June 29 An unusual Monday

Monday:  Dylan and Kelly are out of town beginning this morning through Friday afternoon sometime, so extra "forces" had to be called in for the caretaking of their four beautiful kiddos. My first assignment (!) was to get Brendan over to his "camp" at nine this morning. The younger children were already going to be transported to their "camp" by 8am by Dylan and Kelly.

I delivered Brendan to his camp location, and then went back to my house for stuff that needed getting done, until I picked Brendan back up at 3:00 in the afternoon. It seems he learned a new swim stroke this afternoon--one of the trainers approached me to say how excellent Brendan learned this stroke! Yay, Brendan!

Brendan and I drove to their house where he "crashed" with some screen time in the basement while I tidied up their kitchen, and then picked up the littles from their camp at 5pm. We had two choices for dinner tonight: Eat out at Culver's, or heat up Little Caesar's pizza at home. The overwhelming YES decision was for Culver's. We'll have the pizza tomorrow!

Here are just a few pictures of us at Culver's. These kids know this place and all of it's ins and outs very well. They all knew exactly what they wanted--I wrote their orders down on a pad of paper before going to the counter. BUT I still managed to get the order wrong. I would make a terrible waitress! Thankfully, I was able to "fix" my mistake and Aidan eventually got his grilled cheese sandwich instead of a cheeseburger (Brendan ate the "mistaken" burger).

After we were finished at Culver's, we hung around their house until Joelle arrived at 9pm. I did attempt to put Erin and Cal to bed at 8pm--and I think they were sleeping by the time Joelle arrived, but I'm not 100% positive about Erin. She's a little tricky to get to sleep. I did play pretty music for her and rubbed her back for awhile. I did the same for Cal and he was sleeping within about 10 minutes.

That's all for today ... tomorrow I need to be picking up Brendan at 3:00 from his camp location. SO ... until then ...

June 29 Kaitlynn is FOURTEEN

Monday:  Kaity was born fourteen years ago today in El Paso, Texas. I was actually there when she was born! Not in the birthing room--NO! But I did meet her on her first day. Jesse brought all of us to the hospital in the early afternoon to meet this little squeaker.

Look how little Kaity was!

Emma, Chris, and Matt (and Jesse) were thrilled with her! Look at Emma gazing at this tiny sister.

Emma was still technically NINE when Kaity was born, but she turned TEN just about 7-8 weeks later.

Emma was immediately mothering her little sister from the first day of her life. I love these pictures so much.

I had to leave El Paso the next day and fly back to Grand Rapids. Kaity was my SIXTH grandchild born, and just my SECOND granddaughter.

When the family moved back to Michigan in 2013, Kaity was just a year. I had the honor of having these four grandchildren once again be close enough to spend time with almost every week. Once Kaity was about two years old, she and I began having one-on-one time, once per week, during the school year when the older kiddos were gone from 8-4:00 Monday through Friday.

But this year ... I didn't get to spend time with Kaity very much, and rarely one-on-one. She stopped coming over to my house every Thursday afternoon after school, and oftentimes on Saturday afternoons too for many years. I have missed spending time with her. But I came to realize that I cannot force anyone to come over to my house! I do stop by Jesse's place almost every Thursday and Sunday afternoons to deliver at Kit-Kat bar to Kaity and have a little "chat" time with both Kaity and her dad. 

BUT ... you can't just burst in upon people and start flashing your camera (or phone) in their faces to take pictures, can you?!!! Consequently, I really had to search hard for pictures of Kaitlynn this year. I did find a few that I used to design her card though.

 

So ... dear Kaity ... I pray God's BEST for you, sweet granddaughter. Trust me, no person on this earth will love you like JESUS does. I'm asking that you will give Him your heart every day, and learn to love and follow Him as He alone deserves.