Our 44th anniversary weekend

On Friday we celebrated our 44th anniversary!  It's so easy to go back to that era and vividly relive the details and emotions of looking forward to our wedding day.  We had dated four-and-one-half  years, the last two of which we were separated.  So arriving at our wedding day seemed like the end of one journey and the beginning of another all in one.  Here's a cute picture I posted on FB on Friday.

And this is what forty-four years has done to us!  We went out to eat on Friday evening to one of our favorite places - Texas Roadhouse.

We got home just minutes before Sam and Jenn and the kids arrived.  They had not been here since Easter weekend - six months ago!  At first Bianca was acting extremely clingy and we were not sure that Sam and Jenn would be able to go out on a date.  But after a while she got all happy and hammy, and they were able to leave with no problem.  

It was only later when I turned the lights low that she started to fuss.  She's used to going to sleep in her crib, and I don't have one of those anymore, so I had to do some walking and singing and bouncing for a while.  Eventually she lay her head on my shoulder, and then five minutes later they walked in the door, and she started up all over again, haha!

This was a VERY cool, actually cold, wet weekend.  So we just stayed inside and played Saturday morning.  

After the kids went down for naps, Sam and Jenn went out for shoe shopping and a late lunch.  Lucky for us, Bianca woke up from her nap happy.  She loved this goat puppet we have that sings The Lonely Goatherd from The Sound of Music.  

Sammy discovered this magnetic doll house of Destiny's.  They both had fun with it.  

While they ate their late lunch Grandpa played guitar and sang for them.  He did an old Stauffer favorite - There's a Hole in the Bottom of the Sea. 

Around 5:00 we went over to Anthony and Lori's.  Sam and Jenn had not been there before.  Of course I had envisioned lovely weather and sitting around the fire outside.  Instead Anthony gave them "the tour," including the barn and pond, as we all shivered in our jackets.  Thankfully it was not raining at that time. 

When Anthony was showing them his studio in the barn, Sammy was asking why there was a big TV on the wall.  So Anthony put him and Austin on stools in front of the big camera he uses to record his lessons.  They could see themselves on the big TV!

Then we went back into the house by the cozy fire and ate and talked and laughed a lot.   These two couples have a lot in common as parents of young kids.  And any time we begin to tell stories of the years that our guys were teenagers, there is PLENTY to laugh about.  All it takes is one story about a VW Rabbit, and there are about ten more to laugh over. 

After we went home I read to Sammy for quite a while and we watched the movie American Sniper.   So many deep and conflicting emotions come with that true, sad story. 

Sammy could hardly wait to go to "churches" with us.   At Fillmore he was offering his audible commentary on our music.  For prelude my flutist, guitarist, and I did a rousing rendition of the traditional Lord's Prayer.  When we finished Sammy said, "That hurts my ears!"  After our first congregational song, he exclaimed,  "That was a great song!"  And after the second one, "That was a REALLY great song!"  

Our choir did the African spiritual We Are Marching, complete with a Djembe drum.  He had fun playing it after church.  Maybe next time he comes we'll just put him on a drum, haha!

Like usual, at Houserville he spent some of the time at the piano with me and part of the time on a stool beside Dick on the stage.   This boy is something else.  He loves music and he loves Jesus.  He's like a sponge!  At Houserville we did the song Indescribable.  We actually went through the song during our sound check before the service started, then again during the service.  So he heard it twice.   After we got home and we were preparing lunch, he kept singing little bits and pieces from the song and asking me for more of the lyrics.  

Didn't he look handsome in his plaid shirt?

Little Miss B was so happy to see us when we got back home, looking so cute in her little polka-dotted outfit.  She just walks around and around and around.  We were remembering how Sammy, at her age, used to get into my kitchen drawers a lot.  But she never bothers.  Sometimes she sits down and plays with a toy for a long period of time, then she's on the go again.

Lunch after church was the first time all weekend that we sat at the dining room table to eat.  As Jenn and I were getting it ready, Sammy said, "Are we going to do a family?"  So we joked about that throughout the meal  - that we were doing a family!

They left for home mid-afternoon, and soon thereafter Anthony brought Austin to our house.  Lori had left for a conference in DC for the next few days.  

We tried napping and puzzles for a while, the LO and BEHOLD, the sun came out in all its glory!!!  We HAD to go outside!!  It was still chilly, but oh, the SUN!!!

Austin could endlessly explore in Grandpa's shed.  He climbed on top of a little ladder and looked around asking about everything.  He really begged to have one of the deer antlers off the rack hanging above the door.  Grandpa told him it was Uncle Ray's and he couldn't have it.  What do you think, Ray???   Hahahaha!!

Then we went down to the little playground behind our house.  First time this whole year!  Somehow it seems we spend a whole lot more time at their place than ours anymore.  (-:

Later Anthony came to pick him up, and now we're winding down and preparing for another busy, but regular week.  

Tomorrow it will be TEN YEARS since my first blog post.  I don't have time to do anything big or special to celebrate, but I do hope to find time to post some highlights.