Gorski Happenings

So Long, Farewell, Auf Weiderschen, Goodbye...

2009-05-04T15:19:00.002-06:00

I guess it has been somewhat obvious but I am going to state it anyway. I am saying goodbye to my blog.

There is no big monumental reason, I just can't think of anything interesting enough to blog about. We are busy with a whole lot of things but they are just everyday things. Run one kid here, take another one there, attend a Booster meeting, go to a baseball game, etc. . Certainly not anything that people would want to read about. The boys don't have doctor check-ups anymore, or cute little things that they say and do. They are just your average everyday teen / pre-teen that do average things and don't necessarily enjoy their mom writing about it on the world wide web.

I will post little things here and there on my facebook page if you are interested. If anything truly big and exciting happens I will let you all know somehow. Thank you to the people that have read over the years and left comments.

Later Gators...

Happy Birthday, Phil

2009-02-10T09:43:00.003-06:00

Just a quick note to wish Phil a happy 33rd birthday! He was able to get 60 degree weather which is very rare for February 10th! I love you, Phil and hope that you have an awesome day!

On a side note I have added a link to Tim Ryan's new blog! He is writing all about the adventures they are having renovating their new home. It is funny to read so give it a little look see!

We've been very busy around here and today is no exception so I will leave all other updates to another post!!

Later Gators...

Monthly Update

2009-01-03T07:25:00.002-06:00

It's funny that I feel busy yet I don't feel like I am busy with things that are interesting enough to blog about. So, I have come to realize that this is just a once a month blog! I have also become addicted to Facebook and more daily updates can be found there.

Here is our December...

In the beginning of the month Jimmy turned 11. Yes, my baby is 11 years old. He is also 1/2 way through 5th grade and therefore almost done with his elementary years. He had his 5th grade concert on the actual night of his birthday so Grandma, Nana, Peggy, Doug, Kate, Will, and Ellie came out to see his show and go out to dinner with us. That made his day very special.

I finished up school a week before the boys and truly enjoyed some quiet time. This past semester was rough and my brain needed a serious time out! The boys were supposed to be done with school on the 19th but mother nature intervened and gave them a surprise snow day, so they were done on the 18th instead. I was the only one sad about that and it was because that meant that Jimmy wasn't going to have his last Christmas party! It also meant that I had a lot of cup cakes, a cheese and sausage tray and a fruit tray that was going to waste! However, no worries we took care of all of that!!

We had a nice break off together. We didn't do anything special, just spent time together. Christmas was wonderful as always. Christmas Eve we had the Gorski family over. We had to extend out dining room table into the living room to seat 18 people but it worked out well. All of the cousins had fun playing the Wii and running around together making many happy memories. On Christmas Day we had the Hagerty family over. We also such a nice day together visiting and enjoying more Christmas ham. Poor Danny received many duplicate gifts but he was a very good sport about it! The three boys were playing more Wii and watching Christmas movies together! All in all our celebrations were successful and we all have more happy holiday memories.

Three days after Christmas Joe hit the big 13! You read it right, he is officially a teen! That one hit me SUPER hard!! I mean sometimes I don't feel much older than 13 so how can my son be that age?! It also means that he has just a year and a half until he gets into high school. The night before his birthday he had all of his friends over to help him celebrate. For his actual day we went up to Mary and Ben's house and Grandma met us there. After watching some football we took him out to Chilli's. He had a great day!

We had a really quiet New Year's Eve this year. Mary, Ben, Dan, and my mom came over to our house to celebrate with Phil, Jim, and me. Joe was with his friends at another party. (part of being 13, I guess) We played Are you Smarter than a Fifth Grader and none of us were! We screamed Happy New Year, set off some fireworks and banged on pots and pans. Then the boys put in a movie and us girls sat chatting until after 3!

So, here we are at the start of another year. I wish good health and happiness to all of you and may you be better at keeping your resolutions than I am!! Happy 2009, everyone!

Embarrassed to be from Illinois!

2008-12-09T18:36:00.002-06:00

I am so embarrassed of our state's government. The arrest of Gov. Blagojevich today has made our state look like a joke to the rest of the country and the world. In the press conference one of the men basically said that we were the most corrupt state in the nation. Just from the things revealed at the conference this morning, I think that he is worse than Nixon!

All that I can say is that I hope he sees serious jail time for his crimes. I hope that they put a cot right next to Gov. Ryan and they can sit in a 10 X 10 cell with each other! That will never happen but it sure would be fitting!

ARRRRRR!

Thanksgiving...

2008-11-28T10:49:00.003-06:00

We had such a wonderful Thanksgiving this year! My mom, Mary, Ben, and Danny all came over to our house for the first time! Since Mary lives in Madison now and has to work at 4 the next morning any other place was just too far to go and they would have been sitting at home alone on Thanksgiving. We couldn't let that happen so we decided to have it with just our little family at our house. We were a little bit nervous and not sure how it would go because this is the first time that we are not one of 70 some people at the Ryan Family Thanksgiving. It actually turned out to be quite a success.

My mom and Mary came between 12 and 1. Phil already had his turkey going in the roaster so he and Ben headed right for the TV and started watching football, and the three of us started to prepare all of the food. The kids all helped too. Danny helped to measure things and stir things, Jimmy actually made the pumpkin pie all by himself, and we used Joey's teenaged muscles to mash our potatoes!! It was so fun to all be in there together preparing every part of the meal. At around 3 the turkey was done and we all sat around the dining room table passing the bowls of food that we had just made. Everything was so good. The turkey was very moist thanks to Phil's "secret" recipe. And all of our side dishes were delish! When we were done we were so stuffed that Jimmy went upstairs and put on his jammie pants because they were strechy!!

During desert, as a joke, Mary pushed Ben's cupcake at him as he was going for a bite and got a little frosting on the tip of his nose and his beard. Ha, Ha, right. Well that turned into a food fight right there in my kitchen. I tried to stay unnoticed, you know laughing at everyone else but not actually getting any on me, but before I knew it I got hit from behind with a paper plate full of whip cream! While I was peeling the plate off of my face I could hear big foot steps running away from me and I knew it was Phil! Before I knew it Mary got Phil back for me which looked even funnier because he wears glasses. The whole thing only lasted about a minute and a half but it was so much fun that it may become an annual part of our Thankgiving feast!! Mary took pictures of all of us so when she sends them I will share them.

Overall, it was one of our best Holidays. I am so glad that we made these memoires with the kids and with each other. We all look forward to many, many more!

Congratulations Troyer Family

2008-10-31T10:28:00.004-06:00

Congratulations to my cousin Kate and her husband Joe. They just had a baby girl yesterday. So far the baby doesn't have a name that we know of! We are so happy for them and for Izzy who now has a baby sister. Having a baby sister myself I know what a special bond sisterhood is and I am glad that Izzy and her new baby sister will have that! We wish the new family tons of happiness!

Just as a side note this new baby is Nana's 27th great grandchild and is the 106th member of the Ryan family!

Things are looking up!

2008-10-25T22:34:00.002-06:00

We have been so blessed!! I know that sounds corny but you would not believe the way that our luck has changed. Phil was able to fix our washing machine with just a little $7.00 part; just as we were removing the toilet to bring it to the garage the cap fell out; and Phil was able to get a temporary fix on his car! If that is not the power of prayer I don't know what is!

On Friday Jimmy and I went to see High School Musical 3! Both of us are huge fans of the series and have had this on the calendar since we found out the premier date. We watched the first two during the week before so that we would have it fresh in our minds. (It was also just a really good excuse to watch them on a busy weeknight when we usually don't watch a lot of movies) I picked him up after school and we went right to see the matinee! Our review..... it was the BEST ONE YET!!! We talked about it and sang the songs all of the way home. We are going to get the soundtrack the next time that we are at the store! We were a little sad at the end because according to all of the actors this will be the last one! I sure hope that they change their minds. I really enjoy the movies because I have loved musicals my entire life and I am so glad to share this love with Jimmy. I know the critics don't like it because the story lines are simple but maybe that is why I love it even more. Times are hard enough right now, I don't mind 2 simple hours of singing and dancing. So, if you saw the first two and liked them at all, you will enjoy this move. If you saw the first two and loved them they way that we did, you will LOVE this movie! Besides even if you only go for your kids, watching Zac Efron for 2 hours will make it worth it to you...what a cutie he is!!

Mary, Ben, and Danny came down today and we went to Edward's Apple Orchard. Sadly, the apple picking was closed for some reason but everything else was still open so we still had fun. Danny got to ride a pony, Jimmy and Danny played at the playground, we ate apple donuts and had hot apple cider. Phil and Ben also decided to try something new to all of us...Apple Pie with Cheese on top. The sight of it made my stomach turn but both of them enjoyed it. Whle we were there a news crew was filming a segment on the orchard. Jimmy noticed their cameras and placed himself right in the background pretending to be really into the pumpkins. Well it worked because there he was on the 10:00 news behind the woman who was being interviewed. What a ham!!

After the orchard we came back to our house and had a big spaghetti and meatball dinner. Then we played some Wii fit and all got a good laugh watching each other. They headed home just a little while ago. I am so glad that we get together as often as we do because we all have such a good time when we are together.

Tomorrow we are going to rest, rest, rest! I love a lazy Sunday. I hope all of you are well!

Later Gators!

When it rains it pours...

2008-10-19T18:26:00.004-06:00

...and it is pouring here! Our hall way bathroom has a broken toilet, the washing machine broke yesterday afternoon, and then Phil called to say that his transmission was blown and that he only had 2nd gear in his car. Can it get any worse? Uggggg!!

It started a few weeks ago when Jimmy got sent up to clean the bathroom. Apparently he scooped up some things from the floor and thought that they would all flush. Well, all of them did except for the HAIR SPRAY CAP!!! Now all of you that remember Jimmy's toddler years will get a good laugh out of that because he flooded our toilet more than once between the ages of 2-4 and he did it with many funny items! So, what better person for this to happen to, right! Well, for a couple of days the toilet was completly out of commision but then it seemed to fix itself because we were able to use it again. Then earlier this week it over flowed. Phil got out his plumbers snake, took the toilet off and did all that he could do to try to fix it. The cap is stuck in the toilet right where we can't get at it!! It is a done deal, we need a new toilet. So we are now living with a hole in the floor of our bathroom until payday when we can run and get a new toilet. Too bad that our Joe isn't Joe the plumber!

That would have been no big deal except yesterday I was doing laundry when all of the sudden it sounded as if the washing machine had a bowling ball in it. I ran down to the basement to see what was going on and lifted the lid. The center stand in the basin was completly broken off and flying around with all of the clothes. Phil is going to work more on that tomorrow when he is off and we sure hope that he can fix it.

The worst news was the news of his car! We can live with one bathroom and I can go to the Laundry Bin to do laundry, but we NEED him to have a car. Worst case scenario he will take the van and I will have to miss some of my classes on the days that he is working. I am hopeful that we will get it fixed before we need to take that drastic measure!

On a happy note the old saying goes that things come in threes so I feel like we have paid our dues for a while. I can only hope that the universe agrees!

OK, its been a while...

2008-08-29T10:10:00.003-06:00

It has been so long in fact that I entered my password wrong two times.

According to the blog I have not been on here since the last weekend of June! Yikes. I will try to catch you up without putting you to sleep in the process.

JULY
It will actually be quite easy to catch you up for July because not much happened in that month for us. We had a Fourth of July Bar-B-Q with Mary, Ben, and Danny. Mary and Ben purchased a whole bunch of fireworks and Phil and Ben set off the most amazing back yard firework show that we have ever seen. It was like watching a professional show. We only got scared twice. Once because Ben gave himself a pretty nice burn on his hand and the other because one of the fireworks decided to go off about 15 feet above our heads instead of way up in the sky! Besides that it was a perfect night. For the rest of July we finished up baseball where Joe's team took 4th out of 12 and Jim's team took 1st out of 13! It was a good baseball season for us but I was excited to be done with the four nights a week. That excitement only lasted for one week however because Jim started football and that is five nights a week for two hours!

I was able to get away on a girl's weekend, which is always so much fun. Mary, Annie, and I took my mom to Shipshewanna, Indiana as her Mother's Day gift. It is a cute little Amish village with shops and resturants up and down its few main streets. We had lots of fun walking in and out of the little stores and getting a chance to visit with out the "boy/men" interuptions that usually happen when all of us get together! What we didn't know when we planned the trip was that the town completely shuts down at 5 PM. We were sitting in the hotel room wondering what we should do when Mary saw that there was a county fair going on a few towns over. So, we all packed in her van and drove to the county fair. We had a surprise when we found out that Pat Benattar was perfoming that night. We sat and listened to a few of her songs and walked around the fair eating food that was OHHH so tasty but OHHH so bad for us. It was great to get away with just us girls and I can't wait until we can plan another trip. Where will we go next time, girls?

So, that was July!

August

August started out with a bang! On August 2nd my baby brother finally got married to the love of his life, Annie! Most of us did not know what to expect of the ceremony because it was going to be different than anything we had ever been to. They got married under a canopy of flowers, out on the lawn at the Grand Geneva. It was such an elegant and beautiful yet personal ceremony that almost everyone was left in tears. It started out with their very good friend and roommate for the last four years, Bergen, singing while Annie came in with her dad. From there it went right into their personally written vows. Each of them vowed things that were meaningful to all relationships and things that were meaningful to just the two of them. For instance Annie vowed to bring him green apples when he is sick and to scratch his back until he falls asleep. Anyone that really knows Ray knows how much those two things mean! He had very personal vows that even included some of his students from Gage Park that had attended the wedding. He started out by saying, "I know that marriage will be ...." and his students all yelled, "HARD WORK, COACH!" It was really cool and unexpected which made people wipe their tears for a minute and giggle! After the vows they took love letters that they had written to each other along with a bottle of wine and two glasses and put them into a box that was made of cooper roofing materials. (It was made by Ray's boss, and roofing owner, because that was how Ray supported himself through his college years.) Together they nailed it shut and will not open it again until their 10th anniversary. They also used a Celtic tradition and "tied the knot" with a ribbon around their hands. To end the ceremony they released two doves that promptly flew away side by side! Immediately after the ceremony we all went in to the reception hall and that's where the real party began! All of us in the bridal party were introduced to the White Sox theme song which was quite hard for Phil and the boys!! At least Ray had given them Cubs hats to wear during this difficult time!! Besides that it was a very typical Ryan wedding with a full dance floor all night long. It was fun to see that the Clark family pretty much kept up with us in the dancing department. I would say the floor was pretty equal with Hagerty/Ryan's and Clarks! Jimmy ended up to be the family member with the most stamina however because he NEVER left the floor. He danced all night long with anyone that would dance with him. At one point Phil and I looked over and he was in the middle of three teenage girls just dancing away. We both looked at each other and knew that was a sign for what lies ahead!! All in all it was an awesome wedding and we wish Ray and Annie all of the luck and love in the world! Welcome to the family, Annie, we love you!

August brought us more than a new sister-in-law and aunt! It brought the boys and me back to school. (insert sob!) It is a mixed bag for me because I want so badly to finish school and have my degree but I love summer and being off too! I always mourn my time with the kids when school comes. We spend so much time together in the summer staying up late, laughing, going to baseball games, just making memories. As every summer ends I get so sad because I actually really like my kids and enjoy being with them! Sadly though the time has come when we must once again live our lives by homework, assignment notebooks, and bedtimes. We will live for weekends and holiday breaks!

Even though I am upset about having to go back to school I am actually excited about the classes that I am taking. I am finally in some classes that are for teaching. After all of this time with Gen Ed classes it is so nice to have a subject be something that you actually feel you can and will apply in your future career. It has been so fun to hear the professors say things like... "When you are a teacher" and "Your students will..." The first time I heard that I got so excited that a spontaneous smile came onto my face. MY STUDENTS!! Yes, I will soon have my own students. It really gives me the drive to keep plugging along at this!!

We also attended another Ryan family gathering in August. This one was much more casual than the wedding, which was a fun change after this year of weddings. We went to a Kane County Cougars game that Bridget and Dan Fors arranged for all of us. We first met at their house for some swimming, hot dogs and brats and then went on to the game. It was so fun visiting with everyone and their kids. The Cougars were losing through almost the whole game but came through in the end with a win. (HA, I bet most of you thought that I didn't know that b/c I chatted for the whole game!!) After the game was an awesome fireworks show then all of the kids got to go and run the bases. Everyone that attended had so much fun and would love to see it become an annual event. Thanks to Bridget and Dan for doing all of the leg work!

Well, now you are pretty much caught up on our lives. Sorry that this was such a long one!!

Later Gators!!

You just can't beat a Ryan wedding

2008-06-30T10:33:00.004-06:00

Over the weekend Phil and I went down to Chicago to attend my cousin Tom's wedding to his new wife Julie. The mass was beautiful from little three year old Jack, the adorable ring bearer, and his shamrock pillow to the awesome bag pipes and drums that lead the bride and groom away from the alter.

The reception though was once again the best part of the whole day. Phil and I have been to many weddings with his photography business and we have decided that there is no better wedding, for us, than a Ryan wedding. The food was delicious then the dance floor was at full capacity with awesome tunes being played and the company couldn't be beat. The liquor was flowing fast from the open bar but you would never know it because when you looked around the room all that you saw were fun, happy people giggling over old stories or sharing new ones. Once again my aunts and uncles rocked the dance floor with all of us and some of them even lasted longer than the people my age. Even Nana got up to dance for a few of the songs. In the middle of the dancing they announced that out in the hall they had opened a "Chicago Style Hot Dog Stand"! They were so good and such a unique touch to the wedding. When you have 35 first cousins like we do it gets tough to think of things that no one has seen or done before. Well, Tom and Julie did that with their hot dogs. Everyone that I was with had at least one dog and some of them had even more. It was very much appreciated by the all of us.

When the reception ended at 1:00 we shuttled back to the hotel on the late bus and continued the party as we always do. My Aunt Nonie and Uncle Gary hosted all of us in their hotel room where we stayed and chatted and laughed until close to 4 a.m.

So, to Tom and Julie Ryan, thanks for another great family wedding and may you both have a happy and wonderful life together!

Birthday, Anniversary, and Father's Day...OH MY!!

2008-06-18T11:25:00.007-06:00

The beginning of June is always busy for us. First we have my birthday, then our anniversary and then Father's Day.

Birthday...On June 5th I turned 31! I know that it's not old, in fact it's not even close to old. However, it is an age that I can remember thinking was old when I was younger. Anything over 30 sounded old to me and now I am not just 30 I am officially over 30! I spent my birthday where else but the baseball field for one of Joey's games. After the game we went to get some ice cream at a little place I love in Rockton. All in all it was a nice day.

Anniversary...On June 14th Phil and I celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary. We actually didn't have a lot of time in the schedule to celebrate because Jimmy had a tournament game all day and that night we had to go to a Quinceanera for someone at Phil's work. Earlier in the day though I went down in the basement and read all of the cards that had been given to us on that day, we looked at our wedding photos, and I watched a little bit of the video. It is amazing what 11 years has done to both of us. At the wedding I had just turned twenty 9 days earlier, I was a size 8, I had red hair, and I truly believed that it was impossible to be more in love with Phil than I was that day at the alter. At the wedding Phil was only 21, weighed in at 185 lbs, and had every hair on his head! Well today we are older, neither of us is close to the weight we were, I have gone back to my roots with mousy brown hair while he has lost quite a few of his hairs, and life has thrown us some twists and turns that at 20 and 21 we just didn't see coming. I have also beat the impossible because I do love him more than I did that day. Yes on that day he was young and looking good but something is to be said about taking the twists and turns of life and staying by each other's sides. Truth be told we have had many more happy times than hard times, but the hard times have been there. Either of us could have jumped ship and said it was just too hard, but we haven't. I love him for that! So, as we have changed on the outside our hearts have changed too because we are more in love today than we were 11 years ago. Here's to the next 11 and beyond!

Father's Day... June 15th was Father's Day. The boys and I took Phil to a Rockford Riverhawks game. Father's were allowed to take their children out on the field for a half hour and play catch before the game started. Then we watched the Riverhawks barely win in the 9th inning 9/8. After the game Father's got to run the bases with their children. Phil and the boys really loved playing catch and running the bases out on the field. We love going to those games because the players are so cool too. They were really good with all of the kids there signing ball and mitts and just talking to the kids. When we got home we watched National Treasure 2 and ate some Ice Cream. It was a nice relaxing day for all of us especially Phil for whom nice relaxing days are far and few between. I hope that all of the wonderful father's out there had just as nice of days with their families!!

My scanner isn't working great but here are a few pictures of us 11 years ago...

Until next time.... Later Gators!

Zoo Madness and the end of another school year!!

2008-06-03T15:59:00.006-06:00

Ok, get the tune ready...

SCHOOOOOOOL'S OUT FOR SUMMER! SCHOOOOOOOLS OUT FOR SUMMER!

The boys are now officially in 5th and 7th grade! WoW! Now we can do what we love, stay up late and sleep in the next day!! No more, "Do you have homework?" "Let me check your take home folder", "How many AR points do you have?" ect. ect.! Woo Hoo!!

Now on to Zoo madness...

Yesterday I went on the Fourth Grade field trip to Madison Zoo with Jimmy's class. Since I had worked in the school just last year and because I know Jimmy's teacher so well, she felt comfortable putting the, shall we say, "naughty" boy in my group. I know this boy from last year and I know his background story so I know what discipline to use and when it is necessary! To give a little background he has not had a good childhood. Both parents have been in and out of prison for very bad crimes and he is currently living with his grandmother because they are there again!! The many tragedies of his childhood have turned him into a perpetual liar and a boy that likes to run away, just to name a few traits. Well, I knew all of that so I was more than ready, so I thought!

We arrived at the zoo and started off to see whatever animals the 5 boys wanted to see. Every single place we went he would do his very best to try and get away from me. I ended up having my hand on his shoulder most of the morning until he started to wiggle away from even that. At that point I told him that if he got more than 6 feet away from our group in a crowd I was going to hold his hand the rest of the day. Guess what, within 2 minutes he became my hand buddy!! Also , during this whole time he was telling me what a mean helper I was because I wouldn't buy him ice cream, pop, or toys at the store.

Towards the end of the day we had seen all of the animals and the boys wanted to play at the new playground. There is a 3 foot entrance / exit to the playground so I felt safe letting all 5 boys go in and play without me holding any more hands. I then sat myself right in front of the entrance with my eyes watching everyone that went in or out. I was doing that until a huge group of students came rushing in at the same time and for about 10 seconds I couldn't see the whole gate. I got a bad feeling about this so I called Jimmy over and told him to find our group of 5 so that I could do a head count. Well, you guessed it, four of them were in front of me almost immediately and the one boy was GONE!! I screamed his name a couple of times and when he couldn't be found I called the teacher and the other moms that were with us. Lucky for me the teacher was standing right near the other teachers, a few bus drivers, and some of the other parents! Everyone scattered and went looking for him. After what felt like forever, but according to my outgoing and incoming calls on the cell phone was only four minutes, he was found begging a vendor for some free ice cream.

I had held myself together for the entire time that we were looking for him but once we found him I just started to cry! Not a bawl, but a cry of fear and relief!! That was so scary to think that I had lost a child that I was responsible for. When he was asked why he did that he at first told the teacher that I had said it was ok to leave. He then said that another parent told him to go with her. He finally admitted that he saw the group of kids running in and snuck past them. I was feeling so horrible but the teachers assured me that it was not my fault and that it had happened on the last field trip to the actual teacher. Who would have thought that he would sneak away even with me sitting there watching like that.

After I got over the feeling of relief I was feeling ANGRY. I was so pissed off at this kid who had the nerve to act this way when people were just trying to be kind to him and help him to have a good day. Then I had to have a little chat with myself and remind myself that I have no idea what it would be like to have lived his life. I had to remind myself to just be grateful that my boys are not like this and to think of his poor grandmother who has had this put upon her to deal with. I also reminded myself that Jimmy's poor teacher, and my friend, had been putting up with this B.S. all year long and I only had to deal with it for the day! That made me feel better.

When I got to school today to help run the fourth grade picnic lunch and ice cream social a friend of mine and a fellow chaperone at the zoo gave me the funniest card and a Dove candy bar. (my fav!) On the front is a hand and it says wave this card back and forth. Then you open it up and it says "This is me waving hello!" She had scratched out the word hello and written, "This is me waving... I found John Doe*" We passed the card around to all of the other teachers and moms that had been on the "hunt" and everyone had a pretty good laugh about it. Then as we were serving ice cream he came up to me, put his bowl in front of my face and said, "Whip me!" He was of course demanding whip cream but all of the moms started laughing and one told him, "You better watch it, she might actually WHIP YOU!" He totally didn't get it and just walked away!!

Alas, that day is behind us and the school year is now done. Yet another year gone by so quickly. Fifth grade is going to be Jimmy's last year of elementary school, the first year that he goes trick or treating alone, his first overnight field trip with the school, and more than likely the last year he will want me "hanging around" as his room mom! For Joey seventh grade will mean that he is half way through middle school, he will finally get the cell phone he has been begging for, he will join even more clubs & be home even less, and this is the year that he turns 13. To quote Scarlett O'Hara "I won't think about that right now, I will think about that tomorrow." For now I will just enjoy the benefits of summer; our time together with family, the warm weather, picnics, bike rides, baseball, and so much more. I hope that all of you do too. Happy Summer.

*Name was changed to protect the "innocent" :)

Summer is almost here!

2008-05-28T13:02:00.002-06:00

Hello everyone! I know that I haven't been on here in a while. Here's what's been happening...

Phil...
Most of you know that Phil has an online radio show that he does. He does a really good job and loves it. Well, on Monday night he got a chance to interview a real TV celebrity. He talked to one of the captains from the Discovery show The Deadliest Catch!! It was the captain that brought his wife along with him on his ship and ended up losing a bet to her. He talked to them for 2 hours on his show and was able to get answers to many questions that we had. It was so fun and I was so proud of him. Thank you to those of you that tuned in! This Friday he and Ben are going to NY to stay in a Haunted Hotel. He is going to do a show on Saturday night while they are on an investigation. It will be like having a TAPS show on the radio. If you are interested I will send you a link so that you can tune it.

Me...
I have had the last couple of weeks off which has been awesome! I really got to relax my brain and now I feel ready for my summer math class.! Hip, Hip, Hurray!! Besides resting and getting the house in some order I have been up at the schools doing end of the year things. Phil and I were just up there in fact for Jimmy's field day. I will post some pictures of that some time soon. Also I have been out at the ball field four nights a week. (2 nights each)

Joe...
Last Friday Joe went on a field trip with the band. They started at Johnsburg High School for a competition and then went on to Great America. His school scored a superior at the competition which is the highest score available. When I picked him up at 9 that night he was exhausted but couldn't stop talking about what a great time he had. The first thing he said when he got in the car was that it was awesome because they spent the whole day without any adults!! He said that he went on every ride except for the Raging Bull. The place was so empty that when a couple of rides ended they got to stay in their seats and go again because no one was in line for their seats. He is enjoying baseball. Right now his team is 3/4. Not too bad since last year this same team took last place!!

Jim...
Praise the Lord, he finally got his hair cut! It is nice and short with spiked up bangs. The best thing about it is that I didn't force him to do it. On the way home from one of his games he asked me if I would take him to get his hair cut because the catchers mask kept pulling his hair. I didn't hesitate in saying YES!! The next day as soon as he got off of the bus I was sitting in the van ready to go. He said that he is loving the short hair again! Jim is VERY ready for summer, we all know that he is just not a school kid. He is having an awesome season of baseball. So far his team is undefeated!

Misc...
Phil and Joe planted some new trees in our backyard the other day. If you remember our backyard it is very empty because we used to have the pool and we didn't want leaves and things in there. Now that we took the pool down we felt like we needed something out there. We chose two baby maple trees and truth be told when they finally fill out and look just right, we'll be downsizing! That's ok though because Phil and Joe had a fun time planting them and you can't take back memories like that. Also so far Joe has been quite the gardener out there everyday with the hose, so maybe he found another hobby!!

The boys are done with school on June 3rd and I can't wait! I just love it when we are all off and we can stay up late together or go places during the day!

T.G.I.F.

2008-05-09T20:38:00.003-06:00

Man, what a long week it has been.

I had 3 of my 4 finals which all of you know is very draining. On top of that I had so much to do with the boys and it was Phil's long week at work. It was Teacher Appreciation week at the school and I am a room mom and the secretary of the Booster Club so I had a lot to do. Pretty much everyday this week I have been in the school doing something for the teachers. It started at the beginning of the week presenting gifts and serving food and it ended today when I was at Joey's school from 11-1:30 helping the 6th graders make their Tye-Dyed shirts for their field trip and field day!

On top of everything at the school baseball season started. That means that I am out at the ball field 4 nights a week from now through the end of July. The early games run from 5-7:30 which puts us home close to 8. We had one late game this week that didn't even start until 7:45. Try waking up 2 boys the next day who, like their mother, require a certain amount of sleep. All three of us were very crabby....NOT FUN!!

A couple of stats for you...Joey's team started out rough on Tuesday losing the first game but they came back strong on Thursday winning by a huge lead. Jimmy's team won their Monday and Wednesday games so he is a very happy boy.

I love doing all of these things and given the choice I would just do the "mom" things at the school. However, that is not the case and this week I had to squeeze all of that in with some major studying!! Well, I did it and I just have my Psychology test left on Tuesday which is not cumulative so I am not as worried. I wish that I could say I would be on summer break after that but that's not the case. I have three weeks off and then I am taking a summer math class. God help me and my poor family because math is hard enough for me in 14 weeks to do it in 7 is going to be really hard. I will muddle through though!

So, my long week is over, I have given Jimmy and his friends strict instructions and bed times and I am headed off to bed where I hopefully will not wake up until around 9 am.

P.S. Huge props to Uncle Jim on his amazing ride! I have told everyone that would listen to me talk about it, truly amazing!!

I'm on my way and so is Ray!!

2008-04-30T09:05:00.003-06:00

I met with one of the Rock Valley College counselors today to see exactly where I am in this long process. He had good news for me. If I take a summer class, five classes in the fall, and then five in the spring I will have my associates degree this time next year! It is worth it for me to take the heavier load of five classes and be done in May 2009 instead of December of 2009 because when it gets down to it I just want to be done with school and have a college degree in my hand!!

Speaking of college degrees my brother is graduating this Saturday. He is the first member of our immediate family to graduate college. For those of you that don't know he already has a job lined up, teaching History at Gage High School in Chicago. He has been there since last fall doing his observation and student teaching and they want him so badly that they told him not to even bother going to any job fairs or interviews. He was also their wrestling coach this year and was able to get a bunch of the boys to state for the first time! It is really wonderful to see him so fulfilled with his career. It was a long, hard road for him from Afghanistan to here and we are all very proud of him. So, think of him on Saturday and I will post pictures of our roof top party later. Way to go, Ray!!

Blue Man!!

2008-04-22T11:11:00.005-06:00

I had plans to go and see the Blue Man Concert with my friend Lynne, her daughter Courtney, and Courtney's friend on Sunday. At the last minute Courtney's friend was not able to go and they called and offered the ticket to Joey. He actually was a little hesitant because he was out in the yard playing football and didn't want to have to leave his friends and come in for a shower. I pulled up a clip on youtube to show him what it was and that it was in fact worth missing the neighborhood game for one day!! He relented and went to get ready.

The show started at 7:30 and we were still stuck in traffic at 7:25. The crappy thing was that we were stuck right in front of the Metro Centre. There we were starring at the big orange building knowing that we should be in there. I was so mad! It ended up that more than 1/2 of the people were in the same situation because they had closed the parking garage and parking in downtown Rockford is not easy. We were very lucky and we found an empty parking lot about 5 blocks away. We got out and ran to the Metro as fast as we could. Not easy to do when you are wearing flip-flops like me and Courtney.

Well, we were late but luckily we were only missing the opening act which from what I did see, was not a big deal to miss. It was just some guy scratching records!

The show finally did start about 8:00 and it was well worth all of the craziness!! If you have not seen a Blue Man Group show I am not really sure how to explain it to you. It was fascinating. There was an unbelievable light show, rock music with lyrics that were really meaningful, and lots of comedy. I had never seen them perform before and I went in thinking that it was some men painted blue that would bang on PVC pipes and make music. That was going to be interesting enough to me but they totally blew me away! I was completely amazed at the simple things that they were using to make recognizable music. They also had an awesome percussion section and that always helps. In total there were 4 drummers.

All of us talked about it all of the way home which is always a sign of a really good show. Joey and I were still talking about it the next day. He said that he was so glad that he had decided to go with me and not keep playing with his friends. If any of you ever get a chance to go and see them in concert I highly recommend it to you!

Better late than never....

2008-04-18T20:19:00.002-06:00

I have been so bad about logging on here and posting. Mostly because the things that have been going on seemed so day to day and I didn't want to bore anyone. Anywho, here's what's up.....

Joey had his Spring Band Concert and the whole band showed incredible improvement! What a difference from December. Joey really enjoys playing his saxophone and I am so proud of him that he has the ability to play an instrument. I just never had that talent and believe me I tried.

Jimmy had his 4th grade Spring Musical and the theme was Oliver. He was the Funeral Director. We enjoyed that just as much. It was so fun for me to see many students that I have not seen since I left last year. Amazing what a year can do!!

Nana and my mom got to make it out to both shows which made us so happy. Thanks for taking the trip both times. (And special thank you to Nana for sitting in the bleachers for over an hour at Joey's show.) You two are wonderful and have never missed anything for the boys!!

Phil and I are just going along, same 'ol, same 'ol. I have been spending 4 nights a week out at the baseball field watching the kids practices. Their games start in the beginning of May which will be nice because practice is getting a little old to watch. Joey has been practicing by the school track though so I have been taking advantage of that hour and half by walking the track. Jimmy has been walking with me and we get to have some very nice time together without any distractions. Plus, we are exercising!

Last weekend I was at Dawn's house for a Girls Night Out. We were celebrating the fact that Dawn quit her old job! It was a blast. We played Guitar Hero which I actually own but I have never played because the boys and their friends are always hogging it. Now that I know how much fun it is I am going to put my name on the list and get my 10 minutes of play with the egg timer! Watch out Holly, I am gunning for you at the next party!! We also played Dancing With The Stars because most of us are huge fans of the show. It reminded me of the old school Nintendo Power Pad! Way too much work and the highest I was able to get was a 5!

Today Phil and his friends put in my new kitchen door. We needed to get rid of our slider because last winter it was actually snowing in my kitchen thanks to the horrible seal on the door. It always had a cold draft but snow was ridiculous! The handle on the door was also broken and didn't lock anymore. We red necked it until now with duct tape and paper bags as installation. We replaced it with a set of French Doors that have the blinds inside of the windows. It ended up to be a good thing that we did that because when they pulled the old door out they found out that the wood underneath it had rotted completely. Phil simply put his finger on the wood and it crumbled. They had to run to Menard's and get all new wood. All the while I am sitting here with a HUGE hole in my kitchen and rain on the way. Well they started the job at 9 and thanks to the extra work did not finish until 4:15! A few prayers helped hold off the rain too. It literally started raining just as his friend put the last piece of siding up!! Thank you God. I really LOVE my new doors though so it was totally worth all the hard work. (Of course I did none of the work so I guess that its not really my place to say that) I will post pictures soon, when it is sunny out!!

Well that's all for now. Later Gators!!

When you wish upon a star....

2008-03-10T13:04:00.002-06:00

This is a wish that I bet all men have wished at one time or another. Even if they won't admit it out loud.

The boys were sitting at the kitchen table doing some homework while I was cooking dinner on Friday night. Somehow the subject of wishes came up. They asked me if I had one wish what would it be. I said to be done with school and have my own classroom. Joey's wish was that he was rich. Then it was Jimmy's turn. Here was his wish.......

Jimmy: "I wish that I could be a girl for one whole day!"

I stopped stirring and Joey put his pencil down on the table. Both of us gave him the "what are you talking about" look. Then he explained......

"Well, no offence Mom, but girls are so weird and so confusing. I just don't get them at all. I thought that if I was a girl for a day I would find out all of their secrets and then I would understand them. (Insert huge grin on his face) Then when I came back as a boy, I would get all of the girlfriends!!"

I just laughed and Joey just shook his head. It is always interesting when you get into Jimmy's brain!

Back to normal!

2008-02-28T09:48:00.004-06:00

My psychology class was canceled today so I am sitting in the school library with nothing to do. I figured, why not blog!!

Everyone in my house is finally back to normal. The boys have been on their antibiotic for 2 days and they are doing great.

I knew yesterday that they were doing better because all of the sudden the fighting began. They had laid on the couch together since Sunday night watching whatever came on the TV. In fact, they were so sick, I believe they would have laid there and watched paint dry. Well by yesterday morning I started hearing, "Get your NASTY foot off of me!", or "I don't want to watch your dumb shows, I want to watch Sports Network!" and a lot of "MOOOOOM, he's doing ________"!!! By noon I told them both that if I heard one more argument I was driving them to school! They stopped pretty fast. I wished that I had their school work for them to do but the school only gives work after 3 missed days and you can only pick it up after school. Well, yesterday was the 3rd day but I couldn't pick it up until 3!!

They finally went back to school for the first time today. They have a lot of work to do, especially Joey. I went yesterday to pick up school work and I was shocked at how much Joey had to do. Jimmy had quite a bit too but it was easier work like spelling worksheets, and fill in the blanks for Social Studies. He also had to finish the read aloud book that the class had been reading so that he could take the AR test. We were able to get all of his work done so he is officially caught up. Pre-teen, hormonal Joey would not stop going on and on about how unfair it was that Jimmy was done and how middle school was the worst!!! He was truly mad! They are off tomorrow because of conferences at school so we will just work all day long to get his stuff done. I guess it will be like a day of home schooling which should be real fun because as I mentioned above he is a preteen and hormonal but, only with ME!!

Today I did my second Speech for my Speech class. I am quite sure that I bombed it! It had to be an informational speech and I did it on how to make chocolate candies and suckers. When I get nervous I talk way too fast so I did not fill the time requirement. Also, I was shaking so bad that everyone could see. When I went to pass the molds around for everyone to look at, the mold was visibly vibrating in my hand!! Oh how I hate this class. I know that it is a fear that I must conquer so that I can do parent orientations and other things someday when I have a job. I just don't know how to get over it. I hate talking to a room full of adults! I feel like they are all judging me. Have any of you ever been afraid of public speaking and been able to get over it? Or anyone who is just naturally good? Do you have some tips you would be willing to share?

My Speech professor really scared me when class ended and he asked me if I would stay behind. When everyone left he told me that another student had come to him to talk about me but wanted their name left out of it. (Enter my heart beating out of my chest, sweat on my brow, and a dry mouth) I just stood there with my mouth open and he said, "Oh, no, it's good! She wanted me to tell 'the mom in the front' that she really appreciates the eye contact you gave her during her speech. She said that you were the only one in the room that looked like you were paying any attention to what she had to say." I asked him if that could give me some bonus points on my own speech and he just laughed. I am guessing that is a no. So, that is what I am to my fellow students of 18 and 19. 'The mom in the front' Oh well everyone needs a label I guess.

Later Gators!

Well, Hello again!

2008-02-26T12:55:00.003-06:00

It has been quite a while since I was on here. I guess I was busier than I thought, but with what?? Pretty much just day to day life.

School is keeping me pretty busy right now. I love having all of my classes on Tuesday and Thursday. It gives me Monday, Wednesday, and Friday to do everything else that needs to be done. This week I have two essays due and one speech!! Ahhhh! Thank goodness for the extra days of work time.

Just last weekend we took our annual February getaway with Mary and Ben and went down to Springfield. We all had an awesome time together like we always do. We saw many sites that put us in awwww but that is because Phil and I are huge history buffs. We just love it. We went to see Abraham Lincoln's home and I didn't want to leave the street because I was enjoying soaking in all of the history from every single original house!! We also toured our new capital building and our old capital building. The very best part of the whole weekend was the Lincoln museum and library. If any of you are history buffs like us I highly recommend it to you. We spent well over 3 hours in there and frankly we could have been there even longer. Joey and Ben enjoyed it almost as much as Phil and I did. Mary, Jimmy, and Danny all liked it but could have gone through it in about half the time and felt satisfied about it. Mary is just not into history, Danny is too young to really choose if he is into it or not and Jimmy hates anything to do with school!! Thank goodness for Mrs. Lincoln's attic where Mary took the boys and let them play for about and hour and a half. (Love ya Mary!!)

Sadly, once you step outside of Capital Square, Springfield is a dump! It is actually embarrassing to have that city represent our state! I never would have expected that. We have been to a couple of capital cities before and they have all been decent. It is too bad that so many people come there to see the Lincoln Museum and walk away with such an awful perception of Illinois. I sure hope that they clean it up some time.

The boys had fun swimming and hot tubing at the hotel. To tell the truth I enjoyed that too! With all of this crappy weather it was nice to take a dip and pretend like it wasn't only 9 degrees outside. This was the first trip we have taken where we got adjoining rooms and now I will never do it another way! It was so nice for the boys to be able to run back and forth between the rooms without hearing the slamming of the hallway door and then having to keep getting up to let them back in.

The worst part of the trip was the drive home. Joey all of the sudden was flushed in the face and said that it hurt really bad to swallow. He was eventually driven to tears which is not common in Joey when he is sick. Later that night Jimmy started to have the same symptoms and by Monday morning Phil had it. When we were finally able to get everyone into the doctor they were diagnosed with strep throat and the flu! My poor boys are sick still today, all three of them.

So, that is where we are as of today. I will try to get on here more. Spring Break is coming and I will finally have a break!

Happy Belated Birthday, MOM!

2008-01-18T10:10:00.001-06:00

Yesterday was my mom's 54th Birthday! Mom, sorry that I wasn't able to get on here yesterday. It was good to talk to you though and I am glad that you had a nice dinner with Nonie and Gary.

Well as for the Gorski Happeinings we are all back to our busy schedules.

I started school again on Tuesday. I only have classes on Tuesday and Thursday now and I love it! My school days are long but I love having Monday, Wednesday, and Friday off to study, get into Jimmy's classroom and help, or clean the house.

Joey and Jimmy are also back in school. They are right back in the swing of things. Jimmy joined basketball at the Y so we will be there Tuesday and Friday nights for practice along with Saturday morining for the game. (I enjoy being at that stuff though because many of my friends are there with their kids and we get to chat.) He is such a "sports kid"! Whatever sport season it is; that is his new favorite sport! He has been walking around the house bouncing a basketball for the last week. I thought that the football flying up in the air all day was annoying! I would trade that for the thudding that I am now hearing! I can not wait until it is warm out so that he can get back outside and run and play with his friends. Right now my basement has become their new playground!

Speaking of weather, what is going on? We have a high of 5 all weekend! Yuck, I hate the cold more than anything at all. It isn't worth taking my 11 year old van out in this weather. It doesn't have good heat when it is 40 degrees out forget about it when it is 5! So, that means that by Monday I will have serious cabin fever! Thank goodness that I have my wonderful sister-in-law Kate and my best friend Lynne within 10 houses. I will be walking to one of their houses sometime this weekend just to get out of here!!

Joey turns 12!

2007-12-28T17:26:00.000-06:00

Today is Joey's 12th birthday. One more year and he will be a teen! He is having a sleepover with 7 of his friends and the noise from the basement is just CRAZY!!! They will calm down though, right??? So here are some pictures of him today. I took them with my crappy Sony so they are not the best!!

My boys and Belle

Joe! (If you click this to open it you will see a small little smile)

Jimmy, Joey, Danny, and Belle

I'm Done!

2007-12-21T11:00:00.000-06:00

Well I am officially done with my first semester of full time school! My finals were done last Thursday but now grades have been posted and I really feel done. The kids are done today and we will all be on break, even Phil. His plant is having a mandatory shut down until January 4th. We are all looking forward to having some time off together!

Joey had his first band concert on December 17th. They did really good. I was expecting a lot of squeeks and mistakes but I didn't hear them. I was really impressed. Phil had to work that night, :( ,but we did video tape it for him. Phil's parents were able to make it though and we were really glad to have them there. They were both impressed with Joey's school and he enjoyed showing them where he spends his days. My mom also had to work that night and was missed, but we totally understand! Here a two pictures of that night.

Don't let my hat fool you, there is a lot of hair in there, he is taller than me!

Joey with his Pop-Pop and Mom-Mom! He's got a ways to go until he is taller than them!

Jimmy turns 10!!!!

2007-12-04T10:41:00.000-06:00

I can not believe that it has been 10 years already! I feel so old saying this, but time really does fly! Since it has been a whole decade since he was born I thought that I would take a trip down memory lane and talk about the day that he was born.

Ten years ago right now I was still enjoying that cute, fat 10 lb baby boy. He looked perfect and exactly like Phil. Who knew that at 9:15 that night my world would be turned upside down when the nurse woke me up to tell me there was a problem with the baby. By 10:30 they were wheeling him into my room in an incubator and living off of a machine. The nurse was telling me that I should tell my baby goodbye. I stuck my hand through the little hole on the side, grabbed his hand and told him how much him mommy loved him. Five minutes later he was in a helicopter on his way to Rockford Memorial. He was diagnosed there with Transposition of the Great Vessels and sent immediately to Christ Hospital in Chicago. Phil and his family followed the helicopter all night long from Woodstock, to Rockford, and finally to Chicago. I was in my dark hospital room, with a huge incision from the cesarean, with my mom. She gave me an extra pillow to put on my incision, climbed into my bed, held me tight and told me to just go ahead and cry. I became the baby in my mom's arms that night. I don't know how I would have made it through the night with out her.

Three days later I was on my way to Christ Hospital. Now it was my turn to be strong and be the mom. I stood by Jimmy's bed as long as the nurses would allow me to. They kept getting angry with me and telling me that I was doing too much being that I was post op. I knew better. A mom can never do too much!

At six days old he was taken into surgery. Again the doctors' and the nurses' told us that we should have a moment with the baby. Phil told him that he loved him and had to leave the room. I leaned in reaching around all of the tubes that were keeping my precious baby boy alive and whispered Our Father and then Now I lay me down to sleep into his ear.

His surgery lasted 6 and a half hours. Those were truly the longest 6 and half hours of my life. I just sat there, numb, without any emotion staring at the carpet. Still today I have the design of the carpet ingrained in my brain. When it was finally over they said that Phil and I could go in and see him.He had a whole room to himself. Here he was this tiny little baby on a tiny little bed in a room filled with machines. Each one doing a different job to keep his tiny heart beating and lungs breathing. He had tubes every where. Not even his bald little head was spared because that is where one of the IVs was located. I was not allowed to speak because every time that I did his heart beat would go through the roof. I just sat silently rubbing my thumb along the top of his hand. We were only allowed to stay in there about 10 minutes.

When we went back into the waiting room and I saw my mom the flood gates finally broke. The emotions of the day just flew out of me as I fell into her arms. I was inconsolable. I had been so scared all week that we were going to lose him and I had held it all in wanting to be strong. Now that the worst was over, I could let go.

He ended up spending 3 weeks at Christ Hospital. There were ups and downs through that time but nothing like the actual day of surgery. Poor Joey was being bounced around like a beach ball from family member to family member. Thank God he was an easy going 2 year old and that we had such a helpful family. Phil and I never could have made it through this on our own. It was with family at our side every step of the way that we made it through.

Jimmy has never really stopped giving us challenges. He was the much fussier infant, the impossible toddler, the super attached preschooler, and the student that hates school. However, if you doubled all of the drama you would have the joy and laughter Jimmy brings into our lives every day. I still thank God for our little miracle!

Happy 10th birthday Jimmy, I love you.

P.S. My sister-in-law Kate captured the whole couple of weeks with pictures. At the time I remember telling her that I was never going to want to look at these again. However ten years later I am grateful to her for that. So, here are some of the pictures of that time. Thanks Kate!!

Molly and Phil ~ Visiting Jimmy in the NICU
Molly and Phil ~ Visiting Jimmy in the NICU
Baby Jimmy in the NICU ~ That adult hand is Phil's

Joey and Jimmy meet for the first time 12-20-97
This is the first time I held Jimmy 12-17-97 He was still hooked up to some machines as you can see. He went home 3 days later.

Update on Joe's "growth"

2007-12-01T12:36:00.000-06:00

We went to the Dr. yesterday and walked out still not knowing much. The Dr. looked at it for about 5 seconds, looked up at me and said, "Is there any skin cancer in the family?" I told him that there is skin cancer all over on my mom's side of the family. He said, "Hmmmm??? We are going to need to take a culture of this."

As he was taking a culture I showed him another one that was growing right on above the current one. It is really tiny and flesh toned. I explained to him that this one looked exactly like that when it started. He looked up and me and said, "Yeah, that's not a wart. Wart's don't look like that."

So, he sent us home with some cream to apply twice a day and we need to keep band-aid's on there. He is thinking that we will have the results by Monday, Tuesday at the latest.

Now you know what I know! Does anyone in the medical field have any thoughts on what might be going on?

It's the most wonderful time of the year!!

2007-11-29T19:49:00.000-06:00

Well I just have my village left and I will be all done with my Christmas decorations. It has taked me 3 days to get to this point. I really love our house at Christmas. Every single room gets decorated in every way. I literally remove the pictures from the wall and hang up Christmas pictures, or huge Santas, or wreaths. Christmas decortations are put on every shelf. Every banister is covered in garland and lights. It is like being in a new home for a month.

This is truly my favorite time of year. I love driving through the neighborhoods looking at all of the decorated houses. I love the music on the radio. I really love the giving spirt that most people have.

Last year we started a new tradition of staying home for Christmas Eve instead of going to my aunt and uncles with the whole family. Joey is turning 12 and we just feel like it is time to get some traditions in place for the four of us. This year we are going to do the same thing with a little twist. Instead of just sitting at home, cozy in front of the fire, we are going to go out and do some good. We are searching for a soup kitchen in or around Rockford that we could go to and serve some meals. After that we will come home and have our Christmas movies and fire just like last year. I really believe that this will show the boys the real meaning and spirit of Christmas. Not to mention that it will really make them appreciate the Christmas that they get here at our house.

On a medical note Joey has got something strange going on with his back. A few months back he showed me a growth on his lower left back. I told him that I thought it was a pimple and that it would go away. It was still there a few weeks later and I said that maybe it was a wart and we would keep an eye on it. Well it has continued to grow and is now changing color from flesh toned to red. I of course called the Dr. and we go in tomorrow at 2:00. Hopefully it will be something that they can remove right there in the office and we can be on our way. I will keep you updated.

Congratulations to my MOM!!

2007-11-20T06:41:00.000-06:00

For those of you who don't know, my mom got a new job with Pace Bus Co. She was hired on a couple of weeks ago and has been training since. She went to Elk Grove Village yesterday and passed her 2nd big CDL test! The first one was about a week ago when she got her permit. It is official now! She has her CDL and will begin shadowing for the next couple of days and then will be driving on her own.

We all know that it is hard to start something new, especially when that means tons of learning and studying. Please send her a little note of congrats when you get a minute.

Way to go, Mom. We all love you!

Take off your shoes!

2007-11-09T22:00:00.000-06:00

Well, I registered for next semester yesterday. I am really excited because I got all of the classes that I wanted and they are all on Tuesday and Thursday. I will have the rest of the week to do my studies and keep up my house. The other bonus is that out of 4 classes I only need 2 books! That is the best news and is going to save us tons of money. So next semester I will have Math, Speech, Psychology, and Art for teachers. I am looking forward to having some new classes and having a change.

Dawn and I went to David's Bridal today and got measured for our bridesmaids dresses for Amy's wedding. They were beautiful and we were both so excited!! Good choice, Amy!!

The boys are good. They have both had colds this week but still went to school. Joey is working on having perfect attendance because Phil had it when he was in 6th grade. They know that because they found the old award in a box down stairs. :-}

So, funny Jimmy story. While we were out trick or treating my niece Ellie ran up to us half crying and saying she didn't want to take off her shoes. We looked at her really surprised and said, "Of course you should not take off your shoes, we are trick or treating outside." She says, "But Jimmy said that we had to take off our shoes." I look up and there is Jimmy with all of his buddies in stockings ringing the person's door bell. I said, "Jimmy what on earth are you doing in you socks?" He says, completely seriously, "The sign on the door says 'TAKE OFF YOUR SHOES'" At this point all of the adults are laughing as I turn to Jimmy and say, "Only if you are going IN their house, Jimmy!!!!" He turns around to look at me, starts to blush and says, "OH!" All of the kids bend down, put their shoes back on and run to the next house. So, if you ever wondered where blond jokes came from, now you know!!!! This is the child that wants to go alone next year???

P.S. Let me know what you think of the new layout. I try to change it up every once and a while.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

2007-10-31T05:16:00.000-06:00

Good morning everyone! Or afternoon or evening depending on when you are reading this. Today is going to be super crazy for me but I am going to enjoy every second. I have school until 12:00. I have to rush out of there and pick up a few last min things for Jimmy's classroom party. Speed over to Jimmy's school and run his party.

Then we need to hurry home do all of the homework that they have and get everyone in costumes for trick or treating. This won't be as big of a deal as it used to be because the boys are pretty much on their own for that. We will then spend all evening trick or treating and visiting with friends and neighbors. We will get home again around 8 pm. We will finish up the boys homework, get them ready for tomorrow and get them in bed aroudnd 9. Then, I get to start my 2-3 hours of math homework. Pray for me! I can already predict that Belle will not be getting her 5 am walk tomorrow, I will be too tired.

I am going to enjoy every second of this because this is my last year to go trick or treating. We let Joey go alone for the first time last year when he was in 5th grade and Jimmy hasn't forgotten it. He has mentioned it many times this month that he IS going alone next year just like Joey did. So, another chapter in my life is about to close. That is the thing with Jimmy, every one of his lasts are my lasts too and we have totally seperate emotions about it. He is thrilled that this is his last year and all that I can do is remember that little baby dressed like Pooh Bear that wouldn't even walk up to a door without me!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!

Where have I been???

2007-10-26T05:16:00.000-06:00

I can not believe that it has been almost a month since I last blogged. Thanks for the scolding, Amy! Life has been crazy, crazy, crazy around here. It just doesn't feel like there is a spare second in the day. So, I will update you by family member.

Phil has officially quit smoking and I am so proud of him. He has gone with the patch which is doing some really crazy things to him. He said that he is having the strangest dreams since he has been on it and we have talked to other people who experienced the same thing. He is going on day 4 now and it actually seems to be getting harder on him instead of easier. He's doing it though and the boys and I could not be happier.

I got my mid term grades the other day. Two A's and two B's! I would love to pull those B's up to A's so I will have to work extra hard in Biology and Math.

I have started yet another diet. I am sure that it will be blown on Saturday at the party, but at least I tried right!? I just need to be more disciplined with myself which all sounds great until I see the food or pass the coffee shop at school. I just can't resist a huge plate of pasta or bowl of ice cream or my French Vanilla Latte. I honestly think that if I lived alone I could do it because I just wouldn't have those things in the house. However Phil is not ready to give those things up so they are all over the house. I have been up and down so many times in my life and I just wish that I could find the diet that would work for me. Ahhh, someday! Not too much else is going on with me.

Joey is doing great in school. He has another dance tonight which he is excited about because he had a lot of fun at the last one. He is getting pretty good at playing his sax. No mind you it is only Mary Had a Little Lamb, but you can tell that he is comfortable with the instrument and the notes are just flowing out of his hands. It isns't like he has to sit and think about each note as he goes along. He sees it on the page and just knows. I think that is great because I never had a talant for any instrument. He will have a Christmas concert in December and I can't wait to see how the whole band has done.

Jimmy is also doing well. His football season ened last Saturday on a good note because they won the game in overtime. The over all season wasn't that great, we lost 6 and won 2. Jimmy only got to experience a win one time because the other win was on the day of Mary's wedding. He went on a field trip yesterday to Midway Village. Midway Villge is litterally a step back in time to the 1890's. It is the size of a village with homes and the old time bank and merchantile. There is also a one room school house where the kids spend half of their day doing their regular lessons in old time style. Writing on slates and getting the dunce cap. The kids went to school dressed for the times too which is so fun. All of the girls looked like Laura Ingalls Wilder. They even had to bring their lunch that way. The only thing that we had for Jimmy was a plastic coffee container because we don't buy the metal ones anymore. Besides that and his Converse shoes he looked the part. All of the tour guides there are great because they never step out of their roll. Jimy said that a boy in his class mentioned his PS2 and the lady looked at him like he was from outer space and asked him why he was talking with letters and number mixed together. He tried to explain which just got him in deeper because she pretended not to know of a T.V. or a controller, ect. ect. The kids got a lot out of the trip. I am posting a picture on here and I hope that it ends up right. (I have tried and tried and I can not get the pictures at the end of my post. So, scroll back up and now those pictures will make more sense!!!)

Well that's all of the Gorski Happenings for now. I really promise to try to be better.

She's Going to the Chapel and She's Going to get maaaried!!!!

2007-09-28T05:09:00.001-06:00

Tomorrow is Mary's wedding and I can't wait! I am so excited for her and Ben and Danny! All three of them really deserve each other and the happiness that they are enjoying. I won't go anymore into it because it will ruin my whole speech!

Speaking of the speech! I am so nervous. For those of you that don't know I have put off my speech class at school because I completely hate public speaking. Put me up in front of a room of 9 year olds and I don't have a problem. Put me up in front of a room of adults and I freak out. I had to make a speech about camp to about 60 cub scout parents a few years back and I ended up throwing up in the bathroom. Thank God for my friend Lynne because she went up and did my talking. I am hoping that the fact that 1/2 of the room is my family and the other 1/2 I most likely will never see again, will help. We'll see. If I suck, that is why!

Anyway, we are heading up to Madison as soon as I am done with school, around 12:30. I am going to help set up the favors and the place cards and then we are going to have a little party by the pool!

I can't wait to see all of you up there and PAAAAARTY! I am off of my antibotics now, (I took myself off!), so I can really have fun.

If you are reading this Mary ~ I hope that your day tomorrow is everything you always dreamed it would be! I love you so much!!! You are a great little seester!!!!

Update.....

2007-09-20T08:32:00.000-06:00

As I told you yesterday I have an awful bite on the back of my leg. I thought that I would get through and be fine, I was wrong.

As the day went on yesterday it was harder and harder to walk without extreme pain. I looked up spider bites on the Internet and all of the pictures matched what I had on my leg so I knew for sure that's what it was. I also read on there not to lance it and to keep ice on it. (Both wrong, way to go Internet!) So, there I sat all day with ice on my leg. By the time that Phil got home at 8:00 PM it had almost tripled in size and was so bad that he had to practically hold me up.

My neighbor ran over here to sit with the kids and we ran to the ER. By time I got back to a bed I was in so much pain that if someone even touched it I screamed. The pain was actually shooting up my leg and around to the front of my knee. That didn't stop the Dr. however because he kept touching it and poking at it. All the while I am crying into the pillow and saying, "That really hurts!!!"

Then the Dr. tells me that we are going to have to pop it! I was freaking out because it hurt just to touch it how on earth did he think he was going to stick a needle in it? Well, he had no problem with that at all and just stuck that needle right in. I didn't even get a 1,2,3! I screamed into my pillow while Phil was saying, "Awesome! You should see the stuff flying out of there!"

It was determined that I have a staph infection from the spider bite! I am on two antiboiotics and Vicodin for the pain! I am choosing not to take the Vicodin because I need to get back and forth to school and I can't drive on pain killers.

This morning I took some pictures to show you. The pen mark is where the Dr. drew around the swelling and redness. You can see how much it has gone down just over night. All day today I have to keep warm compresses on it and drain it whenever possible. The fluid coming out is very strange looking to me. It looks like skim milk and flows out as if I turned on a faucet. When I am not draining it I have to keep a bandaid on it so that I can prevent further infection. A little bit of my skin is already turning black so I am going to be very good about the anitbiotic because I don't want to have a chunk of skin fall off.

So what lesson did we all learn from this? ALWAYS BRING A CHAIR AND NEVER SIT IN THE GRASS!

Noah ~ Some things should have been left off the Ark

2007-09-19T06:07:00.000-06:00

Last night I went out to Jimmy's football practice to sit and visit with Phil who was already there. I arrived a little bit late because I had gone to pick up my dress for Mary's wedding. After I walked all of the way over to his practice, which is easily 10-15 acres from the parking area on a 70 acre park, I realized that I had forgotten my chair in the car. Being lazy and tired I didn't want to go back. Phil offered me his and like an idiot I said, "Oh no, I will just sit here in the grass."

After sitting and swatting away all of the annoying bugs, for about 5 min, I felt a huge pain on the back of my right knee. I gave a little yelp and stood up. Immediately I had a red area about the size of half dollar with two white spots in the middle. Everyone started looking but we saw no bug around us that could have done that. Some people said that the bite looked like a spider bite and one person said it looked like a snake bite. I really doubt that since I think that at least one of us would have seen a SNAKE! After all of the drama Phil once again offered me his chair and I gladly accepted. He chose to stand behind me and not sit in the grass!

When we got home last night the pain was getting worse and worse and I was trying to ignore it so that I could get everything together for morning. I finally looked down at it and it was doubled in size. I put my hand on it and it was warm to touch. That was a little bit scary for me so I took a Benedryl just in case it was some sort of allergic reaction to what ever beast attacked me.

When I woke up this morning to go on my daily walk with Belle my knee hurt so much that I could hardly straighten out my leg without pain. Belle was not having any of that however because she just loves her morning walk. So, I started out slow with a sort of limp and by the end of the walk I was walking normal, but slow. As I am sitting here typing I can still feel a throbbing in the area of the bite. Stupid bugs, I hate them!!!! As I said, some things could have been left off the ARK!

Time really does fly!

2007-09-10T16:54:00.000-06:00

Who remembers this little peanut?

Joey has had a big week! He went to his first dance on Friday. He said that he had great time. I brought the camera along with when I dropped him off. Calm down, I wasn't really going to take pictures. I just thought that it was funny to see his face when we pulled up to the school and I took the camera out from under my seat! It was priceless!

We went today and rented his Alto Saxophone, too! He is so excited about playing this. He has been messing with it all night long and just keeps saying, "I haven't broken a reed yet!"

Jimmy had a game on Saturday and lost but only by one touch down this time. He had two awesome tackles that made me almost lose my voice. I really do love being a sports mom!

Well that's all folks! Thanks for checking in on us!

2007-09-06T07:30:00.000-06:00

Well not too many new things have been happening out in Roscoe. Jimmy is still loving football and has played one game. They lost, big time, but he had fun anyway. He was so excited because Ray and Annie came to watch him. That meant a lot to him.

We had Phil's 3 nieces last Friday through Sunday. I loved it! I was picking out all of the cute pink clothes and doing braids in their hair. I have learned that I totally could have had 5 kids. However, I would have no husband because he would go crazy and leave us to live in a mental institution. He can only take the chaos for so long! He is still asking why girls have to scream as the do everything. They are running and they scream, they are playing and they scream. We just aren't used to it because boys generally don't do that. I was able to block it out but Phil wasn't. He finally asked Madi why she was screaming and she looked at him like he was speaking French. I don't even think that she knew she was screaming. All of the cousins had a good weekend though and when it gets down to it that is what matters.

For Labor day we went up to see Mary and Ben in Sun Prarie. Mary and I went shopping for some last minute wedding things and Phil, Ben, and the three boys all hung out. Later we went for a drive and took the ferry across the river. Our family used to do that every year on our way up to camp in Merry Mac. It was fun to take the boys on it and show them where we used to vacation. We stopped in Baraboo for some ice cream and then headed back to their place. We all headed home because it was a school night for everyone. Including Danny who started Kindergarten. He informed me that school was no big deal but he was excited to be taking a lunch in his new metal Spider Man lunch box. It turns out that he had a great first day!

That's really all for now.

Back to School Pictures, Finally!!

2007-08-30T06:25:00.000-06:00

Jimmy heading to the bus stop. 4 fingers for fourth grade! We do that every year. That way if I look back and I didn't mark it, I will remember.

Jimmy~ So excited and happy to smile for Mom!

Both boys headed to the bus stop. Joey was already begging me to please go back home!

Joey and his friend Alex. They have been friends since they were 4 so I wanted a picture of them staring middle school. Alex seemed fine about it. Joe ~ Not so much!!

He finally posed for me if I promised to leave after Jimmy's bus came! He refused to hold up the traditional 6 fingers though!

There goes Jimmy on the elementary bus! He sat up front with his cousin Will who was starting Kindergarten. Must be time for Mom to go home!

Oops one more friend showed up that I want a picture of. You can see what Joey thought about that! I kept my promise and went home after that! Geez, middle schoolers! That's ok I guess, I remember being that age too!

Long time no blog

2007-08-24T13:49:00.001-06:00

Well it has been a whole month since I was on here to blog. Summer just got away from me and I was super busy. Not with anything important, just busy.

So, what have we been up to?

Well Jimmy started with football on July 30th. He had practice 5 days a week for 2 hours. Most kids complain quite a bit about this. In fact when Joey was in it we had to drag him there every day, many times with tears. I was all geared up for the fact that Jimmy would react in much the same way. I had a speach all prepared in my head about how proud I was of him and what dedication it showed to tough it out. Instead he got in the car after the first day, which was very hard conditioning, and declared I LOVE IT! He went on and on about how it really pumped him up when the coaches were yelling, and how totally awesome it was that they called him Gorski and not Jimmy! They have trimmed the practice down to 3 days a week, 2 hours a day now that school has started. He still can not get enough.

Sadly we are all back in school. I started Monday and the boys started on Wednesday. It was really sad for both Phil and me. We have never been the parents counting down the days of summer waiting for the kids to go back to school. That is not to say that our kids are perfect and never get on our nerves! Its just that we love the flexibility of summer. No bed times, no schedules! No signing assignment notebooks and checking homework folders. Also Phil gets to see the boys a lot more in the summer because summer hours are much more condusive to his crazy work hours! Plus, we really do love being with them. The four of us have a good time when we are together! It was really sad to say goodbye to another summer! :(

On the flip side Joey is really loving being in middle school. He loves that fact that he changes classes every 45 min. He has two lockers, a hall locker and a gym locker. Thanks to the fact that his annoying mother had him practice with a lock all summer he had no problems opening either of them. (Wow what a brilliant annoying mother he has!) He also loves the fact that he has P.E. every day. He is a middle school student for sure! I will prove it with the first day of school pictures that I took which I will post later. He refused to smile and kept begging me to leave the bus stop and go home! Someday he will appreciate the fact that I have been so picture crazy his whole life. Jimmy enjoying 4th grade as much as Joey is enjoying 6th. He said that he has the best teacher ever! He ended up with 3 friends in his class which could be pretty scary because he can be quite the Chatty Cathy. We will see. His teacher is a friend of mine so I will find out right away if there is trouble.

So that is what's new with us. I promise that I will try to be much better about this now!

JK Rowling is Bloody Brilliant!

2007-07-24T15:11:00.000-06:00

I finished the final book and I can not say enough about it. I loved it so much. It answered so many questions and really finished off the story. I won't say anymore about it in case some of you have not read it yet. If you have read it though, wasn't it awesome! Joey is almost done with it too and I can't wait to talk to him about it!

I did receive some bad news from my dad two days ago. My uncle Al Bober died after a 15 month battle with cancer. He was married to my dad's sister Mary Ann. I did not know him very well simply because I do not really know anyone on my dad's side of the family very well. However, if you are the praying type please add his children, grandchildren, and wife to your prayer list. I can not begin to imagine what they are going through right now.

We really don't have much else going on right now. We are enjoying every minute of our sport free week!

Till next time......

No more baseball

2007-07-21T07:11:00.000-06:00

Well baseball finally ended for us yesterday. Both boys were eliminated from their tournaments. As their mom I felt bad for them of course and would never let them know that inside I was DANCING!!! I am so sick of baseball! I have been sitting out there 4 nights a week since April. This happens to me every year. I love it until about the beginning of July. Then I just can't take it any more.

So, I have one full week without anything and then football starts on Monday, July 30th! Football is 2 hours a day 5 days a week. Luckily just Jimmy is playing this year so, I can plop my lawn chair down by just one team and read away.

Speaking of reading. The book that Joey and I have been waiting a whole year for comes out today! Harry Potter #7! Both of us have had a count down waiting for this. I will keep you up to date on how we like the book.

More pictures

2007-07-10T10:55:00.001-06:00

Here are a few more pictures. The first two are Jimmy's All Star game and the rest are the family picnic.

Jimmy as catcher during the game

Jimmy and the team as they got their trophies

The "original 11" in Tug of War

Cousins against parents in Tug of War

"Original 11" and spouses against cousins in Tug of War

Pictures of our camping trip

2007-07-10T10:30:00.000-06:00

The fifth wheel that we were in and Bridget and Dan's pop up. See how close we were!

Joey coming off one of the waterslides

Jimmy right after a waterslide

Me and the boys in Yogi's picnic basket

Me and Phil in Yogi's picnic basket

Phil and the boys in Yogi's basket

I'm Baaaaack!!!!

2007-07-09T09:56:00.000-06:00

I am back after a long hiatus. Not a hiatus by choice however.

On Monday June 25th Roscoe lost power for about 4 hours. When that happened a tower for our cable company blew. We lost all of our services from the cable company which for us is just about everything, because we have a lot through Charter. We lost our T.V., our internet, and our phone! After many frustrating cell phone conversations and service calls to us and our neighbors they finally got it up and running again on Friday July 6th! This had a bigger effect on all of us than you might think. Many of us on the street us our computers daily and not just for surfing. There are several people including Phil who use it for their buisness. Phil has a big wedding coming up this weekend and the bride could not get in touch with us because we had no internet and no phone. The lady across from us does hair out of her house and her clients could not get a hold of her. Every neighbor has at least one story like that. It is awful to say but we have really gotten to a place in our lives where we rely on the computer and the internet! It is no longer a toy, it is a necessity. To top all of Phil's and the neighbor's problems, I had to BLOG! Geez, Charter should credit us for that alone!

So, what has been happening here?

We went camping for the first weekend that we had no Charter in the house. For those of you that really know me, this is a big deal. I HATE camping. We went with my best friend Lynne, her husband Skip, and her three kids Courtney, Jake, and Cade. They have a 5th wheel that we all stayed in. That is as close to camping as you will ever find me. Inside they had running water, airconditioning, stove, microwave, and reglular beds! My boys wanted to "really" camp so we set up a tent for them outside and they slept there with Lynne's boys. All in all we had a nice weekend. If there are any campers out there I recommend the Yogi Bear Campsite in Amboy Illinois. They have lots to do on the property and I truly did not see my boys most of the day because they were off having such a good time. They went down waterslides, swam in the pools, went out on paddle boats, and played in the many parks. One of the best parts about the whole trip was that I ran into my cousin Bridget, her husband Dan, and their kids Megan and Ryan. Out of the whole place they were only two sites down from us in thier new pop up camper! What a small world it is!

Jimmy was invited to join the Mustang All Star team for baseball this year and was so excited. They played their game on Saturday July 7th and won 18-4. He ended the game because he caught the last out as catcher when the batter hit a foul ball. He also plays pitcher but didn't get a chance to do that for the All Star game because there were too many pitchers on the team.

After Jimmy's game we went to the annual Ryan Family Picnic. Phil was not able to go because of work but the boys and I had a blast! We loved all fo the new games that were added but laughed the most at the water balloon launch! We sure hope that returns next year! (hint! hint!) Jimmy really enjoyed getting to know Denis and Ray too. In fact he made me get Ray's phone number! Ray better watch out because Jimmy really thinks he made a new best friend! He was a birthday party yesterday and was telling his friends about the cool cousins he just met! He will never get over the fact that he met someone who has carried the olympic torch. Sports are Jimmy's life and to meet Denis and talk about sports and the olympics made this picnic Jimmy's best ever!

Well I think I remembered everything. Hopefully Charter will stay on and I will be able to be more regular about this.

Another Jimmism

2007-06-22T19:55:00.000-06:00

I have to share another Jimmyism!

He has a friend here for a sleep over tonight. They were sitting at the table eating their dessert and I was down stairs playing with the dog. This was the conversation........

Jimmy: Have you seen any good movies this summer?

Kyle: Yes I saw Pirates 3.

Jimmy: Yeah, me too! Have you heard of any other good ones coming out?

Kyle: No but my mom wants to see a move called Hairspray. Do you know what that is?

Jimmy: It sound like a move where all of the people have good hair.

Kyle: Yeah, I think so and they sing about a fat girl and her mom that's really a guy. That's what it looked like when my mom watched the guy on E!

Jimmy: Really? Thanks for telling me, I'll never see that one.

Kyle: Yeah, wanna go play football again.

Jimmy: yup!

You don't know how hard it was not to laugh at those two. They think that because they are in a different room I can't hear them. I love it!!

I can't think of a proper title, so this is what you get!

2007-06-20T15:42:00.000-06:00

We don't have too many new things going on here. It still feels like baseball is our whole lives. I am out there 4 nights a week. Then our weekends are filled up with being chauffeur for the boys or having our house full of kids. I don't really mind. I know that this too shall pass. Then I will be complaining that no one needs me and where has the time gone. I am truly trying to enjoy every minute of this with the boys. It sure does wear me out though.

So, we had a very nice Father's Day. We went to Phil's parents house and swam all day with the family. Then we had a pot luck cookout. The boys had a blast with their cousins and it was nice for us to catch up with his sister Peg and brothers Steve and Matt. Mike and his family along with Kate and her family could not make it and were missed. We don't get to see each other as often anymore so it was a nice relaxing day. In fact we were there so late that we ended up just crashing there for the night. Good thing they have plenty of room for the four of us and Belle! I hope that all of you other father's out there had a nice day too.

10 YEARS!!!

2007-06-15T11:40:00.000-06:00

Yesterday Phil and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary. Celebrate is an awfully big word to put on what we did actually. Life does go on. He had to work, the boys had baseball, ect., ect. I actually got to see him for the first time at 8:45 last night. Oh, and he had to work again today so we were in bed asleep by 10:00. Are we party animals or what? We are going to spend all day Saturday with just the four of us though and then we are going out alone Saturday night. So that will be our real celebration

WARNING: HERE COMES THE SAPPY PART!

I am so glad to have spent the last 10 years married to Phil. I truly love him with every part of my being and not everyone can say that. He has been a wonderful husband to me and an awesome father to Joe and Jimmy. That's not to say that it has been all wine and roses. We have had our tough times, our hills and valleys, and we will have more to come I am sure. But I am proud to say that we have worked through all the tough times together with love and confidence that both of us are here for the long haul.

So in honor of our 10 years here are 10 things I still love about Phil.

10. He can still make me laugh or smile. Even when I am really pissed off at him he has the abiltity to make me smile or giggle.

9. He is so giving. He rarely thinks of himself first it is always about the boys and me.

8. His beautiful blue eyes. I have always been able to get lost in them and I still can. I truly can look at his eyes and know what he is thinking and feeling. I see his soul!

7. His passion for things in life. Whatever hobby he picks up in life he is able to apply true passion to it. He has pulled the car over in the middle of a wooded area just to listen to the cicadas. That's his passion for nature. I love it!

6. He is so talented. He amazes me everytime he shoots a picture. He sees things that I just don't see. I can be right beside him on a bridge and he finds the beauty is something I just didn't see. My walls are full of beautiful pictures due to his photogenic eye!

5. His family values. I love the fact that family has always come first for him. Even when I met him and he was only 17 years old. Family was and still is his priority.

4. He works so damn hard. Phil works awful 12 hour shifts sometimes 4-5 days in a row. He does this all so that the boys and I can live the life we are living.

3. His sense of humor. Anyone that knows Phil knows that he is a prankster. I love it! It keeps me on my toes!

2. He is an awesome father. I wish that my father could have been 1/2 the father that Phil is. He knows when to be funny with them, when to be serious with them, and how to raise them to be proper gentlemen. I get all tingly just watching him play catch with the boys or having a serious father son converstation with Joey. Now, that's sexy!

1. He is my best friend. Since day one he has been my go to guy. He is the one person in the world that I am completly comfortable with. I can be made up or looking pretty sad and he would never show a difference in his love for me. He tells me that I am sexy either way. I can be having a really bad PMS week and he still tells me he loves me. I can be truly 100% myself with him and I love him for that!

So here is to 10 more wonderful years with a wonderful man!

P.S. Sorry for the sap, but you were warned!!

What a couple of weeks!

2007-06-08T12:54:00.000-06:00

Hello all! I have not posted in a couple of weeks because it has been truly crazy around here! I have been on an emotional rollercoaster, but things are good now.

Phil had a surprise party for me, to celebrate my 30th birthday, on June 2nd! Boy did he get me good! I had suspicions a couple of times but they were always explained away really well. My very good friend Lynne took me out to lunch at Panara and then we went to the driving range to hit some balls. None of this seemed strange to me because we always do things for each other on our birthdays. On the way home she called her daughter to tell her that we were about 10 min away, which again did not seem strange to be checking in on the kids. As we turned onto our street I was chatting away and did not look down at my house until we got closer. When I looked up I saw my driveway full of people! I said some very naughty four letter words and hid my face with my purse! My sister finally had to come down to the car and drag me out. Once I got out I saw so many people that I just love. He had my family here, my friends, the teachers that I work with, and neighbors! We ended up parting into the wee hours of the next morning, it's a good thing that the neighbors were here with us or I think the police would have been called for the noise. I could not have had a better birthday! I will always remember my 30th, thanks to Phil. He is such an amazing husband! Thanks, honey!

So there I was on an ultimate high when I crashed, hard! The last day of school was June 5th and boy did it hit me. I was so sad walking out of the building on Tuesday that I could not even speak. I ended up crying all of the way home, thank goodness the boys took the bus home that day. It was so hard leaving a job that I love, with people that I love! I have never had to do something like this. I really want to be a teacher and I really want to have my own classroom and I know that the only way to get those things is to leave my job and go to school. I have been talking about this for such a long time that I did not think I had a problem with it. I guess I was in serious denial! I was almost tempted to turn around, run back in to the office, and say nevermind hire me back!! I of course did not do that. I am pushing myself to move on to bigger and better things even though it is hard. I spent most of Wednesday being sad until a friend of mine from school called me and asked me to go biking every Friday. Now I know that I will move on and keep these wonderful people with me. It won't be the same but it is something.

So, my emotional rollercoaster has rolled into the gate until another day. I just got back from our first bike ride and had an awesome time. We rode bikes for 3 hours and ended up in Boone county. (Which is the county to the East of us) I plan on just enjoying summer and taking each day as it comes.

Happy summer to all of you.

P.S. I have a 6th grader and a 4th grader now! Ahhhhh, Lord help me!!!!!

Memorial Day

2007-05-28T10:24:00.000-06:00

I don't want to rant and rave because this blog should be a positive place, however I felt like I needed to write this today......

I hope that everyone really remembers what this day is all about. While we are at our BBQ's and enjoying our day off of work, lets remember why we are doing these things.

I hope that we all say a prayer for the men and women who have lost their lives for the freedom that we enjoy today. Also, say a prayer for their families.

Anyway, I am off of my soap box now! I hope that you have a great day with your family and friends. We will be having a BBQ with my mom, Nana, Mary, Ben, and Danny. I am sure we will have a great time because we always do when we are with them.

HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY!!!

BIG NEWS FOR THE HAGERTY FAMILY!!

2007-05-25T15:27:00.000-06:00

We have some very exciting news to share with you!

Ray and Annie got engaged today!!

He took her out to Grayslake High School where they first met at a wrestling match. Ray had previously contacted a woman at the school and she played along that Ray had an errand he had to do in their gym. She led them in and then pretended she had to leave really quick but would be right back. When she left, Ray asked, and Annie said YES!

No date set yet, but we are all very excited! We have loved Annie and thought of her as family for many years. Now it will be official!!

Field Day!

2007-05-23T15:52:00.000-06:00

Today at school we had Field Day! We all really love this day, teachers and students! The PE teacher sets up tons of events for us to compete in. (I actually saw some that would be really fun at the Family Picnic.) Each class is split up into two groups, team A and team B. At the end of the events the teams get back together and race on a human bridge. (If you are not sure what that is just ask!) After that our points are combined and they figure out a winner.

The teacher and I both ended up almost losing our voices from cheering the kids on all afternoon. I screamed, Go! Go! Go! more times today than ever before. We also ended up very wet from the water games and standing out in that 90 degree heat! It was all worth it though because our class won FIRST PLACE out of the whole 4th grade and got to take the trophy. Woo Hoo!!! Our kids had so much fun and it is so nice to be with them in a different way. We are not just saying sit down and stop talking. Or did you put that in your assignment notebook. I have a few pictures from our day, but I am not sure how parents would feel about me sharing photos with their kids in it. If you are interested I can show you the next time that we are together.

Joey's class won FIRST PLACE for the 5th grade and Jimmy's class took 2nd. I don't know anymore about their days because I work in 4th grade all day. All in all not a bad day for the Gorskis'.

Also on school news, another huge thank you to those of you that supported the boys in their school Fun Run. Joey ended up earning $267.00 and being the top earner in his class which helped them win a pizza party. Jimmy topped that by being the top earner in all of 3rd grade by earning $266.00. He won a $50 gift card to Volcano Falls. (For those of you not from Rockford this is a huge park. Mini golf/ Go-Carts/batting cages/video games/laser tag/ect./ ect) The school earned a total of $21,000 and says with our fall fundraiser we will be able to get our new playground equipment. So again, thank you to everyone who supported them. They really appreciate it!

Dancing, Dancing, Dancing!!

2007-05-23T05:40:00.000-06:00

Last night was bittersweet for me. My absolute favorite show ended, but my favorite person won!! I am so glad that Apolo won the competition. After his freestyle I jumped off of the couch and gave them a standing ovation in my living room! Joey was funny and a good entertainer but there was something about Apolo and Juliann! (sp?) They were so cute! Last night when they annouced the winner I shot up again as if there was a spring in the couch. I scared Belle because I was so excited!

I went on line to check out the tour dates and the closest that they are going to come is Peoria on July 15th. Anyone up for a road trip? I don't know much more than the date. I would have to look into ticket prices. If they are way out there, forget it. (afterall in 9 days, I am an unemployed student). If anyone is interested in this I will do the research. That would be so much fun! Let me know!

"Do you think they want me on the High School team?"

2007-05-18T18:21:00.000-06:00

I have a Jimmy story that I just have to share.

We got home today and I asked him to go and get me the mail. He came running in the house with an absolute glow on his face.

"I got a letter!"

I said, "Wow, that is great. Who sent it to you?"

"The Hononegah Head football coach!" He said with so much excitement that I could never get it across right in writing. Then he said with pure innocence, "Do you think that they want me on the High School Football team, Mom?"

Not wanting to totally burst the poor kids bubble I told him that he should just open it up and see what it was all about.

He started to open it ever so gently then pulled the envelope towards his heart, closed his eyes, and said, "This is just like in the movie Rudy when he gets his letter!"

He continued to open it and found a flyer in there about a football camp that the high school boys run during the summer. He was just as excited about that! He said, "Look Joe, they asked ME to come to their camp. Can you believe it?"

At which time his wise, almost teen aged brother burst his bubble by telling him that they send those out to everyone one signed up for pee-wee football! He didn't say it quite that nice however. There were a couple of Duh's and Dummy's thrown in there somewhere.

Jimmy took the news well and can't wait for camp!!!

Belle

2007-05-12T08:34:00.000-06:00

These are the pictures of our new pup, Belle. I took them myself so they are a little dark. This was the first week that we brought her home. She is a little bit bigger now. In fact she's 11 weeks old today. I feel like I have a baby again when I refer to age in weeks. So far she is a really good puppy. Some potty accidents but not nearly as bad as it could be. She has a wonderful calm personality that I hope she keeps. I will post more pictures as she grows. Thanks for checking them out!

Good bye Pool!

2007-05-10T20:50:00.000-06:00

We took our swimming pool down today and it was a little bitter sweet. I am ready for it to go because it is old and we really don't use it as much now that the boys are older and gone all of the time. However, I have so many good memories of the pool.

When we first got it Joey was only 4 and Jimmy was just 2. They could not even get close to touching the bottom. We had so many pool parties with family and friend. As the boys have gotten older they would have friends over and just last year it got so that I didn't have to sit right on the deck as they were swimming because everyone could finally touch. I have tons of photos of the boys over the years in the pool.

We all know that it is better to have it gone but it was still hard coming home today and seeing an empty yard. It will save us so much money on chemicals this summer which will help with the tightening of the budget. It will also save Phil time because he was the one that kept up all of the maintenance on the pool.

Our plans for right now are to put our outdoor fireplace there. We'll see.

Hello

2007-05-07T11:12:00.000-06:00

Well I decided that after two years of reading everyone else's blog, I'd better join the bandwagon. I can't promise that I will have a whole lot to say all of the time, but I will certainly try.

I guess that I should begin with a little catch up. I know you all know our family but here's where all of us are right now.

Phil is still working at Huntsman, and yes he still has CRAZY hours! He works 12 hour shifts with one month on days and one month on nights. Trust me, that gets really old. He does like what he does though so he puts up with the hours. His photography buisness is doing spectacular! I am so proud of him that I could bust. He has weddings booked for summer and fall, senior pictures, and family portraits. It couldn't be better!

Joey is 11 years old and is about to finish 5th grade. He is thrilled about moving on to middle school. I do not share that same excitement. He is as tall as me right now so I have started wearing tall shoes a lot. For the summer he is in baseball. The games start tonight and will go through August. He usually plays 1st or 2nd base. His favorite position though is catcher. He has become quite a social guy on top of everything else. For example, this past weekend he had plans for every second of every day. He has also started babysitting this year. He watches Jimmy for us, which has been wonderful. We have been able to get out and be a couple again. He also watches Danny for Mary and Ben and has been watching some boys down the street for a friend of mine. He is really good with the little kids and loves the extra money. I am pretty sure now that grass cutting season has arrived he will slow down on the babysitting and make money mowing lawns.

Jimmy is 9 years old and is ending 3rd grade. He is becoming his own little person for sure. He is 100% athlete and sports fanatic. He has a baseball or football in his hands at all times. We are always saying, "Jimmy stop throwing the football around the house!" He is also always talking about sports. "Today on Sports Center they said...." or "Hey Mom, guess how many touch downs Groosman threw in his rookie year." I told him last week that he could not tell me one more statistic unless he could spell his whole spelling list to me. Needless to say, I didn't hear stats for a week. He too will play baseball this summer and starts Tuesday evening. He plays pitcher and 1st base. He will be in football in the fall.

I guess that leaves me. Well I am pretty much the same as always, just busier. I am still working as a classroom aide up at the school but only until the end of this year. Next fall I am going to school full time to earn my degree in elementary education. I have been going part time while working full time and it is just not working for our family. The time with my kids is just too precious for me and I am not willing to miss any of it. So the choice came down to not going to school at all and just working, or not working at all and just going to school. We are willing to bite the bullet and pull in the purse strings for four years so that I can have a degree. It will be tough but we can manage. When I am not working I am running around with the kids to their events.

We also have a new member of our family. Belle is our new English Springer Spaniel puppy. She turned 10 weeks old on Saturday. So far she has been a really good puppy. (knock on wood!)

So that is us and where we are in our lives right now. I hope that we are interesting enough to read about.