Still Missing You, Dad!

I can't believe it's been 5 years since my dad passed away; since I received that call from my brother that my dad was being transported to the hospital; since I last saw him alive being lowered from the back of an ambulance and through the doors of the ER.

I was going through some of my grandparents' things a few weeks ago and stumbled upon some cassette tapes.  One of them was just labeled "T.A.S." - my father's initials.  Feeling strong enough, I popped it into the cassette player and heard my dad's voice again.  It's funny, though it was my dad's voice, it was before he was married so it was my dad, but not my dad.  I'm so glad though that I have these tapes and can listen to him and remember his voice. 

Samantha was downstairs with me at the time playing with her toys.  I told her that the voice on the tape was grandpa.  She sat and listened to his ramblings intently.  Every time she sees that CD/cassette player downstairs now, she asks to listen to grandpa.  It makes me smile every time!

Dad, I still miss you every day. I wish so badly that you could have known your granddaughter in this life. I know we'll meet again. I have faith in that promise.  Until then...

Tongs

I'm not quite sure why, but Samantha has developed a fascination with TONGS.  She goes and digs them out of the kitchen drawers and proceeds to use them to pick up her toys, blankets, shoes, whatever.  I'm not sure what's driving the sudden attachment to tongs, but it sure is cute.

Deciding which toy to pick up next!
(btw, that's a shadow on her back...)

Looks like the lion is the lucky winner!

Mindee's 2012 Voice Recital - "Norma"

Every year, I participate in a vocal recital alongside the rest of my voice teacher's students.  We don't perform normal recitals though - her tradition is to truly put on a show!

This year, my sister and I reprised our roles as Norma (Melissa) and Adalgisa (Me) in Bellini's, Norma.  Joining us this year was a very talented Tenor, Chris, playing the role of Pollione. 

Let me set the stage:

Norma is the high priestess in a druid society.  As such, she is unmarried and is to remain, pure.  Her friend and confidante, Adalgisa, is also a priestess, though younger and not as high ranking.  Both women are in love with a man.  Adalgisa is excited to tell Norma of her love, and this is when the two women discover that they are in love with the same man.  In fact, Norma has had two children by this man, in secret, of course.  During this particular scene, this man, Pollione, a high ranking Roman official, is trying to sway Adalgisa to be with him, though Norma is keen to protect her.  In the end, both women value their friendship above the love of a man and leave him and his two-timing ways.

Have a listen...warning, it's a 12-minute listen.

 

Now, even if you're not an opera fan or able to understand the words, you have to admit, this is pretty great (if I do say so myself!).  I have to say, singing opera is challenging and so much fun!

Walking on Sunshine!

It was abnormally warm today!!  No, that's an understatement, it was down right HOT out today.  We Washingtonians are heat wimps...and snow wimps, and ice wimps...but we're really good with rain (just not driving in it!).  Anyway, back to my point, it was uncomfortably warm today!  I know I shouldn't complain.  I really do love the sunshine!  I could do without the humidity though.  If only we could set the outdoor thermostat the same way we do inside our homes...

So, what do you do when it gets hot?  You set up a kiddie pool!  Ta da!!

After dinner, we set up this kiddie pool in the back yard for Samantha.  She had a blast.  I think she "swam" in it for almost two hours!  When you think about it, this was really just an outdoor bath while wearing a bathing suit.  I mean really, those are her bath toys with her in the pool!  BUT there's something to be said for the cool water from the hose, being outside in the water, and cooling off as the sunny day wanes.  Even after two hours she was not happy when it was time to go inside.  Had I realized the house was still upwards of 84 degrees, I probably would have let her linger a bit longer in the pool.

Oh little Samantha, you are my sunshine!

This one's for you, Bob!

A few years back, I met a cousin on my dad's side of the family.  Ok, I guess if you want to get technical, he's a second cousin twice removed - but who can keep track of it that way!?!  Through my dad's first cousin, information was exchanged and I was happy to receive an introduction.  The best part of it all, he lives right here in Washington!  Over the past couple of years, we've kept in touch, albeit somewhat irregularly - mostly because I'm not good at replying to mails or keeping up with him on Ancestry.com! ;)

My family met Bob and Kathy for the first time at Missi and Ryan's wedding reception in 2010 and though we've exchanged e-mails since, we hadn't seen each other since...until today!  We finally set a date on the calendar and Bob and Kathy again made the trek up from Olympia to visit us.  This was such a great day for a couple of reasons; one, August 4th is Bob's birthday and he decided to spend it with us :), and two, at the wedding reception, there really wasn't a lot of time to get to know Bob and Kathy, so getting together with them provided that opportunity to visit and get to know all about them!

Cousin Bob and Kathy

I hope they had as great a time as I did.  We chatted for a while, ate some fantastic food, and even took the opportunity to rummage through some old family pictures and other keepsake treasures from my dad and grandparents. 

We should do this more often!!

Blueberries

I've never been to a "U-Pick" blueberry farm before.  Though we have a couple of pitiful blueberry bushes in our back yard, for me, blueberries have always come from the grocery store. 

Well, not anymore!  Today, Samantha and I ventured to the Mountain View Blueberry Farm in Snohomish to pick blueberries.  Before I even parked the car, I asked one of the attendants there a few questions:

1. Do you take credit/debit?
2. Do you provide the containers in which to carry the picked berries?

And last, but most important:
3. I have an almost-two-year-old with me.  Most of the berries she picks will end up either in her mouth or on the ground.  Is that ok?

To my great relief and excitement, all of the answers were what I wanted to hear.  So we parked and headed into the fields.

At first, Samantha was really excited to pick berries.  As I thought, she really just picked and ate them.  After a while though, not even eating the berries was holding her attention.  She had fun running through the bushes, picking up berries off of the ground, and sitting at the base of the berry bushes playing in the dirt.  Oh what an amazing and hilarious little girl we have! 

Fill 'er up! :)

Though we only left having picked 2.5 pounds, we'll definitely be heading back before the season is over!