justin's big day.

today we made a surprise trip to the police station.

well, it was a surprise to the kids.

i received a call yesterday, asking us to be there

this afternoon to surprise justin with an award.

(the kids standing with papa, waiting to go see daddy)

this man is the reason for the award.

billy tucker is a resident of hilltop

and a big help to justin.

they talk on a weekly basis, pretty much.

let's him know what problems are happening

while he's off work and such.

billy's dad just passed away a few weeks

ago, and justin attended his service, as well.

billy had nominated justin for the

'excellence in public service' award last year...

but he didn't win.

this year he won.

the prize: $2500.

wow.

thank you, billy.

if you're not from around here,

the man on the left is the chief of police,

norman williams.

uniformed officer is justin's captain.

first few moments after the city manager told

justin he'd won the award.

the interview--he'll be on the news tonight.

watch 4, 5, 6 and 10pm to see which one they play it on! :)

the camera guy didn't know which one.

justin with lavonta williams, sue schlapp, our new city manager(sorry, i honestly don't know his name!), jim skelton, mr. devore(who gave the money).

an ode to hannah.

this is what the best cookie in the world looks like.

no joke.

this was in my mail today.

(hannah, seriously, i need you to "feel" like i'm

going to have $100 check in the mail tomorrow!)

this is what the best cookie maker in

the world looks like.

this is hannah whyte.

she is justin's cousin, but she likes me more.

ha ha.

she's a student at UC Irvine.

she likes to post photos and comments on

facebook about how great her cookies are.

she says i've been "nagging" her about

sending us some cookies.

i don't know what she's talking about.

for the record...

i do not nag.

i guilt trip.

there's a huge difference, hannah.

if you're going to learn anything in college,

that should be lesson #1. :)

emily got to meet hannah last summer(well, she saw

her when she was about 8 mos. old, but she doesn't

remember that) and fell in love with her.

anytime i mention hannah she gets all squealy and

says, "my big cousin named hannah?? oh, i love her!!"

what a nerd.

hannah, lesson #2 for you.

emily hates nuts.

seriously un-american.

i gave her that cookie and she ate it.

nuts and all.

(well, she picked out like 3 and shared with aiden,

 but still..huge accomplishment!)

there were like 30 nuts in it.

all i had to say is that it was from hannah.

i have a long list of foods she won't eat.

maybe you can get to eat those, too.

aiden loves nuts.

he calls them beans.

i have no idea why.

and he's on a steroid,

so 'roid rage loves cookies. :)

lesson #3 hannah:

do not send justin's cookies to his house.

if you want justin to get cookies,

mail them to his work.

those blasted things are upstairs

shouting on a mega phone for

me to come and eat them.

cruel and unusual punishment.

you get an A+++ for cookie making.

maybe we'll send you a girl scout badge for it. :)

ps...we tried to call you,

but i guess you were at class.

it was like 10 a.m. there.

love the blur.

do you see that blur?!?!

50mm f/1.8 lens.

my new best friend.

take me out to the ball game.

today was national 'date your wife day' for justin.

ha ha.

city employees were given the opportunity to watch

the shockers baseball team play southern illinois

for free.

we of course went...leaving the kids with his parents.

i love them.

before we left, we took these at home.

 it's amazing how well she listens when you say

the picture is for cousin hannah. :)

aiden has to hear the magic word "PAPA"

before he will agree to do anything.

on to our date...

eck stadium at wichita state university.

now i'm not a huge baseball fan.

i LOVE college games of all kinds, though.

high school, too.

i hadn't actually been to a wsu game since 2004,

and i was there strictly to witness my friends

ryan and matt baty playing for ku.

i love knowing someone who is playing.

at the ku game,

i wanted to sit close to the dugout so i could

take some pictures of the baty boys.

we paid big bucks, so we had wonderful chairs behind the net.

this game, however, was free.

general admission.

you sit on bleachers.

i think if i would've thrown out the name

butch anderson,

we could've gotten box seats.

my uncle was a HUGE wsu baseball supporter

when he was alive.

not only do you sit on hard bleachers,

but you sit clear out at the edge of the world.

we are here.

thanks to the telephoto lens we could see that our friends with season tickets were right behind

home plate.

black shades, white and black wsu hat.

kevan guinn.

he was one of justin's groomsmen.

and in the row behind him,

his family and friends.

the guinn's are big wsu fans.

i always tell justin that kevan's dad

looks like the shocker's coach,

gene stephenson.

haha.

oh, silly southern illinois boys.

no one cares that you scored a run.

well, i didn't.

the guy behind me sang another tune.

LOUDLY.

thankfully, wsu answered back with this.

in the right hand corner there's a little white circle.

that my friends is called a home run.

awesome hit.

next we have my "we want a pitcher not a belly itcher"

photo series.

to me,

the games are fun and always mean running

into someone you know.

i glanced over to my right during the game

and two rows up sat my old neighborhood

playmate, lucas sagerty.

we went to elementary school together,

he later moved up north and attended heights high.

it was nice to catch up and see that at age of 29,

he still looks like he did when he was 7.

just less hair, as he said.

and of course i didn't get a picture.

i never seem to get photos of the moments that

actually matter.

sigh.

you can always tell who the real fans of the sport are.

the kids are so cute.

there was a little boy about 3 years old with a mitt

that i wanted to photograph,

but justin said he belonged to a detective,

so i opted not to. :)

there are also those fans that are there

to take pointers.

this kid plays for northwest high school,

3 blocks from our house.

at least i'm guessing with the NW hat,

under armour type practice shirt and black

athletic socks...

black socks--a major no-no, teenage boys.

blech.

or maybe he and his dad were just there so they

could chow down on sunflower seeds...

s. illinois was up by 3 when we left at 

the start of the 9th inning. 

that's right. 

we left early.

don't judge me. 

we went to old chicago for an early dinner. 

much better than watching the home team lose. :)  

preparing for 3.

preparing to have a 3 year old boy.

i made sure he had his favorite stuff in his shots.

1. toy story band-aids.

they were legit...he skinned his knees today.

2. his step stool. he loves that thing.

3. his sunglasses.

4. his "i'm a mama's boy" shirt.

well, that's my favorite....

hop over to whyte house photo for the rest....

she said MY NAME!!!!

i like to call myself a blog fan of 'under the sycamore'.

i check it everyday.

maybe that's called 'blog stalking'???

whatever.
i went to HS with her hubby in tulsa,
so there.
it's legit.

ANYWAY....

ashley had posted links to a 'make your own webpage'

and i've been frantically searching for it,

hoping to pass it on to leslie in oklahoma.

i was pretty sure that i saw it in december,

so i started to thumb through her december posts...

but stopped at the first one when i saw.....

MY NAME!!!!

surely she was talking about another susie.

i read on and she was talking about ME.

for real.

(justin says i've been saying 'for real' a lot

lately, so that was for him. :))

anyway....

i thought it was soooo cool!!!
i don't know how i missed it the first time.
i blame the holidays.

here's the page if you wanna check it out.

of course you wanna check it out...

you're proud to be my friend at this moment. :)

ha ha ha.

the post was about something that we did as kids

in the winter.

credit to my mom. :)

easter.

as always,

we had easter at my parents house.

somehow when emily was a baby we just decided that we would do it there.

i'm guessing it's cause jack would be preaching

and they wouldn't be able to get away.

i don't know.

this year, jack didn't preach, though he has done some

preaching lately.

i hear it's not smoothe sailing by any means,

but he's made it happen.

yesterday's sermon was done by greg,

my stepbrother, justin and i's youth minister back in the day.

i love hearing greg preach,

so i was all for it.

he even mentioned the kids in his sermon.

he was talking about the people being

excited to see Jesus,

much like the excitement of our kids

that morning,

 running down the single isle of the sanctuary

yelling, "pop!!! gra!!!"

the kids had a good time in their class, as well,

and told us all about it afterwards.

as soon as everyone had left,

they ran to find pop and waited for him

so they could go down the ramp again with him.

it's just not a visit to gra and pop's unless you

get to have pop chase you around in his power chair.

greeting us at the house after church

was this face.

little aj is sportin' 2 teeth now.

he'd make crazy faces,

clearly teething ones,

that made him look like an old gummed man.

so cute.

porch swing time.

apparently it was too bright outside.

i have never seen him throw a fit the way he

did yesterday.

had to capture it.

mary anne missed it.

cousin emily had a great time playing with aj.

i didn't match my kids,

but i did buy the boys matching outfits.

they looked like little men in their polos and chinos.

the kids went on a walk after lunch with my mom.

of course emily fell and scraped her knee.

she started hunting eggs,

but her knee hurt a lot and she had to go potty.

i took her in to the bathroom to find out

her little knee was bleeding,

rocks had opened the skin and ripped her

new leggings.

ergh.

which is why she has no leggings on in the pic below.

that little aiden was the king of finding eggs.

emily looks for things like her dad...

if it's not in plain sight,

it doesn't exist.

very annoying.

aiden found the majority of the eggs.

we don't do easter baskets or candy for the kids.

they got candy on saturday and they have baskets

from their first easter's,

but it wasn't something we wanted to glue in their brains.

like santa, i don't want to get them so sucked in

to the thought of the easter bunny and have them

find out that he's not real, too.

easter is about the death and resurrection of Christ,

so that's what we focus on.

they got some m&m's,

which we call their 'spring candy' and i found some little

bubble whistles,

one dora and one diego, from target.

they're pretty messy, though.

aiden's funny to watch blowing his.

he looked like he had to go

to the bathroom bad or something.

usually we put something in the eggs...

candy, money, stickers...something.

we slacked off this year,

as did my mom.

oh, well.

my mom had some things to pass down to me this year..

way cool stuff.

a hand print i did in '86 that use to

hang in our house growing up.

a clutch purse that had belonged to my great

grandma, bessie atteberry.

she had receipts still in it from 1933

and had written,

"mrs. bessie atteberry

atoka, ok"

along with her phone number,

that was a few letters and 2 numbers.

so cool.

i also got my baby brush and some vhs tapes,

one being an anderson family reunion(my dad's side)

from 1988.

famie, i'm pretty sure your mullet is in that one!! :)