Grandma Lois

This is my Grandma Lois (my Dad's mom) with my brother and me.  She is the reason that we packed up the kids and drove a long way for a day to attend my cousin Kim's wedding.  I can't remember the last time I saw my cousin Kim - I would guess it's been 20 years.  We made that long drive because my Grandmother was going to be there.  She has lived on her own in Florida since my Grandfather died in 1998 - driving, cooking for herself, etc. 

We see her once every few years when we are at Disney or when I was traveling on business a lot I would sometimes pass through for an afternoon.  This was the second time Juliana got to meet her and obviously time that she met the boys.  My grandmother had twins so she was especially excited when she found out about the boys.  This is when she got her first look at them (the wedding was outside at a golf course).  She just stared at them for the longest time and then she sat and held each one of them.

There isn't much family on my Dad's side.  There is my Grandmother, his older sister and brother-in-law and their children Scott and Kim, his older brother and sister-in-law, and us.  I have just the 2 cousins on that side of the family and my cousin Scott is engaged to someone named Jennifer - so we have 2 Scott and Jennifer couples in the family now.  Here we are with my Grandmother - not the most photogenic person in the world and it had been a very long day for her at this point - they left shortly after this picture was taken.

Over the past few years she has started to lose a step - no surprise since she will be 88 years old in a few weeks - but she seemed to be able to manage and was in good health, plus she has friends in her community that checked in on her.  Last week she took a bad fall - I don't think we will ever know exactly what happened, best we can tell she had been sick and not eating well and passed out and when she woke she was too weak to get up.  That seems to have happened last Tuesday night.  When her friends called to check on her in the morning, she told them that she had fallen, but not to worry she was all right  (my Grandmother is too stubborn to ask for help).  Thursday morning they decided they should check on her, and my Grandmother was still on the floor.

She spent the next few days in the hospital and was moved to a rehab center this past Monday.  My aunt went to FL over the weekend and she has been staying close to her.  My Grandmother keeps asking when she can go home, but she is weak and isn't working with the program to help improve herself.  At this point she is probably not going home again.

Moving somewhere else in Florida doesn't make sense since there is no family.  The best alternative seems to be for her to come to Pittsburgh.  Scott and I visited an assisted living facility today with my parents.  It is close to our house so we would get to see her and she would get to spend time with her Great-Grandchildren.  It would be such a huge change for her - I had to fight back tears while we were sitting in the office talking about options.  It seems so unfair to be talking about her and potentially making decisions about where she will spend the rest of her life while she is in a rehab center in Florida convinced that she is going home soon.

My Dad is flying there on Sunday; he is the one who will need to have the hard talk with her about the possible options.  It's likely that when he returns home my Grandmother will be with him.

I love the idea of my children knowing their Great-Grandmother and I think it would be good for her as well.

Project 365 - A Picture a Day

I started 2009 with Project 365 and I'm so glad I took on the challenge. Did I miss days?  Yes.  But I think overall I missed less than 20 days. I used a binder designed for this project that t includes slots to print – yes, actually print out the pictures so you can look at them without a computer – a 4 x 6 photo each day and a slot to write a quick note about what happened that day.


I am behind on the printing (photos are waiting in a folder) and I have lots and lots of empty slots where the journaling cards should be completed. I love looking back at the pages that are complete – such a wonderful summary of our lives during those weeks. I plan to have more completed journaling cards in 2010.

This project was especially important to me this year because I scrapbook and I knew that the addition of the boys in our lives would put a hold on that hobby for a little while. This project made me more conscious of the pictures I take. I take lots of pictures of Juliana and the boys – no surprise. I also made an effort to be in more pictures this year instead of always being behind the camera. And I took lots of pictures of the little things that happen in our lives. Food – pictures of the French toast Scott made for me for dinner when I was pregnant and nothing else sounded good to eat and the first meals made when our kitchen was “almost done”. And that watermelon - I really wish I could eat that today.

The kitchen remodel before, during and after.

Getting ready for the boys and their arrival.

Sports championships

An impromptu picnic in the front yard.

Snow angels at the beginning and the end of the year.

Capturing our lives throughout the year – good times and not so good, events and every day life – recording our family history.  Today's picture - Juliana, Ruslan and Wyatt watching Handy Manny on my mom's iphone.

5 Years and Our Family of 5

Five years ago today I became Mrs. Scott Connelly. We started dating in October 2003 after being fixed up by our friend Natalae. Scott proposed in March 2004. We closed on our house in June and focused on making it move-in ready. Everyone kept asking for a wedding date so on July 12th, we announced we would be getting married 2-1/2 weeks later on July 30th. We wanted a simple ceremony and on a lovely Friday evening we were joined by 30 of our closest friends and family for our wedding.

It was so simple back then, just the two of us in a house that seemed so big. We went to Italy for on our honeymoon that October and just one year later we welcomed Juliana Grace into our lives. And so began our journey as mommy and daddy.



We debated for years whether or not we would have another child. I talked to friends who are only children or only have one child and tried to convince myself that one chld was enough. Then last summer we made a snap decision to have another baby and before we knew it we were expecting. On Monday, September 29th we received the surprising news that we were going to have twins and in December we found out that they were both boys.

The boys were born in April and it has definitely taken me a while to get used to the idea that I am a mother of 3 children and 2 of them are boys. When I was growing up I thought that I would have 3 children, but then I got older and realized kids take a lot of work and money to raise so 1 or maybe 2 became the goal. Turns out my childhood dreams caught up with me afterall and we are so incredibly blessed to have 3 healthy, happy children.



I consider our anniversary the start date for our family. So each year during the week before or after July 30th, we take a family picture - casual in the front yard (our wedding picture and 1-yr pictures are in Scott's parent's front yard since that's where we were married). We haven't taken this year's photo yet, so I am including a picture from June. In last year's picture, I wasn't even pregnant and this year there are 2 more children in our picture.

Scott and I were both previously married and I think that we have learned from our mistakes. Sometimes marriage means compromise and other times you need to fight for what you think is best, and I think that we find that balance the majority of the time. Above all we love and respect each other and I wake up each day knowing that we will spend the rest of lives together. Even when we are incredibly sleep deprived and trying to coordinate schedules and figure out how we are going to make everything work...if I take a deep breath, I know that this is where we were meant to be.

Life Changes Fast

Just over one year ago, the week before my birthday, I made a comment to Scott about turning 35 and he quickly replied that I was already 35 and I would be 36 that weekend. I felt like I had lost a year of my life...not quite as dramatic as it sounds. At this point I realized that if we needed to decide quickly if we were going to have another baby. We thought about it for a few weeks and decided that we would try. And one year later, here we are, a family of 5 with our 7 week old twins.