Dancing Queen!

Pictures of my precious little Emmy at her first ballet class this past Monday. Not much to say except it was the cutest thing I've ever seen. She was just SO into it. The pictures of her by the ballet bar and mirror are in her bedroom - she LOVES it. Zoe has the same teacher at a different time and they were having a high old time talking about dancing, tu-tus and the like. Really...they are the definition of GIRLY!!!
Had a great time last night with my little brother in town. We were all together at my mom and dad's for a cozy fall dinner. Gotta say I felt very blessed all night long. Jason's sister Kelley and surrogate sister Sue came in last last night. We had a great day today at the Eastown Street Fair, napping, going to McD's, and watching the BUCKEYES!!! Elijah sprayed his hair bright red in anticipation for the game. His dad has SERIOUSLY brainwashed him. Hope to post some pics of our weekend soon. Love to you all...

Not much happening??? Huh?

Just because I hate it when others don't update, I will quickly post and tell you all that there's not much happening here. I'm not sure how this happened, but it did. Thank God! I sometimes feel as if our life is a constant tornado of tragedy, chaos, upheaval, blah, blah, blah... This last week has been one of the calmest of our married life and I couldn't be more thankful. I spent the weekend in Ft. Wayne with Amanda. Yup, that was fun! We were completely unhurried and did basically everything we wanted (well... you know what I mean.). We even resurrected an old Plymouth tradition of going to the bookstore and sitting forever reading and drinking coffee. You know you're best friends when you can sit like that. Thanks to our sweet husbands for being willing to watch our kids for the weekend.
I also wanted to post a prayer request. I'm sure most of you heard about the tragedy in the W. Michigan district this past weekend. One of the youth pastors here lost his only baby boy in a tragic car accident. His wife and he were also seriously burned and she is still in critical condition. Not much else to say except, these people need EVERYONE'S prayers...
Well, we're gearing up for our fall kick-off at church with an all day event culminating with movies in the park on Sat. night. Should be a blast. I'll post pictures soon as I get a chance!

What a week!!!!!!

Great week...crazy week! Amanda, Brendon and Morgan (Gavin was at G-ma's) came over last Fri.and Sat. This was much needed time for us girls. I thank God EVERYDAY for blessing me with my best friend. There is truly nothing like it. We've been friends since Aug. of 1987-ALMOST 20 years. How crazy is that? Now our daughters are learning a bit about female bonding and we took a couple of pics. Didn't turn out great, but they're just such cuties!!!

Elijah's first day of school. (Anyone notice the very large Ohio State flag in the front? Yeah, not my decorating choice, but oh well.... ) He is loving 2nd grade and adjusting well to VERY early mornings. He doesn't seem to like his teacher as well as last year, but Miss VK will be a hard act to follow!




Pics of Emmy's first day of school. Well, sort of. On her real first day (Wed.) my alarm went off at 7:25. AAAHH!! It was set for 5:25. Yeah, serious panic. Needless to say I threw on some clothes and jumped in the car to go to work. Jason and I two-wayed the whole way there about what to do with her hair, the skirt that was too big, where were her new tennis shoes???? It was crazy and not picture worthy. I was feeling pretty awful about the whole thing, but a couple days later it just seems so US! These pictures are from Friday morning. As you can tell we leave at 7:15 and it's still pretty dark. I also took some of just her outside her new school. She is loving kindergarten and has more self-confidence than I know what to do with. Once again she was upset that I was bringing her into school...."Drop me off, Mom!"

What is this pitiful picture you ask? Our precious little puppy has a broken leg. Last night we had a great night out at Mom and Dad's with Josh and Shelly and the kids. They were all (yes all 5 of them..) riding bikes and Elijah swerved to miss Piper. Didn't work. The yelping and crying was more than my little heart could handle and I started bawling. Later my mom and sister said, "Gosh, I guess she wasn't kidding. She really does love that dog!" We waited it out last night to make sure it was really broken; LONG NIGHT!! I finally took him to Vet ER at 7:30 this morning to see 2 clean breaks on the X-Ray. My poor puppy... Really, he's just too cute.
All in all, we're loving the new schedule and finding it's a real positive for our marriage and family. Surprise, surprise, we love routine! (Really, this is a new adventure for us spontaneous Grates...) Have a great week all you bloggers!

White Caps Game

Well, it's official. Blogger has succeeded at ROYALLY ticking me off. I actually feel like cursing a bit, but I won't. I have tried in vain many a time to get this to post with absolutely no success. We actually went to the game on Wed. night- it is now Sunday morning. Anyone sensing my frustration. That aside, we had a great time. There is really nothing quite like walking into the stadium and smelling fresh cut grass, singing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame", and eating too much fried food and cotton candy. We had great lawn seats right next to the kids playland which was convenient to say the least. Jason, Elijah and my dad REALLY got into the game while the rest of us just had fun taking pictures, eating, and playing with the free basketballs they gave the kids as we walked through the front gate. It was an evening of unforgettable memories and something I hope we continue as an annual summer tradition!
Onto a quick update of my first week as a working mom. What a trip. I loved every minute of it, truly. The school is pretty rough (hence the 10 min. speech on gang policies in the first assembly) and the junior high class is really something-and that's being complimentary. It's amazing how fun it is though to be back into a routine and making music again. I'm having the time of my life! The kids didn't even know I'd been gone the first day... I said to Emmy, "Did you miss Mommy?", and she says,"You were gone???". I guess that's good? Pray for us though as they start school this week and getting out of the house is gonna get much more hairy!
We also had an AMAZING weekend, which I will have to save for a later post.... if Blogger cooperates!!

Sorry for the posting delay... I've been trying aimlessly to post pictures of our night out at the Whitecaps game and Blogger absolutely REFUSES to cooperate. Suffice it to say, we took tons of amazing pictures and had ourselves a whale of a time. I'll post the pictures as soon as I can and also give an update on my first week of work. Too tired tonight! (Sorry JoEllen!)

Well, just a quick post before I head off into the wide blue yonder of working womandom. I officially start my job tomorrow morning. This is the first job I've had in MANY years and surprisingly, I'm not yet nervous, just really excited. Thank you God! I'm not naive enough to think this job won't provide some bumps in the road; despite that, I think this job was tailor made for me by the man upstairs. Not only will it be nice to have a few hours to myself each day, I will be doing something I love. Already been practicing Seasons of Love (any Rent fans out there??? Gosh I love musicals.) I am a bit unsure of how I will get myself and two children showered, breakfasted(huh?), and out the door by 7:15.... Any suggestions from those of you experienced in this area? I love my morning cup of joe, but being gone 'til 10:30 means I must couple it with breakfast...YUCK! Any suggestions for a quick, cheap, healthy breakfast? Gee, I'm not asking much am I.
Well, as I leave my precious kids for the first time in 7 1/2 years (well, not really.... you know what I mean...) I thought I'd share a little story about leaving babiedom behind. Jason and I decided a while back that 3 was a great number and we were done having kids. Most of the time I'm thrilled we made this decision and glad we don't have the option of changing our minds (I'll spare you the details.). But last night as I rocked Zeke to sleep I felt my heartbreaking for a stage never to revisited until I become a grandma. He came down the stairs at 11:15 (don't ask!) and my initial reaction was
be frustrated and put him back in bed for the 7th time. But he says with a totally fake sad face, "I'm crying... Mommy...I'm crying!" Oh it was just too much. I sat with him for 20 minutes and rocked and sang and cried. The realization that this was probably the last time I would be able to hold my children like this was just about more than I could bear. The thought also occurred to me as I sat there, that without the grief of losing a precious niece I probably wouldn't cherish these moments as deeply as I do. More than anything I was just deeply thankful to God for finding me a worthy mother to my 3 darling ones.

New Bathroom!

Tried to post these last night with no success. We are LOVING our bathroom and must say my sweet husband is an EXCELLENT ceramic tiler. Thanks so much to my mom and dad for all of the work they did! Sorry I haven't gotten around to putting everyone's links back yet... I'll do it soon I promise!

Unblogworthy...

Just a quick post to say I haven't fallen off the face of the earth. Just not much blogworthy things happening here at the Grate's. Went camping with the church this past weekend. Kids had a blast- Mom, hmmm, not so much... Spent all week redoing our bathroom. It looks AMAZING! Where are the pictures you say?? Yup, too lazy to take one right now as I just finished it about an hour ago. Jason's family will be here tomorrow night until Sun. afternoon. Should be a grate time (wow, can't believe I actually wrote that...). Also wanted to send you all to the church website as it's receiving some really fun changes thanks to ol' Josh Buck. It's not all done yet but you can listen to some sermons, look at pics of our camping trip and watch a really hilarious video of Brad Emerson. Trust me, you're not ready. The address is www.greenhouseministries.org or just click on the address in my sidebar. Have fun!
P.S.- Oops!!! BIG oops. I decided to have a little fun and change the background of our blog. Not so fun. It deleted all my links and I guess I'm not smart enough to know how to put them all back in less than 3 hours. Sorry- they'll be back soon. Any suggestions for a shorter way of doing this without all the annoying computer code???

Veggie stands....and good news!

Thought I'd post some pictures of Elijah and Emmy at their vegetable stand. My dad has been itching to help him sell some produce from his MASSIVE garden and we finally got it together yesterday. Truly, there is nothing more heartwarming than watching your kids sit outside and wait for people to show up... Elijah has been pretty hard core about it, even taking everything from our house to Shelly's this afternoon so as not to miss ONE customer (a.k.a. MONEY!!!). He's made about $11 since yesterday and is already quite the little business man.
Now for the good news... I GOT A JOB!!!!!!!!!!! What, you say? Yes, yes, yes! I'm officially calling it the Miracle of 2006. I know, maybe a slight exaggeration, but really, it's pretty amazing. I've said for years if I could create the perfect job, it would be playing the piano for a church or school with no other responsibilities than to show up and play. (And also make good money doing it.) So today, the pastor's wife from the church we rent our building from called me up. She just took a JH choir job and was in dire need of an accompanist. It's everyday from 7:50 to 10:15 and the kicker is, it's $60 a day- or $300 a week. This is the EXACT amount we said we needed. WOWOWOWOWOWOWOWOWOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! For me this will be a bit of a break and Jay will be able to be at work by 10:30. Not only that, I can hardly wait for it to start. Yup, I'm a choir nerd, I can say it. It's true...
Also, a HUGE thank you to all for your many prayers throughout these past weeks. I won't say it's been easy, but I've felt constantly uplifted by the prayers of friends and loved ones. You ALL mean a lot to us!

Ava Nicole Buck 05/05/05-08/01/05

Well, it's a little before 8 o'clock in the morning here. I've already formed this post in my head and been to the gas station for coffee (no creamer in the house). The rest of my family is peacefully sleeping, but once again, I'm wide awake. So the story has gone much of this week. As most of you know, Tuesday was a year since the death of our precious niece, Ava Nicole. As I was thinking about what I would say in this post I battled with how to say what I was feeling without sounding too morose. Well, I lost the battle. I FEEL morose. For those of you who know me to be the girl to post happy pictures of my 3 kids, beware, today is not that post. My hope is truly not to offend anyone, but in the light of honesty, share what it really feels like to be in this place. Let me begin by sharing what we did this week.
Monday night Jay and I got a babysitter and went to Josh and Shelly's with my mom and dad. It was just a time where we as adults could have some uninterrupted time to talk. The three of us girls spent a long time in the hottub sharing the things that've been the most difficult for us through the past year. My mom and sister have had to deal with the pain of what they saw and heard that day. Without going into much detail, it was very much like something out of a horrible nightmare. But worse - there is never that relief of waking up and saying, "Whew, glad that was just a dream." You DON'T wake up. For me, the hardest thing has been dealing with the days after her death. I can vividly remember laying in bed with my best friend Amanda and crying like I didn't know was humanly possible. There was such a panic in my that our little girl way all by herself in some room in the basement of a hospital. Probably the hardest thing for me has been the remembering the day of her funeral. Just thing about walking into the funeral home makes my heart start to pound. Why should anyone have to see their 3 month old little girl inside a coffin? I can remember kissing her little head over and over and making sure I said "I love you" enough times that she would hear me in heaven. Seeing Josh and my sister at the gravesite that day is something that instantly makes my throat close up. How does a mother ever go on without knowing what her little girl would've looked like, acted like, loved? As the year has progressed the memory that haunts me more than any is putting her in the ground. They took her little coffin out of the van and ask Jason to help put her in the ground. I'll just be honest and say I went stark raving mad. There was just no spot in my heart and mind to deal with it. I cried and screamed until my mom and Jason finally held me and calmed me down. WHY, HOW can this be happening? Is this even real? Sorry, I know this must be hard to read, but people, this IS our reality. These kinds of things happen to the best of people every day.
Ok... on to Tuesday. We all had some breakfast and then met up at Mom and Dad's at noon. Mom had a craft for the kids to do. (Like I've said before, it seems to help the kids to have some real way to express their grief.) We all loaded up then to go to the cemetery. Once again, the wind was blowing. God KNOWS we need a real reminder that he hasn't forgotten us and it seems EVERY time we go to her grave, the wind is blowing. The kids all put their little crafts around her grave and then let some balloons go. Noah and Zoe especially love to let the balloons "Go up to Ava." We took a long walk all around the cemetery and found all the headstones of children. I know, it sounds pretty morbid, but it's cathartic to know you are not the only people (even in little Allendale) to have experienced such tragedy. I think the most astounding thing was seeing the stones of children who'd died up to 70 years ago and someone was still bring fresh flowers to the grave. It's just proof that you NEVER forget, no matter how much time passes.
After this we all went to the beach. This was the best part of the day. We all seem to feel a bit of peace when we're there. The kids had a blast diving into the huge waves (and so did the adults...) At about dinner time we packed up Josh and Shelly and sent them to a B &B in Grand Haven for a night alone. My mom and dad took Noah and Zoe and our little family went back home to Grand Rapids. As we were driving home, I felt just awful. Like, now what? It's been a year, where do we go from here? As we were pulling out of Allendale, I just felt like we were leaving a little more of her behind. It's hard to explain the feeling... I KNOW she's in heaven and is very MUCH not alone, but I still feel as though when we leave that cemetery, we're abandoning her... Irrational, I know, but this is still how I feel.
Well, as the days continue on, I'll admit to not feeling much better. And if I'm feeling like this, how much MORE must my little sister and Josh be feeling? I'm not sure I'll ever know.
In closing, I hope this encourages all who read to continue to pray for our family and not to forget our precious little girl. She is so much a part of us and ALWAYS will be....

Our trip to Dearborn -Day 1

Sorry it's taken so long to post this, but I've put it off for a myriad of reasons. Writing a serious blog being the main reason. I know most of my posts have been a day in the life of our family with a few laughs and tears thrown in here and there. But as we approach August 1st, I find myself feeling generally somber and not always sure how to express what I'm feeling, much less write it down for all the blogging world to see... Let me begin by giving a quick rundown of why we went to Dearborn.
Compassionate Friends is an organization that exists to help families as they grieve the loss of a child. Every year they have two national events. The first is their candle light service, which we participated in this December. The second is the national conference and Walk to Remember. Each year it's held in a different city and just so happened to be in Dearborn this year. Anyone who has lost a child can participate in the conference or take part in the walk.
On Saturday afternoon, the whole family (Bucks, Grates, G&G Syswerda, G&G Buck and Geoffrey) met up at the hotel. We started the afternoon by letting the kids swim for a while. Of course I neglected to take one picture of Emmy swimming for the first time without the help of her swimmies... Then it was out for pizza in downtown Dearborn- can't remember the name of the restaurant but it was fabulous. After dinner it was back to the hotel to celebrate Zoe Marie's 3rd!! birthday. There was boundless noise, chaos and general pandemonium as 14 of us were packed like sardines in my parents hotel room. But, celebrating her birthday was a glimmer of true joy in the midst of much sadness. After cake and ice cream, my mom brought out the t-shirts. The organization provided Walk to Remember t-shirts for the adults, but not for the kids. Not wanting them to be left out, my mom bought each child a plain t-shirt and things they could put on them. It's funny how something so small can mean so much to them. It gave them each a chance to really focus their grief in a good way and they were also able to spend some time talking about Ava and some of their memories of her. After finishing up the t-shirts it was off to bed so we could all be up at the crack of dawn to walk 2.2 miles!
I will post all the pictures of our walk tomorrow as once again it's almost midnight (why do I do this to myself???)

Grand Haven Vacation

What a great vacation! We spent Monday and Tuesday here in Grand Rapids with my oldest friend April (Holloway) Abbonizio and her husband Mike and daughter Audrey. We had a WONDERFUL time with them and did lots of talking late into the night. I mean, isn't that what best friends are for? (April is also pregnant with their second and is due in December!)
Then it was off to the beach! We spent Wed. thru Sat. at my parents trailer on the beach in Grand Haven. We found it quite amusing that we were taking our vacation back in our old hometown. The weather couldn't have been better. My cousin Ryan and his wife Stephanie and their 4 kids were also there for the week and Elijah and their oldest, Braden, really hit it off. It was great to see him having such a great time. We didn't do much but swim and watch the kids ride their bikes and play with the puppy. (Who, incidentally, turned us into some sort of celebrities at the park..."Aww... can we hold him??") We did all the Grand Haven things; Snug Harbor, Pronto Pups, Pier Peddler Ice Cream, walking the boardwalk and the pier.... We also took our annual trip up to Montague to Dog-n-Suds. (A bittersweet trip as Ava was with us last year on our trip there.) Other than a small mishap while trying to dump the poop (sorry, that's what it is!), it was a successful vacation! PS- I will be posting a detailed blog later in the week about our trip to Dearborn for the Walk to Remember. There were so many pictures and things I wanted to share I thought I would save it for a later post (and and earlier time as it's already almost midnight!)
Ezekiel after being attacked by a Superman ice cream cone!
The kids with cousin Braden Stevens.


Audrey being a horse, her favorite thing to do!


April and I on the beach

We have a new puppy!

The title to this blog is proof that God works in mysterious ways. As I stated in my last post, Josh and Shelly got a new Puggle puppy named Tico last week. Well, because of Jay and I's financial situation we told the kids we'd have to hold off getting a dog until Christmas. (They were actually taking it quite well.) A core team member from our church also bought one of the other pups from the same litter as Shelly's. He took Jason out for breakfast yesterday and said he was going to have to pay an astronomical sum of money to keep the puppy in his apartment complex and would we like it? What?? Huh?? You heard me right! 20 minutes later we had an adorable Puggle puppy named Piper (after John Piper.....). He is absolutely the cutest thing. The kids love him and he is great with them. God is good!
I have also posted some pictures of our new deck and sliders that I promised like a month ago! So many people have helped us and I thank you all. It is truly an oasis of peace! Jason and I are spending countless hours in our Adirondack chairs and the kids love eating at the table. Also note the chiminea (sp?). My dad found it at a campsite with a free sign and spruced it up for us. (Don't ya just love Dutch people? I sure do...) Lastly, we will be out of town much of next week camping in my parents trailer at Grand Haven State Park (another surprise blessing!). We will also be in Dearborn next weekend at A Walk to Remember for our little Ava. Please keep our entire family in your prayers next Saturday!