Sparkle’s Family Blog

Show us your mother.

She's so beautiful!

My MIL got to town yesterday.  She wanted to buy some souvenirs so we went to some of the gift stores in town and then needed to stop at Walmart.  I now remember why I don't go to Walmart on Saturdays.  Craziness!   When I was driving us out of the parking lot, I turned down an aisle and the wind was blowing an unattended shopping cart across the lane.  I stopped to wait for it and just when I had room to sneak around, it started coming back the other way!  Then, the cart proceeded to go right down the middle of the lane so there wasn't enough room to get around on either side.  MIL and I were just roaring following this shopping cart through the parking lot.  It finally got off to the side enough for me to get around so I gunned it.

I mean, we need some moisture but this is just plain wrong!

And they say we could get up to 6 inches.  I will seriously blow a gasket!

Show us your guitar.
Submitted by Sean J. O'Rourke.

I don't play but some of my sweeties do!

Last night were the last practices for my children's choirs for the year.  We always conclude the season with a root beer float party.  They look forward to it from the start of the year!  I'm really proud of the year we've had.  In Chorister Choir, we have 26 kids and 9 in Luther Choir.  I only have one 6th grader that I'll lose and there are nine 2nd graders who'll move up so Luther Choir could potentially double next year!  Both choirs perform one last time this Sunday.

After the big dance recital Friday night, we went to Bismarck for Ray's MBA graduation.  First, the masters' graduates go through a Hooding Ceremony.  Ray's behind the speaker.

That was a nice, short, 30 minute ceremony.  That picture was on the newspaper's website. Then, was commencement which was 1 hour 40 minutes.  Thankfully, the graduate students go first so the rest of us left after Ray walked across the stage. After the ceremony, we took them to dinner at Space Aliens because they'd never been to one before.  Lily hit the jackpot on a game and ended up with over 400 tickets!  She traded them in for some fun things.  We spent the rest of the evening swimming, playing pinochle, and watching a movie. I didn't get one good picture of Jace on the waterslide because he was always laying down.  This was the kids ready to watch the movie. The kids swam some more in the morning after we had breakfast.  Then, we parted ways. Amy Sue should have some more photos from the weekend on her blog this week.

Things that are not so good:

1. The freezing cold temps that we had to sit through at the track meet tonight.
2. Cleaning house.
3. Hearing that Lily qualifies for speech services (hard to hear even when you know it's coming).
4. Kids who are refusing to go to bed and stay in their rooms!

Things that are good:

1. Cody taking 2nd place in the long jump.
2. Lily qualifying for speech services so her articulation problems can be corrected.
3. Root beer float party to conclude my kids' choirs for the year.
4. Eye sight that is 20/20 in the left eye and 20/15 in the right eye one year after Lasik.
5. A mommy who buys me things to enhance our new bedroom furniture.
6. The gorgeous 75 degree weather that was here until the track meet started.

Friday night was Lily's dance recital to conclude the season.  What most people didn't know was that several of the moms had been secretly working on a routine of their own.  I'll start with Lily.  Her first routine was "The Silly Squirrel Dance" which I've shown before so I'll just share a few pictures.

Her 2nd routine was "The Bunny Hop". They concluded with a group performance to "God Bless the USA".  It was really moving. Then, came the surprise.  I'm talking to Lily at the far end and she didn't even recognize me.  In case you didn't, I'm in the blue & purple dress. Unfortunately, the MC thought the song had ended when another was coming on so we missed a little of that video but here's the conclusion.

My best friend is 5th from the back left with the red scarf.  We had so much fun I wish we could do it again.  We messed up some in the middle and had the mistake with the music.  However, we still got a standing ovation.  Jace told me I sure had a big booty!

When I first put the wig and dress on, I was shocked at how much I looked like my Little Grandma.  Of course, she was actually more stylish.  The dress is even similar to this one she wore.

Hope you got a good laugh out of that one, grandma!

A flattering picture?  Definitely not.  How I'm feeling this morning?  Yes!  I dropped the kids at school looking forward to a relaxing morning at home.  Fixed my tea, headed down to the computer, and an alert came up that I had an eye appt. in 2 minutes!  Fortunately, the office is only 2 minutes away so I made it on time.  However, I didn't even get out of the waiting room until 45 minutes later!  Add another half an hour onto that before I was totally done.  I was really annoyed.  I got home, went to the bathroom, came out to go warm up my tea when I looked out the front window to see the furniture truck.  Forgot that they were coming to replace one of the bed posts.  Now, I only have an hour left before I have to pick up Lily.  I hope the rest of my Monday calms down!

What was your first car?

It was a 1982 Plymouth Horizon.  It looked just like this but was gray with red interior (purple would've been cool).