That Girl Rocks the Dress too!

Happy Anniversary!! I love the dress and the Groom is cute too!

That Girl...Reads and Writes!

This will be my guest blogger for Bloggy Book Club on Sunday, May 31...My Daughter!
Bloggy Book Club hasn't really gone anywhere since I started it...well, it's really a membership of "one" ...Me! Rachel's book club that meets in real life just finished up The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes by Diane Chamberlain .....so...since I am changing Bloggy Book Club a little and asking for guest bloggers who have read the book that I choose for that month. Rachel will be the first...she doesn't blog yet but that may change. She is an English major from UF and she loves to read!

So, if you have suggestions for June's Bloggy Book Club and you would like to guest blog or just have me link to your blog for June the 28th ...let me know!
This picture was taken in Orlando over the Memorial Day weekend...for more friday fotos visit Cute Candid Carrie!

26 Years Ago...We Were So Blessed!

Dear Rachel,
I prayed for you...I sat on the floor in the kitchen at night and prayed and cried for another baby... quiet so your Dad wouldn't hear.
I wanted another baby so much. I hated that I envied other mother's their sweet babies and while I was excited about all your older brother's milestones, I knew it took me further and further away from all the baby memories we had shared.
We had decided to stop trying and just embrace our family of three...I didn't think I could go through another miscarriage. Your Dad while sad...honored my decision. And then...like something out of a movie...on our 5th wedding anniversary...
I totally surprised your Dad when we found out I was already pregnant with you...an answered prayer as far as I was concerned! I often describe you as the heart and soul of our family...always loving, loyal...so very tenderhearted.
I love that you set goals for yourself and attain them. I love that you love God, politics, The Florida Gators and Britney Spears.
I am proud of the young woman you have become and while I won't take the credit for you...I will say you are exactly the girl I prayed for... although... I had imagined you with darker hair!
I love you and I hope you had a wonderful 26th Birthday!
Love, Mom
P.S. I owe you Chicken and Yellow Rice w/ peas on top!

Visit Cute Candid Carrie for more friday foto!

Oh Vanna!

Thank you everyone for voting for Sara and entering my give-away for the iPod Nano!

Sara had entered a contest and everyone was wonderful in their support of her and I thank you sincerely!

Sara and my daughter Rachel have been friends since 4th grade! Sara was Rachel's maid of honor at her wedding.

This is the iPod nano that the winner will receive...this is Rachel "Vanna" showing it off!

Take Two!

And the winner is

Blogstalker!

Please email me your address and your name...

I will not publish it...as I know you remain in the shadows protecting all of us bloggers !

Please congratulate Blogstalker and for more friday fotos visit cute candid carrie!

It is also Wheel of Fortune's 5,000th show today!

Please Vote for Sara Nelms!

This...the cute blond on the left, is my daughter, Rachel and on the right is her equally cute childhood friend Sara Nelms. All of you Moms and Dads with grown up kids know how you feel about your kids friends...You love them...you prayed and worried over them as if they were your own!

Our whole family actually loves Sara...she is beautiful inside and out, and funny! When Rachel's two brothers are asked about which friend of Rachel's they like the best...and Rachel has ton's of friends...the guys always say Sara! She is just a very special person, she also is a very special person who can SING!

She has entered a contest to go on tour with Little Big Town and I am asking you to vote for her and then I am asking you to spread the word!

This is my mission, folks! I want her to win!

If you vote for her and then leave a comment on this post telling me you did... I will enter you for a drawing for a ... wait for it...

iPod nano...

If you blog about it and link to where others can vote for her, our Sara...then I will give you a total of ten entries!

Little Big Town-Demand your favorite band!

Vote here and look for Sara Nelms! Thanks!

Contest ends February 26 and I will announce the winner of the iPod nano February 27!

a lotus grows in the mud or in a car ride...

My daughter and I had a road trip of sorts...a quick trip to Orlando to collect money from a customer who doesn't want to part with it and while I understand that desire, they need to pay us!

My business has evolved to me spending a good portion of my day reminding people they need to pay me and me fielding calls from people who would like me to do the same! FUN!

You may wonder why I don't take either of my six foot sons with me on these collection trips, as they are more intimidating than my only daughter and the answer is simple... she likes to listen to books-on-tape (or CD!)

So, "Thelma and Louise" stopped by the library and looked for a mutually satisfying book...no easy task as she is 25 and I am not! I thought maybe the Twilight series but she wasn't interested and there wasn't a huge selection to begin with..but we did find Goldie a lotus grows in the mud by Goldie Hawn with Wendy Holden. We decided that would be a good one... as I had previously started it and not finished it, as was my prior behavior with reading books.

So, this was a good one to get off my book shelve!

This is not your typical celebrity memoir...it isn't told in a lineal fashion but more in a " I remember, one time when this happened" and then you are transported to a different time and a different place in Goldie Hawn's Life. This is not a Hollywood tell-all...no negative comments about people but just great stories about her life, her work, her travels and her family. She is truly a unique person and while I am not anything like her, I appreciate her nature and the fact that she is so funny and that she lives her life to the fullest!

The book is co-written by Wendy Holden and I liked the style of the writing and the fact it wasn't in chronological order. After listening to more than half of it on CD, and it was fun listening to Goldie narrate her story...so much fun in fact after we got back...I picked up the book and finished the rest of her story!

I, now have this terrific memory of Goldie Hawn reading to me and my daughter...I ask you what is better than that?

Friday Fotos...as if!

The Only Daughter meets Alicia Silverstone! Yes...it is really her! We were at a Get out and vote rally!

For More Friday Fotos visit Candid Carrie!

Growing Pains...

As a child I was told that Santa came to my house first on Christmas Eve because we were his favorites...later I realized my parents enjoyed sleeping in on Christmas Day. But...every Christmas Eve my Mom would take us out to look at all the houses decorated for the Holiday and every year when we got home...we would discover we just missed Santa! My Dad would describe in vivid detail what happened, as I got older and older he had less and less details.

This traditional set up worked well for me when I married as My Hubby celebrated Christmas on Christmas Day like the other " red headed step-children" Santa tolerated. This allowed Christmas for "My family" on Christmas Eve as "the Chosen" family, Santa clearly adored!
This continued until 1979 when our first child was born...My Hubby insisted his little family celebrate on Christmas Day...and it meant I could continue to be with my family on Christmas Eve. My Poor Hubby's family has seen us once or twice as they live in Virginia and we just don't travel much during the holidays.

Now...holiday traditions have gotten complicated...for extremely good reasons! All my children are married or very nearly married, as in the last Born's case!
We don't all attend Christmas Eve worship service together anymore as we don't attend the same churches anymore. We don't go looking at the Christmas lights together and then over to my Mom and Dad's although, all the kids do show up at my Mom and Dad's. We do see each other on Christmas morning...although I suspect that will stop soon as Carter and Katie will rightly begin their traditions with their parents. We no longer see movies together on Christmas day because with extended family members we were saving seats for 30! Oh, People do hate that!

It is hard sometimes for Empty Nester's...I know a lot of people are thrilled to be a couple again and we are, too! But, the holidays are the times I literally ache for my children...not so much who they are now...but for their little selves who filled my heart with such joy!
Don't get me wrong...I love my life now...but at Christmas, I do miss the little Baer children and all of our traditions... but they are too big to sit on my lap and read to!

Visit Carrie she has a great give-away involving family traditions!

Also, My Losing Season Contest ...you could win $50 for your favorite charity!

There Are No Words!

That's my girl! For more Wordless Wednesdays visit 5 Minutes for Mom

That Girl!

This is my middle child who also married a middle child, if you have a middle child you understand, if you are a middle child you already feel put out! I'll blog on that another time though... This is about "That Girl" there! This is my favorite picture of them and was taken on the evening of their engagement by a total stranger who I am sure was micro-managed by my daughter for this shot! It is beautiful and it is sad that this is my favorite when I spent a small fortune on a very good photographer for their "official engagement pictures!" But...I digress again as this post is about "That Girl" there...because she has made her parents so proud again...a whole life of making us proud and worried, scared and a couple of times maaaaaaadddd....sorry I have done it again....
The big news about"That Girl".....She has decided to teach...High School English and we are so happy because...she loves English and she is so good with people especially young people and we love teachers!


PS. Thank you, Rachel for never "getting on" to me about my grammar, as I know it "bugs the livin' daylights out of you!!!!"

Thelma and Louise's Daughter's Big Adventure!

He did a great job! I just was a very big baby.

So, Monday, got a tattoo.

Sometimes, reality doesn't just "bite" it hurts big time.

First, I am glad I have it, second I do not understand why anyone would ever get a second tattoo!

My Mother (keep in mind, I am 50) said "This is the dumbest thing you have ever done"...Wow, is she forgetting some pretty big events in my life. Apparently, I have lived them down! Maybe, I just erased them with this current event. She also said there would not be a mother-daughter bonding between she and I similar to my daughter's and mine, because as she reiterated ..."This is so dumb, Ronda" and, it might have been...I look at the pictures and have to say my idea of what I was doing and the reality of what occurred doesn't mesh well. I made less a fuss giving birth to three children without pain medication than this tattoo. Let's just say I behaved poorly and I don't think I am allowed back into the tattoo parlor. The only daughter is showing off the red marks on her poor hand! I don't even remember squeezing it! In addition, my colorful language was so bad she was pleading with me "Mama, No!" Not the religious experience I thought I would be having! It reminded me literally of Peter denying Christ while the rooster crowed. I honestly thought I would pray and breathe quietly through this experience. Some guy next to me got a tattoo of a very colorful "whatever"and sat through smiling while I screamed like a banshee! The experience wasn't what I had planned...Life is seldom what we plan...but look at my daughter! I had the best time with her...albeit a little painful and that is a gift from God!

Note: After the swelling goes down...I'll take a picture of the tattoo.

WHHHHHHHYYYYYYYY?

That was my hubby's response when I said I wanted to get a tattoo for my 50th Birthday, which was last month by the way. He made the word "why" have eight syllables as he asked the question. I had thought about it for a long time but this was really my first time talking to him, or anyone else really about it. When my daughter was 21 she got a tattoo and I am sure I said "Why" exactly the way the hubby did! She said that she wanted to and that she got a tattoo of an ichtus. "Okay, what the heck is that?" and her smarty pants reply "Mom, it's the Greek word for the Christian Fish symbol." It's hard to argue with that and also she was 21 and not seeking my approval as it was already done. I stupidly asked if she had been drinking...picture this if you will my drunken daughter asking a guy to tattoo a Christian symbol on her foot. Too funny! "Moooommmm" "They won't do it if you have been drinking!" Then I thought ..."She can never deny who she belongs to." You see now a days, everyone pretty much knows about the Christian Fish Symbol because you see it on car bumpers and anything labeled Christian but in the early days only fellow Christians understood the symbolism. The fish would not have been an obvious symbol to people who would persecute Christians. But to believers they would know that Jesus asked several fisherman to be his disciples, declaring to make them "fishers of men."

It's said that when a Christian would meet someone new he would draw an arc in the sand. If the other person were a Christian they would finish with a second arc. If the second person were not a Christian they would not complete the symbol with the second arc and the half symbol would not reveal or endanger the first person.

We obviously live in a country where I don't have to worry about any real persecution but the idea of me permanently labeled as a Christian seems really important to me. I want to stand for my faith and I hope in a positive way. I am a Christian. I do not pretend to agree with all those who label themselves as Christians, I just know who I belong to. I know I don't need a tattoo to show that I am Christian but next Saturday, I am getting a tattoo on my foot, just like my daughter's!

I am a little afraid of needles... but not persecution.

I want others to know I follow Him.

As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, as they were fisherman. "Come follow me" Jesus said "and I will make you fishers of men." At once they left their nets and followed him.

Mark 1 16:18

The Baers Summer Vacation

Our family, which now pretty much consists of myself and my hubby are watching our pennies. The downturn in our economy has effected our construction business in a very real way. We will be working very hard this summer trying to play catch up after a slow six months. Which is fine because we are grateful to God for the work. So this year rather than go away for vacation we will be taking some on those "One tank trips" with Bill Murphy( an excellent book by the way,) because about one tank is all we can afford. If you unfamiliar with the book it is 52 Florida adventures that you may get to on a tank of gas. Since we are close to Busch Gardens we did decide to buy a "Pay for a day. Come back all year" ticket with one ticket upgraded for parking. This is something we can do in the evenings after supper, the park is open until 10 pm and we are now 50 so we are considered "Active Adult Visitors" which really doesn't get you anything other than a good laugh and an itinerary. We have always bought Disney passes but because we will be so busy working and because gas is expensive and Busch Gardens tickets were a bargain we decided to do the closer of the two. We have also started canoeing, which is fun and requires not any gas at all. My grandson loved it and we look forward to more times together. We are going to be creative this year with our family get-togethers and our budget but we always have a wealth of love for our time together. I had read in the St. Pete times paper that people are staying home this summer to have "staycations." Let me know what you will be up to this summer unless you are going to Europe and then just go quietly and I will be happy for you and not bitter at all.

Some rant about comma placement and other atrocities.

So, the only daughter feels that I should change my header because I am talking about the goodness in the world and not "ranting" enough. She is an English major who takes words and grammar very seriously. On her face book page her "flair" says "she will judge you when you use bad grammar." We all know this so there is no need for the banner stating the obvious. She is the only person I know who can get into a heated argument about the placement of a comma. Seriously, the placement of a comma.
So, in honor of my daughter who is very smart, honest and a true dedicated warrior of the English language... I give you... the definition of rant.
rant (rant) v. to talk in a loud, wild way; rave. n. loud, wild speech.
I think I have ranted and raved many times and while it may be true that as I age I'm less wild (maybe), I'll always rant even about the "good things in this world." I think it is important for people to feel passionately about things they believe in even if it is "just" the placement of a comma! You go girl!