the motherland

so the time to take our trip to greece arrived. aaron and candy took us to the airport. and off we went. instead of trying to write out all the detials...i will summarize...



worst part: sleeping on the floor or the gatwick airport...not as bad as the time i had to sleep on the bench at la...but probably ranked up on the top 5 sleepless nights

craziest person: mom...was like a bloodhound on the scent when we arrived at aberdeen. the city was BEAUTIFUL. and we tramped around looking for the golfcourse, which we found. it was next to the sea. and we wondered why old grandpa gibb ever left scotland in the first place



funnest thing: justin's suitcase broke pretty early on in the trip. he rigged up a high tech coat handle and spend the remaining 8 days carring it around that way...



most annoying: "POLIOGISE!!!" what the "albanians" would yell in the morning on the loud speaker when they were trying to collect trash (that they would go recycle to make some money)

prettiest place: these three hills...the "three sisters" or something like that. this was somewhere in the highlands of scotland...sooo beautiful!



most shocking for hilary: waking up in the middle of the night to see a complete stranger strip down to his underware and climb onto the bottom of my bunk!

most shocking for justin: something simular...but worse :)

nastiest moment: when the toilet on the bus taking us back to london flooded...this was an 8 hours trip

best meal: probably a tie between fish n chips in london, and sardeens at mom's house... unless you can count baklava as dessert...in which case, that would win hands down :)



worst meal: haggis...with a little black pudding (made with pigs blood) but you have to try it right!

coolest castle: eddenborough

most beautiful moment: when michigan beat notre dame!!! (yes even in greece these things are important)

biggest challange (for mom): making megan's princess dress... i thought the pattern looked easy. evidently i was wrong :) but mom trudged through!!! and it was so worth it! (right mom? :)

anyway...the trip was great. and now it's back to life :)

school shopping, drug dealing

so yesterday was a day filled with excitement and adventure. i have discovered a new form of torture. namely, school shopping. now maybe i have had my memories replaced, or maybe my kids are just bad, but i remember school shopping being a pleasant experience. grandma ruth always met us at wall mart in mt. vernon. we always loaded up the cart with school supplies that we may, or may not, have needed, and were allowed to get whatever we wanted really. than grandma took us out to eat as much as we could possibly stuff into ourselves at ryan's. we were happy. we were pleasant. it was one of the days we looked forward all summer. now lets fast forward about 10 years. (ok...maybe 15) picture this. screaming children. an irritated mother who is trying to focus on the list of supplies she needs to get, as the kids toss random things into the cart (because michael saw this commerical for these "cool" crayons...he tried to convince me why we should buy them) which i (almost...but not quite) just as quickly tossed back out. megan had picked out the most un-megan like backpack, which myself and grandma kathy were trying to convince her was not something she wanted. while she whined and was completely unreasonable. i don't suppose this episode was as good as it could have been considering we had just returned home from a five day trip (in which i...and only i... took the kids down to atlanta to see rebecca) that had totaled 16 hours in the car, and i was not exactly in my best mood either... anyway... when i was a kid, i don't remember it being quite like this...

later that night, at 10:30 i drove down to my interview at ups, also known as the countries largest drug dealer.... this is a job i am thinking would be good because:
-the pay is decent
-the job has a late night shift (10-3) so i could theoretically still get the kids to school in the morning if i had to
-i would be getting a workout in every shift...and i like jobs where i feel like i'm actually working
-tuition reimbursement!!! this means i can go back to school for free!! (the only way to go to college i think...college is, after all...a scam ;)

so first we were corralled into this yellow lined "pasture" where most of the potential employees shared looks not unlike dumb sheep, and i was seized with the urge to laugh. another woman and i kept grinning at each other like fools...probably thinking the same thing. than we were divided into two groups and brought into the office for a briefing on how the job worked ect ect... when they opened the floor up for questions at the end. long haired man raised his hand. "is this (pointing to his long hair) ok..or do i need to have it up? no, long hair is ok, said friendly hr person. another fashion concerned man asked "can i wear shorts in the winter...caz i like to wear shorts...i don't get hot" (don't have to tell me :) no mr. fashion sense, people can wear whatever they want. mr. fashion sense asked another question. "what about chains?" what about them indeed! no mr. fashion sense...chains are pretty dangerous around heavy machinery... "any more (stupid) questions?" asked ms. hr...

than we were shown what our job would be. we could either unload the truck...which is doing pretty much what it sounds like...or load the truck...also pretty much what it sounds like. so i wait to see it they call me back for a second interview, which is an actual interview, as opposed to this, which was more like a tour. good times... good times :)

and other random news bits

-school starts next Wednesday...THANK YOU GOD!!!
-justin brought home hermet crabs for the kids from his trip on the beach...i told justin our pets are getting lower and lower maintenance. the next pet is going to be a rock!
-lastly but most exciting...the greece trip is in... 18 days!!! i am so excited to have some time with justin...without the kids. with him working so much, i see him way less... oh which reminds me of one more thing...
-justin got the job as a banker. he will start training for this when we get home from greece and they are putting him in an even better branch than he had interviewed for. another THANK YOU GOD!!! (with slightly less sarcasm in it ;)

and here's some pics...

wow!

WOW...so, i've been busy. but now here i am. the word "wow" will forever remind me of costa rica. not because of the scenery, or the poverty, or the people, but the fact that i was the hearer of that phrase COUNTLESS times. it became a joke when someone would make fun of someone else...they would say "wow!" in a really loud obnoxious way. and i suffered by looking out the window of the bus (where these type of conversations inevitably took place) and make grown up jokes with myself...mostly silently in my head...mostly...

so other than the trip. the month was filled with other memorable events with the most noteworthy probably being when michael learned the importance of wearing underware to the doctor's office. when the kids were told to strip to their underware for their yearly exam, michael started to panic. i don't have to tell you how happily megan tossed her clothes to the floor. and when mom and i tried to reason with michael that he only had to take his pants off, not his underware, he responded with "but i'm not wearing any!" to which, both mother and grandma burst into laughter. the sort that makes you cry you're laughing so hard. evidently this happens more often than you think, said the doctor... in fact, she had a simular case with another boy last week...a 14 year old one :)

here's some pics of what we've been up to...

oh, and the driveway is finished!!! it's the most beautiful thing i've seen in awhile. (sentemental sigh)

like a man...but not

one of the people who knows me best once described me as "like a man...but not." and espically recently i seem to have been surrounded with men like activities. with justin working full time, i came to the quick realization that (dispite the dislike of sounding cliche) if you want something done right (or at all) you have to do it yourself...

we recently had a entire weekend sans children and while part of it was spend at my aunt's house, doing activites entirely too scandalous to report here, another part of it was spend at the "clubhouse" working on MY bike with the hopes that it would start running... the clubhouse is basically a huge garage where all the guys from the local ducati forum come and hang out and drink beer and watch races and work on their bikes, and where our bike is currently parked... i spent the afternoon watching men wander around the garage looking for "that part" that no one could locate (personally i think this is because there were no women to find these mysterious missing parts) and telling tall tales about their bike escipades... the women that were there were all, as i like to call, "acessories" (women who don't actually own or ride a bike but are happy to ride on the back of their mans...needless to say i hold some degree of scorn for such women...and justin is not a little dissapointed in my harsh rejection of the idea of riding on the back of his bike with him...such women are described as "my wife" and "my girlfriend" with names unknown)

than there is the driveway... if having two bosses is bad...having "boss jeff" and "boss bob" is one hundered million times worse... don't get me wrong, i am happy for the imput. but they both have entirely different ideas as to how a driveway should be resurfaced, and i am starting to realize that a big part of all this confusion is that i have absoutley no idea what i'm doing... granted that has never stopped me from doing something. the first step was powerwashing it clean. i ended covered (literally) with mud and stickey tar (which will come off eventually...when your skin does!), but feeling quite proud of myself. anyway, without going into numurous detials which will, no doubt, bore you, it is almost finished and it still looks like crap. but once i put the topcoat on...theoritically...it will look (almost) like new... my fingers are crossed.

and as bob has found an amazing deal on some exerior paint, i see the large demon of a prodject (we shall call it...PAINTING the ENTIRE house) looming in the distance. and after all this complaining, you should know, that i really to love this stuff :) nothing beats it when you tell your girlfriend about your day resurfaceing the driveway and they look at you bewildered and say "is there anything you don't do?!?"

update via photo :)

so the summer has been busy so far...






rebecca came to stay...

we have spent lots of time at the pool with uncle aaron and aunt candy...

michael's best friend from kindergarden met us at the park one day for some activities...


i did candy's hair...



for the wedding of...



my beautiful cos larisa...



and spent some quality time with crazy grandpa tom...



and grandma mary, and aunt bonnie, and grandpa jeff...

and grandma teen...

and it's july...almost

well we survived a month with rebecca and are now preparing for the second wave of lovley craziness...mom comes home thursday!!!!! this week is vbs which is perfect timing because i (introvert that i am) and loving the free mornings to myself which have been composed of mostly laying around aaron and candy's pool (aka...burning my skin to a crisp :) and running at the gym...although i might actually do something productive this morning and go grocery shopping...ahhh good times!

justin (much to my dismay) has joined a ducati forum where he has publicly stated that HE owns a bike. the unaccuracy of this statement is astounding and i have had to join the forum myself (likley making me the sole female duc rider) simply to refute these henious claims! it's MY bike thank you very much... at least you all know the truth!

and last...michael and megan are now swimming without their floaties. they are just tall enough to stand in the 3 foot section of aaron and candy's pool and this has given them the push to try the swim thing on their own. michael even (gasp) does cannon balls into the water. jumping off the side of the pool! MICHAEL!!! i am shocked, but pleased with their progress, and it just goes to show that nothing you do as a parents helps your kid at all. they all just do what they want to when they want to...

aunt rebecca

aunt rebecca arrived on thursday much to the delight of everyone involved. she is teaching down in atlanta these days and has the summer off so will be up in ohio for june. she spent the first few days taking michael and megan on dates. when she asked michael where he wanted to go for his, he had trouble choosing between going to bob evans or getting ice cream. aunt rebecca said "michael, you can do both!" but michael said "i don't want to go to both places, because that would cost too much money"!!! aunt rebecca assured michael that SHE would be the one paying and that cost was of no concern...

justin continues to work full time. ugg! the hardest part about this is that i'm home all the time and i feel like he goes to a job that's hard for him, and i get to stay home and play with my kids and cook things...and read...a lot... but come fall i will probably try to get something part time and i think than i will feel like i'm contributing a little more...not that sleeping in every day and reading books is something i'm complaining about...

this weekend michael and megan are having "graduation parties" because i thought it would be fun. and i like to have people over. i plan on making lots of water balloons and setting up games for the kids and eating some good cake....michael's is saturday, megan's is sunday...and that's pretty much it for now...

oh yes...one more thing...bryan, one of the guys that goes to the youth group and is an incredibly gifted artist, has agreed to desisn our gas tank!!! so...here's what he's done so far...