It Makes You Grateful...

Friday Night we spent the night with my family at a park. We were celebrating some family birthdays.

We had a nice night of enjoying each other's company and just hanging out. The kids enjoyed playing on the playground and the older boys enjoyed throwing a football around and even ended up playing a game of "Jackpot". We've also found a family sport in playing what we call "Noodle Ball" which is pretty fun as well.

At one point in the night I had to take my 1 year old nephew back to his mom after he was done playing on the playground. I had taken my camera to the playground with me and left it with my older sister and brother while I took my nephew back. I came back to find my sister and brother kind of laughing - so I asked them if they had found any good pictures. They said they just picked up the camera.

So, today as I am adding the pictures from the memory card to my computer, I come across the above picture and one other one. The three of them (L-R) Our "adopted" sister, Heather, My Sister, Kami and Brother, Corby had taken 2 pictures of the three of them. Clever, clever, but who has the last laugh now?

Anyway, after we had dinner and were done with the games we headed to my mom's for an ice cream treat. For some reason, I wasn't that interested in the ice cream. (odd, I know) We hung out some more and gave my little brother (turned 22) his gift.

This brother is difficult to shop for and I never quite know what to get for him. Usually it ends up just being money or a gift card (which he doesn't like getting), this year however, I wanted to get him a real gift.

After looking around at the store for awhile I ran across a game I thought he might enjoying playing with his friends. It is called iList by Hasbro. It is a game played with up to 4 mp3 players. I know that my little brother and his friends all have some sort of iPod so I figured what the heck and bought it. I included a gift receipt if he decided to take it back.

I was a little surprised when he actually kept it AND opened it. So, of course, I had to play with him. I had a lot of fun and it is fun to see what songs people have on their mp3 players. I had so much fun with the game that I actually went to try and find it at a store near us on Saturday. I found one and then made Eric play with me. He was at a bit of a disadvantage as he has the ipod that holds thousands of songs...Too bad for him. ;)

So that was the weekend.

Last night around 8:30 I get a phone call from my mom telling me that my brother-in-law, Cody, was in a car accident on his way home from work. He couldn't remember what happened, but as far as what others could figure was that he had to swerve to miss hitting a car and ended up crashing into a pole. The car was totaled and he seemed to be alright.

He didn't want to go to the ER as he hasn't been at his job quite long enough to get the insurance, however, his Mom took him to the ER just to be safe. He had a catscan just to make sure brain activity was all normal.

He got a clean bill of health and left the hospital. They stayed the night at his parents home and he is recovering well. I called my sister today to ask how he was doing and she said that he is pretty bruised and his eyes are pretty swollen, but for all intents and purposes he is fine. He was even talking about going to school tonight and back into work tomorrow. He is a strong guy!

Anyway, when things like this happen it makes you reflect and think about lots of things. You are thankful that nothing worse happened and that the person is still alive and well. It makes you thankful for all of the people in your life and you want to hold them and keep them that much closer to you. I am thankful for all of you who are in my life.

I will leave this post on a happier note however. Eric has been getting into Tai Kwon Do lately with one of his friends who is a black belt as the "teacher." Eric purchased some protective gear to use in sparring with his other friends. Anyway, it arrived today while Eric was at work. Eric wanted pictures of it, so I had the bright idea to put the stuff on Lex and take pictures of it. I took the pictures, emailed them to Eric, then he wanted to see Lex with all the stuff on at one time. So, Lex (bless his heart) agreed and let me put all of the stuff on at once... I leave you with a picture of our little trooper.

Love you all! BE SAFE!