Treasures In The Attic

 I absolutely loved The Littles series when I was little myself!  Reading has always been a passion for me and it was fun to find a large box of favorites that I had saved.

 See, I really did love these books, as evidenced by my handwritten fourth grade statement above!  I liked to slather "Becky Byard" all over everything not knowing that I would one day embrace my proper name.

 My super sized Barbie who I thought was so pretty and played with constantly!

 A large floor puzzle that I loved and have now given to MVP.

 My Trapper Keeper...if you were a young girl in the 70's/80's your life was not complete without pictures of cute kittens and puppies!

Fuzzy Pumper!!!  (Sorry the pic is sideways, it's late and I'm too tired to fix it.)

<3  Shaun Cassidy <3

My crumpled up Brownie beanie!  It was part of the reason that I quit, I thought it was an embarrassing fashion statement and I had no desire to sell those cookies!  I used to wad the beanie up in a ball and stuff it in the back of my desk at school.

I kept John Stamos's addy handy...and Ricky Schroeder's and Menudo's and...

I wish I would have played with this more and developed a talent for sewing, I'd be making some phat cash on Etsy right now! 

I think these belonged to my older siblings, but I remember playing with them.

I loved all of the Tiger Beat type of mags!

I found a whole plethora of MJ stuff...books, cards, stickers, clothing...

Okay, so I actually found a bunch of my childhood stuff in the basement of my parent's house, not the attic, but after sorting through it all we put the stuff for keeps up in the attic.  It was a total walk down Memory Lane, let me tell you!  I remember doing a major sweep of my bedroom at the end of my 7th grade year, getting rid of all the "childish" things and bagging them up for the basement. That was 26 years ago.  Such a cliche, but seriously, WHERE DOES THE TIME GO?!? 

Home Sweet Home

I like that these pictures seem timeless.  I plan to try some of them in sepia.

The little white dress is from Auntie Heather and the antique chair is my dad's.  The pictures were taken on my parent's property.

Sturgeon Bay...the backdrop of my childhood.

MVP having a little beach picnic.

Zonked out after a short ride with Uncle Charlie!

Cousins:  Alivia, Emma, MVP, Griffin & Daniel.  (Genevieve was also nearby!)

A play day in Mackinaw City, MI.

MVP on the farm!

Handsome boy LOVES going up north!

MVP thinks the ride home was more fun with Aunt Sue along!

We went up north to see my family this week and it reminded me how much I wish we could get up there more often!  The wicked long drive seems to become more and more monotonous as the years go by.  Unfortunately, Patrick had too much work lined up this week to join us, so it was just me, MVP and Jasper.  Margaux is a good little traveller and so the worst part of the drive was avoiding a collision with deer!  I SO do no miss that part of northern living, nor do I miss the swarms of mosquitos!  However, there are a lot of things that I do miss...family, friends, beautiful beaches, the fresh air and being serenaded to sleep at night by crickets and frogs.  Oh, and the vast velvet black sky lit up by millions of stars at night!  We met up with my friend Tiffany and her two youngest children at Sturgeon Bay and had a nice little visit.  We learned right away that MVP has a sand phobia when it got on her hands and she started to scream bloody murder!  She wouldn't even walk on it.  Thankfully, she loves being in the water and she was okay with hanging out on the beach blanket under the umbrella.  We enjoyed a little shopping and lunch day with my mom and my sister Sue...Margaux loves seeing her aunts and uncles who are so nice to her and play with her whenever they see her...Uncle Charlie took her for a ride on his four wheeler, Aunt Ruth & Uncle Doug played with her and we stopped to visit Aunt Laura at her work.  It was also nice meeting up with my nieces and their kids (my great-nieces/nephews) for a play day in Mackinaw City.  We came back home tonite with an extra passenger, my sister Sue knew we were without anyone to watch Margaux on Saturday while we are working and so she is here until Tuesday!  We are beyond appreciative of this!  Patrick missed his girl terribly and I know she missed her Daddy right back...looking forward to Traverse City again next weekend! 

New York, New York

Kim & Abby

Abby & Mike

All dressed and ready to party!

Opening gifts the next day.

Anna & MVP making sweet music!

This past weekend was our niece Abby's high school graduation party.  She graduated from St. Francis High School in Traverse City, MI.  Her party was NYC themed because she is attending St. Francis College in Brooklyn Heights, NY this fall.  She received an athletic scholarship for volleyball.  We are all excited for her and hope that she loves it!  And on the off chance that she doesn't, at least she went for it and tried it out!  ("Live in New York once, but leave before it makes you hard."  -Baz Luhrmann)  Kim & Mike hosted a wonderful party and even had pastrami from Carnegie Deli in NYC.  It was a great weekend and we hope to make it up there again this summer!

Little Junebug

She LOVES her bottle, zero interest in sippy cups!

A nice nap under the big blue sky.

MVP's new pool!

My beloved Kindle.

June 1st already...Happy Birthday to you, Tera, if you're reading!!!  This past weekend was my birthday and I had opted not to take the day off.  BIG mistake!  My work girls were super sweet to me with treats and prezzies and lunch, but working on the weekend AND having it be your birthday is rather depressing!  I was looking forward to yesterday, Memorial Day, hoping to go to Arlington Park (horse races) or Morton's Arboretum...but it rained for most of the day.  We had purchased one of the Intex Easy Set pools for MVP and so Patrick was able to get it set up despite the weather.  It's really nice and perfect for our needs!  We splashed around in it a bit today, but the water still needs to warm up a bit more.  We love going to the beach since Chicago offers quite a nice stretch of it, but sometimes it's a whole lot of work to get down there:  packing up everything a toddler needs, dealing with traffic and finding parking.  (It's not like back home where you just hop in the car and you're at Sturgeon Bay within 5 minutes!)  We are hoping for a really nice summer of gorgeous weather, hopefully nice and warm but not dreadfully scorching, and enjoying some nice visits home to Michigan!