Always Smiling

I can't believe how fast time is going nowadays. I was thinking today that if I write a post it will only have been a few days since my last one and I'd be doing so good!

Then I looked at the date of my last post, sigh. It really is going too fast.

Chuck turned 60 on February 6 but a friend of Diana's was getting married today and Diana had already planned to fly out here for her wedding so we decided to wait and have Chuck's party while she was here. So we planned it for last night, February 24.

Sharaya lives in a condo and they have a wonderful clubhouse that you can rent for parties and such. It was so nice to have this available to use! Thank you Sharaya! 😍

We decided to lay out some pictures and memorabilia from 1958 and everyone had such a good time looking at everything and trying to pick Chuck out of his Kindergarten class photo!

(FYI - he's on the very bottom, far left!)

Remember Leave It To Beaver? 

It came out when Chuck was just a year old!

This is the house they lived in when he was born. It was a ranch with 10,000 chickens!

 
 Sharaya gave a toast part way through the party, a very touching tribute about how Chuck has always been there for her and even shared some stories from when she was growing up... it was very moving! I cried!

Then Chuck shared a little about how he can recall 4 times in his life he should have died - when he was born, both of his lungs were collapsed and he spent some time in an incubator; was in such a major car accident that people who saw the accident scene were sure no one had lived; almost drowned in a river in the Philippines...

He has been through so much in his life but is the most joyful person I know. Seriously! He's so friendly and is always smiling! He truly is a remarkable man and I am so blessed that I get to live life with him. 

 

 

Happy Birthday Chuck!

Family Stuff

Chuck, Beth and I went to a wedding the other day and Beth studied that bride!

(She's wearing the brown pants)  

Chuck and I got some cake and sat down with friends while she followed J and S around the room. When she threw the bouquet, Beth actually squealed! Then she came over to us and began to talk about what she wanted her wedding dress to look like!

We had no idea Beth was going to this wedding with the idea of planning her own! 😮

Diana will be here on Friday!! A friend of hers is getting married next weekend so she'll be here for a week and we are so excited!!

Allie came over for a while today while Sharaya cleaned Allies room. It gives her a chance to get rid of things without Allie being there to protest. 😏

We painted and played board games and ate cookies and looked at her baby pictures and watched TV... we always have so much fun when she's here!

I'm in the process of painting our small bathroom. A friend of mine painted her bathroom a soft violet and had pictures of her daughter's cheer leading team on the walls. It was a University of Washington Husky's bathroom and it was gorgeous! She did such a great job on it and I thought, "I can do this!" 

I was born and raised in San Diego, Chuck's family moved there when he was very young and that's where we met, got married, started our family... and so it would be safe to say the San Diego Chargers were his first love. Even after we moved to Seattle, he'd cheer for the Chargers. So I decided to paint the bathroom the color of the lightening bolt. Then I'd add dark blue towels and accessories. It was gonna be great! But the color of the bolt actually looked orange. And I don't mean, "Does that have a hint of orange?" I mean, it was really orange. I always thought it was a mustard/gold color but nope. Orange.

And then the Chargers moved to L.A. 

Sigh.

So I'm painting it white again.

How are things going at your house? 

Worth The Wait

We've lived in Seattle for close to 30 years and have never been to the Skyview Observatory!

The Columbia Center is the tallest building in the State of WA at 76 stories and the Skyview Observatory is on the 73rd floor. By contrast, the CC is 930 feet tall and the Space Needle is 520 ft.

 (This picture is from Google.) 

 

You might remember that Chuck drives for Metro and I think I've been on a city bus three times in my life. So we decided to take the bus downtown and ride the Light Rail to the Columbia Center.

There's SO much construction doing on downtown!

 

The views are spectacular and I love the different perspective of the city. 

 

Looking West toward the Olympic Mountains

Looking East. That city just on the other side of Lake Washington is Bellevue.

North

And South. Mount Rainier is directly in the center of the photo, a dark triangle in the middle of the clouds.

Centurylink Field and Safeco Field

We tried our hand at selfies

Hahahaha!!! How do people do it?! 😆

Then a kind gentleman offered to take our picture.

 Much better. 😊

We sat at  Starbucks for a while, walked around downtown, it was such a great day hanging out with my guy.

How did you spend your Saturday?

The Last Two Weeks

When church's Executive Assistant retired last fall, another admin was given her position but the main job was broken up between a few people. One of the jobs I received was Memorial Service Coordinator.

I volunteered at one and just knew this is what I was supposed to do. Our church doesn't have many funerals or memorials throughout the year but we've had 6 in the last 4 months.

But in the last two weeks, a older member of our congregation passed away...

(Placing the flowers and photo before the service)

I arranged for Beth and Nick to meet up for dinner and a movie. They made it their Valentines celebration.

 

Sharaya and Allie came over and somehow we ended up on the computer looking at pictures of Allie as a baby. She made so many cute expressions!

  

 I'm the event planner for our Business Meetings. We had about 180 for our Annual Meeting last week.

The morning of the Business Meeting we found out that our head custodian had suddenly and unexpectedly died in his sleep. It's been a very somber, difficult week at work.

(Trying to arrange everything.

We ended up putting some of it at the top of the stairs.)

 

After R died, we had a Facilities Meeting that I bought food and drinks for, set everything up then was a part of the meeting. (I'm the Admin for the Facilities Department.)

We've cleaned up our main custodial closet. A couple of the admin removed everything, then I went in on my days off to wipe shelves, label things and just get them organized. With so many custodians using it, over time it tends to collect things.

Before

 

(I love it when there's a place for everything and everything is in it's place!) 

 

 Beth and I drove to The Spaghetti Factory yesterday for Nick's surprise birthday party! His parents are taking him to Disneyland!

The last two weeks have been a roller coaster of emotions. It's 6:00 on Monday night right now and I should be at work. (I work a part time job Monday evenings) but I decided to stay home. I'm doing laundry and helped Beth put on her new comforter and pillows. 

Time to just relax.

What kinds of things do you do to relax? Has it been a long time (too long?) since you had a chance to really relax?