These are a few of my favorite things...

Today is my husband's birthday. He is 63 years young. My very own geriatric stud-muffin! Stan really knows how to love. To love life. To love his family. He is an example to me every day. He laughs like Popeye. How can you get mad at someone who laughs at you and sounds like Popeye. That must be why we don't ever fight. He is definitely one of my favorite things. The rest of my favorite things are my children and grandchildren.

I have 4 kids. Three girls and one boy. My husband has 2 daughters and between us we have 8 grandkids, only one of which is a boy so my husband is "swimming in a sea of estrogen". My laptop recently died and I was reinstalling some pictures and found some of my favorite pictures of my oldest daughter. I was so excited when I found out I was pregnant with her! I got so huge with her that I looked like I had a basketball up my shirt because she was such a big baby! They did an ultrasound to make sure I wasn't having twins and the doctor said "No just one big kid!" That was back in the old days when the ultrasound wasn't as good as it is now so they couldn't tell if she was a boy or a girl. Since I was so big, I naturally assumed it was a boy. I sewed for weeks making all these blue outfits and blankets. In the delivery room when the doctor announced "it's a girl!" I started crying and said "she doesn't have a thing to wear!" I swear that was the c-section anesthesia talking because it was a dream come true to have a daughter.

We took her home and had a wonderful time spoiling her rotten.  She was always such a sweet baby. We knew she was awake from her naps because she would be in her crib singing "...lalala". She could play for hours by herself. She called herself "salar salar" since she couldn't say her name. Her favorite story was Jack and the Beanstalk. During the summer she would go out in the garden and pick "magic" beans and come to me asking me to read "jackstock" to her.

She was the best big sister when my second daughter came along. She was always a good helper and as they grew, they loved to stay up late at night giggling.  That girl was a little toughie. She liked to bait her own hooks and would clean her own fish when we went fishing. She raced dirt bikes with her dad and brother. Yet she was such a little lady who loved to cook and sew and is always helping someone still to this day being the little mother hen to all of us. She married and now she and her husband have a daughter who is just like her mom. Sweet Jo Jo joined the family in January. It brings me so much joy to watch her with her family. She is a wonderful mother and I am so very proud of her. Blessings come in all shapes and sizes. I am so lucky to have such a wonderful family. I will continue on my next post with the next kid...(if she let's me :D) That's all for today at the Garden of Eggen.