christmas Day at our house is unusually quiet. We celebrated last night by opening gifts, eating lasagna and going to mass. It was a wonderful day! Nothing like Christmas with a baby!! Curtis did not disappoint us. He enjoyed his new "couch" and toys. So much fun!!! He even behaved in church. What a trooper! I've posted lots of pictures in picassa but here's a teaser with him playing with the gift that my mom and dad gave him on his fold out couch.

The Woods family had a wonderful surprise.......Kristy's sister decided to have her baby early and delivered Trevor yesterday afternoon. Exactly when her other two kids wanted him born! Merry Christmas to them! :) I know that Grandma & Grandpa Wood were extremely excited to be here for the delivery. Our most sincere congratulations to them all!

Talk about Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Well.....let's just say it was the Happiest Thanksgiving of my life!!! I'll start at the beginning. My mom and dad came in to visit us for the week. That in itself is a reason to give thanks! I loved having them here! Then.....Kristy offered to cook for us! Another reason to give thanks! I had to make my famous yeast rolls which didn't turn out very well. I put them in a warm oven that turned out to be too hot so they all fell - 3 batches worth!!! Oh well......back on track now......Thanksgiving day at Dan's. Much to my surprise, Dan offers to say the Thanksgiving blessings. Anyone who knows my #1 son, knows that he loves to joke around. Well, he's giving his prayer and thanking our good Lord for the family, food, football, troops, children, Kristy's sister and her unborn son Trevor, and then he says "And thank you Lord for the baby in Kristy's tummy!" I about flew across the room. Of course, they all had cameras aimed at me for my reaction! I don't think I disappointed them! I made a total fool out of myself and I'd do it again! I'm sooo excited! Another grandbaby to love and spoil! So you see why I'm so darn excited!!! It was such a wonderful surprise. I know that they will make the best parents!

As for the visit with my parents.....it was a wonderful time. I continue to ask everyone to pray for my parents to move nearer to us. I worry about dad caring for my mom. She seems to be falling more and he can not continue to lift her from the floor for much longer. I would love to have them here!

Thanks to all!

So it's been a month

Ok already! Here's a new blog! Let's see......I went to the Quilt Show.....Kim finished football....we got to babysit Curtis. That's about our entire life. What can I say? Hmmm....still going out to eat on Wednesdays for wings and beer with one of the greatest couples on earth. (That's a shout out to you Todd & Jill!) And let's see...it's Thursday night and we're watching Ugly Betty, Grey's Anatomy and ER. That's about our life!!! Sad huh? I've got to be honest....we like it that way! We're still hoping we can get to Hawaii this summer but we'll see! Here's one of the cutest pictures taken of one of the cutest little guys to ever walk the face of the earth!

Looking forward to Sunday when my parents are coming from Florida for turkey day. We give thanks that they can still drive here. I'm eager for them to see Curtis. I'm hoping I can talk them into moving here. I just can't imagine dad taking care of mom much longer. It's got to be hard. He is such a loving husband to mom! I am truly a blessed woman! Surrounded by great men!

Well, I'll try to not wait another month but honestly I'm a boring old lady! HAH!

Rescued pictures

Yee-haw! Our lost pictures from our Wyoming trip were "rescued" by Wolfe photo. Take a peek at them in our Picassa folder.

Our prayers go out to Jillian and Curtis. Poor little Curtis has a really sore throat from some weird virus....hand & foot? Guess he needs to keep those cute little tootsies out of his mouth! JK........lots of love to you all.

Love,Love, Love those babies!

We had the privilege of babysitting the sweetest little lady I've met in years, Ana Lavine. Curtis was in love with her as were we. We continue to pray for the entire Lavine family and their personal struggles. Check out this precious little girl with the most beautiful woman and young man you'd ever want to meet!

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Labor Day!!!

ah yes......sleeping in....watching morning TV while reading the paper....life is good! I love week days off! I must admit, I'm missing Jill, Jacob & Curtis. They've been in San Diego with my niece and her family. Looks like they're having a blast by their pictures. Poor Kim has had to work everyday. Such is the life of a Texas HS football coach.......hopefully the weather will be good enough later today for a bike ride.

Had to put some pictures of Curtis in San Diego. He's got to be the cutest little boy I've ever seen (and I have no prejudices at all! HAH)

It's my Birthday!

It's my birthday and I took a 1/2 day off work and did my favorite thing in the world. I babysat! Jill's not feeling well so I took some time off and helped her get some rest. It was the perfect way to spend my birthday. It's so much fun! Here's a picture of Curtis on the quilt I made for him. I'm happy to say, he loves it!

Knives, cars, plastic bags, drugs and alcohol

Well, I am a woman in love. I got to babysit Kurty Burdy yesterday while Jill and Jacob went on a much needed date. I had so much fun! He took a quick nap for me but then we played! I was successful keeping him away from the knives, cars, plastic bags and prescription drugs but I couldn't keep him out of the liquor cabinet. That boy! Now that he's crawling he just won't stay out of trouble. Taking after his mom! Trouble maker!!! HAH!

Honestly, it was a blast! He jsut giggled and played with his nana. I can't wait to do it again.

Congratulations to Jill Irwin on her college graduation. She actually went to 7 different colleges over her 40+ years but she perservered! We enjoyed celebrating with her.

Football

Here we go. Football season! YAHOO! We had the kick-off coaching party Friday night (Thank you Sharon & Jill for making it such a riot!) and Kim went into doubles today. I feel so sorry for those kids - 105 degrees today and they're running in the sun. YUCK! I took his working again to start working out again. I've got to lose this weight! I feel gross! So....all those great friends of mine - keep me away from the sweets!!!!

Working on repairing the severed relationship with my sister. I need lots of prayers and support. This is not going to be easy! Love to all......

Life is good again!

Ahhh......Kim is back home and all is very well with the world. The tests all showed nothing wrong with his heart. We'll never know what caused all the chest pain but I'm glad to know that a heart attach is not in the cards. We've really been enjoying lots of family time. I'm enclosing the cutest picture of Curtis. I was getting him ready for bed and he just looked so cute I couldn't resist getting our picture taken. What a cutie!

Yucky week-end

Well, this is definitely not the week-end we had planned. Kim went fishing with Dan yesterday morning and, even though the fish were biting, they were home by 10:00am. I couldn't believe it! Turns out Kim wasn't feeling well....of course, I asked him if he had diarrhea or vomiting....aren't those the normal thing? Turns out he was having chest pains! I very reluctantly let him take a shower to get the salt water off of him and then brought him to the closest emergency room. He was admitted and we'll be here until the very earliest Monday afternoon. They've done all sorts of tests on him and so far it looks like it wasn't a heart attack but we won't know for awhile. They're going to do a nuclear stress test on him tomorrow and that'll probably be when we know for sure. He's feeling lots better this morning and I'm sorry to say that I was glad he was running a temperature and high white blood cell count last night. I'd much rather it be an infection or pneumonia than heart problems. So would he!

We were very lucky in that Dan, Jill, Jacob and Kristy all live so close and were all planning on attending Stacy Irwins wedding with us Saturday afternoon. The kids were able to represent the Schwartz's at the wedding but we were so sorry we missed it! We heard it was beautiful. Of course, we always knew that Stacy would be a beautiful bride!!! We really hated to miss since we've been talking about it for months. We'll have to drink our share of Todd's beer at our favorite wing place or we'll wait til Jeff's wedding.

I'll keep all my bloggers up to date......please be sure to remember us in your prayers.

e-mail

YAHOO! Our e-mails are working!!! I'm going to check the gmail on occassion but we'll probably be checking the judynkim@comcast.com and kimanjudy@comcast.com the most since our old e-mails are being forwarded now.

Kim's home from convention. I missed him! It's good to have my best friend back home. Of course, football season is starting up so he's already got physicals tomorrow night. I'll start getting some sewing now.

Alone

Well, Kim has gone to coaching convention. I'm sure he's having a great time. I've used this time to get the bedroom redecorated. I think I'm done but I need Jill or Kristy to come in and give me the final "go-over." They've been a great help.....from Jill's "Mom, those doilies have GOT to go!!" Kristy never says something's bad but she has a little look that let's me know it's not a good idea. She's still not quite able to tell me that something is really bad. I'll give her a few more years. HAH!

Sad news....a favorite family friend of Kim's passed away. Pete Schutte was a great man and a wonderful mentor/hero type to Kim as a young man. Pete was a little rough around the edges but would give you the shirt off his back (or the tools off his tool bench). He will be sorely missed by us and I believe the entire community of Quincy, IL. He's probably having a great time partying with Kim's dad in heaven right now.

In case anyone reads this, our comcast e-mail is still not working. I'm now using my kimandjudy@gmail.com address. Please write often!

what a great week-end

We had the pleaseure of having Curtis, Jill & Jacob spend the week-end with us. They had a table at church to talk about NFP. They are such a pleasure to have around. Responsible adults and a beautiful baby. Jill is helping me update the house. I don't want to have the "old lady" place. It's amazing what a few new picture frames can make! Back to the old grind tomorrow. I'll try to get some pictures up soon.

Back to reality

Well, we got home Sunday night to no phone service and no internet. Somehow our Road Runner modem and computer must have been affected by the storms while we were gone. Luckily we had our cells phones and were able to get some things done. It's amazing how dependent we are on our computers now. I couldn't pay bills or balance the checkbook etc. Luckily I had the laptop I had put quicken on in May. I had to just input everything from past statements and hope we're close. I'm hoping Jacob can look at our computer tonight or Sunday.

Thanks to everyone who looked at our blog during our trip. Hope it gave you some enjoyment. Time to go back to laundry........

I've decided that Reality Bites!

Amarillo

Well, I've seen a lot of interesting places but last night may just have been the most unusual. We're in Amarillo and Kim wined and dined me at the Big Texan. We watched two teenage boys try to eat a 72 oz steak in an hour (we didn't stay for the end - I thought it was rather disgusting) and then we went to the Cadillac Ranch. That was really strange but kinda fun. There were empty spray paint cans everywhere. We tried to leave our mark but couldn't find one with anything left in it.

This morning we woke to a flat tire on the truck so Kim is outside fixing that while I type. We also need to replace our wiper blades before getting into all the rain we've been hearing about in mid-Texas. Home today or tomorrow. Check out our hilarious pictures of yesterday.

Leaving Estes

Well, this morning Kim is fishing in Rocky Mountain Park and I'm starting to pack up. This has been a beautiful "resort" with lodge, mini golf, pool, spa, nightly entertainment and a wonderful view of the rockies. Our site is actually right behind the sign welcoming people to Rocky Mountain Park. Today we're making a short drive to Golden to the Coors Brewery and then possibly to a Rockies Game. We're going to hit the road the next few days after that and expect to be home somewhere around Monday or Tuesday. Love to all.

Estes Park

Well, we made it to Estes Park yesterday. Kim is out fishing while I do some laundry, blog updating and reading. It's nice to just stop and enjoy a lazy day. It rained a little last night but just a drizzle to keep the dust down. These poor people in Wyoming and Colorado need rain so desperately. The fire danger is extremely high everywhere.

Our trip to Mt. Rushmore was very eventful. We had heard it may be crowded around the 4th but had no idea that the fireworks were on the 3rd. We shared the monument with about 40,000 other people. Honestly, we parked in Keystone and hiked 3 miles up the mountain to see it. I've been having a hard time with the altitude and getting dizzy at times. That wasn't fun when we reached the top. it just takes some time with my head down and ice on my neck. After about 10 minutes I'm fine but it sure was embarrassing at the time! The monument was worth the hike up the mountain though. We had the pleasure of sharing some of it with a very nice black gentleman from Georgia. It made it so poignant when we read about Lincoln freeing the slaves but then realized that Jefferson had made the importing of black men and women from Africa illegal. It took our country so many years to finally realize the horrible things we had been doing.

On to more pleasant things....we are planning one more night here and then on to Golden. I really want to see the Coors brewery. After that we're going to really start our driving southward. I'm really missing the kids! And of course my Curty!!!!!

Electricity!!!!

We're back to civilization but still in Wyoming. We left Yellowstone this morning trying to make it to Mt. Rushmore but the drive was much longer than we thought. We'll go tomorrow. Yellowstone was beautiful but everywhere you go, you have to drive. We've put over 2400 miles on the truck and haven't even started back home yet. The reason for my header is that we have been camping in national parks with no water or electricity. Yes, Judy has not had electricity to do anything! I've had instant coffee each morning and couldn't charge the cell phones so a call to the kids was quick. We even had to pay for our showers....$2.00 for 6 minutes. My nails are horrible!!!! Oh well, such is the life of a camper. Kim and I have so much to tell everyone about Yellowstone......bison, bald eagles, cut throat trout, moose, elk, deer, and even a grizzly. Although we didn't have the luxuries of home, I'd go back in an instant if the kids could go with us. I'll hopefully get to post again tomorrow. The only part I really regret about the trip is the fact that our camera somehow lost the formatting of the card inside and we lost all the pictures we took. Luckily, I had the ones already downloaded to Picasso. I've posted LOTS more. Thankfully, we had another card. All our love......

Kim fishing and our view

Just in case you don't go to Picassa. I had to show Kim's fishing trip today and our view.

Grand Tetons

Tetons are beautiful. We finally found A spot in "the" Lodge that offers wi-fi. All is well. Kim went fishing this morning while I read at the riverside. He caught 11 trout but unfortunately none were of the keeper size. He had fun with his new fly rod (thanks kids!). I've put lots of pictures on the picassa. Only complaint is that the campground has no hook-ups so we're dark, COLD, and porting water. No showers either- ewww! We're going to go to pay for a shower tonight after we hike. We complain for awhile and then see the spectacular view....it's been worth it. No, if only Jacob was able to get us a site at yellowstone. We've heard its crowded. We'll see. We plan on going there Friday and staying through Wednesday. Then we'll go towards Mount Rushmore and then home.

Day 2 - Colorado to Wyoming

Keep losing my connection so I'll type fast. We're in Rawlins WYOMING. Very long drive. Nothing exciting to post. Hope all our loved ones are doing well. Check out picasso for todays pictures.

Texas to New Mexico in a day!

Well, Kim drove 840 miles today and we made it to Roton, NM at about 7:15 our time (6:15 Mountain. We left at 5:00am). It is COLD!!! It's probably 50 but the wind is howling so we actually have a windchill. We've already seen elk, deer and lots of weird land formations. Drove through some boring country and some beautiful country. As we entered New Mexico on HWY 87 it started to pour! It was worth it....it cleaned up all the dead bugs on the car and we saw the most beautiful rainbow we've ever seen. The colors were so vibrant.

We've had a wonderful time so far. I had to go to classes today but when I was done we went for a walk along the shoreline and stopped for a fruity drink on the water. Then we all went back to the room for a nap before going to the barbeque hosted by TASBO at the Corpus Christi Hooks minor league baseball game. It was a wonderful night! We were afraid we'd be really hot but the breeze was perfect and Curtis LOVES baseball! He got really tired and didn't want to miss anything. He was so cute falling asleep on my lap watching the game. I've put some more pictures on our web-site. I've so enjoyed this time. I've learned a lot for my job and had some wonderful quality time with Kim, Jill and Curtis. We miss Jacob, Dan & Kristy but maybe someday we'll get to do something with them all.

Corpus Christi

I am a certified Texas School Business Buyer and am in Corpus Christi for a conference. Since Kim and Jill are off for the summer they came with me and are having a mini vacation with Curtis while I work. Somehow this doesn't seem right! Should Grandma be the working one???? The conference starts tonight so we're going to have some fun today at the aquarium. Here's a few pictures of the trip so far.

Quincy

Kim got to enjoy a trip to Quincy to visit his family. We just can't seem to convince his mom that she'd love the weather in Houston, especially in January! We keep trying though!

San Antonio, Texas

We had a wonderful time in San Antonio with my high school friend, Laura, and her husband, Bruce. It's such a wonderful friendship that Laura and I share. We were best friends in HS and college and can pick up after years as if we were never apart. The miles mean nothing! Kim and Bruce had a blast too getting soaked at Sea World! Check out more pictures at Picasa.

Our 2006 Vacation

Last year we took a long, leisurely cruise through the Southern Caribbean.