Bittersweet

Tonight we had my family over to celebrate Sam's 5th birthday. I'll post more about the celebration later, that's not what's on my mind. Every year, every event, every milestone that we celebrate with him still leaves me with a twinge of longing. As much as I try not to, I can't help but reflect on what life would have been like if Ben had survived. We'd have celebrated two birthdays tonight. Joe would have been assembling two bikes. I wonder, would we have done two cakes, or would they have shared one? You get the idea.

I miss him. I miss what our life could have (should have?) been with our twin boys. I wish that Sam could really understand that he has a twin brother. Someday he will. Someday we'll all be together again.

Memorial day is coming up and, like every year, I wish that I could visit his grave in Utah. He was buried on Memorial day. The cemetary opened early so that we could have a graveside service before the crowds came. I know that he won't be forgotten because he is buried with lots of relatives from my Dad's side of the family. There will be flowers on his grave. But I still wish that I could go.

Life is happy and good and I have so many things to be grateful for. But I miss my Benjamin. Sometimes I just have to allow myself to feel that. And then life continues on...

Benjamin Joseph Lodge

May 24-28, 2005

(Picture taken May 28, 2005)

Dancing in the Streets

Last night we decided to brave the crowds and we took the family to the Lilac Parade. We made plans to meet up with a friend of mine, Breanna, and her kids. We got there around 5:00 and ended up with some pretty good seats and room for everyone. By parade time our group had grown to include two of my brothers and their wives as well as my niece (Ela) and nephew (Bernie) AND Breanna's three cousins and two of their friends plus a family from my parent's ward who just happened to be walking by. It was quite a crowd and lots of fun!

Here's a picture of our half of the crew, we never did get a picture of the whole group...

I thought that my boys would enjoy the parade, but I had no idea how much! It was definately worth the late hours!
Breanna brought pizza to share and we had dinner while we waited for the parade to start. We had a few hours to kill since we got there so early!


One of the other moms thought ahead and brought a box of sidewalk chalk. Such a good idea! Our kids decorated the whole street while waiting for the parade, it was lots of fun for them. They were COVERED in black dirt from the road!

This was when the four jets flew overhead in formation, they loved that!

Once the parade started, they were so excited about EVERYTHING that walked/drove/marched/danced by us. Their two favorite things were the princess floats and the marching bands (which there were LOTS of). Sam was a bit smitten by all the pretty girls in fancy dresses!
Another notable mention was the Spokane Indian tribe in their full traditional dress, the kids were mesmerized! Whenever a marching band came by they showed off their amazing dancing skills, I can't believe they could keep up this energy for the entire night, but they did! This video is a small sampling of the show they put on...

It was such a fun night. I will definately go again, I'm so glad that Breanna suggested it! We are paying a price today, though, for the lack of sleep...Andrew was a monster at church! Oh well, I guess that's the price we pay for good memories!

Quick Update

I haven't been very good about posting very many pictures lately (or even taking them, if I'm really being honest) but here are a few cute ones!

This is how I found the boys one morning when they were supposed to be in their room getting dressed and making their beds. The funny thing is that once I'd discovered their hiding place, they discovered they couldn't get out. (I got video of that part, but I'm not patient enough to post video on here!) It was pretty cute!

Abby has started eating solid foods and is pretty happy about it. Her favorite so far is green beans...good girl! Sam has been playing soccer. (I'll post more pictures and details later...)
As for Andrew, well he's been busy too...

There you have it, a quick look at what's been going on at our house! We are really looking forward to May being over because that means that "busy season" is over for Joe at work and his hours go back to normal (40/week) AND he's also taking the last test for the CPA so (fingers crossed that he passes it...) he'll also be done studying! We'll have our daddy/husband back!

Mother's Day challenge....

I was talking to some friends this week about Mother's day and was surprised to find out that for them it is one of the worst days of the year! I was shocked and confused. They went on to explain how by the end of the day, they are sick of hearing about how great other mom's are and are feeling lousy about how they are doing as a mom. I was really sad to hear that and it made me start to think.

I think that we should all give ourselves a gift this Mother's day...don't do that to yourself! Use this day to honor and show our love to the wonderful mom's in our lives, not to focus on our shortcomings or compare ourselves to others. It's about our mom's, it's not about us. We should enjoy the love from our kids and turn around and do the same for our moms/mother-in-laws/grandmas.

Hope that we can all have a good mother's day!

What is she DOING???

My babies have all been devoted binky babies...which I have been very happy about! Lately though, Abby has been doing a lot of this....


And here she is with her first favorite doll, she loves to suck on the braids and hands. Very cute!

I know I say it every time I post, but I'll say it again...I can't believe how fast she's growing!!!

Apparently, that's okay at our house...

How many times as a kid were you told to not play with your food? Well, apparently I haven't taught my kids that yet...

Andrew and his "pizza face"

Sam's lunchtime creation...he made it all by himself and was so proud of himself! (I'm not sure what he'd already eaten to make his face such a mess...)

Let's be honest, playing with your food makes meals much more fun!

Always checking my oatmeal...

This morning Andrew climbed up into the computer chair and started clicking, pointing and typing on the email page that I'd left up. I asked him to get down and stop playing with the computer. He gave me a very annoyed-but-trying-to-be-patient look and said, " But Mom, I'm just checking my oatmeal!"

Funny boy, thought I'd share!