No Christmas card after all

The only purpose of this post is to share that Walmart really messed up our Christmas card and so they never went out... So lest you are wondering why you never received yours, now you know. :)

Also I do plan to blog again once things settle down. Having your house on the market for an extended period of time is for the birds.

Merry Christmas Week

  

Here is to our 2011 Christmas card that I really didn't think was even going to happen.  Thanks Walmart one hour photo.  Guilt narrowly avoided.  (at least about this).  Now if I can just get them mailed.  In all seriousness, Merry Christmas - I hope your week is filled with anticipation and lots of family and fun!

My Pink Printhess and Sick Villian

When we were looking for Halloween costumes this year, I picked out the cutest little Smurf costume you've ever seen for Emme.  It was darling - it was pretty much made for my little petite Emme.  She really does make a cute little person.  (The gnome costume she wore last year still makes me laugh)

The problem is that the only thing she wanted to be was a pink princess and she wouldn't even hear of anything else.  For weeks she's been talking about being a pink princess - er... pink printhess.  Not any color would do - it had to be pink!

I sat on the floor of the store with her trying to sell her on the merits of the Smurf.  At one point, I think I actually had her talked into it.  But in the end, she stood firm (aka threw an outright tantrum).  I resigned to the pink printhess, reasoning that there will be many many times in her life that I will have to draw a line and stand firm, and this probably isn't one of those times.   I give you the pink printhess!!

Poor Noah was sick for Halloween.  Strep.  Again.  No trick or treating here.  We typically don't go trick or treating anyway, but there were other church festivities that we missed.

A very sick and irritable Annakin Skywalker.

No worries, he wore his costume everyday for the past two weeks, so we got our money's worth.

XO

NYC and Vegas

Within the span of a week I was in NYC for a few days and then Las Vegas for five - whew!  I missed the babies like crazy, but I will say that I had some much needed 1x1 time both with friends and Mark.

First up, a fabulous girls weekend in NYC for my friend, Katherine's 30th birthday.  We stayed at the Waldorf Astoria and between the four of us we managed to squeeze in shopping in SoHo, a Cirque show at Radio City Music Hall, Grand Central, 9-11 Memorial visit, fabulous dining, the Today show, purse shopping in China Town (ha!), the Little Italy food festival and Central Park.

New York City, have I told you lately that I LOVE you?

Times Square

We took this water taxi down to battery park and then made our way to the 9-11 Memorial.

The Freedom Tower.  The flag is much larger than it appears and is emotionally stirring as a backdrop to the memorial.

It is hard to show in pictures how massive the fountains are.  It is truly moving.

There were many of these that read "... and her unborn child."  There really aren't even words...

This tree was taken from ground zero, rehabilitated, and replanted at the memorial site.

On a lighter note - we headed to China Town where I crossed a very important Bucket List item off of my list:  Haggling for a knock off purse - ha.  

I went back to Balthezar for the Pavlova with berries... YUM.  I had been dreaming about it since our trip to NYC last year.

We stumbled past the Kardashian store, Dash.   hehe - yeah, I know you know what I'm talking about.    There was a long line out of the store.  We did not go in, but I did indulge in snapping a photo as proof that we've been there.  

Street shopping in So Ho.

Central Park

Thank you Katherine, Sarah and Meagan... what a blast!  Let's do it again!

If you're still with me, I'll move on to our fabulous Vegas Vacation.  We flew out on Tuesday and took the red eye back on Saturday night.  Mark had to work the first two days during day -  but me and the other fabulous and fun wives - April and Holly- made the best of it at the spa and the pools while our hubby's slaved away during the first two days. :)

The weather was picture perfect the entire time.  This was a ridiculously indulgent resort - definitely the nicest I've ever stayed at (or probably will stay again at for that matter!).  I actually felt twinges of guilt my second day of just lounging around at spa and the pool... but I managed to get over it.  I didn't actually take that many pictures because between the sauna and the giant pool bed, I couldn't really be bothered.

We ate, and saw, and tried our luck at slots and blackjack.  The restaurants are incredible - the lights were bright and there was someone who was always waiting to meet your every request.  A strange but fun experience.

One of my favorite nights was the night that Mark and I won ~$200 at blackjack, celebrated by jamming until 2 AM to an awesome 90s cover band, went back to blackjack, lost our $200, and then gorged on "What-A-Burgers" at 3 AM.  (Note to my Amanda's:  The lead singer would hand me the mic a few times and let me sing the chorus to a few songs... ummm awesome!)  It was definitely a flashback to our dating days and it was tons of fun.

View from the spa

There it is!  That's my spot.  I logged many hours here.

Love these ladies.

The Strip

Dinner at the Bellagio

This was for the benefit of our boys.

Love the fountain show.... !!

William Wellington Williams

Mark's grandfather passed away on October 4th, 2011.  There is a perfectly suitable quote that comes to my mind when I think about Granddaddy Williams, and it is this:

To laugh often and much; To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children;  To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends;  To appreciate beauty, to find the best in others;  To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition;  To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived.  This is to have succeeded.  (Emerson?)

He lived a long happy life and he blessed his family and friends in ways too numerous to mention.

Mark gave a eulogy at his funeral.  It was one of the few times I've seen my husband break down and cry.  It was beautiful and I was so proud of him because I know how hard it was for him.  I wanted to share his words here.  RIP Granddaddy Williams, we love you.

Thank you everyone for coming today.  For those of you that don't know, I am Mark Williams, Captain Billy’s grandson. I’d like to share some thoughts and a few stories about my Grandfather today.

My grandfather was a very special man and he taught by example how to be a hardworker, to love others, to be generous, always help others and most of all to love your family. We all used to ask him on his most recent birthday’s what the secret to life was and he used to tell us, “no stress”. I think we can all take something from that. If you treat people the way he did, if you love people the way he did, if you enjoy life each day the way he did, if you go fishing 3 times a day the way he did, maybe that will put you too on the path to a long and happy life.

Many of my greatest memories are with my Grandfather…..sitting between his lap on the big tractor dragging the dirt road, working the garden, teaching me how to shoot, trips out to eat, letting me drive the lane from the age of 3, Christmas mornings and of course fishing and captaining the Gwen Marie.

Speaking of fishing, Dad and I always remark how passionate someone must be to do something twice a day, every available day for the majority of their life most of their life. As long as Granddaddy was at Horse Point he fished twice a day, for six months of the year, for 50 years. With roughly an average catch of 25 per trip, this totals roughly half a million fish he pulled out of the Piankatank river – Amazing.

There was never a dull moment with Granddaddy. I am sure many of us have been a victim of one of his pranks at some point, including me. I recall one time he and I were out fishing one day on the Gwen Marie - I couldn’t have been much more than 5 or so. I started getting bored of fishing so I decided to start tinkering with all of the electrical gadgets on the boat (now I know where my son gets that from).  Granddaddy was watching me closely and told me a couple of times to that I was going to run the battery down which in retrospect was just a setup for what was to come. For those of you who don’t know the Gwen Marie, there as a kill switch on the right side of the boat from a spot that he usually fishes from so I naturally never noticed anything. Unbeknownst to me, he leaned down and turned the switch to off which killed all the power to the boat. I guess at some point I realized that the boat didn’t have power and asked him what was wrong and then told me to start up the boat to head home. Well, naturally the boat didn’t start so he handed me a crab net and told me I better start paddling home. So there I am, 5 years old, paddling a 45 foot deadrise as hard as I can paddle with a crab net and if I remember correctly, he never took his pole out of the water. Well, he finally clued me in on his little prank and just smiled and giggled at me. He was a lot of fun to be around.

Another one of my personal favorite stories was what I call the “fried chicken” story. Grandma had placed on order with the Deltaville Market, I think it was called Park Place at the time, to pick up a bucket of fried chicken at 4:30. Well 4:30 was rapidly approaching and Grandma was getting on him about not leaving. He finally tells me to c’mon so we hop in the truck, start it up, he looks at his watch and says 4:27 we got 3 minutes. Then he precedes to put the pedal to the medal, up and down the hills of the dirt road like a roller coaster the whole time I am laughing as hard as I can. Then we get to 17 and he floors it. We pull into the parking lot, he looks back at his watch and simply says “we made it”.  Well the Horse Point lane to the highway is 1.5 miles and it’s another 3 miles or so to get to the market.  According to my calculations, that means we had to average 90mph to go that distance in that amount of time. I have to say it was the most memorable fried chicken I ever had. Then there was the trip to Alaska. Well, I better leave that one alone.

You know, I truly believed that Granddaddy was going to live forever, especially with each and every passing birthday and I foolishly never thought this day would come. I am comforted in knowing that he lived a long and happy life, with memories that live on in each of us. There isn’t a single person in this church that he hasn’t affected or influenced in one way or another. We have lost a husband, a father, a grandfather, a great grandfather, an uncle, a fellow fisherman, a fellow gardener but his spirit lives within each one of us. I am going to miss you Granddaddy.

Thanks Alan Davis for many of these photos.