My Family's Collection (Part 3)

When I first started this blog back in 2008, I had written two blog posts about my family's collections. Originally, I had thought that we were a family who never collected anything, but I was soon proven wrong when I blogged about our movie & book collection.

The other day we were talking about how easy it is to accumulate stuff over the years, and not want to throw anything away because of the memories. I just randomly said, "If there was a fire in your house, and you could only grab about 10 things...what would you grab?" My mom quickly said, "My photo albums!!!"

I guess, technically, this blog should be entitled "My Mom's Collection" as she is the one who does all the work with the photo albums, but to continue on with the series, I will leave it with that title :)

One of my mom's most favorite things to do is to work on her photo albums. As of right now, she has about 30 books filled with - on average - 50 pages of pictures. The only ones that are less than that are our individual photo albums. There are photo albums for each of the kids, photo albums of vacations we have been on, and a whole bunch of general photo albums filled with random activities we have been involved in throughout the past many, many years.

These albums are not just filled with pictures of our family, mind you. If you have been friends with my family for any period of time, there is definitely a possibility that your smiling face shows up in 1 or 2 pages of one of these albums. If you are really curious, you could always leave a comment and I could look to see if I have a picture of you. ;-) Scary, isn't it???

These photo albums have been such a blessing. This past Christmas, we went through each of these books and found various pictures of us with our grandparents. Our gift to both sets of grandparents this year was a digital photo frame, where they could watch a slide show of pictures of their grandchildren. We were able to give both sides at least 100 pictures!! Little did I know how much that would mean to my Pop-Pop especially. Of course, I had no idea what the future held when I gave him that digital photo frame for Christmas. As his health continued to decline, he would just sit there in his chair, looking at all the pictures of his grandkids, remembering all the good times. At his funeral later on, Andy was able to put together a slide show of about 90 pictures of my Pop-Pop, just by browsing through all the photo albums and scanning them into the computer.

If I could sum it all into one word - it's all about the MEMORIES. Does it cost money, time and effort for my Mom to put these books together? Oh, yes. But you could NEVER put a price tag on all the memories - "Kodak Moments" - captured on the pages of these albums. And believe me, she is FAR from being done, as there are still many memories to be made! The only question is, Where do we store all these memories??? Sooner or later, we will be running out of room!!! :)

Right now, most of my memories are still being captured in my family's photo albums. However, I have started a small collection of my own - mostly filled with pictures of my kiddos and some trips I have been on. One day, when I have a family of my own, I hope to continue on with the photo album tradition my Mother has started. I know I won't regret it! :)

Artistic Inspiration in the Great Outdoors

Today, the elementary students had art class in the great outdoors. What a gorgeous spring day to be outside! Instead of keeping the kids cooped up in the lunchroom to do art class, their creative art teachers took them outside to get their artistic inspiration from the blossoming trees and the beautiful flowers growing in our church's flower beds. To be perfectly honest, I never would have thought of having art class right at this spot! However, I shall definitely remedy that next year! :-)

Pizza, Prizes & Park Play

Today was Pizza Party at Miss Follett's house for those who read 1,000+ minutes during the Winter Reading Program. Other than the Top Reader award (bowling), this was the highest prize the kids could win. There is just something about going to the teacher's house.... :)

I was sooooooo very thankful that it was a beautiful day outside! It was a little on the chilly side after having a couple of days of 80 degree weather, but the kids didn't seem to mind.

Our ping-pong table was set up on the back porch, so of course that was a big hit!

Shooting hoops was fun too...

I found these two ball toss games at the store the other day. I knew I needed some more game options if I was to entertain these kids at my house for over an hour!

I think the Velcro ball toss game was a favorite. So easy to catch the ball...it just sticks!

We had already pre-selected what kind of pizza toppings we wanted on our pizza. The choices were cheese, pepperoni, 1/2 sausage, 1/2 grilled chicken. Yum!

24 slices of pizza were gone lickety-split! (they weren't very large slices, just so you know ;-))

Left to right: James, Taylor, Matthew, Jacob

Left to Right: Allen, Jordan, Hope, Emaline

After lunch, the kids played for awhile longer, but started looking for something new to do. They found our shelf of games, and this game soon became a hit (literally!).

It's called Hydro Battle. Its just like the regular Battleship game, but instead of calling out "A7, H2 etc" to see if you can hit your friend's "battleship", you insert the stick into one of the holes on your side of the game. If you have hit one of your friends' battleships, they will receive a nice surprise - a squirt of water in their face! You can only imagine how much fun this is to a bunch of kids. They made sure that they hit a battleship, so they could giggle with glee when someone got a water spray in their face. Oh the simple things in life :) This was a game Andy got when he was 10 years old (almost a decade ago *gasp!*), so other than a collectible on Amazon, I couldn't find it anywhere online. (Sorry to any Moms who were desirous to get this game for their children :D)

When we got back to school, we headed straight for the school bus to head off to our next adventure. As a reward for those students who got on honor roll this past quarter, we went to a community park nearby for ice cream sundaes and some outside fun time.

Mrs. Lytle went all out for the ice cream sundaes. Let's see...there was crushed Oreos, chocolate syrup, caramel syrup, marshmallow fluff, peanuts, strawberries, bananas, cherries, sprinkles, and whipped topping available to the students to put on their vanilla ice cream. Talk about a sugar rush!!! :D

This was my ice cream sundae. :) My teeth were chattering a bit as the wind was slightly chilly under that pavilion. However, I enjoyed it immensely!

After ice cream sundaes were over, we split up into two groups. Some went to nearby field to play kickball, while others played on the playground.

The "zip line" was a favorite :)

Some of the kiddos played "hide & seek tag" on the playground. Here are Abbi and Jordan hiding in the one tube slide. :) I had been standing nearby when I heard them whisper "Miss Follett...shhhhhh!" I wasn't supposed to reveal their hiding spot. Of course, they both looked so cute, I had to take a quick picture :)

So, yes, it was a busy day filled with fun adventure, yummy food & beautiful blue skies. Can't ask for anything better :)

Thoughts to Ponder

"One day at a time - this is enough. Do not look back and grieve over the past for it is gone; and do not be troubled about the future, for it has not yet come. Live in the present, and make it so beautiful it will be worth remembering."

"I know who holds the future, and I know who holds my hand. With God things don't just happen,everything by Him is planned. So as I face tomorrow with its problems large and small, I'll trust the God of miracles- Give to Him my all."

(~Photography by Alayna~)