So this is slightly embarrassing to post these pics,

but I feel I need to post a question

to all my avid readers/bloggers/mommys.

Why are there NEVER any pictures of us???

I'll go through my families' pictures, & find that I'm not in any of them.

I know that's because I'm the one capturing all those wonderful memories.

But still, come on. So I'll give the camera to my awesome spouse

telling him to get some with me in them. Please don't think I'm vain.

It's not as though I feel that I'm so gorgeous & my picture must be captured.

Just that it would be nice to be in some pics with my kids.

So I am posting these pictures as proof.

SEVERAL are the only pics of me on Christmas, 4th of July,

Easter or vacations. It's all I got to remember for that year.

Plus, who needs 20 or so pics of my large rear end?

Maybe I need Jared to take some photography classes.

(Please don't laugh)

Belated Sad Goodbyes to best friends

What I really wanted to do was scan some older pics of all us for fun.

But let's face it, I'm never gonna get around to it.

Here is a pic of one of Jared's best friends.

Vinnie has lived near Jared for a couple decades.

They strung up little brothers, buried the nice silverware,

started fires, you know, all the boy stuff.

That is until Vinnie joined the Air Force, then they both served missions,

then got married & moved far away. But For the last 3 or 4 years,

they've lived close enough for us to see them a few times a year.

But now, so long. It's time for them to go to Florida!

(Actually, it was time weeks ago, I'm just getting around to this post.)

They look good together.

Playing Guitar Hero while Charly hung out in the closet.

And here's my besty. We met at band camp. Yes, band camp. Andrea & I bonded immediately. Always at each other's homes, switched baby blankets, drooled after immature high school boys, camping, writing letters in class, the works.

Then her husband had to go join the Air Force too. So 3 years ago it was off to Germany. Boooo Ben Kanop (google the video) She visited a couple times, but was here for a bit a couple months ago before she was off to Georgia. A little bit closer than Europe.

The boys with the cute babies.

As Jared & I were driving away after saying goodbye, I was thinking out loud.

"It seems as though we just saw them, & that we'll see them again

sometime next week. Not like until Christmas time."

Jared said, that's how I feel about Vinnie.

That's when you know it's a best friend.

Several times I've lamented over not having a really good or

best friend that lived close. I wish I could find another like Drea.

But then again, that's what makes her so special.

Some firsts for Grant

My baby is going to school! No tears or sadness from me.

I was super proud of how big he has gotten. Grant has been preparing &

talking about going to school for over a year.

(Don't mind the time stamp, it's from my Mom's camera & we can't change it)

SOCCER!!

I have been waiting to be a soccer mom FOR-EVVV-ER.

So even though Grant only made the age cut by 2 days,

therefore making him theeeee youngest kid in the league,

I signed him up.

He doesn't run too fast, but he enjoys picking flowers for me during games.

During a game last Saturday, I kept looking into the backyard behind us. Then one time I looked, a small table in the yard had caught on fire. I told the people around me, "Ummm, can you tell if that's a table or a BBQ on fire?" We yelled a bit & after I had a bad attempt at climbing the fence (darn flip flops), one of the parent refs hopped the fence where there just happened to be a gallon of water & a towel nearby. WHEW Guess the person was in the shower & a candle caught the magazine on fire.

Never without excitement.

He looks like a natural.

Charly got to a bowl of cheez-its.

Kept finding bits & pieces

throughout the house for days

Little Dresses for Africa

There WILL be child care from 3-5:30 pm!!

Little Dresses for Africa service project.

Changing lives one little dress at a time.

Friday, September 25th

3 pm – Finish

9821 Old Placerville Rd

Sacramento CA, 95827

Over 135 pillowcases & fabrics have been collected. Please come

to help assemble & sew them into dresses for African orphanages.

See the original post here.

Items to bring along: thread, scissors, elastic, rotary cutter & mat,

iron/board, pins, sewing machine, serger, YOURSELF!

(Be sure to label all items with your name.)

Any extras like Ric Rac, lace or ribbon can add nice touches.

If you're a thrift store shopper, there's always some ric rac for .50 cents or so.

All & none talent is needed. From cutting & sewing to ironing &

sizing. No sewing skills are necessary. Only the desire to do good.

Come for as little as 10 minutes.

Children old enough to help are welcome.

If you would like to do these at home, let me know!

I can drop off some supplies & show you how to do them.

Even if it's only the prep work!

I do need some one to be my second in command.

You just need to be able to boss people

around & be there for the most part.

Feel free to call or email with questions.

Jennifer Hasleton 747-5110

jnjhasleton@gmail.com

Lisa's Mirror

One of my favorite SIL posted this on her blog recently. I asked her if I could copy it & post it on mine seeing it said everything I wish I could. You can see her here.

Mirror, Mirror

My poor old body. Tonight I had the rare opportunity to take a bath. Yesterday while rushing around like an exhausted zombie I tried to impale my thigh on our front gate. Seriously, I first felt the shock of hitting it and then in my confused state I kept going forward into the protruding metal bars. I don’t know, maybe I was hoping if I hit again I might win the second time. But I definitely lost. Then hurrying to clean the wound and get into bed I taped on an inferior cloth bandage and called it good enough. This evening it was predictably “glued” to the gash necessitating a long soak and proving that while haste makes waste, haste + exhaustion makes pain.

Painful origins of the bath aside, I really enjoyed the soak and lived it up with a bit of Epsom salt poured in. It’d been quite a day, quite a week, quite a month, quite a year. So much has happened. So much of it good. So much of it just-what-happens-to-people-when-they’re-alive. But I digress (and when don’t I), to concentrate on today, when I stepped out of the bath and looked in the mirror I was shocked. Who was that mess of a woman and how come she was taking up my reflection?

Then I remembered, oh yes, that’s me. That’s what I look like now. Not that I was expecting to see twenty-something Lisa: effortlessly size six, naturally long blond hair, and blue eyes unhidden by glasses (which I believe is the legal definition of pretty—wish I’d appreciated it more then), but neither did I expect the wreck of a human that wearily chuckled and sighed back at me.

My lovely bruise, glowing purple and red above my knee, was nothing compared to the lines of stretch marks that shone on my legs and torso in rippling waves. Sadly, there is plenty of flesh for those marks to illuminate.
Nor could my bruise compete with that strange crater that my poor belly button has become. My pitiable navel has been living the life of fugitive for the last ten years. It keeps going into hiding, lost at the end of a massive growth, only to resurface, wider and worse for the wear, 9 months later.
And perhaps it is the 45 months of pregnancy that is responsible for my stature, but I just didn’t seem to be as tall as I once was. Is that possible? Or maybe it was just my posture, perhaps I was stooped from the pain and annoyance of that monthly visitor I am entertaining. Which then indicates that I’m no longer nursing and therefore the one-two? things I didn’t mind looking large now just hung there.
And to top it all off, my eye make up, which I hadn’t removed yet, was smudged from the crying I done earlier at a funeral for David’s mentor who was taken too soon by a -hard, early life in the Chinese coal mines and nicotine. Altogether, I looked something like a large, wet raccoon drug in by the dogs.

“Oh yikes,” was all I could think. “Oh yikes, what happened to you Lisa? Who did this? And why?” It was a very depressing moment for me and my reflection, standing there facing the naked truth. Then grace, sweet grace, came and I recalled, through no effort of my own (after all, all my efforts were engaged in suppressing laughter and tears at that lady in the mirror) the Parable of the Talents.

Suddenly I understood that my body was exactly what I wanted it to be, perhaps minus the bruise. And to answer my questions: Life happened. I did this to me. And because I want to live that life to it’s fullest and for the purpose that it was given.

As that long ago twenty-something I thought that the talents in the parable meant abilities like playing the piano, manipulating a soccer ball, or even befriending people. It never struck me to take it farther to the most obvious gift that our Heavenly Father has bestowed. So, with renewed vigor I take on the challenges of this life. I will not bury my body in the gym or hide it in the kitchen. I will strengthen it, feed it right, use it to bless others, and keep it until it is completely worn out and ready to hear the words “well done thou good and faithful servant.”

-Lisa